Dr. Ron Paul has been saying this for years, while most of the country sat in their stupor, claiming he was a kook, making fun of him, making fun of his supporters. Now as we sit back and watch this go around for the run to the President of the US, what do we see? A whole lot of Bernie Sanders supporters, who are basically claiming that the old Bernster deserves to be POTUS because of a few things he has in common with Ron Paul. What’s even worse? Bernie is calling for a very extreme form of socialism, and anyone with any sense at all knows that socialism needs to be implemented before full communism can take it’s form. Continue reading →
Like anything that happens with the State involved, such as the events which transpired in Oregon recently, people are going to be rushing to the internet to do their own investigating. The footage released by the FBI of the road block incident which resulted in the death of militia member LaVoy Finicum can be found here. Continue reading →
Below is the complete “unedited” video footage of joint FBI and OSP operation that took place in January 26th with the Oregon/Bundy militia. Continue reading →
More and more information keeps coming in about the standoff between the Feds and the Bundy militia. Not only do the Feds have the roads all blocked off and set up a perimeter but the FAA has set a no fly zone over the entire area. This will bring out more theories, but it looks as if we have another Waco on our hands. Continue reading →
Two years after Edward Snowden first leaked information about the National Security Agency’s illegal domestic spying programs, the once-cynical whistleblower is now striking a more optimistic tone about what he sees as a rising “post-terror” America.
In an op-ed published Thursday in The New York Times, whistleblower and former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden reflected on how circumstances have changed on the two-year anniversary of his first leaks. “Two years ago today, three journalists and I worked nervously in a Hong Kong hotel room, waiting to see how the world would react to the revelation that the National Security Agency had been making records of nearly every phone call in the United States. In the days that followed, those journalists and others published documents revealing that democratic governments had been monitoring the private activities of ordinary citizens who had done nothing wrong,” wrote Snowden in the opening of his retrospective.
On January 30th, all Facebook users will be asked whether or not they will accept the new “Terms of Service” policy. According to reports, they want to allow third parties such as CIA, NSA, FBI, and others to access all of your information. This may not just be the information stored on your Facebook account, the also could include private information on your phone and computer. Many Facebook users have vowed to delete their Facebook accounts before the new year starts. Continue reading →
(CAV News) - A person close to the Boston Police commissioner, Edward Davis, has told a source that the department will be filing formal complaint against the FBI over the handling and sharing of information related to the Boston Bombing back in April. Continue reading →
As tens of thousands of members of the public have come out to show support for the alleged Boston Bomber as continues to mount the suspects were being handled by the FBI in a terror plot they failed to foil.
At the center of the effort are calls to have the United States government investigated for the role it is suspected in playing in the Boston Bombings.
In all over 15,000 people have joined the Facebook page calling for alleged bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to be released and thousands more have signing an online petition to the White House web page along with numerous other petitions, events and campaigns created in his support.
As more people turn to media sources outside of the control of the federal government the more steam the effort will gain.
What we know now is that the United States government was tipped off to alleged Boston Bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s ties to an underground militant group created and supported by the CIA which is run by a terrorist known as Russia’s Bin Laden.
This information was revealed through Russia Today and was made public while the FBI was still hiding the fact they had been tipped off that Tamerlan made an overseas visit during which he was seen with terrorists with known ties to the CIA in 2011.
After the FBI was forced to admit they were in fact contacted by Russian intelligence they stated Tamerlan was cleared after being investigated in 2011.
The FBI claimed the investigation ended with a request to the Russian government for more information after which there was no further contact and no further information supplied.
We now know that is not the truth and Tamerlan had in fact been put on the United States terrorist watch list and the top-secret no fly-list.
Despite being placed on these lists, Tamerlan was still allowed to fly out of the country back to Russia where he once again was observed meeting up with the terrorist cell by Russian Intelligence.
During his stay he also is said to have attended a CIA-sponsored workshop which is funded by the United States government to promote democracy overseas and achieves such means through radicalizing local populations into taking up revolution against the government in power.
This information, which again was known to the United States government whom the media continues to quote in blatantly lying the bombers had no ties to overseas terrorist organizations, was again released just today by the Russian media.
Workshop Description: “The evening dedicated to the 68th anniversary of the Chechen and Ingush peoples deportation to Central Asia in 1944, was organized by the “Fund of Caucasus” on February 23rd, 2012. The evening was held at the conference-hall of business-center “Kalas”. This tragedy – mass deportation of the Chechns and Ingushes – was evaluated as a part of general imperialistic policy of the Russian Empire and totalitarian Soviet regime.”
Further thickening the plot is the recent revelation that the bombers’ Uncle was also on the CIA’s payroll through the USAID foreign aid front and has ties to intelligence agents in his former homeland where he was a well-connected oil-executive with crime to Russian crime bosses and involved in ring of offshore oil company’s Swiss investigators learned where laundering billions of dollars for the purposes of international corruption of western public officials.
Yet despite these clear ties, the FBI lied about what they knew and allowed him to fly anyway.
The corporate media has also confirmed today that the United States government was contacted multiple times by Russian Intelligence about Tamerlan’s activities and ties to those overseas terrorists.
In fact, the Washington Post reported today that CIA was contacted directly and they had also placed Tamerlan on the terrorist watch list.
Why would the FBI first fail to disclose they were tipped off about Tamerlan? Then lie about their knowledge of Tamerlan’s activities claiming they had no knowledge of terrorist activities or ties to foreign terrorist groups? Why are they still lying about it and why the media is continuing to echo their lies at the same time reporting contradictory information in the same exact reports revealing the feds were in fact notified, several times, and continue to allow this plot to happen?
More than likely it will soon be revealed, that like so many previous terror plots the FBI was in fact handling the Boston Bombers.
Perhaps they intending to conduct a sting operation like planned when they enticed the 1993 World Trade Center bomber into conducting and attack – which went horribly wrong and ended up with the World Trade Center actually being bombed.
The conspiracy theories surrounding the 9/11 bombings fall into the category of “the government let it happen” verse “the government made it happen” offering up numerous motives for each case.
The conspiracy theories around Boston Bombings will be no different as more and more information is revealed connecting the bombers to the CIA and the “let it happen” conspiracy becomes more of a fact than fantasy.
Indeed, special operations mercenaries were photographed in operation at the Boston Bombings.
The government’s narrative continues to change and as it does so does the information the corporate media echoed.
As that information changes the government controlled corporate media will undoubtedly continue their all out crusade to conform the public opinion against doubting the government narrative or supporting the movement to free the alleged suspect who is looking more and more everyday like he was set up as his family has claimed since the outset.
The media’s campaign of disinformation, in which we even, sees the media cannibalizing itself, is one that has all of the hallmarks of a Black Ops information operation campaign not dissimilar to the CIA’s famed operation mockingbird.
Luckily the public’s distrust in their reporting has led to a massive tuning of the propaganda machine perhaps much more than has ever been seen before.
Of course, this is not without good reason as there is plenty of proof of repeated lies and manipulation by the America’s state run press.
This is not conspiracy either but a provable fact openly admitted by Former President George Bush In this YouTube video, watch him admit he plants fake news stories for political agendas.
Bush admits he participates in the long-standing federal government practice of planting fake propaganda news stories in US media.
In this clip, Bush tells a reporter it has been a long-standing federal government practice to pay journalists to run fake pre-packaged news stories, which serve as government propaganda to further political agendas.
Or take last year’s infamous CNN scandal in which they were caught running a staged interview with the Syria activist who had become the corporate media’s poster child in drumming up support for war in Syria.
Syria activist Danny, the poster child to justify a military invasion in Syria, has been caught staging entire an entire CNN interview including directing fake gunfire off stage.
Raw video footage of the Syria activist Danny as he waits to do a live video interview with CNN shows him directing off-stage fake gunfire and explosions, as well as being directed to tell CNN he has been retrieving the bodies of civilians from buildings that collapse due to Syria army mortar fire. It also shows Danny totally exaggerating a sense of fear and urgency as he goes from being totally calm, smiling and even somewhat bored before the on air interview starts to acting totally scared, hysterical and pretending he is in the middle of a war zone as soon as the actual interview starts.
I have condensed footage of the original video to remove 5 uneventful minutes of watching him waiting around before the interview because most people will not stay interested long enough to get to the parts were he starts directing his off-stage actors to start the faked off stage gunfire. Also below are two detailed reports from the Intel Hub and Infowars on this incident, which outline more faked activist reports and other crimes committed by the rebels.
