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Snowden: NSA Targeted Journalists Critical of Government after 9/11

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Photo Credit: Daily Mail By Jonathan Easley

Leaker Edward Snowden accused the National Security Agency of targeting reporters who wrote critically about the government after the 9/11 attacks and warned it was “unforgivably reckless” for journalists to use unencrypted email messages when discussing sensitive matters.

Snowden said in an interview with the New York Times Magazine published Tuesday that he came to trust Laura Poitras, the documentary filmmaker who, along with Guardian reporter Glenn Greenwald, helped report his disclosure of secret surveillance programs, because she herself had been targeted by the NSA.

“Laura and [Guardian reporter] Glenn [Greenwald] are among the few who reported fearlessly on controversial topics throughout this period, even in the face of withering personal criticism, and resulted in Laura specifically becoming targeted by the very programs involved in the recent disclosures,” Snowden said for the article, a profile of Poitras.

Snowden didn’t detail how Poitras was targeted by the NSA surveillance programs he disclosed, but suggested the agency tracked her emails and cautioned other journalists that they could be under surveillance.

Read more from this story HERE.

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‘It cost the public dearly’: Snowden says media have failed as government watchdogs in his first interview since NSA leaks

By Joshua Gardner

In his first interview since he outed himself as the source of leaked NSA documents, Edward Snowden said the media has given the government a free pass to grow unchecked power ever since the attacks of September 11.

‘[It] ended up costing the public dearly,’ the 30-year-old newly minted Russia resident told the New York Times in a QandA published Tuesday.
Snowden’s interview focused on journalists and the media, which he said need to wake up to the realities of surveillance. ‘Any unencrypted message sent over the Internet is being delivered to every intelligence service in the world,’ he said.

Snowden’s QandA was, of course, done through encrypted emails. Laura Poitras, the documentary filmmaker who helped Snowden spill his secrets, served as intermediary, having won the former NSA contractor’s trust months ago.

‘Laura was more suspicious of me than I was of her, and I’m famously paranoid,’ Snowden told Times reporter Peter Maass.

Read more from this story HERE.

Video: Snowden’s Father Urges Son Not to Accept a Deal with US Authorities

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Photo Credit: Reuters By Alexander Bolton

Lon Snowden, the father of accused spy Edward Snowden, is urging his son not to take a deal with U.S. authorities to allow his return from Russia.

Snowden, appearing on ABC’s “This Week” with his attorney, said his son should fight espionage charges at a public trial.

“What I would like is for this to be vetted in open court for the American people to have all the facts,” he said. “What I have seen is much political theater.”

His attorney, Bruce Fein, said Snowden would be traveling to Moscow “very soon” to visit his son.

“We intend to visit with Edward and suggest criminal defense attorneys who have got experience in Espionage Act prosecutions,” Fein said, noting there have been only ten such prosecutions in the past century.

Read more from this story HERE.

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Hayden labels Snowden a ‘defector’

By Caitlin Emma

Retired Gen. Michael Hayden, the former NSA and CIA director, classified Edward Snowden as a “defector” on Sunday, saying “traitor” was too narrowly defined by the Constitution.

“We used to have a word, for somebody who stole our secrets, who got the job to steal our secrets, and then he moved to a foreign country with those secrets and made them public. It wasn’t ‘whistleblower.’ It was ‘defector.’ And I actually think that’s a very good word for him,” Hayden said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Members of Congress Denied Access to Basic Information About NSA

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Photo Credit: Getty Images By Glenn Greenwald

Members of Congress have been repeatedly thwarted when attempting to learn basic information about the National Security Agency (NSA) and the secret FISA court which authorizes its activities, documents provided by two House members demonstrate.

From the beginning of the NSA controversy, the agency’s defenders have insisted that Congress is aware of the disclosed programs and exercises robust supervision over them. “These programs are subject to congressional oversight and congressional reauthorization and congressional debate,” President Obama said the day after the first story on NSA bulk collection of phone records was published in this space. “And if there are members of Congress who feel differently, then they should speak up.”

