Lock Them Up

[Newt]

Obama intel agency secretly conducted illegal searches on Americans for years

May 24, 2017

The National Security Agency under former President Barack Obama routinely violated American privacy protections while scouring through overseas intercepts and failed to disclose the extent of the problems until the final days before Donald Trump was elected president last fall, according to once top-secret documents that chronicle some of the most serious constitutional abuses to date by the U.S. intelligence community.


Related:Court clears way for suit against NSA surveillance
1 of 18

More than 5 percent, or one out of every 20 searches seeking upstream Internet data on Americans inside the NSA’s so-called Section 702 database violated the safeguards Obama and his intelligence chiefs vowed to follow in 2011, according to one classified internal report reviewed by Circa.

The Obama administration self-disclosed the problems at a closed-door hearing Oct. 26 before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that set off alarm. Trump was elected less than two weeks later.


2 of 18

WATCH | Circa's Sara Carter looks at a classified document from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
3 of 18

The normally supportive court censured administration officials, saying the failure to disclose the extent of the violations earlier amounted to an “institutional lack of candor” and that the improper searches constituted a “very serious Fourth Amendment issue,” according to a recently unsealed court document dated April 26, 2017.

The admitted violations undercut one of the primary defenses that the intelligence community and Obama officials have used in recent weeks to justify their snooping into incidental NSA intercepts about Americans.
4 of 18
The FISA court opinion
5 of 18

Circa has reported that there was a three-fold increase in NSA data searches about Americans and a rise in the unmasking of U.S. person’s identities in intelligence reports after Obama loosened the privacy rules in 2011.

Officials like former National Security Adviser Susan Rice have argued their activities were legal under the so-called minimization rule changes Obama made, and that the intelligence agencies were strictly monitored to avoid abuses.


6 of 18

The intelligence court and the NSA’s own internal watchdog found that not to be true.

“Since 2011, NSA’s minimization procedures have prohibited use of U.S.-person identifiers to query the results of upstream Internet collections under Section 702,” the unsealed court ruling declared. “The Oct. 26, 2016 notice informed the court that NSA analysts had been conducting such queries inviolation of that prohibition, with much greater frequency than had been previously disclosed to the Court.”


7 of 18

Speaking Wednesday on Fox News, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said there was an apparent effort under the Obama Administration to increase the number of unmaskings of Americans.

"If we determine this to be true, this is an enormous abuse of power," Paul said. “This will dwarf all other stories.”

“There are hundreds and hundreds of people,” Paul added.
8 of 18

The American Civil Liberties Union said the newly disclosed violations are some of the most serious to ever be documented and strongly call into question the U.S. intelligence community’s ability to police itself and safeguard American’s privacy as guaranteed by the Constitution’s Fourth Amendment protections against unlawful search and seizure.

“I think what this emphasizes is the shocking lack of oversight of these programs,” said Neema Singh Guliani, the ACLU’s legislative counsel in Washington.
9 of 18

“You have these problems going on for years that only come to the attention of the court late in the game and then it takes additional years to change its practices.

“I think it does call into question all those defenses that we kept hearing, that we always have a robust oversight structure and we have culture of adherence to privacy standards,” she added. “And the headline now is they actually haven’t been in compliacne for years and the FISA court itself says in its opinion is that the NSA suffers from a culture of a lack of candor.”
10 of 18

The NSA acknowledged it self-disclosed the mass violations to the court last fall and that in April it took the extraordinary step of suspending the type of searches that were violating the rules, even deleting prior collected data on Americans to avoid any further violations.

“NSA will no longer collect certain internet communications that merely mention a foreign intelligence target,” the agency said in the statement that was dated April 28 and placed on its Web site without capturing much media or congressional attention.
11 of 18

In question is the collection of what is known as upstream “about data”about an American that is collected even though they were not directly in contact with a foreigner that the NSA was legally allowed to intercept.

The NSA said it doesn't have the ability to stop collecting ‘about’ information on Americans, “without losing some other important data. ” It, however, said it would stop the practice to “reduce the chance that it would acquire communication of U.S. persons or others who are not in direct contact with a foreign intelligence target.”
12 of 18

The NSA said it also plans to “delete the vast majority of its upstream internet data to further protect the privacy of U.S. person communications.”

Agency officials called the violations “inadvertent compliance lapses.” But the court and IG documents suggest the NSA had not developed a technological way to comply with the rules they had submitted to the court in 2011.
13 of 18

Officials "explained that NSA query compliance is largely maintained through a series of manual checks" and had not "included the proper limiters" to prevent unlawful searches, the NSA internal watchdog reported in a top secret report in January that was just declassified. A new system is being developed now, officials said.

