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Post by WaTcHeR on Feb 1, 2006 11:09:56 GMT -5
02/01/2006 - AT&T has been named a defendant in a class action lawsuit that claims the telecommunications company illegally cooperated with the National Security Agency's secret eavesdropping program.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in San Francisco's federal district court, charges that AT&T has opened its telecommunications facilities up to the NSA and continues to "to assist the government in its secret surveillance of millions of ordinary Americans."
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which filed the suit, says AT&T's alleged cooperation violates free speech and privacy rights found in the U.S. Constitution and also contravenes federal wiretapping law, which prohibits electronic surveillance "except as authorized by statute."
Kevin Bankston, an EFF staff attorney, said he anticipates that the Bush administration will intervene in the case on behalf of AT&T. "We are definitely going to have a fight with the government and AT&T," he said.
AT&T said Tuesday that it needed to review the complaint before it could respond. But AT&T spokesman Dave Pacholczyk told CNET News.com last week in response to a query about NSA cooperation: "We don't comment on matters of national security."
A Los Angeles Times article dated Dec. 26 quoted an unnamed source as saying the NSA has a "direct hookup" into an AT&T database that stores information about all domestic phone calls, including how long they lasted.
If the Bush administration does intervene, EFF could have a formidable hurdle to overcome: the so-called "state secrets" doctrine.
The state secrets privilege, outlined by the Supreme Court in a 1953 case, permits the government to derail a lawsuit that might otherwise lead to the disclosure of military secrets.
In 1998, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals elaborated on the state secret privilege in a case where former workers at the Air Force's classified Groom Lake, Nev., facility alleged hazardous waste violations. When requested by the workers' lawyers to turn over information, the Air Force refused.
The 9th Circuit upheld a summary judgment on behalf of the Air Force, saying that once the state secrets "privilege is properly invoked and the court is satisfied as to the danger of divulging state secrets, the privilege is absolute" and the case will generally be dismissed.
The Bush administration also is defending a related lawsuit filed earlier this month by the American Civil Liberties Union, that says the surveillance was unconstitutional and illegal.
AT&T has 30 days to file a response, which could include a request that the case be dismissed or a motion for summary judgment.
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Post by KC on Mar 10, 2006 21:19:14 GMT -5
AT&T now owns Cingular and S.W. Bell.
One would only wonder why the Government would allow them to get so big again. Could mean if you go along with "big brother," the government will let you do almost anything?
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Post by KC on Apr 8, 2006 22:12:42 GMT -5
04/07/2006 - AT&T provided National Security Agency eavesdroppers with full access to its customers' phone calls, and shunted its customers' internet traffic to data-mining equipment installed in a secret room in its San Francisco switching center, according to a former AT&T worker cooperating in the Electronic Frontier Foundation's lawsuit against the company.
Mark Klein, a retired AT&T communications technician, submitted an affidavit in support of the EFF's lawsuit this week. That class action lawsuit, filed in federal court in San Francisco last January, alleges that AT&T violated federal and state laws by surreptitiously allowing the government to monitor phone and internet communications of AT&T customers without warrants.
On Wednesday, the EFF asked the court to issue an injunction prohibiting AT&T from continuing the alleged wiretapping, and filed a number of documents under seal, including three AT&T documents that purportedly explain how the wiretapping system works.
According to a statement released by Klein's attorney, an NSA agent showed up at the San Francisco switching center in 2002 to interview a management-level technician for a special job. In January 2003, Klein observed a new room being built adjacent to the room housing AT&T's #4ESS switching equipment, which is responsible for routing long distance and international calls.
"I learned that the person whom the NSA interviewed for the secret job was the person working to install equipment in this room," Klein wrote. "The regular technician work force was not allowed in the room."
Klein's job eventually included connecting internet circuits to a splitting cabinet that led to the secret room. During the course of that work, he learned from a co-worker that similar cabinets were being installed in other cities, including Seattle, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego.
"While doing my job, I learned that fiber optic cables from the secret room were tapping into the Worldnet (AT&T's internet service) circuits by splitting off a portion of the light signal," Klein wrote.
The split circuits included traffic from peering links connecting to other internet backbone providers, meaning that AT&T was also diverting traffic routed from its network to or from other domestic and international providers, according to Klein's statement.
The secret room also included data-mining equipment called a Narus STA 6400, "known to be used particularly by government intelligence agencies because of its ability to sift through large amounts of data looking for preprogrammed targets," according to Klein's statement.
Narus, whose website touts AT&T as a client, sells software to help internet service providers and telecoms monitor and manage their networks, look for intrusions, and wiretap phone calls as mandated by federal law.
Klein said he came forward because he does not believe that the Bush administration is being truthful about the extent of its extrajudicial monitoring of Americans' communications.
"Despite what we are hearing, and considering the public track record of this administration, I simply do not believe their claims that the NSA's spying program is really limited to foreign communications or is otherwise consistent with the NSA's charter or with FISA," Klein's wrote. "And unlike the controversy over targeted wiretaps of individuals' phone calls, this potential spying appears to be applied wholesale to all sorts of internet communications of countless citizens."
After asking for a preview copy of the documents last week, the government did not object to the EFF filing the paper under seal, although the EFF asked the court Wednesday to make the documents public.
One of the documents is titled "Study Group 3, LGX/Splitter Wiring, San Francisco," and is dated 2002. The others are allegedly a design document instructing technicians how to wire up the taps, and a document that describes the equipment installed in the secret room.
In a letter to the EFF, AT&T objected to the filing of the documents in any manner, saying that they contain sensitive trade secrets and could be "could be used to 'hack' into the AT&T network, compromising its integrity."
According to court rules, AT&T has until Thursday to file a motion to keep the documents sealed. The government could also step in to the case and request that the documents not be made public, or even that the entire lawsuit be barred under the seldom-used State Secrets Privilege.
AT&T spokesman Walt Sharp declined to comment on the allegations, citing a company policy of not commenting on litigation or matters of national security, but did say that "AT&T follows all laws following requests for assistance from government authorities."
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Post by KC on Apr 18, 2006 21:55:44 GMT -5
04/18/2006 - A former employee of AT&T has come forward with documents suggesting that there may be a lot more spying going on in America than President George W. Bush has admitted. The AT&T documents suggest that telephone companies may be helping the U.S. government engage in wholesale interception of telephone calls, e-mail messages and Web surfing. If AT&T is violating its customers' privacy rights, it should come clean, and stop immediately.
According to Mark Klein, a longtime AT&T technician who is now retired, AT&T maintained a room at its San Francisco Internet and telephone hub where its customers' data could be mined by keywords, e-mail addresses and other attributes. Klein says the National Security Agency was given access to the room and the data. He says other technicians have reported to him that similar rooms exist at other AT&T sites.