But members of Congress, including those in Obama’s party, have flatly denied knowing about them. On MSNBC on Wednesday night, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Ct) was asked by host Chris Hayes: “How much are you learning about what the government that you are charged with overseeing and holding accountable is doing from the newspaper and how much of this do you know?” The Senator’s reply:

The revelations about the magnitude, the scope and scale of these surveillances, the metadata and the invasive actions surveillance of social media Web sites were indeed revelations to me.”

But it is not merely that members of Congress are unaware of the very existence of these programs, let alone their capabilities. Beyond that, members who seek out basic information – including about NSA programs they are required to vote on and FISA court (FISC) rulings on the legality of those programs – find that they are unable to obtain it. Read more from this story HERE.

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Amash: Snowden a whistle-blower, ‘told us what we need to know’

By Fox News

Rep. Justin Amash said Sunday that Edward Snowden is a whistle-blower — adding to the debate about whether the American should be considered a traitor for leaking National Security Agency secrets while working as a federal contractor.

Amash, R-Mich., acknowledged that Congress was aware that U.S. intelligence agents could gather information on Americans under the post-9/11 Patriot Act but not to the extent Snowden revealed this spring.

“Members of Congress were not really aware … about what these programs were being used for, the extent to which they were being used,” Amash told “Fox News Sunday. “He’s a whistle-blower. He told us what we need to know.” Read more from this story HERE.

Bradley Manning Acquitted of Aiding the Enemy but Guilty of Espionage Violations (+video)

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By Chelsea J. Carter, Ashley Fantz and Larry Shaughnessy. A military judge acquitted Army Pfc. Bradley Manning on Tuesday of aiding the enemy, but convicted him of violations of the Espionage Act for turning over a trove of classified data to the website WikiLeaks, in a case where the soldier has been portrayed variously as a traitor and as a whistle-blower.

The verdict by the judge, Col. Denise Lind, dismissed the prosecution’s argument that Manning released documents — in the largest leak of classified information in U.S. history — that he knew would end up in the hands of al Qaeda. The verdict also found Manning not guilty of unauthorized possession of information relating to national defense.

If he had been found guilty of aiding the enemy, he would have faced life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Manning still faces the prospect of years, if not decades, behind bars. He was found guilty on 20 counts. The sentencing phase of the court-martial begins Wednesday, and Manning faces up to a maximum 136 years in prison.

Among the charges, Manning was found guilty of the theft of more than 700 U.S. Southern Command records, the possession of records pertaining to Afghanistan; the theft of State Department cables and the possession of classified Army documents.

Read more from this story HERE.

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Bradley Manning verdict: cleared of ‘aiding the enemy’ but guilty of other charges

By Ed Pilkington. Bradley Manning, the source of the massive WikiLeaks trove of secret disclosures, faces a possible maximum sentence of 136 years in military jail after he was convicted on Tuesday of most charges on which he stood trial.

Colonel Denise Lind, the military judge presiding over the court martial of the US soldier, delivered her verdict in curt and pointed language. “Guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty,” she repeated over and over, as the reality of a prolonged prison sentence for Manning – on top of the three years he has already spent in detention – dawned.

The one ray of light in an otherwise bleak outcome for Manning was that he was found not guilty of the single most serious charge against him – that he knowingly “aided the enemy”, in practice al-Qaida, by disclosing information to the WikiLeaks website that in turn made it accessible to all users including enemy groups.

Lind’s decision to avoid setting a precedent by applying the swingeing “aiding the enemy” charge to an official leaker will invoke a sigh of relief from news organisations and civil liberties groups who had feared a guilty verdict would send a chill across public interest journalism.

The judge also found Manning not guilty of having leaked an encrypted copy of a video of a US air strike in the Farah province of Aghanistan in which many civilians died. Manning’s defence team had argued vociferously that he was not the source of this video, though the soldier did admit to the later disclosure of an unencrypted version of the video and related documents. Read more from this story HERE.

NSA Surveillance Critics – Including Glenn Greenwald – to Testify Before Congress

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Photo Credit: Michael Reynolds/EPACongress will hear testimony from critics of the National Security Agency’s surveillance practices for the first time since the whistleblower Edward Snowden’s explosive leaks were made public.

[Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian journalist who first revealed details of the surveillance programmes leaked by Snowden, had also been invited to testify via video-link from his base in Rio.]

