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xchrom

(108,903 posts)
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 03:25 PM Mar 2014

Report: NSA Can Swallow a "Nation’s Telephone Network Whole"

https://www.commondreams.org/headline/2014/03/18-7


Emblem of the MYSTIC program on a cover slide from a weekly briefing slide deck from the NSA's Special Source Operations team

The National Security Agency has the ability to record every single phone call made in an unnamed foreign country and can rewind and revisit those calls up to a month later, The Washington Post revealed Tuesday.

Citing "people with direct knowledge of the effort and documents supplied by former contractor Edward Snowden," reporters Barton Gellman and Ashkan Soltani outline the NSA's "MYSTIC" voice interception program and its RETRO (retrospective retrieval) tool, which was first used against a country in 2011.

"In the initial deployment, collection systems are recording “every single” conversation nationwide, storing billions of them in a 30-day rolling buffer that clears the oldest calls as new ones arrive, according to a classified summary," according to The Washington Post.

While the report's authors did not disclose which country this occurred in, at the request of the NSA, they note that documents indicate "similar operations elsewhere."
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Report: NSA Can Swallow a "Nation’s Telephone Network Whole" (Original Post) xchrom Mar 2014 OP
This isn't a after thought to that other thread is it? William769 Mar 2014 #1
it wasn't til you mentioned it xchrom Mar 2014 #22
Yeah but it's just metadata so it's no big deal. Autumn Mar 2014 #2
You know how they were convinced that messages were being sent back and forth through gaming Baitball Blogger Mar 2014 #3
Swallow a "Nation’s Telephone Network Whole" snooper2 Mar 2014 #4
Well if the to (sic) geographical locations are identical then there no need for the phone hootinholler Mar 2014 #7
Swallowing a 'Telephone Network Whole' might lead to severe indigestion. lumpy Mar 2014 #30
Bart Gellman is a commie putinista poopiehead Luminous Animal Mar 2014 #5
Why is Gandalf playing an electric guitar? Warren DeMontague Mar 2014 #9
The NSA needs to spend more on illustrators. Luminous Animal Mar 2014 #11
I know, right? Warren DeMontague Mar 2014 #23
K & R !!! WillyT Mar 2014 #6
Okay, it's scary but sort of sexy at the same time. Warren DeMontague Mar 2014 #8
I'm just glad I'm not the only one. AtheistCrusader Mar 2014 #25
To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, "We are all in the gutter..." Warren DeMontague Mar 2014 #27
Link to the WaPo article Luminous Animal Mar 2014 #10
The NSA can gather all the data it wants but it has to be able to pick out the important info .... spin Mar 2014 #12
either way it's a win for them Locrian Mar 2014 #18
If you are right and I suspect you are ... spin Mar 2014 #31
conspiratorial, are we? erronis Mar 2014 #33
I think you pretty much nailed it Locrian Mar 2014 #34
Sorry Amigo Savannahmann Mar 2014 #13
Please notice that this is UNCLASSIFIED. MineralMan Mar 2014 #14
Duh. Kind of hard to miss that. Autumn Mar 2014 #17
Yes, it is, isn't it. MineralMan Mar 2014 #19
No evidence. Autumn Mar 2014 #20
OK. MineralMan Mar 2014 #21
Then this Guardian article confuses me. AtheistCrusader Mar 2014 #26
A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right. Tierra_y_Libertad Mar 2014 #15
I'm going to prank call people in Iran and Syria just to confuse the NSA. Vashta Nerada Mar 2014 #16
Yottabite Octafish Mar 2014 #24
I hope all the people who tried to spin the crap that the NSA does not have time to listen to calls djean111 Mar 2014 #28
That pretty much nails the spin. Pholus Mar 2014 #29
I actually nailed that spin months ago, but I may as well have been talking in tongues. djean111 Mar 2014 #32
I was hoping for an administration of good listeners, but this is becoming ridiculous... adirondacker Mar 2014 #35

Baitball Blogger

(46,576 posts)
3. You know how they were convinced that messages were being sent back and forth through gaming
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 03:30 PM
Mar 2014

programs?

We'll that couldn't have been too painful to sit through a session of World of Warcraft. Let's really make them work. Let's tell them that conversations between teenagers are coded.

Ha-ha. Have fun with that.

 

snooper2

(30,151 posts)
4. Swallow a "Nation’s Telephone Network Whole"
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 03:31 PM
Mar 2014

LOL

Does this include calls over an MPLS VPN between to geographically different locations using a Cisco Call Manager?

hootinholler

(26,449 posts)
7. Well if the to (sic) geographical locations are identical then there no need for the phone
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 04:11 PM
Mar 2014

Is there.

My guess is yes it does. My further guess is that your Cisco VPN is compromised.

spin

(17,493 posts)
12. The NSA can gather all the data it wants but it has to be able to pick out the important info ....
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 04:22 PM
Mar 2014

from all the noise.

Most important and possibly quite likely is that the information gathered is used to target those who exercise their right to peaceful free speech and speak out against our government. Those who assemble peacefully to protest certain government policies could be subjected to intense scrutiny without good reason.

Freedom of the press is essential to our form of democracy. In the wrong hands surveillance data could enable the government to find our a reporter's sources and silence them. Gathering data on a newspaper's editors could uncover personal details of their lives that could be used to prevent them from publishing stories that would embarrass those in power.

Gathering files on all the people we elect to represent us might enable a powerful few to gain control over Congress or even our President. There are few saints in public life who have absolutely nothing to hide.