Of course, as many know this practice is nothing new.
There are numerous examples, with dozens of stories out of CNN, The BBC, Al-Jazeera and others exposed as false government propaganda dealing with Syria just last year.
Now that we have established that it is not insane to believe the conspiracy theories claiming the media lies but rather it is an insane to accept the government’s promulgated conspiracy that the media always tells the truth let us continue with the Boston Bombings.
Why did the FBI make a spectacle out of releasing the photos of the alleged Boston bombing suspects to the public feigning ignorance on who they were, asking for the public’s help to identify them, when they knew all along who they were?
Remember the FBI saying the following:
These photos should be the only ones the public should view to assist us. Other photos should not be deemed credible. They unnecessarily divert the public’s attention in the wrong direction, and create undue work for vital law enforcement resources.
This entire press conference is now exposed as a lie since we now know the FBI was “monitoring them at every step”, according to their own admission.
The FBI originally denied first meeting with the bombing suspect two years ago (lie #2), according to CBS. That was until they were forced to admit their involvement with the suspects.
CBS reported “The FBI admitted Friday they interviewed the now-deceased Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev two years ago and failed to find any incriminating information about him.”
The suspects’ family also state that they were well aware of an ongoing relationship between the FBI and the boys. Family members said they were “monitored” and “counseled” at every step, and the FBI was “controlling” and “following” them for years.
Their mother, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva, in an interview with RT, said that the FBI had made contact with the family on multiple occasions:
“They used to come [to our] home, they used to talk to me … they were telling me that he was really an extremist leader and that they were afraid of him,” Tsarnaeva said.
“They told me whatever information he is getting, he gets from these extremist sites… they were controlling him, they were controlling his every step…and now they say that this is a terrorist act!”
So the FBI, after first denying monitoring them, says yes, we did meet with him (Tamerlan) but “failed to find any incriminating information about him” while telling their mother that “he was really an extremist leader and that they were afraid of him.” (lie #3)
There are only two possible conclusions to explain the FBI’s blatant lies; either they’re covering up their complete incompetence to stop attacks that they were monitoring, or they’re covering up the fact that they were spurring and handling the bombing plot in the first place, as they’ve done in countless other fake terror plot cases.
History would indicate that the lies are a little of both: direct involvement and incompetence. It’s apparent they had a direct hand working with the suspects, but complete incompetence in pulling off the plot without their fingerprints all over it.
This deception in the Boston bombing case was premeditated and not just some fog-of-war, we-don’t-have-all-the-facts-yet confusion. That much is now clear.
And since these significant lies have been revealed, how are we to believe in wild car chases, car jackings, police shootouts, and the rest of the crazy narrative spewing out of the FBI’s PR department?
It’s beyond convenient for covering up their deception that the Tsarnaev brothers have been rendered incapacitated with one mutilated and killed, and the other in critical condition waiting for justice without Miranda Rights. It will surprise no one if Dzhokhar (suspect 2) winds up dead, because dead men tell no tales.
Fact: the FBI has been involved in staging numerous fake terror plots using patsies to make themselves look like heroes when they stop the attack. Now they’ve been caught in a web of lies surrounding one that went live and resulted in the deaths of Americans.
Question: In what world are they not the prime suspects here?
Their days of terrorizing the American public into giving up civil liberties with false flags are numbered as the truth becomes more difficult to hide.
It’s easy to look back and see how we allowed the “Patriot” act to slip past us: we were emotional from the attacks on 9/11 and fearful and thereby willing to sacrifice the rights that make us American. We were convinced that it was a different time, a time when the Constitution needed reinterpretation. More than a decade later we still feel the effects of 9/11 everywhere: airport security has never been the same, war has consumed our lives, our military has become enormous, executive action has become an increasingly popular recourse; we have constantly been in a time of “great threat” since 9/11. Around 3000 died on that day and a subsequent 5000+ fighting abroad in the wars since. Perhaps the most terrorizing effect, however, is the credibility we have given to terrorism and the way that fear is now being exploited.
Last week in Boston, in a senseless and abhorrent act, terrorism struck again and 3 died and 170 or so were wounded (17 critical). In an all-out manhunt, the city was placed in martial law and we threw any rights to freedom out the window to catch the despicable individuals responsible. Upon apprehension, the one living suspect was not read his rights.
Real damage: 3 killed, 17 critically wounded, 150+ more wounded to some extent. This is what threw our country into a tailspin. Without getting into a passionate discussion on gun rights but to give this perspective, at the time of writing this blog 3,527 Americans (according to a NYT tracker) have been killed from gun violence since Newtown. More than a 1000% fatality difference (even more if you consider the time lapse between the last victim of terrorism on our soil), yet it was the terrorist act killing 3 that spun us into martial law and a common sense bill that could not get through the senate.
We have been tricked into believing that terrorism is our greatest threat; it is not. Terrorism relies on communication; it is a message that relies on us being scared of it and thus requires more credibility than it otherwise would warrant. It is emotional, yet irrational; it is not the biggest threat and not worth giving up the rights that we should be enjoying as Americans.
The real fear from terrorist acts, then, is not the damage in blood spilt, which when put in perspective is extraordinarily small in comparison to other real threats plaguing our streets, it is the fear generated from the blood spilt, or as FDR said, “The only thing to fear is fear itself.” We need to push back. We need to let terrorists know that they will not scare us, but not by massive police manhunts made for CNN to appease the mob calling for a head on a stick, or massive invasions of foreign countries, or massive restructuring of homeland security posts, or absolute desecration of the Constitution, but by sending the message that a terrorist is, by itself, a small person; it is a person that only wields the power that we give it. Terrorism, then, has to be a minuscule part of our lives, it only holds value if we give it value, but we must realize that we are more threatened by a car accident than a terrorist bomb. Terrorists are nothing more than criminals; they’re no more a war combatant than a crack dealer on the corner holding up a liquor store—the only difference is visibility and thus the credibility we give it.
The scary thing is the structure of our society now allows something like the Boston terrorists to warrant a shut down of the city with hardly any dissent. Rather than waiting a month, year, or decade to look in hindsight at all the rights we sacrificed when we were scared of the Boston bombing, we need to stop judging acts emotionally and judge them realistically. It was a terrible act that killed 3 people and wounded several more, but lets not sacrifice our way of life over this anymore than we would if it were a back alley shooting or stabbing that did not get anything more than a back page article in the local paper.
This is far more than theoretical; the debate whether we should respect the rights of the citizen SUSPECT is already raging. Senator Lindsey Graham suggests not, that this is a terrorist and the public safety exception applies—no need to Mirandize, go ahead and extract information by any means necessary. Again, to put this in perspective, Lindsey Graham was one of the senators that voted against expanding background checks, presumably fearing infringement of rights (without blatantly saying it was playing politics). So the lesson learned from what this senator has told us this week is that some amendments are binding, others are not, but we’ll leave that determination up to the government. The right to bear arms is not to be infringed upon (to include any gross distortion of the meaning of infringement) meanwhile American citizen’s 4th amendment rights can arbitrarily be taken away should we (read government with consensus approval) deem the actions extra gross. This determination of grossness, of course, is credibility. But what about the Aurora shooter? He is getting a trial, he is receiving due process and he killed 12 and injured 58. He even told authorities that his place was boobie trapped with explosives. But apparently that was not a terrorist attack, that wasn’t a Muslim, it wasn’t a bomb; it was a gun so it was not a public safety exception. But with a quarter of the fatalities Senator Graham believes that the public safety exception is applicable. But how many deaths and injuries have been incurred by terrorism since 9/11 on our soil? What about other crime? We do not live in a time of great threat, we just have been convinced we do—the threat is just as significant as it was before 9/11. These senseless acts will occur from time to time, they did long before 9/11 and will continue to long after; the power of a lunatic acting individually is that they can slip through the cracks—it will never be 100% stopped. Fortunately reality suggests that we do not live in a world littered with these lone lunatics—very rarely do they manifest.