Democratic congressman Alan Grayson, who is leading a bipartisan group of congressman organising the hearing, told the Guardian it would serve to counter the “constant misleading information” from the intelligence community.

The hearing, which will take place on Wednesday, comes amid evidence of a growing congressional rebellion NSA data collection methods.

On Wednesday, a vote in the House of Representatives that would have tried to curb the NSA’s practice of mass collection of phone records of millions of Americans was narrowly defeated.

However, it exposed broader-than-expected concern among members of Congress over US surveillance tactics…

Read more from this story HERE.

Obama Speaks With Putin Amid Tensions Over Snowden

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Photo Credit: Jedimentat44By Fox News. President Obama spoke Friday with Russian President Vladimir Putin amid escalating tensions between the two countries over NSA leaker Edward Snowden but there was no indication they reached any accord on the fugitive’s future.

Snowden, surfacing for the first time in weeks, held a meeting with human rights groups earlier Friday at the Moscow airport, where he’s been stuck in the transit zone since he left Hong Kong last month.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said the meeting amounted to a “propaganda platform” for Snowden, and criticized Russia for its handling of the affair.

“It’s also incompatible with Russian assurances that they do not want Mr. Snowden to further damage U.S. interests,” he said.

The Russian government so far has rebuffed calls to return Snowden to the U.S. to face multiple federal charges. Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: APInside the Ring: More NSA leaks

By Bill Gertz. U.S. intelligence officials are braced for more disclosures of National Security Agency eavesdropping secrets from renegade contractor Edward Snowden, who is seeking asylum in Venezuela.

New details from Mr. Snowden, who was still in a Moscow airport transit lounge on Wednesday, appeared Sunday. Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine and Brazil’s O Globo newspaper published new details about NSA electronic intelligence gathering, including two code names for programs that had not been made public before.

In an email interview with video maker Laura Poitras and journalist Jacob Appelbaum, Mr. Snowden revealed that the NSA works with German intelligence and other Western governments to track down terrorists and other criminal suspects.

“We [NSA] warn the others when someone we want to catch is using one of their airports, and they then extradite him to us,” he stated. “We can have obtained the information for that, for example, from the monitored cellphone of the girlfriend of a suspected hacker who has used it in an entirely different country that has nothing to do with the matter.”

Mr. Snowden said the NSA’s Foreign Affairs Directorate is the main liaison. Read more from this story HERE.

Pentagon Papers Whistleblower Says Snowden Made the Right Call in Fleeing US

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Photo Credit: The GuardianSnowden made the right call when he fled the U.S.

By Daniel Ellsberg. Many people compare Edward Snowden to me unfavorably for leaving the country and seeking asylum, rather than facing trial as I did. I don’t agree. The country I stayed in was a different America, a long time ago.

After the New York Times had been enjoined from publishing the Pentagon Papers — on June 15, 1971, the first prior restraint on a newspaper in U.S. history — and I had given another copy to The Post (which would also be enjoined), I went underground with my wife, Patricia, for 13 days. My purpose (quite like Snowden’s in flying to Hong Kong) was to elude surveillance while I was arranging — with the crucial help of a number of others, still unknown to the FBI — to distribute the Pentagon Papers sequentially to 17 other newspapers, in the face of two more injunctions. The last three days of that period was in defiance of an arrest order: I was, like Snowden now, a “fugitive from justice.”

Yet when I surrendered to arrest in Boston, having given out my last copies of the papers the night before, I was released on personal recognizance bond the same day. Later, when my charges were increased from the original three counts to 12, carrying a possible 115-year sentence, my bond was increased to $50,000. But for the whole two years I was under indictment, I was free to speak to the media and at rallies and public lectures. I was, after all, part of a movement against an ongoing war. Helping to end that war was my preeminent concern. I couldn’t have done that abroad, and leaving the country never entered my mind.

There is no chance that experience could be reproduced today, let alone that a trial could be terminated by the revelation of White House actions against a defendant that were clearly criminal in Richard Nixon’s era — and figured in his resignation in the face of impeachment — but are today all regarded as legal (including an attempt to “incapacitate me totally”).