Of course meta data might be used to stop terror plots. Unfortunately the well trained terrorist will be aware of our data gathering abilities and will find ways to bypass it.

If you suspect this could never happen I suggest that you do some reading about the Nixon Presidency and also J. Edgar Hoover's career.

Information is power and power corrupts. Without proper oversight and regulation, the NSA data gathering ability could enable a select few to gain power over our nation and we might not even realize it. In fact this may have already happened.

The problem is how do you insure that the data is used properly and not abused to gain power? I really have no idea of how this can be accomplished.

Locrian

(4,522 posts)
18. either way it's a win for them
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 04:34 PM
Mar 2014

A) They either develop or have the ability to get info (or manufacture it) on *anyone*

AND/OR

B) They create a gigantic parasitic industry, taxpayer funded "$ecurity industrial complex" (SIC) and crony capitalism makes BANK.


Don't underestimate "B" - it doesn't have to "work" at all to make a ton of money.


Likely it will be a combination of "selective "A" where info can be collected / used against political enemies and "B" for the big dollar win. Actual benefits for the average citizen will be zip.

spin

(17,493 posts)
31. If you are right and I suspect you are ...
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 06:08 PM
Mar 2014

we are living in the last days of our nation's great experiment with a representative democracy.

In the near future we will live in a feudal society much like has existed throughout history where the ruling few have all the power and the wealth and everybody else are merely peasants who are slaves, serfs or the somewhat privileged freemen. The slaves will be illegal immigrants who can be easily abused and exploited by their employers and have few rights. The serfs will be the average citizen and the freemen will be those have the education to advance the wealth of the powerful few or the ability to entertain the masses. (Perhaps that actually describes the society we live in today.)

History does repeat itself and I am beginning to fear that there is little we can do about it.

Of course we will be led to believe that we still are free and we will believe it. We will vote for those who promise to represent us but once in office they will find themselves unwilling or unable to deliver on their promises.

Our Second Amendment which allows civilians to own firearms may still exist but that fact alone will not enable a civilian uprising to overthrow the government. Government surveillance will enable those in power to quickly silence any who advocate armed resistance and Homeland Security will have the ability and the equipment to quickly stifle any uprising.

Of course I am describing a very dystopian future far worse than the one portrayed in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.

Hopefully I am wrong. I have to admit that often I am a pessimist. That frequently works out well as usually things work out far better than I hoped and that makes me feel much better than an optimist who usually ends up extremely disappointed.

erronis

(14,955 posts)
33. conspiratorial, are we?
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 06:52 PM
Mar 2014

Yes - I am. Having worked with the parasites gathered around the corpse of this democratic experiment (sorry, I meant the Beltway Bandits), I think the dark force that gathers this together is nothing more than common human greed.

Every Booz-Allen, SAIC, Unisys-style player wants this travesty to go on as long as possible.

You only have to look at the McMansions perched above the Potomac to realize that these aren't being built based on normal government salaries. They are the excretions of the bloodsuckers of the public wealth. Lobbyists, revolving-door bureaucrats now ensconced as officers of the corporate pirates, political scum who couldn't stay in office for vice, opportunists and evangelists.

Locrian

(4,522 posts)
34. I think you pretty much nailed it
Wed Mar 19, 2014, 07:00 AM
Mar 2014

One only has to look at where the power is, and at the enablers that support it.

There are several wild cards: climate change, the greedy becoming too bold that people wake up and band together, etc.
But those could go either way.... making things even worse as people turn against each other.


Not a fun outlook. I'm still fighting ... but I'm also a realist.

 

Savannahmann

(3,891 posts)
13. Sorry Amigo
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 04:23 PM
Mar 2014

We were told that was impossible, there wasn't enough computer space on the planet to manage such a task.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022993108

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023125853

So you see, you're spreading information that was impossible, and now will be decried as old news, and then in a day or so, will be helping the enemy, so Snowden needs to come home and face justice and stop helping bad people we are trying to spy on. Which is apparently every single man, woman, and child in one of a several nations. They're all bad people don't you know.

MineralMan

(146,192 posts)
19. Yes, it is, isn't it.
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 04:36 PM
Mar 2014

The NSA's mission is foreign intelligence collected from electronic sources. Of course they have the capability of capturing phone calls. Mystic was used in foreign countries. There's no evidence of its use within the United States.

Not a secret. It's their mission.

 

Tierra_y_Libertad

(50,414 posts)
15. A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 04:28 PM
Mar 2014
A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right. Thomas Paine
 

djean111

(14,255 posts)
28. I hope all the people who tried to spin the crap that the NSA does not have time to listen to calls
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 05:35 PM
Mar 2014

now understand that of course they do not have to - there is software that even little old me can buy for 4.95 a month that will sift through recorded calls for key words. Imagine what the NSA has.....

Pholus

(4,062 posts)
29. That pretty much nails the spin.
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 05:39 PM
Mar 2014

Now it's on to "prove it's being used against US Citizens" as if Parallel Construction doesn't exist.

 

djean111

(14,255 posts)
32. I actually nailed that spin months ago, but I may as well have been talking in tongues.
Tue Mar 18, 2014, 06:08 PM
Mar 2014

Or the spin switched to well, they can't store it. Pretty sad and funny, really.
And all because of who happens to be president while the NSA is having its way with us.

adirondacker

(2,921 posts)
35. I was hoping for an administration of good listeners, but this is becoming ridiculous...
Wed Mar 19, 2014, 07:20 AM
Mar 2014


It seems that the right side is working excessively well, but the left canal seems to be blocked.
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