After years of illegal wiretapping of Americans and collecting 530 million phone records in 2017 alone, according to the New York Times, the National Security Agency (NSA) has reportedly stopped using it for the past 6 months. They also don't think Trump will renew it's use in the future.
Source
House minority leader national security adviser Luke Murry, speaking on The Lawfare Podcast, said the NSA "hasn't actually been using it for the past six months," adding "“I’m actually not certain that the administration will want to start that back up."
It may or may not be true that the NSA has stopped engaging in massive surveillance of Americans. I don't see why they would have stopped if it was useful to begin with, especially in our hyped up data surveillance times and future progression. But the NYT has reported the NSA having stopped or abandoned previous programs, only that wasn't true.
The XKeystore program used to search and analyze global internet data was previously said to be defunct, the NSA is still using it. In 2013, ormer Director of National Intelligence James Clapper lied to Congress when questioned by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR). When asked "Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions, or hundreds of millions, of Americans?," Clapper replied: "No sir, not wittingly."
DNI Clapper tells Wyden the NSA does not collect data on millions of Americans
Not wittingly? Not according to anyone's will? Really? These programs just got developed by themselves and no one was administering them? What a crock of shite!
Edward Snowden once explained what XKeystore can do:
You could read anyone's email in the world, anybody you've got an email address for. Any website: You can watch traffic to and from it. Any computer that an individual sits at: You can watch it. Any laptop that you're tracking: you can follow it as it moves from place to place throughout the world. It's a one-stop-shop for access to the NSA's information.
... You can tag individuals ... Let's say you work at a major German corporation and I want access to that network, I can track your username on a website on a form somewhere, I can track your real name, I can track associations with your friends and I can build what's called a fingerprint, which is network activity unique to you, which means anywhere you go in the world, anywhere you try to sort of hide your online presence, your identity.
So Clapper lies to Congress, and then gets away with it, while other get hunted down by an FBI witch-hunt for lying and get sent to prison in an attempt by the Deep State to make anything stick to Trump and take him out of office. Oh right, Clapper was part of the Deep State, that's why he is immune...
The phone surveillance program was scaled back in 2015 as part of the 2015 Freedom Act, which is set to expire this year. Metadata is being kept by carriers like At&T and Verizon, and accessed quickly through a court order.
Source
The NYT reports how effective this mass surveillance has been:
Yet the scale of collection remained huge: The program gathered 151 million records in 2016, despite obtaining court orders to use the system on only 42 terrorism suspects in 2016, along with a few left over from late 2015. In 2017, it obtained orders for 40 targets and collected 534 million records.
Problems with the system emerged last year, when the National Security Agency said it had decided to delete its entire database of records gathered since the Freedom Act system became operational. Glenn S. Gerstell, the agency’s general counsel, said in an interview at the time that because of complex technical glitches, one or more telecom providers — he declined to say which — had responded to court orders for records by sending logs to the agency that included both accurate and inaccurate data.
But I guess the government and deep state doesn't need to do "so much" spying anymore as the corporate technocracy grows and is welcomed by a majority of the populace. People are willingly buying commercial products with microphones in them, such as Amazon's Alexa or Echo, and Google's Home or Nest. Worse yet, Nest has been revealed to have a hidden microphone that Google never disclosed as part of the components.
That doesn't meant he NSA is not collecting data, since NSA whistleblower William Binney has exposed how there are billions of records collected each year through the totality of the NSA surveillance system.
NSA Whistle-Blower Tells All: The Program
So even if we're being told by the "trusted" mainstream media that one facet of the NSA's massive surveillance apparatus is "shutdown", you can bet your bottom dollar that there are more data collection programs ongoing, and are likely better to compensate for the former being abandoned. After all, t hey have to keep us safe and secure, we don't need no stinkin' freedom!
References:
- Disputed N.S.A. Phone Program Is Shut Down, Aide Says
- NSA ABANDONS PART OF MASS SURVEILLANCE PROGRAM EXPOSED BY SNOWDEN
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No way they have stopped it. They have been amping up the spying through the so called smart technology. Smart locks, smart thermostats, internet based home security systems. Onstar for vehicles (thats probably outdated now and newer improved spy crap for vehicles). Echo and etc etc.
I am guessing that within 15 years at the current pace there will be no place within cities one is not completely monitored and recorded.
I would also point out to those who believe their crypto holdings are anonymous what you mentioned about
Amazon and other companies have somewhat shown their hands for years now at being able to identify computers despite masking tech such as VPN.
The other day i was reading about people doing something called Bitcoin washing to try and confuse the tracking taking place. The problem I see with that is they have all these transactions going to one wallet to wash from several others, some of which may actually be involved in some shady shit. Then they record and follow all these wallets the so called washed Bitcoin flows out to. I would also assume given the governments police/spy machines penchant for setting traps that some of these washing systems are being ran by the very people the washing is supposed to keep from knowing, lol.
The "Mark of the Beast" is here and its slowly been closing in on all of us.
I was going to make a comment, but I just decided to upvote this one.
It might be renamed, moved, slightly changed, but I don't think they "Stopped".
Yeah it's moved beyond phone taps form Echelon to PRISM and beyond, all data is theirs and all devices are being jacked with surveillance tech :/
In other news, my uncle’s also not using heroin anymore. It’s only the sixth time we’ve heard this, and the last five times it was a lie, but I’m sure it’s totally accurate this time.
LOL :P yes, this time it's the truth, don't take past behavior as anything meaningful :/
Probably because they have some better surveillance techniques now...
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Indeed they do ;)
That was my thought as well ;~) when I first heard about it....
The problem is not whether the NSA is still doing mass surveillance on the American people. The problem is that they were ever allowed to in the first place. As soon as it was revealed everyone complicit in the crime should have been tried and locked up for a good portion of their lives. These people are not our noble protectors. They are criminals. Period.
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true, never allowed, but given the clout of legal authority anyways. The deep state and security paranoid won't let it be a crime :/
The security paranoid are what really bother me. It's to be expected that the deep state is going to continue using their power to get what they want. They're the villains of this story even if they don't realize that's what they are, so you can only wag your finger in disapproval so long. The people that actually think the NSA's surveillance program is in any way justifiable, necessary, or even at all useful is what really bothers me. It's like a deathrow inmate rushing in a panic to hand their executioner the lethal injection, but their death won't be fast. It'll be long and agonizing, and it'll be by their own hand.
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It would be lovely if the surveillance practice were discontinued. However I highly doubt this has happened truly.
No doubt it's all BS ;)
They never told us about it in the first place.
They try to prosecute the whistle blowers.
Why would anyone care what they have to say? lol. sad.
Yup, lies after lies after lies.
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Classic bait and switch. They are dismantling this program because they are getting all the data they need elsewhere. It’s probably coming from the telecom companies, the back doors built into our phones and computers and all the other nefarious ways. Or they could just be starting up another program under s different name, but the work will continue.
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