I hope Snowden’s revelations will spark a movement to rescue our democracy…Read more from this story HERE.

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Paper reveals NSA ops in Latin America

By Juan Forero. A Brazilian newspaper on Tuesday published an article it said is based on documents provided by the former American contractor Edward Snowden asserting that the United States has been collecting data on telephone calls and e-mails from several countries in Latin America, including important allies such as Brazil, Colombia and Mexico.

The paper, O Globo, based in Rio de Janeiro, says the documents show the National Security Agency amassed military and security data on countries such as Venezuela, an American adversary that has been accused of aiding Colombia’s Marxist rebels and maintaining close ties with Iran. But the documents also show that the agency carried out surveillance operations to unearth inside commercial information on the oil industry in Venezuela and the energy sector in Mexico, which is under state control and essentially closed to foreign investment.

U.S. officials have declined to address issues about intelligence gathering or the O Globo report, except to issue a statement saying that “we have been clear that the United States does gather foreign intelligence of the type gathered by all nations.”

The report on Tuesday came after O Globo on Sunday published a story contending that Brazil is a major target of the NSA’s international effort to monitor telecommunications. The newspaper said that in gathering data in Brazil, the NSA counted on the collaboration of American and Brazilian telecommunications companies, though O Globo did not name them.

The revelations of the American agency’s operations across a swath of Latin America coincided with news from Russia about where Snowden, who is believed to be at the Moscow airport, may be headed. A leading Russian lawmaker, Alexei Pushkov, said on Tuesday via his Twitter account that Snowden, who had been a contractor for the NSA, had accepted the offer of asylum that Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro had made on Friday. Read more from this story HERE.

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WikiLeaks: Snowden Has Not Accepted Asylum in Venezuela

By CBSDC/AP. WikiLeaks claims that National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden has not yet formally accepted asylum in Venezuela after a Russian lawmaker tweeted, then deleted minutes later, that Snowden accepted asylum from the South American country.

“The states concerned will make the announcement if and when the appropriate time comes. The announcement will then be confirmed by us,” WikiLeaks posted on Twitter.

The Associated Press reports that Russian lawmaker Alexei Pushkov initially tweeted that Snowden accepted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s political asylum request.

“Predictably, Snowden has agreed to Maduro’s offer of political asylum. Apparently, this option appeared most reliable to Snowden,” Pushkov tweeted.

But the post was deleted minutes after Pushkov tweeted the information. Read more from this story HERE.

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Edward Snowden: U.S., Israel ‘Co-Wrote’ Cyber Super Weapon Stuxnet

By Lee Ferran and Kirit Radia. The former National Security Agency contractor on the run from U.S. authorities halfway around the world said that Stuxnet, an unprecedented cyber weapon that targeted Iran’s nuclear program, was the product of a joint American-Israeli secret operation.

Before Edward Snowden became a household name, he conducted an interview via encrypted emails with cyber security expert Jacob Appelbaum and was asked about the game-changing computer code, according to the interview published in the German newspaper Der Spiegel Monday.

“NSA [U.S. National Security Agency] and Israel co-wrote it,” Snowden said.

Snowden said that the NSA regularly works with foreign governments and has a “massive body” called the Foreign Affairs Directorate to deal with international partners.

In the interview Snowden did not discuss Stuxnet further and, so far, none of the newspapers Snowden has worked with have published any documents directly relating to the cyber weapon. Read more from this story HERE.

Worse than Watergate? Cameras Catch Break-In at Law Firm Representing Whistleblower in Explosive State Department Sex, Molestation, Drug Scandal (+video)

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Photo Credit: STATE DEPARTMENTCameras Catch Mystery Break-In at Whistleblower’s Law Firm

By John Hudson. The offices of a Dallas law firm representing a high-profile State Department whistleblower were broken into last weekend. Burglars stole three computers and broke into the firm’s file cabinets. But silver bars, video equipment and other valuables were left untouched, according to local Fox affiliate KDFW, which aired security camera footage of the suspected burglars entering and leaving the offices around the time of the incident.