The real fear from terrorism is the repercussions of our fears of terrorism. The threat of losing more liberties under the flag of terrorism is a much more real threat to us than blood spilt by terrorism. Not affording the suspects due process gives terrorism all the credibility it relies upon to be successful. It is visual, so if it is believed to be the greatest threat, it is successful. The person who committed these heinous acts of violence needs this notoriety to send their message and Senator Graham is suggesting we give them exactly what they want.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation or the FBI has been manufacturing fake terror plots only to later claim that they foiled the same plots that they created. This is a historical fact. They have been doing this for decades and have greatly accelerated these programs following the 9/11 attacks and the official launch of the so-called war on terror. Is it any surprise that the FBI was in close contact with at least one of the two Russian brothers who have been accused by the FBI of being behind the Boston Marathon bombings? It shouldn’t be when you also consider that the FBI actually allowed the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center to go forward and did nothing to stop it. Accusations have even been made by Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols that a high level FBI source had been directing Tim McVeigh in the plot to blow up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. So not only does the FBI have a track record of creating fake terror plots but they have a track record of allowing real terror plots to take place. With this in mind, the FBI has no credibility with their alleged ongoing investigation into the Boston Marathon bombings.
Let’s first take a look back at the FBI’s involvement in the events that led up to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. The FBI actually had foreknowledge of the bombing through one of their informants Emad Salem. Salem was embedded amongst a group of Muslims who the FBI believed were preparing to launch terrorist attacks. The group included Ramzi Yousef and others who would eventually be sentenced to prison in connection with the bombing.
In 1992 roughly a full year before the attack, Salem told his handlers at the FBI that the group was building a bomb. The original plan was for Salem to substitute harmless powder for the explosives but the plan was called off by a FBI supervisor who claimed Salem could be used better in other ways. Not trusting his FBI handlers, Salem recorded many hours of their conversations. The transcripts of these conversations clearly reveal that the FBI knew about a real terrorist plot but did nothing to stop it. The news of these transcripts was reported in media outlets including CBS News and the New York Times.
Moving on to the Oklahoma City bombing, below is an excerpt from a 2007 Salt Lake Tribune article regarding Terry Nichols statement claiming that Tim McVeigh was being directed by the FBI.
Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols says a high-ranking FBI official “apparently” was directing Timothy McVeigh in the plot to blow up a government building and might have changed the original target of the attack, according to a new affidavit filed in U.S. District Court in Utah.
The official and other conspirators are being protected by the federal government “in a cover-up to escape its responsibility for the loss of life in Oklahoma,” Nichols claims in a Feb. 9 affidavit.
Needless to say, the official story of the Oklahoma City bombing is littered with unanswered questions. The documentary film A Noble Lie goes over the mountain of evidence proving that the government had prior knowledge of the Oklahoma City bombing and participated in a massive cover up.
Worse yet, there is a substantial amount of evidence indicating that the government was involved in the attacks themselves. The ATF had offices in the Alfred P. Murrah building but ATF personnel were conveniently told not to come into work the day of the bombing. There were also eyewitness accounts and local media reports confirming that there were in fact multiple bombs inside the building. The only way bombs of such sophistication could have been put inside a secure federal building would be if the people placing them in the building were doing so under some sort of official capacity. This in of itself proves that the Oklahoma City bombings couldn’t have happened unless high level people in the government green lit such an operation. Amazingly, this just represents a small fraction of the evidence proving government involvement in the Oklahoma City bombings.
Since the 9/11 attacks the FBI has been involved in manufacturing a number of terror plots by entrapping a myriad of idiots and bizarre characters. What is significant about this is that these so-called terror plots would not have happened if it weren’t for the activity of undercover FBI informants. There are so many cases of this that it would be almost impossible to include them all in a single article. A book entitled The Terror Factory: Inside the FBI’s Manufactured War on Terrorism written by Trevor Aaronsondetails several cases of the FBI creating terror plots so they can later make arrests and claim they are making progress in the fake terror war.
Here are just a few of the articles that detail the FBI busting terror plots that they created in the first place.
From the FBI manufacturing fake terror plots to the FBI allowing real terror events to take place, the connection between the FBI and the now allegedly deceased Boston Marathon bomber suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev is highly suspicious. The odds that he and his brother were setup by the FBI are quite high considering the FBI’s historical track record in dealing with such matters. The FBI has still yet to provide any real evidence proving that these two young men were solely responsible for the bombings. All they have going for them is the mockingbird media repeating generalizations and lies that are not backed up with any facts or logic.
It is painfully obvious that the establishment is struggling to link these two men to known terrorist groups or offer a reasonable motive as to why they would use bombs against innocent people. The official narrative is falling apart and the FBI along with the assorted establishment agencies and corporate media outlets are losing more and more credibility the longer they try to sell this ridiculous story to the public.
(RT) -A privacy watchdog group is suing the FBI over the agency’s failure to fulfill Freedom of Information Act requests for documents involving a secretive and expansive database that could be used to track down anyone, anywhere and at any time.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) filed the complaint [PDF] in United States District Court for the District of Columbia on Monday, suing the Federal Bureau of Investigation for failing to comply with a pair of FOIA request placed more than six months ago.
Last September, EPIC asked the FBI to explain their “Next Generation Identification,” or “NGI” program, a system that’s been building a database of biometric data such as DNA profiles, mug shots and iris scans in order to give law enforcement the ability to track down suspects without relying on more archaic methods. In 2012 the FBI said NGI is already more than 60 percent complete, and Assistant Director Tom Bush of the agency’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division said it will be “bigger, faster, and better” than the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS) currently in place.
“Bigger,” the FBI wrote on their website in 2009, “because it will increase the capacity of our fingerprint storage plus house multimodal biometrics records like palm prints and iris scans,” all the while leaving room to accommodate for tracking methods that have yet to be perfected, such as voice analysis. Once the program is fully rolled out, the FBI says they should be able to narrow in on suspects in a matter of only 10 minutes.
The FBI doesn’t want NGI to pull data from just criminal databases, though. Because the agency wants NGI to work with public and private surveillance cameras around the country — of which EPIC estimates there are around 30 million in use at this time — the targets of investigation might not necessarily be the bad guys.
“The Department of Homeland Security has expended hundreds of millions of dollars to establish state and local surveillance systems, including CCTV [closed-circuit television] cameras that record the routine activities of millions of individuals,” EPIC writes. “The NGI system could be integrated with other surveillance technology, such as Trapwire, that would enable real-time image-matching of live feeds from CCTV surveillance cameras.”
Trapwire, a spy system uncovered by RT last year while analyzing emails hacked emails obtained from the Stratfor private intelligence firm, has already been sold to cities across the US including Washington, DC and New York, and lets customers scan the faces of people caught on surveillance cameras in only seconds. “TrapWire is a technology solution predicated upon behavior patterns in red zones to identify surveillance. It helps you connect the dots over time and distance,” the company said.
And although the FBI publically disclosed their NGI program for the first time nearly a decade ago, the agency has been unwilling this far to honor EPIC’s request for information. The NGI system will include facial recognition capabilities and will include photographs and biometric identified of millions of individuals who are neither criminals nor suspects, EPIC says, and the FBI has already been attempting to import human statistics pulled from the driver’s license profiles of residents in a number of states.
“The NGI database will include photographic images of millions of individuals who are neither criminals nor suspects,” write the attorneys for EPIC.
When EPIC attorney Ginger McCall sat down with Thom Hartmann in 2011 to discuss the NGI program on RT’s The Big Picture, she warned of what could happen when the FBI accumulates vast troves of data on people who, in some cases, aren’t even considered suspects in crimes.
“The way that this new database will be set up, it will allow for information to be input from state and local law enforcement,” McCall said. “That information could be brought in from commercial services; it could be brought in from covert surveillance.”
“In the past,” added McCall, “the FBI has had a bit of a problem. They’ve been putting in peaceful protesters and classifying them — misclassifying them — as terrorists. So there’s a lot of problems with these sorts of databases.”
Now half a year since EPIC first filed FOIA requests for records relating to NFI as well as any contracts with commercial entities and technical specifications, they are suing the FBI in order to force them to follow through.
“Defendant has failed to comply with statutory deadlines, has failed to grant expedited review of EPIC’s FOIA Requests, and has failed to disclose a single record. EPIC asks the Court to order immediate disclosure of all responsive records and to provide other appropriate relief as it may determine,” EPIC attorneys McCall, Marc Rotenberg and David Brody write in the complaint, dated April 8, 2013.