Klein's assertions are the heart of a lawsuit filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which charges AT&T with helping the NSA conduct an extensive and illegal domestic spying program. The government can legally intercept private communications only under limited circumstances, with proper judicial oversight. AT&T has refused to describe its cooperation with the NSA.
The lawsuit seeks damages on behalf of a large number of AT&T customers, which could provide the company with a strong incentive to re-evaluate its policies. But even without the suit, AT&T has a reason to worry if it is participating in illegal domestic spying. No company should want to get a reputation for allowing the government to listen in on its customers' phone calls, read their e-mail and monitor their Web activity without the requisite legal showing.
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Post by WaTcHeR on Apr 25, 2006 12:18:14 GMT -5
Congress Is Giving Away the Internet, and You Won't Like Who Gets It 04/25/2006 - Congress is going to hand the operation of the Internet over to AT&T, Verizon and Comcast. Democrats are helping. It's a shame. Don’t look now, but the House Commerce Committee next Wednesday is likely to vote to turn control of the Internet over to AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, Time Warner and what’s left of the telecommunications industry. It will be one of those stories the MSM writes about as “little noticed” because they haven’t covered it. On the surface, it may seem a stretch to think that those companies could control the great, wide, infinite Internet. After all, the incredible diversity of the Net allowed everything -- Web sites and services of all kinds to exist in perfect harmony. What’s more, they were all delivered to your screen without any interference by the companies that carried the bits to and fro. Until recently, they had to. It was the law. The telephone companies, which carried all of the Web traffic until relatively recently, had to treat all of their calls alike without giving any Web site or service favored treatment over another. The result was today’s Internet, which developed as a result of billions of dollars of investments, from the largest Internet company that spent millions on software and networking, to the one person with a blog who spent a few hundred dollars on a laptop. The Internet grew into a universal public resource because the telephone and cable companies simply transported the bits. Last fall, however, the Federal Communications Commission, backed by the U.S. Supreme Court, decided that the high-speed Internet services offered by the cable and telephone companies didn’t fall under that law, the Communications Act. Out the window went the law that treated everyone equally. Now, with broadband, we are in a new game without rules. Telephone and cable companies own 98% of the high-speed broadband networks the public uses to go online for reading news, shopping, listening to music, posting videos or any of the thousands of other uses developed for the Internet. But that isn’t enough. They want to control what you read, see or hear online. The companies say that they will create premium lanes on the Internet for higher fees, and give preferential access to their own services and those who can afford extra charges. The rest of us will be left to use an inferior version of the Internet. Admittedly, it hasn’t become a problem yet. But to think it won’t become one is to ignore 100 years of history of anti-competitive behavior by the phone companies. And it was a mere six weeks or so from the time the FCC issued its ill-fated decision to the time when Ed Whitacre, the CEO of (then-SBC) now AT&T issued his famous manifesto attacking Google and other Web sites for “using my pipes (for) free.” They don’t, by the way. Here’s the inside baseball: A couple of weeks ago, a courageous band of legislators tried to stop the madness in Subcommittee. Ed Markey, Rick Boucher, Anna Eshoo and Jay Inslee proposed some good language to protect the Internet. For their troubles, they just got four more votes, other than theirs. Just three Democrats, other than the sponsors, voted for it. Only one Republican voted for it. When we talk about special interest giveaways, this one will be at the top of the list. And we won’t have only Republicans to blame. www.tpmcafe.com/node/29086
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Post by WaTcHeR on May 16, 2006 9:48:41 GMT -5
05/16/2006 - The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY. The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren't suspected of any crime. This program does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist activity, sources said in separate interviews.
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS: The NSA record collection program
"It's the largest database ever assembled in the world," said one person, who, like the others who agreed to talk about the NSA's activities, declined to be identified by name or affiliation. The agency's goal is "to create a database of every call ever made" within the nation's borders, this person added.
For the customers of these companies, it means that the government has detailed records of calls they made — across town or across the country — to family members, co-workers, business contacts and others.
The three telecommunications companies are working under contract with the NSA, which launched the program in 2001 shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the sources said. The program is aimed at identifying and tracking suspected terrorists, they said.
The sources would talk only under a guarantee of anonymity because the NSA program is secret.
Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, nominated Monday by President Bush to become the director of the CIA, headed the NSA from March 1999 to April 2005. In that post, Hayden would have overseen the agency's domestic call-tracking program. Hayden declined to comment about the program.
The NSA's domestic program, as described by sources, is far more expansive than what the White House has acknowledged. Last year, Bush said he had authorized the NSA to eavesdrop — without warrants — on international calls and international e-mails of people suspected of having links to terrorists when one party to the communication is in the USA. Warrants have also not been used in the NSA's efforts to create a national call database.
In defending the previously disclosed program, Bush insisted that the NSA was focused exclusively on international calls. "In other words," Bush explained, "one end of the communication must be outside the United States."
As a result, domestic call records — those of calls that originate and terminate within U.S. borders — were believed to be private.
Sources, however, say that is not the case. With access to records of billions of domestic calls, the NSA has gained a secret window into the communications habits of millions of Americans. Customers' names, street addresses and other personal information are not being handed over as part of NSA's domestic program, the sources said. But the phone numbers the NSA collects can easily be cross-checked with other databases to obtain that information.
Don Weber, a senior spokesman for the NSA, declined to discuss the agency's operations. "Given the nature of the work we do, it would be irresponsible to comment on actual or alleged operational issues; therefore, we have no information to provide," he said. "However, it is important to note that NSA takes its legal responsibilities seriously and operates within the law."
The White House would not discuss the domestic call-tracking program. "There is no domestic surveillance without court approval," said Dana Perino, deputy press secretary, referring to actual eavesdropping.
She added that all national intelligence activities undertaken by the federal government "are lawful, necessary and required for the pursuit of al-Qaeda and affiliated terrorists." All government-sponsored intelligence activities "are carefully reviewed and monitored," Perino said. She also noted that "all appropriate members of Congress have been briefed on the intelligence efforts of the United States."
The government is collecting "external" data on domestic phone calls but is not intercepting "internals," a term for the actual content of the communication, according to a U.S. intelligence official familiar with the program. This kind of data collection from phone companies is not uncommon; it's been done before, though never on this large a scale, the official said. The data are used for "social network analysis," the official said, meaning to study how terrorist networks contact each other and how they are tied together.
Carriers uniquely positioned
AT&T recently merged with SBC and kept the AT&T name. Verizon, BellSouth and AT&T are the nation's three biggest telecommunications companies; they provide local and wireless phone service to more than 200 million customers.
The three carriers control vast networks with the latest communications technologies. They provide an array of services: local and long-distance calling, wireless and high-speed broadband, including video. Their direct access to millions of homes and businesses has them uniquely positioned to help the government keep tabs on the calling habits of Americans.
