[Noisebridge-discuss] NSA snooping on all calls, internet, fax and other data *inside* the USA

[Jacob Appelbaum]

Hi all,

I'm fairly interested in surveillance and for quite sometime, I felt
like the Bush administration was lying to us about the scope of the
spying. While I had suspected that the NSA listened to everything, I
hadn't even remotely considered that the day after Bush left office an
NSA analyst would speak out.

Amazingly, this is just what has happened:
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/01/nsa-whistleblow.html

If this Ex-NSA analyst is telling the truth, the magnitude of this leak
is not just unbelievable, it's astounding. Imagine the data warehousing
required, the network for transferring data, the computer power required
and the access to various communication facilities around the nation and
the world. This kind of crime cannot happen without massive amounts of
collaboration at the very highest and lowest of levels. It doesn't sound
like AT&T was the odd duck out here.

To really drive this home, every phone call and everything you've ever
done in the USA was recorded and filtered by the NSA. If you wrote an
email, if you read your email, if you visited cnn.com. If you made a 2
minute phone call to say that you'd be at Noisebridge shortly, that
flagged your call for recording and further analysis because...
"Terrorists make short calls." Everything. Always.

How's that for a chilling effect on your next phone call or email?

It really puts Das Leben Des Anderen into perspective in a whole new light:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0405094/

Welcome to the new world order,
Jake