The firm Schulman & Mathias represents Aurelia Fedenisn, a former investigator at the State Department’s Office of the Inspector General. In recent weeks, she raised a slew of explosive allegations against the department and its contractors ranging from illicit drug use, soliciting sexual favors from minors and prostitutes and sexual harassment.

“It’s a crazy, strange and suspicious situation,” attorney Cary Schulman told The Cable. “It’s clear to me that it was somebody looking for information and not money. My most high-profile case right now is the Aurelia Fedenisn case, and I can’t think of any other case where someone would go to these great lengths to get our information.”

According to the KDFW report, the firm was the only suite burglarized in the high-rise office building and an unlocked office adjacent was left untouched.

The State Department, which has repeatedly disputed Fedenisn’s allegations, denied any involvement in the incident. “Any allegation that the Department of State authorized someone to break into Mr. Schulman’s law firm is false and baseless,” spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.

Read more from this story HERE.

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Sex for Visas? State Department now confirms probe of US consular official in Guyana

By Judson Berger. The State Department acknowledged it is investigating alleged “improprieties” regarding a consular official who until recently was posted to Guyana, following reports he was trading visas for money and possibly sex.

The department said in a statement it was “aware” of the allegations, without going into detail.

“The department takes all allegations of misconduct by employees seriously,” a spokeswoman said in an email.

“We are reviewing the matter thoroughly. If the allegations are substantiated, we will work with the relevant authorities to hold anyone involved accountable.”

The department would not identify the individual, though media reports in Guyana have. Read more from this story HERE.

Snowden a Whistleblower, but US Leaders, Press Increasingly Call Him a Traitor as Asylum Offers are Made

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Photo Credit: J Scott Applewhite/APEdward Snowden is a whistleblower, not a spy – but do our leaders care?

By Spencer Ackerman. According to US legislators and journalists, the surveillance whistleblower Edward Snowden actively aided America’s enemies. They are just missing one essential element for the meme to take flight: evidence.

An op-ed by Representative Mike Pompeo (Republican, Kansas) proclaiming Snowden, who provided disclosed widespread surveillance on phone records and internet communications by the National Security Agency, “not a whistleblower” is indicative of the emerging narrative. Writing in the Wichita Eagle on 30 June Pompeo, a member of the House intelligence committee, wrote that Snowden “has provided intelligence to America’s adversaries”.

Pompeo correctly notes in his op-ed that “facts are important”. Yet when asked for the evidence justifying the claim that Snowden gave intelligence to American adversaries, his spokesman, JP Freire, cited Snowden’s leak of NSA documents. Those documents, however, were provided to the Guardian and the Washington Post, not al-Qaeda or North Korea.

It’s true that information published in the press can be read by anyone, including people who mean America harm. But to conflate that with actively handing information to foreign adversaries is to foreclose on the crucial distinction between a whistleblower and a spy, and makes journalists the handmaidens of enemies of the state.

Yet powerful legislators are eager to make that conflation about Snowden. Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: APVenezuela, Nicaragua offer Snowden asylum

By Hadas Gold and Nick Gass. Nicaragua and Venezuela on Friday night became the first countries to offer National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden asylum.

“As head of state, the government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela decided to offer humanitarian asylum to the young American Edward Snowden so that he can live (without) … persecution from the empire,” President Nicolas Maduro said, according to the Associated Press.

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega said he’d be willing to extend the same offer to the 29-year-old, but adding he would only do so “if circumstances allowed it.”

“We have the sovereign right to help a person who felt remorse after finding out how the United States was using technology to spy on the whole world, and especially its European allies,” Ortega said.

Wikileaks announced earlier Friday via Twitter that Snowden has applied for asylum in six more countries. Read more from this story HERE.

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Iceland proposal to grant NSA leaker Snowden citizenship appears to go nowhere

By Fox News. Icelandic lawmakers introduced a proposal in Parliament to grant immediate citizenship to National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden — but it looks like it’s going nowhere.

Parliament later voted not to debate the measure before the summer recess, Reuters reported.

With his options narrowing daily, WikiLeaks announced Friday the fugitive NSA leaker had applied for asylum in another six countries, in addition to the 12 where he reportedly already has applied. However, WikiLeaks said it could not reveal the new names due to “attempted U.S. interference.”