“It’s very problematic from a privacy standpoint and a freedom of expression standpoint,” McCall told Hartmann in 2011. “There’s a real chilling effect on freedom of expression when you feel that you’re constantly being surveilled by the government.”
QUEENS — Prominent Queens politicians Malcolm Smith and Dan Halloran were arrested early Tuesday for attempting to manipulate this year’s mayoral election, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
At the conclusion of an extensive undercover corruption investigation, four others were arrested along with the Queens pair, including two Republican party officials and the mayor of Spring Valley, N.Y., the Department of Justice said.
“Public service is not supposed to be a shortcut to self-enrichment,” FBI Assistant Director George Venizelos said in a statement. “At the very least, public officials should obey the law. As alleged, these defendants did not obey the law; they broke the law and the public trust. There is a price to pay for that kind of betrayal.”
Halloran told a reporter outside his home that he “had no idea” why he was being arrested, the Post reported.
“I’m sure the truth will come out once I have an opportunity to find out what’s going on,” Halloran added.
The pair allegedly formed an alliance to place Smith, a Democrat who represents Queens Village, St. Albans and Jamaica, onto the Republican mayoral ballot by enlisting the support of major GOP leaders through bribes, according to the Post and officials.
Smith needed the support of three boroughs to get the Republican nod without having to change party affiliation, the newspaper reported.
Halloran, a Republican representing northeastern Queens, was tasked with setting up those meetings and handling bribes totaling thousands of dollars, the Post reported.
The bribes were masked as legal and accounting services, the paper added.
Halloran has also been accused of pocketing bribes from a consultant in exchange for $80,000 in City Council funding, the newspaper said.
Just five days before his arrest Tuesday, Smith tweeted, “The theme of this week is ‘Tell the Truth.'”
The mayor of Spring Valley, Noramie F. Jasmin, and her deputy were also arrested Tuesday morning as part of the corruption investigation. It wasn’t immediately clear how they were connected to the scheme.
“These six officials built a corridor of corruption and greed from Queens and The Bronx to Rockland County and all the way to Albany,” said Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District.
“After all the public corruption scandals we’ve charged, the sad truth may be the most powerful special interest in politics is self interest.”
(Digital Journal) -Hackers have revealed, and continue to release, the alleged financial records of various US politicians and celebrities including the First Lady Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, Kim Kardashian and even Donald Trump.
According to RT, the website revealing the information has a .su domain, which was a country code used for a short period in the USSR, just before the Soviet Union collapsed. However, RT explains that the website is not, in fact, Russian. On finding a Twitter account linked from the hacker’s website, the tweets are apparently in badly machine-translated Russian.
At the top of the home page the website quotes the TV show, Dexter, saying “If you believe that God makes miracles, you have to wonder if Satan has a few up his sleeve.”
Reportedly, TMZ, the gossip website, was the first to report the leak on Monday.
The website lists the following, with links which supposedly take you to the information.
The first is a link to information on First Lady Michelle Obama, on which the hacker states “Blame your husband, we still love you, Michelle [heart].”
This is followed by links to the alleged contact and financial information of Kim Kardashian, Joe Biden, Robert Mueller (FBI Director), Hillary Clinton, Eric Holder (U.S. Attorney General), Charlie Beck (LAPD Chief), Mel Gibson, Ashton Kutcher, Jay Z, Beyonce, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Sarah Palin, Hulk Hogan, Donald Trump and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
More names may be added as time goes by, as apparently the list has grown since first reported on Monday.
No reason is given for the hacking, but it is noted that while the hacker appears to like the First Lady, and displays an image saying “I [heart] Michelle”, the other government people and celebrities are all represented by rather unflattering photos, as per Ms Clinton on the right.
The webpage for the LAPD Chief, Charlie Beck, displays the following tag: #YouCantCornerTheDorner, apparently in reference to the former police officer and alleged cop-killer, Christopher Dorner, recently killed after a police chase, together with a photo of a woman protesting police brutality.
Britney Spears’ webpage has an image of her crying, together with sound of an impassioned plea by a friend or fan to leave poor Britney alone.
Both RT and AP apparently attempted to contact the listed celebrities, but without success. They either declined to comment or could not be contacted.
The LAPD will investigate leaks of personal information for celebrities living in the city, should they require it. Apparently so far the FBI has declined to state whether they are investigating the leak of FBI Director Robert Mueller’s personal data.
(ArsTechnica) -Though FBI agents are held to a high standard of conduct, some fall short—far short. Take, for instance, an incident in 2007 when an FBI employee “drove past a felony traffic stop, yelled ‘Rodney King’ out his car window and momentarily lost control of his vehicle, swerving into the oncoming lane and almost striking a police officer,” according an account of an internal FBI investigation. (When cops pulled him over, the employee claimed he had yelled, “Geeze Louise.”)
Thanks to the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR), which rounds up accounts of these infractions and distributes the cautionary tales to employees each quarter, we get glimpses of the seedier side of life inside the agency. CNN has obtained a recent set of these memos (after obtaining earlier ones last year) that show employees sexting, breaking e-readers, viewing pornography in the office, improperly accessing databases, and even shoplifting “two ties from a local retailer.”
Given the FBI’s size, the number of such infractions is quite low, and the OPR investigations are encouraging. Still, they serve as a reminder of the need to watch the watchers. Here are some of the most intriguing technology-related offenses from FBI personnel over the last five years.
“During argument with spouse, Employee broke spouse’s e-reader in half and pointed unloaded gun at dog’s head while dog was sitting in spouse’s lap.” The OPR report notes that the use of a handgun was “an extraordinarily serious escalation” of the situation.
“Employee had a recording device in supervisor’s office. In addition, without authorization, Employee made copies of supervisor’s negative comments about Employee that Employee located by conducting an unauthorized search of the supervisor’s office and briefcase.” The employee in question then turned this information over to a lawyer and lied about the whole thing during an internal investigation. The employee was subsequently dismissed.
“Employee destroyed or hid electronic surveillance (ELSUR) evidence instead of properly processing it. An enormous backlog of unprocessed evidentiary material accumulated over several years. When questioned about it, Employee repeatedly lied to supervisors and hid/destroyed the unprocessed tapes.” The mishandling “negatively impacted investigations” and led to the employee’s dismissal.
“An employee failed to properly identify and secure materials on a thumb drive related to a child pornography investigation. As a result, the material was inadvertently viewed by other FBI employees.”
“An employee used FBI equipment to view pornographic movies in the office while sexually satisfying himself. In aggravation, the employee was a supervisor.”
Database dives
An entire class of bad behavior concerns unauthorized usage of the FBI’s vast databases. In a January 2013 internal e-mail, OPR said it had found only one recent case where an employee “made unauthorized use of FBI database to search for information about friends and coworkers”; that person was suspended for five days.
This is pretty tame stuff compared to past infractions. In late 2007, for instance, an employee was found to have “conducted more than 1,500 unauthorized FBI database searches” and to have shared some of that material with people outside the agency.
In early 2008, an FBI employee “searched FBI databases for information on public celebrities the employee thought were ‘hot.’ The employee also conducted NCIC searches on two employees’ boyfriends and shared the results with those employees.”
In late 2010, an employee was found to have “misused government database [sic] to conduct name checks on to friends who were foreign nationals employed as exotic dancers. Employee also failed to report his contact with foreign nationals and brought the two friends into FBI space after hours without proper authorization.” And lest you think the employee was some intern who may not have known the rules, the report notes that the employee had already served a suspension for misusing a government database and was currently “in a leadership position at the time of this offense.”
Smart phones, dumb people
Smartphones have created a new series of opportunities for humans to do stupid things involving naked bodies and cameras, and FBI employees are not immune to the siren song of sexting.
“Employee e-mailed nude photograph of herself to ex-boyfriend’s wife,” says the report on one of the oddest incidents. “Ex-boyfriend and wife reported the incident to the local police. Employee failed to cease contact with ex-boyfriend and wife after twice being ordered to do so by supervisor and Chief Security Officer.” The sexting employee was “suffering from depression related to break-up” and was suspended for 10 days.
Another employee used a personal cell phone “to send nude photographs of self to several other employees. In aggravation, Employee’s conduct created office gossip and negatively impacted office operations.” Indeed, the pictures were enough to affect “the daily activities of several squads.”
Finally, one employee used a government BlackBerry to send sexually explicit messages to another employee and did so repeatedly, intentionally, and “during work hours.”