The NSA conducts thousand of searches a year on data involving Americans and the actual numbers of violations were redacted from the documents Circa reviewed.
14 of 18

But a chart in the report showed there three types of violations, the most frequent being 5.2 percent of the time when NSA Section 702 upstream data on U.S. persons was searched.

The inspector general also found noncompliance between 0.7 percent and 1.4 percent of the time involving NSA activities in which there was a court order to target an American for spying but the rules were still not followed. Those activities are known as Section 704 and Section 705 spying.
15 of 18

Review | The NSA inspector general's highly redacted chart showing privacy violations.


16 of 18

The IG report spared few words for the NSA’s efforts before the disclosure to ensure it was complying with practices, some that date to rules issued in 2008 in the final days of the Bush administration and others that Obama put into effect in 2011.

“We found that the Agency controls for monitoring query compliance have not been completely developed,” the inspector general reported, citing problems ranging from missing requirements for documentation to the failure to complete controls that would ensure “query compliance.”
17 of 18

The NSA’s Signal Intelligence Directorate, the nation’s main foreign surveillance arm, wrote a letter back to the IG saying it agreed with the findings and that “corrective action plans” are in the works.

[Pine Mt Beagles]

Really: newt
Simply pathetic.!

[Rabbithoundjb]

REALLY PMB, LMAO!! BOUGHT AND PAID FOR MORON

[SNOWDOGS1]

I don't normally comment on this stuff, but PMB you really need to wake up to reality. The ultra liberal ACLU is up in arms about what has been going on at the NSA with the illegal spying on Americans. The FISA court itself has scolded them for the practices they conducted under the Obama administration. It appears that they have spied on congressmen and senators of both parties. This is stuff straight out of the Nazi and Communist playbook. This should be front page news at all news sites, but instead the media is running irrelevant negative stories on what Trumps wife and daughter wore to meet the Pope and mostly burying this story. Do you think most Americans really care what the Trump women wore? Is that more important than the Constitutional rights of people being violated? The majority of the media are so committed to a smear campaign and ignoring real news they can't be considered journalists anymore by anyone other than totally biased liberals. They have exposed themselves as bitter partisans and are in the process of destroying themselves in the eyes of fair minded people.

[Pine Mt Beagles]

Snow
I think your decision not to post was the right call,it is obvious you have no clue what is going on,,You mention the Constitution,,Republicans think the Constitution is part of the Cartoon section of the News paper.

General Flynn,,ate Lunch everyday for Months with Russians,Putin etc,you guys have no problem.and Lied about it.

Hillary Clinton,,was 8,000,,,Miles away from Bengazi,,where Ambassador Stevens,,went in against advice from The Secretary of State and others because there was not enough Security and got killed not her fault Months of Investigation and Millions of dollars say that same thing,yet you republicans still are not satisfied.

Today trump is talking about NATO Not paying their Dues,,,and ,,,trump has been sued many times for not paying his Own Workers.

I don't think I am the one who is a sleep here.

[bluemouse]

There you go snowdog poke the clown and he will make you laugh.

[Rabbithoundjb]

Dave just goes to show even people who don't post here know PMB's elevator is stuck on stupid

[Pine Mt Beagles]

Mr Snow
Do you see any comparison to Hitlers,rise to power in Nazi Germany in the 1930's,,More directly how he attacked the press, the intelligence agencies and police forces.
How he lied until he got what he wanted then it was too late.He talked people into turning on their neighbor's turning on their country even their families.By using a rhetoric of hate in every speech he has ever given,he knows human being are sustable to hate especially Bigotry,Racist,comments and Religious differences he was born to a bigot and raised to be a bigot and appointed a cabinet of the same.
Trump has convinced the Republican Party to turn against their families and country.By tolerating his constant attacks on the constitution of the United States.He first attacks the press then the intelligence agencies our elected officials,,who the people elected,,who is he to go against the will of the people anyway.Just a fat slob conman nothing but scum.
You mentioned the Nazis ,,look at your president.can you really defend this guy.there is no elected official on either side to compare him to.

Trump has incited so much hate politicians are choke slamming reporters,


On a side note,,there is a case of Child Abuse reported EVERY 10- SECONDS IN AMERICA.

[littlewoody]

Dave just goes to show even people who don't post here know PMB's elevator is stuck on stupid

OMG thats funny as hell !