Among the big telecommunications companies, only Qwest has refused to help the NSA, the sources said. According to multiple sources, Qwest declined to participate because it was uneasy about the legal implications of handing over customer information to the government without warrants.
Qwest's refusal to participate has left the NSA with a hole in its database. Based in Denver, Qwest provides local phone service to 14 million customers in 14 states in the West and Northwest. But AT&T and Verizon also provide some services — primarily long-distance and wireless — to people who live in Qwest's region. Therefore, they can provide the NSA with at least some access in that area.
Created by President Truman in 1952, during the Korean War, the NSA is charged with protecting the United States from foreign security threats. The agency was considered so secret that for years the government refused to even confirm its existence. Government insiders used to joke that NSA stood for "No Such Agency."
In 1975, a congressional investigation revealed that the NSA had been intercepting, without warrants, international communications for more than 20 years at the behest of the CIA and other agencies. The spy campaign, code-named "Shamrock," led to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which was designed to protect Americans from illegal eavesdropping.
Enacted in 1978, FISA lays out procedures that the U.S. government must follow to conduct electronic surveillance and physical searches of people believed to be engaged in espionage or international terrorism against the United States. A special court, which has 11 members, is responsible for adjudicating requests under FISA.
Over the years, NSA code-cracking techniques have continued to improve along with technology. The agency today is considered expert in the practice of "data mining" — sifting through reams of information in search of patterns. Data mining is just one of many tools NSA analysts and mathematicians use to crack codes and track international communications.
Paul Butler, a former U.S. prosecutor who specialized in terrorism crimes, said FISA approval generally isn't necessary for government data-mining operations. "FISA does not prohibit the government from doing data mining," said Butler, now a partner with the law firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in Washington, D.C.
The caveat, he said, is that "personal identifiers" — such as names, Social Security numbers and street addresses — can't be included as part of the search. "That requires an additional level of probable cause," he said.
The usefulness of the NSA's domestic phone-call database as a counterterrorism tool is unclear. Also unclear is whether the database has been used for other purposes.
The NSA's domestic program raises legal questions. Historically, AT&T and the regional phone companies have required law enforcement agencies to present a court order before they would even consider turning over a customer's calling data. Part of that owed to the personality of the old Bell Telephone System, out of which those companies grew.
Ma Bell's bedrock principle — protection of the customer — guided the company for decades, said Gene Kimmelman, senior public policy director of Consumers Union. "No court order, no customer information — period. That's how it was for decades," he said.
The concern for the customer was also based on law: Under Section 222 of the Communications Act, first passed in 1934, telephone companies are prohibited from giving out information regarding their customers' calling habits: whom a person calls, how often and what routes those calls take to reach their final destination. Inbound calls, as well as wireless calls, also are covered.
The financial penalties for violating Section 222, one of many privacy reinforcements that have been added to the law over the years, can be stiff. The Federal Communications Commission, the nation's top telecommunications regulatory agency, can levy fines of up to $130,000 per day per violation, with a cap of $1.325 million per violation. The FCC has no hard definition of "violation." In practice, that means a single "violation" could cover one customer or 1 million.
In the case of the NSA's international call-tracking program, Bush signed an executive order allowing the NSA to engage in eavesdropping without a warrant. The president and his representatives have since argued that an executive order was sufficient for the agency to proceed. Some civil liberties groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, disagree.
Companies approached
The NSA's domestic program began soon after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to the sources. Right around that time, they said, NSA representatives approached the nation's biggest telecommunications companies. The agency made an urgent pitch: National security is at risk, and we need your help to protect the country from attacks.
The agency told the companies that it wanted them to turn over their "call-detail records," a complete listing of the calling histories of their millions of customers. In addition, the NSA wanted the carriers to provide updates, which would enable the agency to keep tabs on the nation's calling habits.
The sources said the NSA made clear that it was willing to pay for the cooperation. AT&T, which at the time was headed by C. Michael Armstrong, agreed to help the NSA. So did BellSouth, headed by F. Duane Ackerman; SBC, headed by Ed Whitacre; and Verizon, headed by Ivan Seidenberg.
With that, the NSA's domestic program began in earnest.
AT&T, when asked about the program, replied with a comment prepared for USA TODAY: "We do not comment on matters of national security, except to say that we only assist law enforcement and government agencies charged with protecting national security in strict accordance with the law."
In another prepared comment, BellSouth said: "BellSouth does not provide any confidential customer information to the NSA or any governmental agency without proper legal authority."
Verizon, the USA's No. 2 telecommunications company behind AT&T, gave this statement: "We do not comment on national security matters, we act in full compliance with the law and we are committed to safeguarding our customers' privacy."
Qwest spokesman Robert Charlton said: "We can't talk about this. It's a classified situation."
In December, The New York Times revealed that Bush had authorized the NSA to wiretap, without warrants, international phone calls and e-mails that travel to or from the USA. The following month, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group, filed a class-action lawsuit against AT&T. The lawsuit accuses the company of helping the NSA spy on U.S. phone customers.
Last month, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales alluded to that possibility. Appearing at a House Judiciary Committee hearing, Gonzales was asked whether he thought the White House has the legal authority to monitor domestic traffic without a warrant. Gonzales' reply: "I wouldn't rule it out." His comment marked the first time a Bush appointee publicly asserted that the White House might have that authority.
Similarities in programs
The domestic and international call-tracking programs have things in common, according to the sources. Both are being conducted without warrants and without the approval of the FISA court. The Bush administration has argued that FISA's procedures are too slow in some cases. Officials, including Gonzales, also make the case that the USA Patriot Act gives them broad authority to protect the safety of the nation's citizens.
The chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., would not confirm the existence of the program. In a statement, he said, "I can say generally, however, that our subcommittee has been fully briefed on all aspects of the Terrorist Surveillance Program. ... I remain convinced that the program authorized by the president is lawful and absolutely necessary to protect this nation from future attacks."
The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., declined to comment.
One company differs
One major telecommunications company declined to participate in the program: Qwest.
According to sources familiar with the events, Qwest's CEO at the time, Joe Nacchio, was deeply troubled by the NSA's assertion that Qwest didn't need a court order — or approval under FISA — to proceed. Adding to the tension, Qwest was unclear about who, exactly, would have access to its customers' information and how that information might be used.
Financial implications were also a concern, the sources said. Carriers that illegally divulge calling information can be subjected to heavy fines. The NSA was asking Qwest to turn over millions of records. The fines, in the aggregate, could have been substantial.
The NSA told Qwest that other government agencies, including the FBI, CIA and DEA, also might have access to the database, the sources said. As a matter of practice, the NSA regularly shares its information — known as "product" in intelligence circles — with other intelligence groups. Even so, Qwest's lawyers were troubled by the expansiveness of the NSA request, the sources said.