(ArsTechnica) -Leaking information and materials regarding upcoming consoles is serious business. Just ask SuperDaE, the anonymous source whose parceling of information and attempted sale of his supposed Microsoft “Durango” development kit has purportedly earned him a visit from police and an FBI agent.
The mysteriously well-informed source posted on Twitter this morning that “police raided me,” apparently based on a warrant that cited Microsoft, eBay, and Paypal. He later followed up to say that an FBI agent and seven to eight police were involved in the raid.
We’ve been unable to independently confirm SuperDaE’s claims. The clandestine source says he was tweeting from an Apple Store and was therefore unable to post proof of the warrants that were sitting at home. While his location on Twitter is listed as North Carolina, the second attempted eBay sale of the Durango kit (Which went for over AUD$50,000) lists the location as Perth, Australia. That would raise questions about the involvement of the US FBI, but it would help explain how he was supposedly posting from an Apple Store during what was the middle of the night for the United States.
Console makers routinely place strict controls on the distribution of development kits, especially before a system’s formal announcement and release. Developers are required to sign strict nondisclosure and no-resale agreements before receiving hardware, so the thought that Microsoft would get law enforcement involved isn’t outside the realm of possibility. When Curt Schilling’s 38 Studios was liquidated recently, Microsoft publicly intervened to try to prevent the resale of its Xbox 360 development kits. Then again, SuperDaE has said that his first attempt to sell the kit on eBay was blocked by Microsoft—without the need for a police raid.
Last June, supposed documents describing the next Xbox’s features and hardware specs were taken down from the Web at the request of an IP law firm that frequently represents Microsoft.
(Image credit: Joe Ravi under CC-BY-SA 3.0)
(EndTheLie) -Questions about the legality of the secretive cell phone surveillance tool known as “Stingray” are being raised as the use of the device, originally billed as a counterterrorism tool, expands into everything but cases related to terrorism.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called Stingrays “the biggest technological threat to cell phone privacy you don’t know about” and “an unconstitutional, all-you-can-eat data buffet” in October of last year and unfortunately it has only become more important since then.
The Stingray essentially dupes cell phones into treating the device as if it were a real cell phone tower, thus allowing “the government to electronically search large areas for a particular cell phone’s signal—sucking down data on potentially thousands of innocent people along the way,” as the EFF puts it.
The major problem is that law enforcement has used them while circumventing the need for individualized warrants as the Constitution requires.
Since this is dragnet surveillance, anyone and everyone can be targeted by the device without a warrant being issued for the search and seizure of their data.
In late January, LA Weekly reported that Stingray while “intended to fight terrorism, was used in far more routine LAPD criminal investigations 21 times in a four-month period during 2012, apparently without the courts’ knowledge that the technology probes the lives of non-suspects who happen to be in the same neighborhood as suspected terrorists.”
The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) was able to purchase their device thanks to a 2006 grant from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Keep in mind, DHS funds many highly troublesome surveillance efforts around the nation.
While the original grant request from the LAPD claimed they would be using the Stingray for “regional terrorism investigations,” they’ve been using it for everything from drug cases to burglary and murder cases.
“Of course, we’ve seen this pattern over and over and over,” the EFF points out. “The government uses ‘terrorism’ as a catalyst to gain some powerful new surveillance tool or ability, and then turns around and uses it on ordinary citizens, severely infringing on their civil liberties in the process.”
As previously mentioned, the biggest problem with Stingrays is the lack of a specific warrant issued for an individual, instead, it essentially gives police “general warrant” powers.
Blocking general warrant powers was exactly what the founding fathers had in mind when drafting the Fourth Amendment since, as the EFF rightly notes, “In pre-revolutionary America, British soldiers used ‘general warrants’ as authority to go house-to-house in a particular neighborhood, looking for whatever they please, without specifying an individual or place to be searched.”
Instead of obtaining a warrant for a specific individual’s cell phone data, the Stingray acts as the “digital equivalent of the pre-revolutionary British soldier” by allowing police to simply “point a cell phone signal into all the houses in a particular neighborhood, searching for one target while sucking up everyone else’s location along with it. With one search the police could potentially invade countless private residences at once.”
The EFF isn’t the only group questioning these devices. The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) obtained a paltry two FBI documents (see here and here) on Stingrays (out of an estimated 25,000) as part of their Freedom of Information Act lawsuit attempting to uncover more information on the use of Stingrays.
The documents, which are unsurprisingly heavily redacted, reveal that even within the government itself there are concerns that the use of Stingrays may in fact be in violation of a prohibition of interference with communications signals in a section of the Communications Act.
This demonstrates that “there are clearly concerns, even within the agency, that the use of Stingray technology might be inconsistent with current regulations,” EPIC attorney Alan Butler told Slate. “I don’t know how the [Department of Justice] justifies the use of Stingrays given the limitations of the Communications Act prohibition.”
The FBI declined to comment on the specifics of the legality or illegality of Stingrays since it remains in litigation. However, FBI spokesman Christopher Allan told Slate’s Ryan Gallagher by email that “in general the FBI cautions against drawing conclusions from redacted FOIA documents.”
Perhaps most disturbing of all revealed in the documents is that they “disclose that the feds have procedures in place for loaning electronic surveillance devices (like the Stingray) to state police. This suggests the technology may have been used in cases across the United States, in line with a stellar investigation by LA Weekly last year, which reported that state cops in California, Florida, Texas, and Arizona had obtained Stingrays,” writes Gallagher.
Some of the questions surrounding Stingrays and the information obtained through their use may be answered on March 28th.
Both the EFF and American Civil Liberties Union submitted an amicus brief in the case, United States v. Rigmaiden, and the March hearing will address if evidence obtained by using a Stingray should be suppressed.
“It will be one of the first times a judge will rules on the constitutionality of these devices in federal court,” writes the EFF.
The EFF urges local and federal law enforcement agencies alike to come clean about the Stingray technology and how they are using it before even more innocent people have their Fourth Amendment rights violated.
UPDATE: EPIC just announced a new release of documents related to this technology.
In the fifth interim release of documents in EPIC v. FBI, a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, the agency has turned over nearly 300 pages about the surveillance technique directed toward users of mobile phones. The documents obtained by EPIC reveal that agents have been using “cell site simulator” technologies, also known as “StingRay,” “Triggerfish,” or “Digital Analyzers” to monitor cell phones since 1995. Internal FBI e-mails, also obtained by EPIC, reveal that agents went through extensive training on these devices in 2007. In addition, a presentation from the agency’s Wireless Intercept and Tracking Team argues that cell site simulators qualify for a low legal standard as a “pen register device,” an interpretation that was recently rejected by a federal court in Texas. For more information, see EPIC v. FBI (StingRay).
(Boston Herald) -In the latest setback for Boston’s beleaguered U.S. attorney, red-faced feds admit they may have arrested the wrong man during a massive gang and drug takedown two weeks ago because he looked like someone they wanted, after they were forced to tell a judge there was “sufficient doubt” that he was the suspect.
O’Neil Taylor, 30, of Norwood, who was arrested Jan. 17 and freed the next day, “looks very much like” an associate of the Hendry Street gang in Dorchester who cooks crack and goes by the street name of ‘Chew,’ prosecutors wrote in court papers. But they now say they’re not sure Taylor is “Chew.”
“Although Mr. Taylor or his vehicle was regularly in the Hendry Street area and he may in fact be the person involved in the drug conspiracy,” prosecutors wrote, “there is sufficient doubt right now that the government believes it is in the interest of justice to release Mr. O’Neil (sic) pending further investigation regarding the identity of ‘Chew.’ ”
Federal Magistrate Robert B. Collings granted the motion to release him while the feds sort out the matter.
However, the drug conspiracy charges against Taylor have not yet been dropped.
Taylor’s attorney declined to comment.
Prosecutors are expected to go before a judge today to detail their progress in determining whether they can say Taylor is “Chew” or not.
A spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz declined to say how worried authorities are that they may have arrested an innocent man.
“We think we addressed that concern in the motion. There will be further detail in the hearing,” office spokeswoman Christina DiIorio-Sterling said.
Ortiz has been criticized for her heavy prosecution of Internet activist Aaron Swartz, who committed suicide while facing up to 35 years and $1 million in fines for hacking academic documents. And last week, a judge tossed her effort to seize a family-owned motel in Tewksbury because people had been arrested there on drug charges.
