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Shortly after the events of 9/11, the Bush administration sought and was granted fairly sweeping powers to combat terrorism by Congress.  Well, “sweeping powers” may be a mis-statement depending on yor point of view.  I really don’t feel like delving into the intricate details, so lets just summarize by saying that the Executive Branch was authorized by Congress to use whatever military “force” was deemed necessary to ensure that something like 9/11 did not happen again.  The Executive Branch then used this authorization to go after Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and also to step up its intelligence gathering.  Almost nothing I am about to mention is new information.  I am bringing this subject up merely to refresh the dialogue in peoples minds.  When Bush was in office, this “Warrantless Wiretapping” program was in the news often.  Now that Mr. Obama has inherited this program and shows every sign of continuing it unabated, not quite so much attention from the media.  Hmmmmm.

Now since intelligence gathering is a vital part of waging war, the Administration reasoned that it could do pretty much whatever it wanted with regards to surveillance.   Having been in the military for longer than I care to admit, I agree with this assertion.  What I do not agree with is that it grants the Executive Branch the right to spy on United States Citizens without following the rules laid out in the Constitution and many, many lines of US Civil Code.  Others will disagree with me.  I have had many discussions with people who freely admit that they have no problem with the Federal Government listening in on their phone calls and e-mails because “I have nothing to hide”. 

Of course this program is secret and thus we can’t really now for sure what the feds are listening to, but we do know a few things.  In late 2002, AT&T cooperated with the NSA and installed a beam splitter on the backbone in their facility in San Francisco.   A great feature of fiber optics is that you can split the signal with vitually no signal loss and send identical streams to different locations.  In the case of AT&T, one stream continues to its destination (your home or office) while an identical stream goes into a secure room (room 641a) and is processed by some very high powered servers.  Now, I do not know for sure that room 641a is still operating, internet chatter on the subject dries up around late 2008, but I see no reason why it and other rooms like it would not still be operating today.  It should also be noted that room 641a likely began operation in 2003, but was not reported until a whistleblower at AT&T broke the story.

Even before room 641a, the FBI was using a piece of software called “Carnivore” to sniff out e-mails.  Carnovore was a rather un-remarkable tool in that it was basically just a packet sniffer, what made it stand out was its ability to use various criteria to filter out what the person using it wanted to zero in on.  The FBI later abandoned Carnivore in favor of commercially available software and hardware from a company called Narus.  Coincidentally, Narus is also who builds the machines the NSA used (uses?) in room 641a.  If this little article about Narus doesn’t give you visions of 1984, then you should probably re-read that Orwell classic.  And don’t even think about giving me any guff about using Wikipedia.  This is a blog, not a research paper.  I am sure there is plenty more info out there on Narus, I just don’t feel like digging tonight.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NarusInsight

Now, I understand the need for surveillance, and I understand the need for that surveillance to be secret at times.  We already have a system in place for that though, and its called FISA (Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Act) and it allows officials to get warrants from a secret court and go monitor whoever they want.  Since its inception in 1978, the FISA court has awarded over 19,000 warrants and denied only 5.  So I think its pretty easy to get one.  As useless as this system is, at least its a system that keeps us a littel further away from the slippery slope that we are on.  For you Star Wars fans, don’t forget that Palpatines rise to Emperor really started when the Senate granted him all those “Emergency” powers…

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