The NSA, which needed Qwest's participation to completely cover the country, pushed back hard.
Trying to put pressure on Qwest, NSA representatives pointedly told Qwest that it was the lone holdout among the big telecommunications companies. It also tried appealing to Qwest's patriotic side: In one meeting, an NSA representative suggested that Qwest's refusal to contribute to the database could compromise national security, one person recalled.
In addition, the agency suggested that Qwest's foot-dragging might affect its ability to get future classified work with the government. Like other big telecommunications companies, Qwest already had classified contracts and hoped to get more.
Unable to get comfortable with what NSA was proposing, Qwest's lawyers asked NSA to take its proposal to the FISA court. According to the sources, the agency refused.
The NSA's explanation did little to satisfy Qwest's lawyers. "They told (Qwest) they didn't want to do that because FISA might not agree with them," one person recalled. For similar reasons, this person said, NSA rejected Qwest's suggestion of getting a letter of authorization from the U.S. attorney general's office. A second person confirmed this version of events.
In June 2002, Nacchio resigned amid allegations that he had misled investors about Qwest's financial health. But Qwest's legal questions about the NSA request remained.
Unable to reach agreement, Nacchio's successor, Richard Notebaert, finally pulled the plug on the NSA talks in late 2004, the sources said.
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Post by WaTcHeR on May 16, 2006 9:49:21 GMT -5
05/16/2006 - BOSTON - If the National Security Agency is indeed amassing a colossal database of Americans' phone records, one way to use all that information is in "social network analysis," a data-mining method that aims to expose previously invisible connections among people. Social network analysis has gained prominence in business and intelligence circles under the belief that it can yield extraordinary insights, such as the fact that people in disparate organizations have common acquaintances. Companies can buy social networking software to help determine who has the best connections for a particular sales pitch.
So it did not surprise many security analysts to learn Thursday from USA Today that the NSA is applying the technology to billions of phone records.
"Who you're talking to often matters much more than what you're saying," said Bruce Schneier, a security expert.
To be sure, monitoring newer communications services is probably harder than getting billing records from landline phones. USA Today reported that the NSA has collected call logs from the three largest U.S. phone companies, BellSouth Corp., AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc.
That level of cooperation confirmed the fears of many privacy analysts, who pointed out that AT&T is already being sued in federal court in San Francisco for allegedly giving the NSA access to contents of its phone and Internet networks.
WHAT ABOUT CELLS?
It remains unclear whether other communications providers have been asked for call logs.
Verizon Wireless spokesman Jeffrey Nelson definitively said his company was "not involved in this situation." His counterparts at Cingular and Sprint Nextel Corp. were less explicit and did not deny any participation.
In an e-mail statement to The Associated Press, T-Mobile USA Inc. said it does not participate "in any NSA program for warrant-less surveillance and acquisition of call records, and T-Mobile has not provided any such access to communications or customer records."
Even without cell phone carriers' help, of course, calls between wireless subscribers and Verizon, AT&T and BellSouth landlines presumably would be captured.
WHAT ABOUT THE WEB?
Representatives for AOL LLC said the company complies with individual government subpoenas and court orders but does not have a blanket program for broader sharing of customer data. Microsoft Corp. had "never engaged in the type of activity referenced in these articles," according to a statement. Google Inc. spokesman Steve Langdon said his company does not participate, either.
Yahoo Inc. officials say they comply with subpoenas, but refused to elaborate.
WHAT ABOUT VOIPs?
Even Skype, the popular Internet phone service that encrypts its calls -- which presumably prevents monitoring of their content -- is thought to be vulnerable to who's-calling-whom traffic analysis.
Other tiny, free voice-over-Internet services likely don't bother to maintain the kinds of call logs that Verizon, BellSouth and AT&T apparently handed over, said Jeff Pulver, an authority on the technology.
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Post by KC on May 31, 2006 16:48:21 GMT -5
Key Portions of Critical Documents Unsealed in AT&T Surveillance Case AT&T has set up a secret, secure room for the NSA in at least one of the company's facilities—a room into which AT&T has been diverting its customers' emails and other Internet communications in bulk—according to evidence in key documents partially unsealed today in the Electronic Frontier Foundation's (EFF's) class-action lawsuit against the telecom giant. "Now the public can see firsthand the testimony of Mark Klein, a former AT&T employee who was brave enough to step forward and provide evidence of the company's illegal collaboration with the NSA," said EFF Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston. "Today we have released some of the evidence supporting our allegation that AT&T has given the NSA direct access to its fiber-optic network, such that the NSA can read the email of anyone and everyone it chooses—all without a warrant or any court supervision, and in clear violation of the law." www.eff.org/legal/cases/att/
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Post by lm on Jun 4, 2006 19:40:45 GMT -5
Class Action Lawsuit Filed Against AT&T by Texas Journalists and Lawyers
AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 19, 2006--On May 18, 2006, a class action lawsuit was filed against AT&T, Inc., by Austin attorney R. James George, with George & Brothers, LLP, in the local division of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas (James C. Harrington, Richard A. Grigg, Louis Black, The Austin Chronicle, Michael Kentor, et al. v. AT&T, Inc., Case No. A06CA374LY). The suit was filed on behalf of Texas subscribers or customers who have had telephone records divulged by AT&T to the National Security Agency (NSA) and includes subclasses of journalists, reporters, newspaper editors, and lawyers, all of whom are duty-bound to maintain confidentiality with respect to their sources and clients.
One of the lead plaintiffs, attorney Richard A. Grigg, currently represents an individual detained in the U.S. Government's detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Though he may not communicate with his client over the phone, Mr. Grigg uses AT&T telecommunications equipment and services to communicate with other habeas attorneys concerning his client and his client's case.
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Post by WaTcHeR on Jun 5, 2006 11:18:28 GMT -5
U.S. Wants Companies to Keep Web Usage Records
The Justice Department is asking Internet companies to keep records on the Web-surfing activities of their customers to aid law enforcement, and may propose legislation to force them to do so.
The director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Robert S. Mueller III, and Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales held a meeting in Washington last Friday where they offered a general proposal on record-keeping to a group of senior executives from Internet companies, said Brian Roehrkasse, a spokesman for the department. The meeting included representatives from America Online, Microsoft, Google, Verizon and Comcast.
The attorney general has appointed a task force of department officials to explore the issue, and that group is holding another meeting with a broader group of Internet executives today, Mr. Roehrkasse said. The department also met yesterday with a group of privacy experts.
The Justice Department is not asking the Internet companies to give it data about users, but rather to retain information that could be subpoenaed through existing laws and procedures, Mr. Roehrkasse said.