Taylor, one of 30 people arrested in the FBI-led bust, “protested that he was not the person named,” from the outset, prosecutors wrote in a motion requesting his release. “Further investigation has indicated that there is a person in the neighborhood and who is known to associate with the defendants who looks very much like Mr. Taylor (same physical build) and who allegedly goes by the name of ‘CHEW.’”
PORTLAND, Ore. (Associated Press) -The father of an Oregon terrorism suspect testified Monday that his then-teenage son was suffering from an identity crisis and enduring a troubled home life when the FBI brainwashed him.
Osman Barre, the father of Somali-American terrorism suspect Mohamed Mohamud, said he was concerned for his son’s safety when he contacted the FBI in 2009.
Barre said Mohamud told him he was planning to fly to Yemen to learn Arabic at a time when Barre was frightened by news accounts of Somali-American teenagers joining the mujahedeen in Somalia.
The stories led him to contact the FBI and say he feared his son was being brainwashed by al-Qaida recruiters.
But Barre testified Monday that he now thinks it was an elaborate FBI sting that brainwashed his son.
Prosecutors rested their case Monday. Barre was the first defense witness.
Mohamud is accused of attempting to detonate a bomb at a Portland Christmas-tree lighting ceremony in November 2010. The bomb was a fake supplied by undercover FBI agents whom Mohamud thought were al-Qaida recruiters.
During cross-examination by prosecutors, Barre was asked why he used the word “brainwashed” when speaking about his son to FBI agents. Barre interrupted Assistant U.S. Attorney Ethan Knight to say, “Can I tell you, the FBI brainwashed my son.”
“That’s not the question I asked,” Knight responded.
Authorities say the FBI was tracking Mohamud’s online contacts with Islamic radicals in early 2009. By the time Barre contacted the bureau, agents had been watching Mohamud for months, from the time he was 17.
Defense attorneys have argued that the bureau could have informed Barre and Mohamud’s mother about the contacts with radicals. FBI agents have testified that providing such information could have compromised ongoing investigations into the jihadi contacts with whom Mohamud was involved.
Barre said he did not hear anything further from FBI agents until his son was arrested.
Barre described Mohamud’s life in the strict Muslim home as troubled by the time he came to the FBI’s attention. Barre and his wife, Miriam Hassan, had split up, and the couple’s daughter _ Mohamud’s younger sister _ kept running away.
Mohamud was a sweet-natured kid, Barre testified, but impressionable and immature. The family believed Barre’s contact with the FBI led to Mohamud being placed on the no-fly list.
Mohamud turned from an engaged, sociable freshman at Oregon State University into a withdrawn sophomore who slept during the day, Mohamud’s friend Mohammad Mohamed testified.
Barre, under cross-examination, told Knight he drilled into his children that they should be grateful to live in America. He said he told them not to make waves, to make their parents proud.
“Did you do everything you could to help your son?” Knight asked. “Did you give him every chance to succeed?”
With his wife sitting 20 feet away in the gallery, her chin cradled in her right hand, Barre paused.
(Washington Post) Federal investigators looking into disclosures of classified information about a cyberoperation that targeted Iran’s nuclear program have increased pressure on current and former senior government officials suspected of involvement, according to people familiar with the investigation.
The inquiry, which was started by Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. last June, is examining leaks about a computer virus developed jointly by the United States and Israel that damaged nuclear centrifuges at Iran’s primary uranium enrichment plant. The U.S. code name for the operation was Olympic Games, but the wider world knew the mysterious computer worm as Stuxnet.
Prosecutors are pursuing “everybody — at pretty high levels, too,” said one person familiar with the investigation. “There are many people who’ve been contacted from different agencies.”
The FBI and prosecutors have interviewed several current and former senior government officials in connection with the disclosures, sometimes confronting them with evidence of contact with journalists, according to people familiar with the probe. Investigators, they said, have conducted extensive analysis of the e-mail accounts and phone records of current and former government officials in a search for links to journalists.
The people familiar with the investigation would speak only on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter. The Justice Department declined to comment.
The Obama administration has prosecuted six officials for disclosing classified information, more than all previous administrations combined. But the Stuxnet investigation is arguably the highest-profile probe yet, and it could implicate senior-level officials. Knowledge of the virus was likely to have been highly compartmentalized and limited to a small set of Americans and Israelis.
The proliferation of e-mail and the advent of sophisticated software capable of sifting through huge volumes of it have significantly improved the ability of the FBI to find evidence. A trail of e-mail has eased the FBI’s search for a number of suspects recently, including John Kiriakou, the former CIA officer who was sentenced Friday to 30 months in prison for disclosing to a journalist the identity of a CIA officer who had spent 20 years under cover.
Late last year, retired Gen. David H. Petraeus resigned as CIA director after the FBI discovered e-mails in one of his private accounts showing that he had an extramarital affair with his biographer.
Holder appointed Rod J. Rosenstein, the U.S. attorney for Maryland, to lead the Stuxnet inquiry after a New York Times article about President Obama ordering cyberattacks against Iran using a computer virus developed in conjunction with Israel. Other publications, including The Washington Post, followed with similar reports about Stuxnet and a related virus called Flame.
At the same time, Holder named Ronald C. Machen Jr., the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, to head a criminal investigation into leaks concerning thedisruption of a bomb plot by al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Holder’s action followed complaints from members of Congress, including the heads of the intelligence
Machen is examining a leak to the Associated Press that a double agent inside al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen allowed the United States and Saudi Arabia to disrupt the plot to bomb an airliner using explosives and a detonation system that could evade airport security checks.
“People are feeling less open to talking to reporters given this uptick,” said a person with knowledge of Machen’s inquiry. “There is a definite chilling effect in government due to these investigations.”
Since the probes were announced, there has been little publicity about the ongoing inquiries.
The Justice Department declined to provide statistics on how many leak investigations were launched during Obama’s first term. Between 2005 and 2009, according to an April 2010 Justice Department letter that was sent to a Senate committee, intelligence agencies notified the department 183 times about leaks. The FBI opened 26 investigations and identified 14 suspects.
Lisa Monaco, the head of the Justice Department’s National Security Division who was named Friday as the president’s new counterterrorism adviser, told the Senate in 2011 that there has been “a stepped-up effort, and indeed a priority placed on the prosecution of leak matters.” Monaco said that leaks “do tremendous damage” and that unauthorized disclosures should be “prosecuted and pursued, either by criminal means or the use of administrative sanctions.”
Former prosecutors said these investigations typically begin by compiling a list of people with access to the classified information. When government officials attend classified briefings or examine classified documents in secure facilities, they must sign a log, and these records can provide an initial road map for investigators.
Former prosecutors said investigators run sophisticated software to identify names, key words and phrases embedded in e-mails and other communications, including text messages, which could lead them to suspects.
The FBI also looks at officials’ phone records — who called whom, when, for how long. Once they have evidence of contact between officials and a particular journalist, investigators can seek a warrant to examine private e-mail accounts and phone records, including text messages, former prosecutors said.
Prosecutors and the FBI can examine government e-mail accounts and government-issued devices, including cellphones, without a warrant. They can also look at private e-mail accounts without a warrant if those accounts were accessed on government computers.
The investigation of Kiriakou grew out of an inquiry by the Justice Department into how high-value detainees at Guantanamo Bay came to have photographs of some intelligence officials in their cells. E-mails eventually led the FBI to exchanges between Kiriakou and a journalist that revealed the name of a covert officer. That name was passed to an investigator working for the American Civil Liberties Union and finally made its way into a classified filing by the ACLU.
In the case of Petraeus, the FBI started with five threatening, anonymous e-mails sent to a Florida woman. After several weeks of following the trail, the bureau found itself confronting explicit exchanges between Petraeus and his mistress. They also found what have been described as flirtatious e-mails between Gen. John Allen and the Florida woman. Petraeus was not charged with a crime, and Allen was cleared of wrongdoing last week.
On November 22, 2012, the Los Angeles Times published an alarming piece of news entitled “Cyber Corps program trains spies for the digital age”. The “cyber-warriors” who are headed for organizations such as the CIA, NSC, FBI, the Pentagon and so on, are trained to stalk, “rifle through trash, sneak a tracking device on cars and plant false information on Facebook [emphasis added]. They also are taught to write computer viruses, hack digital networks, crack passwords, plant listening devices and mine data from broken cellphones and flash drives.”
