The Back Alley Archives

Former National Security Agency analyst Russell Tice, who helped expose the NSA's warrantless wiretapping in December 2005, has now come forward with even more startling allegations. Tice told MSNBC's Keith Olbermann on Wednesday that the programs that spied on Americans were not only much broader than previously acknowledged but specifically targeted journalists.

"The National Security Agency had access to all Americans' communications -- faxes, phone calls, and their computer communications," Tice claimed. "It didn't matter whether you were in Kansas, in the middle of the country, and you never made foreign communications at all. They monitored all communications."

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Whistleblower_Bushs_NSA_targeted_reporters_0121.html

Sweet.

I fail to see how even the NSA had the manpower or computing power to monitor ALL communications.

I'm sure they are able to monitor anyone they choose to target, but come on. Logistically, it's just not possible.

^^^correct.

I highly doubt they were listening in on AA's conversations with his mom about the goings on of his ranch, or with my conversations with anyone or whathaveyou...

I know they weren't actively listening to many conversations...absolutely right that they don't have the manpower to have many folks sitting there wearing headsets transcribing conversations.

However, I believe it's short-sighted to assume they don't have the technological capabilities to capture virtually ALL communication data being sent/received in the U.S. I haven't been able to find a good breakdown but I'd be willing to be that the largest 10 telecom companies transmit the vast majority of data in the U.S. This means the NSA would need only to set up one discreet office in 10 companies nationwide to begin collecting insane amounts of data. Such an amount of data would be extremely unwieldy from the standpoint of monitoring any single stream of data but that, I don't think, takes away from the invasion that has occurred at that point.

Y'all think I'm a conspiracy nut...I'm not at all...it's just that I get worked up more easily than most folks. Most folks say, aww, there's no way they can listen to all the conversations so who cares? I say, they shouldn't even have ACCESS to that ability. I don't care if they happened to not "abuse" it this time. It's still wrong. Wrong is wrong, IMO.

I think you're right, AA. I think they're treading a very fine line when they have the ability to monitor so much private communication.

They've had the capability to do this for years, notably through ECHELON.

The recent stuff I've read about regarding the NSA involved tapping hard cables rather than intercepting satellite communications. This makes sense given the NSA's fairly new focus on the internet as a data source...they can't pull the internet out of the air efficiently, so they need a room in the telecom company's switching facility where they can tap in directly. That's the sort of stuff they've been doing in the last 5-6 years, I think.

Nice work Obama!

The Obama administration fell in line with the Bush administration Thursday when it urged a federal judge to set aside a ruling in a closely watched spy case weighing whether a U.S. president may bypass Congress and establish a program of eavesdropping on Americans without warrants.

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/01/obama-sides-wit.html

And Z, this interview talks a bit more about the process the NSA went through:
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/01/nsa-whistlebl-2.html

Also, from 2006, this article discusses the supposed "secret room" set up in AT&T's central traffic control center in St. Louis:
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2006/06/21/att_nsa/

If you agree with my husband the last thing you would want to do is listen to one of my conversations...about anything!