While initial proposals were vague, executives from companies that attended the meeting said they gathered that the department was interested in records that would allow them to identify which individuals visited certain Web sites and possibly conducted searches using certain terms.
It also wants the Internet companies to retain records about whom their users exchange e-mail with, but not the contents of e-mail messages, the executives said. The executives spoke on the condition that they not be identified because they did not want to offend the Justice Department.
The proposal and the initial meeting were first reported by USA Today and CNet News.com.
The department proposed that the records be retained for as long as two years. Most Internet companies discard such records after a few weeks or months.In its current proposal, the department appears to be trying to determine whether Internet companies will voluntarily agree to keep certain information or if it will need to seek legislation to require them to do so.
The request comes as the government has been trying to extend its power to review electronic communications in several ways. The New York Times reported in December that the National Security Agency had gained access to phone and e-mail traffic with the cooperation of telecommunications companies, and USA Today reported last month that the agency had collected telephone calling records. The Justice Department has subpoenaed information on Internet search patterns — but not the searches of individuals — as it tries to defend a law meant to protect children from pornography.
In a speech in April, Mr. Gonzales said that investigations into child pornography had been hampered because Internet companies had not always kept records that would help prosecutors identify people who traded in illegal images.
"The investigation and prosecution of child predators depends critically on the availability of evidence that is often in the hands of Internet service providers," Mr. Gonzales said in remarks at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Alexandria, Va. "This evidence will be available for us to use only if the providers retain the records for a reasonable amount of time," he said.
An executive of one Internet provider that was represented at the first meeting said Mr. Gonzales began the discussion by showing slides of child pornography from the Internet. But later, one participant asked Mr. Mueller why he was interested in the Internet records. The executive said Mr. Mueller's reply was, "We want this for terrorism."
At the meeting with privacy experts yesterday, Justice Department officials focused on wanting to retain the records for use in child pornography and terrorism investigations. But they also talked of their value in investigating other crimes like intellectual property theft and fraud, said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington, who attended the session.
"It was clear that they would go beyond kiddie porn and terrorism and use it for general law enforcement," Mr. Rotenberg said.
Kate Dean, the executive director of the United States Internet Service Provider Association, a trade group, said: "When they said they were talking about child pornography, we spent a lot of time developing proposals for what could be done. Now they are talking about a whole different ball of wax."
At the meeting with privacy groups, officials sought to assuage concerns that the retention of the records could compromise the privacy of Americans. But Mr. Rotenberg said he left with lingering concerns.
"This is a sharp departure from current practice," he said. "Data retention is an open-ended obligation to retain all information on all customers for all purposes, and from a traditional Fourth Amendment perspective, that really turns things upside down."
Executives of several Internet companies that participated in the first meeting said the department's initial proposals seemed expensive and unwieldy.
At the meeting scheduled for today with executives of Internet access companies, Justice Department officials plan to go into more detail about what types of records they would like to see retained and for how long, said a Justice Department official who spoke on condition of anonymity. "It will be much more nuts-and-bolts discussions," he said, adding that the department would stop short of offering formal proposals.
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Post by WaTcHeR on Jun 22, 2006 12:54:17 GMT -5
06.22.2006 - AT&T has issued an updated privacy policy that takes effect Friday. The changes are significant because they appear to give the telecom giant more latitude when it comes to sharing customers' personal data with government officials.
The new policy says that AT&T -- not customers -- owns customers' confidential info and can use it "to protect its legitimate business interests, safeguard others, or respond to legal process."
The policy also indicates that AT&T will track the viewing habits of customers of its new video service -- something that cable and satellite providers are prohibited from doing.
Moreover, AT&T (formerly known as SBC) is requiring customers to agree to its updated privacy policy as a condition for service -- a new move that legal experts say will reduce customers' recourse for any future data sharing with government authorities or others.
The company's policy overhaul follows recent reports that AT&T was one of several leading telecom providers that allowed the National Security Agency warrantless access to its voice and data networks as part of the Bush administration's war on terror.
"They're obviously trying to avoid a hornet's nest of consumer-protection lawsuits," said Chris Hoofnagle, a San Francisco privacy consultant and former senior counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center.
"They've written this new policy so broadly that they've given themselves maximum flexibility when it comes to disclosing customers' records," he said.
AT&T is being sued by San Francisco's Electronic Frontier Foundation for allegedly allowing the NSA to tap into the company's data network, providing warrantless access to customers' e-mails and Web browsing.
AT&T is also believed to have participated in President Bush's acknowledged domestic spying program, in which the NSA was given warrantless access to U.S. citizens' phone calls.
AT&T said in a statement last month that it "has a long history of vigorously protecting customer privacy" and that "our customers expect, deserve and receive nothing less than our fullest commitment to their privacy."
But the company also asserted that it has "an obligation to assist law enforcement and other government agencies responsible for protecting the public welfare, whether it be an individual or the security interests of the entire nation."
Under its former privacy policy, introduced in September 2004, AT&T said it might use customer's data "to respond to subpoenas, court orders or other legal process, to the extent required and/or permitted by law."
The new version, which is specifically for Internet and video customers, is much more explicit about the company's right to cooperate with government agencies in any security-related matters -- and AT&T's belief that customers' data belongs to the company, not customers.
"While your account information may be personal to you, these records constitute business records that are owned by AT&T," the new policy declares. "As such, AT&T may disclose such records to protect its legitimate business interests, safeguard others, or respond to legal process."
It says the company "may disclose your information in response to subpoenas, court orders, or other legal process," omitting the earlier language about such processes being "required and/or permitted by law."
The new policy states that AT&T "may also use your information in order to investigate, prevent or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud (or) situations involving potential threats to the physical safety of any person" -- conditions that would appear to embrace any terror-related circumstance.
Ray Everett-Church, a Silicon Valley privacy consultant, said it seems clear that AT&T has substantially modified its privacy policy in light of revelations about the government's domestic spying program.
"It's obvious that they are trying to stretch their blanket pretty tightly to cover as many exposed bits as possible," he said.
Gail Hillebrand, a staff attorney at Consumers Union in San Francisco, said the declaration that AT&T owns customers' data represents the most significant departure from the company's previous policy.
"It creates the impression that they can do whatever they want," she said. "This is the real heart of AT&T's new policy and is a pretty fundamental difference from how most customers probably see things."
John Britton, an AT&T spokesman, denied that the updated privacy policy marks a shift in the company's approach to customers' info.
"We don't see this as anything new," he said. "Our goal was to make the policy easier to read and easier for customers to understand."
He acknowledged that there was no explicit requirement in the past that customers accept the privacy policy as a condition for service. And he acknowledged that the 2004 policy said nothing about customers' data being owned by AT&T.
