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April 13, 2006
"Big Brother is Listening"
I am providing on my website a copy of an article from the Atlantic Montly that gives a lot of valuable historical context on the development of the NSA and its operations. Both the main article and an interesting sidebar about how NSA surveillance can lead to military action are provided at www.mattfordmedia.com/NSA
This article also elaborates on the motivation behind the Bush Administration's decision to go around the FISA court. Of special value to us is the portion of the article where James Bamford details the way the NSA operates and from what locations within the U.S. He also gives a good representation of the size and scope of the NSA. He also has this to say about the current discussion of wiretapping.
"Contrary to popular perception, the NSA does not engage in “wiretapping”; it collects signals intelligence, or “sigint.” In contrast to the image we have from movies and television of an FBI agent placing a listening device on a target’s phone line, the NSA intercepts entire streams of electronic communications containing millions of telephone calls and e-mails. It runs the intercepts through very powerful computers that screen them for particular names, telephone numbers, Internet addresses, and trigger words or phrases. Any communications containing flagged information are forwarded by the computer for further analysis."
Posted by Matt Ford at April 13, 2006 07:59 AM
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