Not surprisingly, less than a month later, it was rumored that Iran ’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei had started a Facebook page. The style and content of the site ruled out its authenticity, but the State Department was amused. In spite of the potential for alarm, State Department Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland jokingly expressed Washington ’s curiosity to see how many “likes’ Khamenei would receive. This is no joking matter. Any message on this page would be attributed to Khamenei with a potential for dangerous ramifications.
Barely a month later, on January 24, 2013, Guardian’s blaring headlines exposed fake blogs and Facebook pages made for BBC Persian’s Iranian journalists with claims that these were made in order to harass, intimidate, and discredit the journalists. These fake blogs, according to The Guardian charges, are not by the American Cyber Corps warriors, but are alleged to be the creation of the Iranian ‘Islamic cyber-activists’ in “what appears [emphasis added] to be an operation sponsored by the authorities”.
While truth is the fist casualty of war, journalists are also fair game thanks — in large part owing to the provisions of the Information Operations Road Map of 2003 (signed by the then Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and pursued by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta). As part of the plan, “public affairs officers brief journalists”. In 2005 it came to light that the Pentagon paid the Lincoln Group (a private company) to plant ‘hundreds of stories’ in Iraqi papers in support of U.S. Policies. The plan also called for “a range of technologies to disseminate propaganda in enemy territory: unmanned aerial vehicles, “miniaturized, scatterable public address systems”, wireless devices, cellular phones and the internet. “
In light of such wide spread propaganda, deception and digital warfare by the Pentagon, and with the recent Los Angeles Times revelations of the Cyber Corps training, truth become indistinguishable from falsehood and thus accepting or rejecting the authenticity of allegations by the Guardian becomes subjective, in spite of the reality of the victimhood of BBC journalists (ditto Radio Farda, VOA) whose reporting is not welcomed in Iran.
The broadcast of BBC Persian into Iran is problematic. Leaving aside the illegality of it (see article), BBC Persian which was launched in early 2009, receives significant funding from the United States . To many Iranians, no doubt including the Iranian government, BBC’s role was (and continues to be) a dark reminder of its past role in destroying Iran’s democracy in 1953 when, by its own admission, the BBC spearheaded Britain’s propaganda and broadcast the code which sparked the coup and the overthrow of Prime Minister Mossadegh.
As if in a reenactment, the role of BBC Persian in the 2009 post-election unrest was significant. Claiming that BBC Persian Services was basing its reporting on “citizen journalists” and on the receiving end of “eight user generated communications per minute”, their own report indicates that some of the reporting was impossible to verify. Unlike BBC Persian (and VOA, Radio Farda, etc.), Wired Magazine did its homework fully. In its report aptly titled “Iran: Before You Have That Twitter-Gasm…” , it revealed that the “ U.S. media is projecting its own image of Iran into what is going here on the ground.” BBC Persian, true to its track record, and thanks to State Department funding, had a desire to trumpet in a new era in Iran ’s history – A historical change planned from without, with help from within. Unlike 1953, it failed.
Once again, with the Iranian elections on the horizon, indications are that the recent elections in the United States and Israel will not produce a break-through in the US-Iran relations, or the foreign policy agenda of the United States toward Iran — warfare by other means, including propaganda. Cognizant of this fact, either the Iranian government is bracing itself for a propaganda war by discrediting sites with a potential to propagate misinformation, which may explain duplicating the BBC (admittedly, a clever move), or, the American Cyber Corps has outdone itself with the ability to point the finger at Iran.
Either way, in launching its cyber warfare, the United States has crossed the Rubicon. Cyber warfare, much like germ warfare, is dangerous, relentless, and without boundaries. The casualties of such warfare will continue to rise – unstoppable.
Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich is a Public Diplomacy Scholar, independent researcher and writer with a focus on U.S. foreign policy and the role of lobby groups.
(Dailymail) - Two senior DEA agents arranged a rendezvous with a Colombian prostitute for their friend in the Secret Service ahead of President Barack Obama’s visit to the country last April, it was revealed on Thursday.
The Drug Enforcement Agency officers, who both have top security clearances, also admitted to buying local hooker for themselves and using their government-issued Blackberry phones to set up the illicit rendezvous, a government investigation found.
The report implicates yet another government agency in the prostitution scandal that caused international embarrassment for U.S. government.
Shady: The new report implicates the DEA - yet another government agency - in the prostitution scandal that brought low the Secret Service
Twelve Secret Service agents and 12 U.S. military personnel were implicated in the prostitution scandal that overshadowed Obama’s trip the Colombia for the Summit of the Americas last spring.
The agents were in Colombia as part of an advance team preparing for the arrival of the President - though most were not staying at the same hotel where Obama slept.
NBC News reports that the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General sent a letter to Senators Joseph Lieberman and Susan Collins revealing the DEA agents’ role in the prostitution scandal.
The agents admitted that they arranged for a Secret Service agent to meet with a hooker.
A third DEA agent admitted he patronized prostitutes, as well, but was not involved in procuring the hooker for the presidential bodyguard.
Embarrassment: Dania Suarez caused an international incident when she caused a commotion over the $800 she said she was due from her Secret Service john
All three special agents also initially lied about their encounters with prostitutes or tried to destroy evidence relating to their encounters.
All three have high-level security clearances.
The letter revealed that no criminal charges were filed against the DEA agents, and that disciplinary action was still pending.
Sen Collins called the findings ‘troubling’ and sent a reply letter to the agency demanding to know why the DEA hadn’t acted on the damning report eight months after the scandal.
A report from the Department of Homeland Security, which overseas the Secret Service but not the DEA, revealed that 13 employees had sexual encounters with Colombian women during hard-partying nights before the president arrived.
Three of the women never asked for money. Five asked for money and were paid. Four women asked for money, but were refused.
The last, Dania Londono Suarez, created an international incident when she demanded $800 from her Secret Service agent client, but was refused. She caused a ruckus at the hotel, which led to hotel security calling local police.
Nine of the 12 Secret Service agents implicated in the scandal left the agency. Six resigned, one retired and two were fired.
(Business Insider) -Given how notorious Wall Streeters are for writing embarrassing e-mails that are later used against them in court (see: Libor scandal), they should really take note of this news.
The FBI has developed new software that scans e-mails for buzz words and phrases that indicate the sender (and receiver) or said mail are up to no good, the FT reports. There are over 3,000 words and phrases that would raise a red flag in the program.
Accounting firm Ernst and Young found out about this program after looking through evidence from corporate investigations in conjunction with the FBI.
“The language, which is a mix of accounting phrases, personal motivations and attempts to conceal, are very revealing,” said Rashmi Joshi, Ernst & Young’s director of fraud investigation and disputes services.
He said that the monitoring of email traffic played almost no role in the compliance efforts of companies looking for possible problems. “While most organisations only focus on the numbers when investigating discrepancies, what we are seeing are ways of analyzing words – emails, SMS or instant messaging – to identify and isolate wrongdoing.”
Linguistic analysis software, which initially protects employee anonymity, can flag uncharacteristic changes in tone and language in electronic conversations and can also be tailored for particular types of employees, especially traders.
So phrases like, “nobody will find out,” “call my mobile“,” and “don’t leave a trail” could now get you noticed.
(JusticeOnline) - FBI documents just obtained by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF) pursuant to the PCJF’s Freedom of Information Act demands reveal that from its inception, the FBI treated the Occupy movement as a potential criminal and terrorist threat even though the agency acknowledges in documents that organizers explicitly called for peaceful protest and did “not condone the use of violence” at occupy protests.
The PCJF has obtained heavily redacted documents showing that FBI offices and agents around the country were in high gear conducting surveillance against the movement even as early as August 2011, a month prior to the establishment of the OWS encampment in Zuccotti Park and other Occupy actions around the country.
“This production, which we believe is just the tip of the iceberg, is a window into the nationwide scope of the FBI’s surveillance, monitoring, and reporting on peaceful protestors organizing with the Occupy movement,” stated Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, Executive Director of the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF). “These documents show that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are treating protests against the corporate and banking structure of America as potential criminal and terrorist activity. These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America.”
“The documents are heavily redacted, and it is clear from the production that the FBI is withholding far more material. We are filing an appeal challenging this response and demanding full disclosure to the public of the records of this operation,” stated Heather Benno, staff attorney with the PCJF.