But Britton insisted that these elements essentially could be found between the lines of the former policy.
"There were many things that were implied in the last policy." He said. "We're just clarifying the last policy."
AT&T's new privacy policy is the first to include the company's video service. AT&T says it's spending $4.6 billion to roll out TV programming to 19 million homes nationwide.
The policy refers to two AT&T video services -- Homezone and U-verse. Homezone is AT&T's satellite TV service, offered in conjunction with Dish Network, and U-verse is the new cablelike video service delivered over phone lines.
In a section on "usage information," the privacy policy says AT&T will collect "information about viewing, game, recording and other navigation choices that you and those in your household make when using Homezone or AT&T U-verse TV Services."
The Cable Communications Policy Act of 1984 stipulates that cable and satellite companies can't collect or disclose information about customers' viewing habits.
The law is silent on video services offered by phone companies via the Internet, basically because legislators never anticipated such technology would be available.
AT&T's Britton said the 1984 law doesn't apply to his company's video service because AT&T isn't a cable provider. "We are not building a cable TV network," he said. "We're building an Internet protocol television network."
But Andrew Johnson, a spokesman for cable heavyweight Comcast, disputed this perspective.
"Video is video is video," he said. "If you're delivering programming over a telecommunications network to a TV set, all rules need to be the same."
AT&T's new and former privacy policies both state that "conducting business ethically and ensuring privacy is critical to maintaining the public's trust and achieving success in a dynamic and competitive business climate."
Both also state that "privacy responsibility" extends "to the privacy of conversations and to the flow of information in data form." As such, both say that "the trust of our customers necessitates vigilant, responsible privacy protections."
The 2004 policy, though, went one step further. It said AT&T realizes "that privacy is an important issue for our customers and members."
The new policy makes no such acknowledgment.
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CANCEL ATT SERVICES
Guest
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Post by CANCEL ATT SERVICES on Jun 23, 2006 17:08:30 GMT -5
CANCEL YOUR AT&T SERVICES
CANCEL YOUR AT&T SERVICES
CANCEL YOUR AT&T SERVICES
What's wrong with people? CANCEL your AT&T services. If you own a small business, this is even more important.
Ahhh, never mind. Nobody really cares.
CANCEL YOUR AT&T SERVICES
CANCEL YOUR AT&T SERVICES
CANCEL YOUR AT&T SERVICES
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Post by LLP on Jun 23, 2006 18:24:27 GMT -5
It's not about having nothing to hide. It's about the common sense American principle of mind your own business. And, it's about a growing tyranny. That's a strong word, but it fits.
Our government _should_ be protecting us from domineering corporate bullying. Instead, it partners with them.
Some people don't care. Good for them. I do. I want a reasonable degree of privacy. Why? Because it irritates me to have some company recording my behavior however uninteresting. Because that's what I want and I need provide no further justification.
Yet, what choice do we have? Boycott AT&T? And then what, trust Verizon? Comcast? All of these are quasi, if not outright, monopolies. Individuals are rendered nearly powerless with only a Hobson's choice.
There's a bigger issue: our failing government. Both parties have become hopelessly corrupt, pandering for votes based on emotion and superficial wedge issues rather than providing wise leadership and catering to special interests rather than serving the common welfare. We need to do what corporations like to do -- restaff and clean up the whole mess.
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Post by EBG on Jun 23, 2006 19:23:50 GMT -5
Since AT&T is really SBC, who has done nothing but screw customers over from the very beginning. Why would we all of a sudden expect ethical behavior from them? They are from Texas, the home of unethical businesses.
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Post by WaTcHeR on Jun 27, 2006 14:03:50 GMT -5
SAN FRANCISCO - Privacy rights advocates pressed a U.S. judge on Friday to allow their lawsuit against AT&T to go forward, charging the telecommunications giant is breaking the law by helping a U.S. government eavesdropping program.
Lawyers for AT&T, which will neither confirm nor deny it is letting the U.S. government monitor its telephone and e-mail traffic as part of a counterterrorism effort, shot back in U.S. District Court in San Francisco that the Electronic Frontier Foundation's charges were based on hearsay and that the group lacked standing to bring its lawsuit.
Additionally, a lawyer from the U.S. Justice Department told Chief Judge Vaughn Walker that any court review of the Bush administration's program of monitoring electronic communications to spot telephone calls and e-mail traffic to and from suspected terrorists must show the greatest deference to national security interests.
The government cannot openly discuss whether AT&T is lending its network to the effort, and it wants the lawsuit dismissed because evidence in a trial could compromise the eavesdropping program President Bush has confirmed exists, Assistant Attorney General Peter Keisler said.
"It's a secret of the highest order," Keisler told Walker, referring to what role, if any, AT&T has in the initiative.
AT&T and other phone companies face lawsuits claiming they have let the National Security Agency, which tracks signals intelligence, the run of private networks and have surrendered call records of millions of customers without permission.
AT&T will only say it follows the law. That gives the company immunity from liability from possible rights violations from the National Security Administration's effort, AT&T lawyer Bradford Berenson of the Sidley Austin law firm told Walker.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation should focus its lawsuit on the U.S. government and leave AT&T out of the dispute, Berenson said.
"Congress gave companies this immunity to ensure their cooperation with critical national security issues," AT&T said in a statement issued after Friday's hearing. "Ultimately, the Electronic Frontier Foundation is suing the wrong party. Their issue is with the government."