Ogmundur Jonasson, whose liberal Left-Green Party is backing the Snowden citizenship proposal along with the Pirate Party and Brighter Future Party, put the issue before the Judicial Affairs Committee Thursday, but it received minimal support.

Snowden is believed to be stuck in a Moscow airport transit area. At one point, he told the Guardian newspaper that he was inclined to seek asylum in a country that shared his values — and that “the nation that most encompasses this is Iceland.” Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: Valda Kalnina/EPANSA leaks: UK blocks crucial espionage talks between US and Europe

By Ian Traynor. Britain has blocked the first crucial talks on intelligence and espionage between European officials and their American counterparts since the NSA surveillance scandal erupted.

The talks, due to begin in Washington on Monday, will now be restricted to issues of data privacy and the NSA’s Prism programme following a tense 24 hours of negotiations in Brussels between national EU ambassadors. Britain, supported only by Sweden, vetoed plans to launch two “working groups” on the espionage debacle with the Americans.

Instead, the talks will consist of one working group focused on the NSA’s Prism programme, which has been capturing and storing vast amounts of internet and mobile phone metadata in Europe. Read more from this story HERE.

Obama Downplays Snowden Case, Says US Not ‘Scrambling Jets to Get a 29-Year-Old Hacker’ (+video)

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Photo Credit: Fox News

Photo Credit: Fox News

President Obama said Thursday he has not gotten personally involved in the case of Ed Snowden, because he expects other countries to “abide by international law” and not provide harbor to a fugitive. At the same time, he indicated he does not plan to go to extraordinary lengths to capture the NSA leaker, saying: “No, I’m not going to be scrambling jets to get a 29-year-old hacker.”

As Republican lawmakers urge Obama to get tough with Russia as it denies extradition requests, Obama said he has not directly spoken with Russia’s Vladimir Putin or Chinese President Xi Jinping. He flashed some annoyance as he declared he has not called either leader because “I shouldn’t have to.”

He noted that the U.S. does “a whole lot of business” with both countries, and said he doesn’t want to be in a position where he’s “wheeling and dealing and trading” just to “get a guy extradited.”

The president suggested this should have been a routine bit of business for either leader, so he decided not to get personally involved. Read more from this story HERE.

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Tensions flare with Ecuador, Hong Kong over Snowden

Tensions flared Thursday between the Obama administration and countries that appear to be helping NSA leaker Edward Snowden, with the State Department pointedly warning a defiant Ecuador there will be “grave consequences” if the foreign government grants Snowden asylum.

State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell also ripped Hong Kong officials for trying to claim a day earlier that a misspelled middle name on Snowden’s paperwork contributed to him being allowed to catch a flight from Hong Kong to Moscow over the weekend.

“They knew he was a wanted fugitive, and they intentionally let him go,” Ventrell said, calling their excuse frivolous. “They’ve tried to sort of say, oops, he just left. And we’re saying, no, that this was an intentional decision.”

The dueling statements escalated the already-tense stand-off involving several countries now.

The Obama administration has warned that Hong Kong’s decision to let Snowden go could hurt U.S.-China relations. U.S. officials, to little avail, are still trying to convince the Russian government to expel Snowden to the United States — Snowden is believed to be hunkered down in the Moscow airport, but Russian officials claim he is not their problem. Read more from this story HERE.


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Obama administration reportedly allowed NSA to gather Americans’ Internet data until 2011

The Obama administration allowed the National Security Agency to gather Americans’ Internet information, including emails, until 2011 under a secret program launched by President George W. Bush, according to newly leaked documents.

The data collection was first reported by the Guardian newspaper. An official confirmed its existence to the Associated Press.

The NSA ended the program that collected email logs and timing, but not content, in 2011 because it did not do what was needed to stop terrorist attacks, according to the NSA’s director. Gen. Keith Alexander, who also heads the U.S. Cyber Command, said all data was purged at that time.

The Guardian Thursday released documents detailing the collection, although the program was also described earlier this month by The Washington Post.

The Guardian said that according to secret documents it had obtained, a federal judge sitting on the FISA court, a secret surveillance panel, would approve a collection order for Internet metadata every 90 days. Read more from this story HERE.