As early as August 19, 2011, the FBI in New York was meeting with the New York Stock Exchange to discuss the Occupy Wall Street protests that wouldn’t start for another month. By September, prior to the start of the OWS, the FBI was notifying businesses that they might be the focus of an OWS protest.
The FBI’s Indianapolis division released a “Potential Criminal Activity Alert” on September 15, 2011, even though they acknowledged that no specific protest date had been scheduled in Indiana. The documents show that the Indianapolis division of the FBI was coordinating with “All Indiana State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies,” as well as the “Indiana Intelligence Fusion Center,” the FBI “Directorate of Intelligence” and other national FBI coordinating mechanisms.
Documents show the spying abuses of the FBI’s “Campus Liaison Program” in which the FBI in Albany and the Syracuse Joint Terrorism Task Force disseminated information to “sixteen (16) different campus police officials,” and then “six (6) additional campus police officials.” Campus officials were in contact with the FBI for information on OWS. A representative of the State University of New York at Oswego contacted the FBI for information on the OWS protests and reported to the FBI on the SUNY-Oswego Occupy encampment made up of students and professors.
Documents released show coordination between the FBI, Department of Homeland Security and corporate America. They include a report by the Domestic Security Alliance Council (DSAC), described by the federal government as “a strategic partnership between the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and the private sector,” discussing the OWS protests at the West Coast ports to “raise awareness concerning this type of criminal activity.” The DSAC report shows the nature of secret collaboration between American intelligence agencies and their corporate clients - the document contains a “handling notice” that the information is “meant for use primarily within the corporate security community. Such messages shall not be released in either written or oral form to the media, the general public or other personnel…” (The DSAC document was also obtained by the Northern California ACLU which has sought local FBI surveillance files.)
Naval Criminal Investigative Services (NCIS) reported to the DSAC on the relationship between OWS and organized labor for the port actions. The NCIS describes itself as “an elite worldwide federal law enforcement organization” whose “mission is to investigate and defeat criminal, terrorist, and foreign intelligence threats to the United States Navy and Marine Corps ashore, afloat and in cyberspace.” The NCIS also assists with the transport of Guantanamo prisoners.
DSAC issued several tips to its corporate clients on “civil unrest” which it defines as ranging from “small, organized rallies to large-scale demonstrations and rioting.” It advised to dress conservatively, avoid political discussions and “avoid all large gatherings related to civil issues. Even seemingly peaceful rallies can spur violent activity or be met with resistance by security forces. Bystanders may be arrested or harmed by security forces using water cannons, tear gas or other measures to control crowds.”
The FBI in Anchorage reported from a Joint Terrorism Task Force meeting of November 3, 2011, about Occupy activities in Anchorage.
A port Facility Security Officer in Anchorage coordinated with the FBI to attend the meeting of protestors and gain intelligence on the planning of the port actions. He was advised to request the presence of an Anchorage Police Department official to also attend the event. The FBI Special Agent told the undercover private operative that he would notify the Joint Terrorism Task Force and that he would provide a point of contact at the Anchorage Police Department.
The Jacksonville, Florida FBI prepared a Domestic Terrorism briefing on the “spread of the Occupy Wall Street Movement” in October 2011. The intelligence meeting discussed Occupy venues identifying “Daytona, Gainesville and Ocala Resident Agency territories as portions …where some of the highest unemployment rates in Florida continue to exist.”
The Tampa, Florida FBI “Domestic Terrorism” liaison participated with the Tampa Police Department’s monthly intelligence meeting in which Occupy Lakeland, Occupy Polk County and Occupy St. Petersburg were discussed. They reported on an individual “leading the Occupy Tampa” and plans for travel to Gainesville for a protest planning meeting, as well as on Veterans for Peace plans to protest at MacDill Air Force Base.
The Federal Reserve in Richmond appears to have had personnel surveilling OWS planning. They were in contact with the FBI in Richmond to “pass on information regarding the movement known as occupy Wall Street.” There were repeated communications “to pass on updates of the events and decisions made during the small rallies and the following information received from the Capital Police Intelligence Unit through JTTF (Joint Terrorism Task Force).”
The Virginia FBI was collecting intelligence on the OWS movement for dissemination to the Virginia Fusion Center and other Intelligence divisions.
The Milwaukee division of the FBI was coordinating with the Ashwaubenon Public Safety division in Green Bay Wisconsin regarding Occupy.
The Memphis FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force met to discuss “domestic terrorism” threats, including, “Aryan Nations, Occupy Wall Street, and Anonymous.”
The Birmingham, AL division of the FBI sent communications to HAZMAT teams regarding the Occupy Wall Street movement.
The Jackson, Mississippi division of the FBI attended a meeting of the Bank Security Group in Biloxi, MS with multiple private banks and the Biloxi Police Department, in which they discussed an announced protest for “National Bad Bank Sit-In-Day” on December 7, 2011.
The Denver, CO FBI and its Bank Fraud Working Group met and were briefed on Occupy Wall Street in November 2011. Members of the Working Group include private financial institutions and local area law enforcement.
Jackson, MS Joint Terrorism Task Force issued a “Counterterrorism Preparedness” alert. This heavily redacted document includes the description, “To document…the Occupy Wall Street Movement.”
You can read the FBI - OWS documents below where we have uploaded them in searchable format for public viewing.
The PCJF filed Freedom of Information Act demands with multiple federal law enforcement agencies in the fall of 2011 as the Occupy crackdown began. The FBI initially attempted to limit its search to only one limited record keeping index. Recognizing this as a common tactic used by the FBI to conduct an inadequate search, the PCJF pressed forward demanding searches be performed of the FBI headquarters as well as FBI field offices nationwide.
The PCJF will continue to push for public disclosure of the government’s spy files and will release documents as they are obtained.
theintelhub.com Two time Olympic gold medal winner Mo Farah was recently detained and questioned as a possible terrorist by overzealous US Customs officials in Oregon.
Farah, both gold medals in hand, was apparently singled out and pulled aside by officials due to his Somali origin.
MO Farah was quizzed by US customs on suspicion of being a terrorist — even though he had his two Olympic gold medals in his suitcase.
The Team GB hero, one of the world’s most famous athletes, was hauled off for questioning after border guards saw he was born in Somalia.
Mo, 29, said: “I couldn’t believe it.
Because of my Somali origin I get detained every time I come through US Customs.
This time I even got my medals out to show who I am, but they wouldn’t have it.”
Startlingly, this is not the first time Farah has been accused of being a terrorist by US officials.
After leaving Portland on a travel visa and expecting to return on a more permanent residency visa that had already been given the go ahead by sports giant Nike, Farah was stopped from entering the country due to suspicion that he was a terrorist.
“We were in Portland on a tourist visa so had to leave and re-enter the country as a resident.
“So we flew to Toronto to stay for a few days, then come back in.
{…..}
“But when we were there we got a letter telling us we’re under investigation as a terrorist threat and we would have to stay away for 90 days.
Only after his coach in Portland contacted a friend in the FBI was the gold medalist allowed to enter the US.
“As luck would have it Alberto has a friend who works for the FBI.
This guy happens to be a massive running fan, knew exactly who I was and got it sorted then and there.
The above display of ridiculous American police state tactics is only one small example of what has sadly become an everyday occurrence in America.
From TSA sexually harassing anyone from children to grandmothers, DHS labeling OWS as a possible terrorist group, and police around the country completely ignoring the 4 amendment, this country is slowly but surely transforming into an Orwellian police state nightmare.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation or the FBI has been manufacturing fake terror plots only to later claim that they foiled the same plots that they created. This is a historical fact. They have been doing this for decades and have greatly accelerated these programs following the 9/11 attacks and the official launch of the so-called war on terror. Is it any surprise that 
(Washington Post) Federal investigators looking into disclosures of classified information about a cyberoperation that targeted Iran’s nuclear program have increased pressure on current and former senior government officials suspected of involvement, according to people familiar with the investigation.
Shady: The new report implicates the DEA - yet another government agency - in the prostitution scandal that brought low the Secret Service
Embarrassment: Dania Suarez caused an international incident when she caused a commotion over the $800 she said she was due from her Secret Service john
Two time Olympic gold medal winner Mo Farah was recently detained and questioned as a possible terrorist by overzealous US Customs officials in Oregon.