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Post by WaTcHeR on Jun 30, 2006 13:56:53 GMT -5
06.30.2006 - WASHINGTON — Members of the House and Senate intelligence committees confirm that the National Security Agency has compiled a massive database of domestic phone call records. But some lawmakers also say that cooperation by the nation's telecommunication companies was not as extensive as first reported by USA TODAY on May 11. Several lawmakers, briefed in secret by intelligence officials about the program after the story was published, described a call records database that is enormous but incomplete. Most asked that they not be identified by name, and many offered only limited responses to questions, citing national security concerns. In the May 11 article that revealed the database, USA TODAY reported that its sources said AT&T, BellSouth and Verizon had agreed to provide the NSA with call records. AT&T, which is the nation's largest telecommunications company, providing service to tens of millions of Americans, hasn't confirmed or denied its participation with the database. BellSouth and Verizon have denied that they contracted with the NSA to turn over phone records. On May 12, an attorney for former Qwest CEO Joseph Nacchio confirmed the USA TODAY report that Qwest had declined to participate in the NSA program. Most members of the intelligence committees wouldn't discuss which companies cooperated with the NSA. However, several did offer more information about the program's breadth and scope, confirming some elements of USA TODAY's report and contradicting others: • Nineteen lawmakers who had been briefed on the program verified that the NSA has built a database that includes records of Americans' domestic phone calls. The program collected records of the numbers dialed and the length of calls, sources have said, but did not involve listening to the calls or recording their content. • Five members of the intelligence committees said they were told by senior intelligence officials that AT&T participated in the NSA domestic calls program. AT&T, asked to comment, issued a written statement Thursday. "The U.S. Department of Justice has stated that AT&T may neither confirm nor deny AT&T's participation in the alleged NSA program because doing so would cause 'exceptionally grave harm to national security' and would violate both civil and criminal statutes," it said. "Under these circumstances, AT&T is not able to respond to such allegations." • Five members of the intelligence committees said they were told that BellSouth did not turn over domestic call records to the NSA. Asked about BellSouth's denial, Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said, "What they said appears to be accurate." Still, BellSouth customers' call records could end up in the NSA database, he said. "Obviously, a BellSouth customer can contract with AT&T (for long-distance phone service). There is a possibility that numbers are available from other phone companies." • Three lawmakers said that they had been told that Verizon did not turn over call records to the NSA. However, those three and another lawmaker said MCI, the long-distance carrier that Verizon acquired in January, did provide call records to the government. While Verizon has denied providing call records to the NSA, it has declined to comment on whether MCI participated in the calls database program. "The President has referred to an NSA program, which he authorized, directed against al-Qaeda," Verizon said in a written statement May 12. "Because that program is highly classified, Verizon cannot comment on that program, nor can we confirm or deny whether we have had any relationship to it." The statement also said the company was now "ensuring that Verizon's policies are implemented at that entity (MCI) and that all its activities fully comply with law." In the weeks since the database was revealed, congressional and intelligence sources have offered other new details about its scope and effectiveness. "It was not cross-city calls. It was not mom-and-pop calls," said Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, who receives briefings as chairman of the Senate Appropriations Defense subcommittee. "It was long-distance. It was targeted on (geographic) areas of interest, places to which calls were believed to have come from al-Qaeda affiliates and from which calls were made to al-Qaeda affiliates." Other lawmakers who were briefed about the program expressed concerns that gaps in the database could undercut its usefulness in identifying terrorist cells. "It's difficult to say you're covering all terrorist activity in the United States if you don't have all the (phone) numbers," Chambliss said. "It probably would be better to have records of every telephone company." "The database is not complete," said another lawmaker who was briefed on the program, speaking on condition of anonymity because the information is classified. "We don't know if this works yet." Other publications have characterized the breadth of the database and how it is used. The New York Times reported on May 12, for instance, that a senior government official had confirmed that the NSA had access to records of most telephone calls in the USA but said the records are used in a limited way to track "known bad guys." The Washington Post reported on May 12 that "sources with knowledge of the program" said that the Bush administration had been collecting the domestic telephone records in "gargantuan databases" and that the "companies cooperating with the NSA dominate the U.S. telecommunications market and connect hundreds of billions of telephone calls each year." President Bush and his top aides have defended the legality of the program, although they haven't directly confirmed its existence. Three days after the USA TODAY story was published, national security adviser Stephen Hadley said on CBS' Face the Nation that he couldn't "confirm or deny the claims that are in the USA TODAY story." He went on: "But it's very interesting what that story does not claim. It does not claim that the government was listening on domestic phone calls. It does not claim that names were passed, that addresses were passed, that content was passed. It's really about calling records, if you read the story. ... There are a variety of ways in which those records lawfully can be provided to the government." At a news conference two weeks later, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales made a similar point. "There has been no confirmation about any details relating to the USA TODAY story," he said. "I will say that what was in the USA TODAY story did relate to business records." Citing a 1979 Supreme Court decision, he said, "There is no reasonable expectation of privacy in those kinds of records." Lawmakers who were briefed about the program disagree about whether it's legal. "It was within the president's inherent powers," said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., a member of the House Intelligence Committee, said there was a "schizophrenia in the presentation" by the administration. Officials say, " 'It's legal,' " she said. "But in the same breath they say, 'Perhaps we should take another look at FISA.' " FISA refers to the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which established a secret court that can grant warrants for eavesdropping. Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J., another member of the House Intelligence Committee, said, "I find it interesting that it seems the government is asking telephone companies to do things that their customers and shareholders would find totally unpalatable." Debate over the database continues in several areas: • In federal courts, at least 20 class-action lawsuits have been filed alleging that the government and phone companies have violated the rights of people whose calls have been reviewed by the NSA. The Justice Department signaled its intention in a court filing in Chicago this month to assert the "military and state secrets privilege" in all of them. That privilege allows the government to seek the dismissal of lawsuits if pursuing them would imperil national security. • In New Jersey, the state attorney general is investigating whether telephone companies released confidential information without the consent of their customers. The federal government asked a court this month to quash subpoenas the state had issued to phone companies seeking information. • At the Federal Communications Commission, the American Civil Liberties Union requested this month that approval of AT&T's acquisition of BellSouth be withheld until the commission reviews the companies' dealings with the NSA. However, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said last month that the commission couldn't investigate complaints about the phone companies and the NSA because the reported activities were classified. • On Capitol Hill, Vice President Cheney held private talks this month with Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Cheney discouraged them from supporting Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter's vow to call telecommunications executives before the panel to answer questions about the database. Specter, R-Pa., protested to Cheney in an angry public letter. The White House then agreed to talks with Specter on legislation he has drafted that would give the administration the option of putting the NSA's warrantless-surveillance program — which includes domestic wiretapping without a court warrant when one participant in a conversation is overseas — under the scrutiny of the FISA court. "I'm prepared to defer, on a temporary basis, calling in the telephone companies," Specter said. If the discussions on his legislation fall through, however, he said, he will move again to demand testimony from the telephone executives about the database. This story was reported by Leslie Cauley, John Diamond, Jim Drinkard, Peter Eisler, Thomas Frank, Kevin Johnson and Susan Page. It was written by Page. www.rawstory.com/showoutarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.usatoday.com%2Fnews%2Fwashington%2F2006-06-30-nsa_x.htm