[SNOWDOGS1]

PMB, i have no clue? That's comical coming from you. This will be the last time i engage with you since it is a waste of time. You will never see clearly, that is obvious. First, you have no idea about my political affiliation. All the previous things you mentioned have no bearing on the current situation either. Stay on point if that is possible. I will reserve judgment on the Russia collusion investigation until the investigation is complete and any EVIDENCE is provided. I do not rely on unnamed source as it is apparent the media and you do. Currently also we have leakers in the intelligence community that care more about political party than national security. British intelligence shared info with us about the bombing investigation in Manchester and that info was leaked to the NYT. England is furious and is questioning further intelligence sharing. This is our intelligence agencies more concerned about making Trump look bad than our national security. Someone needs to be rooted out and made an example of, but I'm sure you are like them and want to play politics with national security matters. So, I am through with further commenting since Ihave better things to consume my time. Now you can go ahead and make some rude comment or start name calling as most liberals seem to do when they can't dispute facts. Have a nice life.

[Pine Mt Beagles]

Chris
What is really funny is how easily trump,convinced you to turn on your family and friends as well as your country,,it doesn't bother you that your older family members want have insurance.Or that wages are starting to slip jobs growth is just starting to slow down as well.do you think your elder family members will pay 16.100.00 dollars a year for health care,,,I don't,I pay 9,346.00,dollars a year for just me and my wife I pay 3,423.00 a year for Medicare as well,and I am very lucky and blessed to afford it.------->Trump Care,,,=Don't Care.!!!
It's also funny how trump turned the Americans against each other like he has,,,You can say anything you want against any one or anything,Curse God,republicans want say a word,,but say anything about trump,,they completely go into orbit I am 65 years old and have never seen anything like it.
If it was because he was a true patriot a great leader, like JFK ,I might could understand why they take up for him,but considering that he is a traitor a Russian spy it's just crazy.

On a side note

Jeff Sessions
Lied to Congress about his contacts with Russia,,and Lied on his forms he filed for security clearance.But,,trump still loves him.

Like Flynn,,a proven Traitor,,trump wants him back in the White House.

[Pine Mt Beagles]

Don't run off Mr Snow.

You might be interesting as for your political affiliation that is obvious,,

Trump is the one leaked information,not just on the bombing but,He also gave information to Russia about Israel Intelligence,concerning ISIS,
And,,Told the President of the Philippines,where American Submarines are at.
Ousted CIA Operative's in China


But,,either way come on back.

[Rabbithoundjb]

There PMB goes again proven stupid has no limitation.

[Newt]

Trump follows the Rule of Law.

ICE Arrests 190 Immigrants in Southern California Roundup, Including a Rapist

quote:
Of the 188 people arrested in the six-county operation, which ended Wednesday, 169 — or about 90 percent — had prior criminal convictions, the agency said. They included 15 people convicted of sex crimes, including a convicted rapist, a previously deported cocaine trafficker, and two people convicted of cruelty to a child.

While the vast majority of arrestees were from Mexico — 146 — they also came from countries, including Russia, Armenia, Thailand, El Salvador, Vietnam, Cambodia, Russia and Guatemala.


ICE Officers Dined At Cafe, Then Arrested 3 Of Its Cooks, Owner SaysPosted on 5/25/17 at 3:41 pm
152


This is how you get them to go home, and stay home.

quote:
Federal immigration officers who took part in a “raid” at a Michigan restaurant Wednesday first sat and ate breakfast, according to the eatery’s owner.

Six U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents came to the Ann Arbor restaurant Sava’s on Wednesday morning, owner Sava Lelcaj said. Two officers were stationed at the front door, two stood at the back exit and two entered the restaurant and had breakfast at the bar with a view of the kitchen, other staff members told Lelcaj, who wasn’t present at the time.

The officers who came inside did not initially identify themselves as ICE agents. They dined on waffles with bacon and egg whites with toast before inquiring about a kitchen worker who was not there, Lelcaj told HuffPost.

About the same time, line cook Carlos Rivera-Ochoa took out the trash in the back when officers slapped handcuffs on him, according to Lelcaj. Rivera-Ochoa told MLive he carries his permanent residency card with him, and he was released shortly after being taken into a vehicle and fingerprinted.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/ice-officers ... 43333.html


Three more jobs available to Republicans. Three more democrat voters sent back to Mexico.

The Winning continues!




But when three other cooks in the kitchen saw officers confront Rivera-Ochoa, they “panicked,” Lelcaj said, and ran out the front door and were then arrested.