NSA's mass surveillance includes credit card data

[Twofish]

WASHINGTON—The National Security Agency's monitoring of Americans includes customer records from the three major phone networks as well as emails and Web searches, and the agency also has cataloged credit-card transactions, said people familiar with the agency's activities.

NSA also obtains access to data from Internet service providers on Internet use such as data about email or website visits, several former officials said. NSA has established similar relationships with credit-card companies, three former officials said.

It couldn't be determined if any of the Internet or credit-card arrangements are ongoing, as are the phone company efforts, or one-shot collection efforts. The credit-card firms, phone companies and NSA declined to comment for this article.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324299104578529112289298922

I love the smell of treason in the morning.

[Autumn]

1. Interesting, so it's a secret U.S. court that approves the program every

Last edited Sat Jun 8, 2013, 09:07 PM - Edit history (1)

three months.

[Twofish]

3. The word "approve" implies there is any sort of review of the conduct of the NSA and FBI.

There is none. Its a kangaroo court. Their "approval" amounts to a rubber stamp attached to one of those plastic drinking birds.

[GoneFishin]

7. LOL. ..." a rubber stamp attached to one of those plastic drinking birds."

[DevonRex]

5. Autumn, that's the FISA court everyone has known about forever.

The proceedings are secret because the subject matter is highly classified. Even the warrants that are routinely reissued are TS/SI.

[Autumn]

12. I had thought that the program itself was approved every three months

by Congress. I guess I must have seen the uncorrected article that this part in the article corrected down at the bottom

"Corrections & Amplifications
The NSA monitoring program must be approved by a secret U.S. court every three months. An earlier version of this article incorrectly the approval came from Congress."

[DevonRex]

15. Oh. Yeah, they wrote that really badly, didn't they?

I swear, they can't even write a simple sentence that doesn't change an important fact. It's annoying as hell. No wonder people don't,t know what's going on.

I am not saying there's no cause for concern. Just that it'd be really nice if the journalists writing about this would be more careful when facts matter.

[Autumn]

17. Badly doesn't even come close to describing the shit

some of these journalist write. Sometimes I think a monkey banging on a keyboard would get it just as right as some of these idiots do.

[DevonRex]

18. Like this?

[Autumn]

19. That's it.

thanks

[leveymg]

2. Why am I not surprised that a mass profiling program would also include bank records?

Along with on-line shopping, social media, internet search, and anywhere else any large volume of personal electronic records are available. They should just come out and admit it - Total Information Awareness and Thin Thread never died, they just got folded together and went operational under a different codename.

Every time you make a phone call or buy a carton of milk or do a Google search, you're being profiled by the NSA.

[GoneFishin]

4. Upon the earliest dust-ups over TIA they folded much too easily. I knew then that they would move

it, rename it, and hide it better. I knew that of all their possible actions, the one option they would never choose was to end the program like they said they would.

[Twofish]

6. These programs do not exist to protect us.

They exist to protect the government.

[1-Old-Man]

8. I have no doubt it contains every sort of data that is collected, everywhere, all the time.

Why on earth would anyone think the NSA would restrict itself to only electronic data kept about us that relates to our communications? Do you recall that Osama had need of constant attention to failed kidneys, do you not think they (our Government Agencies) were looking at medical records world wide based on just that one little bit of information? We have moved into the world of a total information society amd in it just about every action you, and I and everyone else takes is subject to being recorded and transcribed for whoever finds a way to access to the information - and the NSA knows no walls.

[Twofish]

10. Precisely why I don't have a bank account.

And why I work under the table, use a burner cellphone, use a VPN through wifi that I don't pay for, don't have a car, use various secure, encrypted email addresses and dress as inconspicuously as possible.

[woo me with science]

16. Thank you. nt

[kentuck]

9. Why do they do it?

Because they can.

[woo me with science]

11. To protect the growing corporate state

and maintain the ability to pre-empt challenges to what they are doing.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022962685

[ThoughtCriminal]

13. Well that explains some mysterious purchases

[ohheckyeah]

14. To what end?

There's a reason for all of this and you can bet your ass it's not for our benefit. I don't care who started it, I don't care how long it's been going on, I just damn sure want it to stop. I don't care what bullshit reasons Obama or Congress or anybody else gives. It's all invasion of privacy, it's bad for our mental, financial, and physical well-being, it does not promote the general welfare. There's nothing, NOTHING, acceptable about it.

This country has run off the rails.

[SidDithers]

20. And I love the smell of hot, freshly delivered pizza...

Try to stay longer next time, k?



Sid