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Post by KC on Jul 2, 2006 22:26:39 GMT -5
July 02, 2006 - (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. National Security Agency asked AT&T Inc. to help it set up a domestic call monitoring site seven months before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, lawyers claimed June 23 in court papers filed in New York federal court. The allegation is part of a court filing adding AT&T, the nation's largest telephone company, as a defendant in a breach of privacy case filed earlier this month on behalf of Verizon Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. customers. The suit alleges that the three carriers, the NSA and President George W. Bush violated the Telecommunications Act of 1934 and the U.S. Constitution, and seeks money damages. ``The Bush Administration asserted this became necessary after 9/11,'' plaintiff's lawyer Carl Mayer said in a telephone interview. ``This undermines that assertion.'' The lawsuit is related to an alleged NSA program to record and store data on calls placed by subscribers. More than 30 suits have been filed over claims that the carriers, the three biggest U.S. telephone companies, violated the privacy rights of their customers by cooperating with the NSA in an effort to track alleged terrorists. ``The U.S. Department of Justice has stated that AT&T may neither confirm nor deny AT&T's participation in the alleged NSA program because doing so would cause `exceptionally grave harm to national security' and would violate both civil and criminal statutes,'' AT&T spokesman Dave Pacholczyk said in an e-mail. U.S. Department of Justice spokesman Charles Miller and NSA spokesman Don Weber declined to comment. Pioneer Groundbreaker The NSA initiative, code-named ``Pioneer Groundbreaker,'' asked AT&T unit AT&T Solutions to build exclusively for NSA use a network operations center which duplicated AT&T's Bedminster, New Jersey facility, the court papers claimed. That plan was abandoned in favor of the NSA acquiring the monitoring technology itself, plaintiffs' lawyers Bruce Afran said. The NSA says on its Web site that in June 2000, the agency was seeking bids for a project to ``modernize and improve its information technology infrastructure.'' The plan, which included the privatization of its ``non-mission related'' systems support, was said to be part of Project Groundbreaker. Mayer said the Pioneer project is ``a different component'' of that initiative. Mayer and Afran said an unnamed former employee of the AT&T unit provided them with evidence that the NSA approached the carrier with the proposed plan. Afran said he has seen the worker's log book and independently confirmed the source's participation in the project. He declined to identify the employee. Stop Suit On June 9, U.S. District Court Judge P. Kevin Castel in New York stopped the lawsuit from moving forward while the Federal Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation in Washington rules on a U.S. request to assign all related telephone records lawsuits to a single judge. Robert Varettoni, a spokesman for Verizon, said he was unaware of the allegations against AT&T and declined to comment. Earlier this week, he issued a statement on behalf of the company that Verizon had not been asked by the NSA to provide customer phone records from either its hard-wired or wireless networks. Verizon also said that it couldn't confirm or deny ``whether it has any relationship to the classified NSA program.'' Mayer's lawsuit was filed following a May 11 USA Today report that the U.S. government was using the NSA to monitor domestic telephone calls. Earlier today, USA Today said it couldn't confirm its contention that BellSouth or Verizon had contracts with the NSA to provide a database of domestic customer phone call records. Jeff Battcher, a spokesman for Atlanta-based BellSouth, said that vindicated the company. ``We never turned over any records to the NSA,'' he said in a telephone interview. ``We've been clear all along that they've never contacted us. Nobody in our company has ever had any contact with the NSA.'' The case is McMurray v. Verizon Communications Inc., 06cv3650, in the Southern District of New York. www.rawstory.com/showoutarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bloomberg.com%2Fapps%2Fnews%3Fpid%3D20601087%26sid%3DabIV0cO64zJE%26refer%3D
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Post by WaTcHeR on Jul 21, 2006 14:38:49 GMT -5
07.21.2006 - SAN FRANCISCO - A federal judge Thursday refused to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the Bush administration's domestic spying program, rejecting government claims that allowing the case to go forward could expose state secrets and jeopardize the war on terror.
In declining to dismiss AT&T Inc. from the lawsuit filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation privacy group, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker suggested the case had some merit. "AT&T cannot seriously contend that a reasonable entity in its position could have believed that the alleged domestic dragnet was legal," he wrote.
This is the first time a judge has ruled on the government's claim of a "state secrets privilege" in a suit alleging that telecommunications companies and the government are illegally intercepting Americans' communications without warrants.
A Justice Department spokes-man said the administration was reviewing the ruling.
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Post by WaTcHeR on Jul 26, 2006 13:35:07 GMT -5
07.26.2006 - WASHINGTON — The federal government sued two members of the Missouri Public Service Commission on Tuesday to stop them from seeking information about customer records that telephone companies may have given to the National Security Agency. IN A CHICAGO CASE: Judge dismisses phone records lawsuit The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in St. Louis, claims disclosure of any information the Missouri regulatory body wants to obtain could cause "exceptionally grave harm to national security." Public Service Commission members Robert Clayton and Steve Gaw issued subpoenas last month to find out whether AT&T Inc. supplied Missouri customer information and calling records to the NSA in violation of Missouri privacy rules. The Missouri subpoenas came after a USA TODAY story reported that AT&T and other phone companies handed over phone records of millions of Americans to the NSA after the Sept. 11 attacks. In its lawsuit, the Justice Department says the federal government has "exclusive control vis-a-vis the states with respect to foreign intelligence gathering, national security, that conduct of foreign affairs and the conduct of military affairs." The government asserts that Missouri officials lack authority to compel AT&T — and any other phone company that serves Missouri residents — from responding to the subpoenas because highly classified and sensitive information is involved. Responding to the lawsuit, Clayton said the government "cites no law or court order which allows AT&T to ignore or violate Missouri law." "We in no way want to interfere with activity that relates to national security, but we have a legal and moral obligation to enforce Missouri privacy law," Clayton said. "We are asking very general questions to ensure that our own laws are being followed." Last month, the Justice Department filed a similar lawsuit against the New Jersey attorney general and other state officials to stop them from obtaining information about phone company cooperation with the NSA. The Justice Department has said more than 20 lawsuits have been filed around the country charging phone companies with illegally assisting the NSA. In Missouri, a Cole County judge has set an Aug. 28 hearing on the request from Clayton and Gaw to compel AT&T to comply with the subpoenas. www.rawstory.com/showoutarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.usatoday.com%2Fnews%2Fwashington%2F2006-07-25-nsa-lawsuit_x.htm
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Post by WaTcHeR on Aug 30, 2006 11:57:22 GMT -5
08.30.2006 - AT&T on Tuesday said hackers broke into one of its computer systems and accessed personal data on thousands of customers who used its online store. The information that was illegally accessed includes credit card numbers, AT&T said in a statement. The cyberattack affects about 19,000 customers who purchased equipment for high-speed DSL Internet connections through AT&T's Web site, the company said. "We deeply regret this incident," Priscilla Hill-Ardoin, chief privacy officer for AT&T, said in the statement. "We will work closely with law enforcement to bring these data thieves to account." The break-in occurred over the weekend and was discovered within hours, after which the online store was shut down, AT&T said. The telecommunications company quickly notified credit card companies and is in the process of contacting the affected customers via e-mail, phone and letter, it said. The incident is the latest in a long string of data security breaches. Since early last year, more than 90 million personal records have been exposed in dozens of incidents, according to information compiled by the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. AT&T is offering to pay for credit monitoring services for customers whose accounts have been impacted because they could be at risk of identity fraud. The company also has made available a toll-free number to affected customers to call for more information. news.com.com/2100-1029_3-6110765.html?tag=nefd.top
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