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In reply to the discussion: Can someone please explain how the NSA Slurp and Burp doesn't violate wiretap law? [View all]Igel
(35,199 posts)2. He was asked if they collected data.
He said no.
He said that he considered data collection to be collecting the content of phone calls. Wyden might have considered it to be collecting the outside of the book.
If you think that collecting the Dewey Decimal #--the telephone number and a bit more--is "data collection," he's saying he didn't answer properly. If you consider data collection as collecting the content of the phone calls, then no, they don't.
He has a lot of dysfluencies.
First, he sets up his metaphor.
A metaphor I think might be helpful for people to understand this is to think of a huge library with literally millions of volumes of books in it, an electronic library. Seventy percent of those books are on bookcases in the United States, meaning that the bulk of the of the world's infrastructure, communications infrastructure is in the United States.
There are no limitations on the customers who can use this library. Many and millions of innocent people doing min-- millions of innocent things use this library... So the task for us in the interest of preserving security and preserving civil liberties and privacy is to be as precise as we possibly can be when we go in that library and look for the books that we need to open up and actually read.
... So when we pull out a book, based on its essentially is-- electronic Dewey Decimal System, which is zeroes and ones, we have to be very precise about which book we're picking out. And if it's one that belongs to the-- was put in there by an American citizen or a U.S. person.
We ha-- we are under strict court supervision and have to get stricter-- and have to get permission to actually-- actually look at that. So the notion that we're trolling through everyone's emails and voyeuristically reading them, or listening to everyone's phone calls is on its face absurd. We couldn't do it even if we wanted to. And I assure you, we don't want to.
...
There are no limitations on the customers who can use this library. Many and millions of innocent people doing min-- millions of innocent things use this library... So the task for us in the interest of preserving security and preserving civil liberties and privacy is to be as precise as we possibly can be when we go in that library and look for the books that we need to open up and actually read.
... So when we pull out a book, based on its essentially is-- electronic Dewey Decimal System, which is zeroes and ones, we have to be very precise about which book we're picking out. And if it's one that belongs to the-- was put in there by an American citizen or a U.S. person.
We ha-- we are under strict court supervision and have to get stricter-- and have to get permission to actually-- actually look at that. So the notion that we're trolling through everyone's emails and voyeuristically reading them, or listening to everyone's phone calls is on its face absurd. We couldn't do it even if we wanted to. And I assure you, we don't want to.
Next, the Question:
Can you explain what you meant when you said that there was not data collection on millions of Americans?
First-- as I said, I have great respect for Senator Wyden. I thought, though in retrospect, I was asked-- "When are you going to start-- stop beating your wife" kind of question, which is meaning not--
answerable necessarily by a simple yes or no. So I responded in what I thought was the most truthful, or least untruthful manner by saying no.
And again, to go back to my metaphor. What I was thinking of is looking at the Dewey Decimal numbers-- of those books in that metaphorical library-- to me, collection of U.S. persons' data would mean taking the book off the shelf and opening it up and reading it.
=============
So he says what he means by data collection. Getting the metadata and using it as a guide to finding the contents of the call. Then in response to the question, Are you collecting Americans' data? he answers, "No."
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Can someone please explain how the NSA Slurp and Burp doesn't violate wiretap law? [View all]
hootinholler
Jul 2013
OP
First one must understand what wiretapping involves and understand what collecting phone call record
Thinkingabout
Jul 2013
#8
Thanks for speaking out on behalf of simple thinkers. And simple spellers, too.
DisgustipatedinCA
Jul 2013
#23
Oh wow, seems like simple thinker can even get the message with typo, guess everyone can't be
Thinkingabout
Jul 2013
#24
still waiting to hear the justification for the patriot act being used mainly to arrest pot smokers.
Warren DeMontague
Jul 2013
#14
The best argument for how it can be legal, is they have FISA court warrants for it.
limpyhobbler
Jul 2013
#25