Open email to Deputy Attny. Gen. Cole,
Senators Leahy, Wyden, Durbin,
and Rep. Sellsenbrenner:
Dear Deputy Cole, Senators Leahy, Wyden, and Durban and Rep Sellsenbrenner,
I am directing this email to you, because you were each mentioned in a recent article by the Washington Times covering various questions and disagreements concerning the collection of citizen telephone data by the National Security Agency (NSA).
The basis of the disagreement appears to be a lack of understanding on exactly what the NSA has been doing. It is said that the NASA requires phone companies to turn over data for every phone call made in the U.S., including which numbers were dialed and the length of the conversations. It was also reported that NSA Director Gen. Keith Alexander said data-collection does not include information on where the calls were made on mobile phones, or the names or addresses of individual telephone subscribers.
While I am not an expert in data processing, I have some experience with it. If I collect a large number of telephone numbers of calls that have been made, all I have is a mixed compilation of telephone numbers. I can sort them by area code and likely by local municipality, and can then count the number of calls made from each area and each municipality. If there are repeat calls, I can then also count the number of calls repeated. However, if to each telephone number a time is related, I then know that for each of my telephone numbers listed the call was made at a specific indicated time. That's all I know. I don't know who made the call, who they called, or the subject of the conversation in addition, my area code information is valid only for land lines, for cell phones, my area code information is useless, since the call might have been placed in any location where the person holding the cell phone happened to be.
This all means to me that I am completely ignorant concerning the finer points of telephone surveillance or the NSA is trying to hoodwink me. I suspect the latter. The telephone companies have substantially more information on each telephone call than just the fact that a number made a telephone call at a specific time. It is likely that that information is going to the NSA. While the NSA may honestly be claiming that they have not gone further into the detail than just the telephone number and the time of call, that seems unlikely to me, because the ancillary information is available to the NSA, and without that ancillary information, all of the other records are useless in any attempts to uncover a potential terrorist.
With all that said, I encourage each of you to continue your investigations of what the NSA is doing and the techniques that it is using. The claim will always be made by the NSA that this is confidential information, which if publicly released, would be of great value to terrorist organizations. I'm sure that has a modicum of truth, but like anything else done by government agencies, the claim will be abused. I'm sure that you can collect substantial information of non-confidential nature, wherein you can come to a conclusion as to whether the NSA is violating the Fourth Amendment of civilian rights, as I strongly suspect it is.
However, I am not claiming that the NSA should be shut down, nor any other similar extreme measure. Citizens are entitled to a program of protection from terrorism from their government, and I am sure this can be accomplished without contradicting the citizen's Fourth Amendment rights. I have mentioned in a previous message the obvious ways to determine potential terrorists, which are messages from foreign governments, terrorist organization websites, CIA agents, etc. Each of these then leads to a suspicion of wrongdoing, on which further investigative techniques can be used through issuance of warrants. Simply put, I find it unnecessary to usurp the privacy of the average US citizen in order to protect him.
As previously mentioned, government agencies routinely have a tendency for abuse. All of these agencies have been set up by Congress with appointment to the President and his Administration to operate each of the programs. However, Congress obviously sees the fallacy of ignoring any subsequent responsibility and generally has established an oversight committee. Both the Senate and the House probably have an oversight committee with respect to activities of the NSA. If they do not, those committees should be established for routine attention to NSA activities. In this relationship, any confidential and secretive information being used by the NSA and which could be deleterious if known to the enemy, should be discussed with the oversight committee. If employees of the NSA are considered good security risks, there is no reason to consider that Senators and House members should be any poorer risks.
Please keep up the good work of investigation to your complete satisfaction that you are familiar with all NSA activities. If necessary, change the law and be sure to set up the oversight committees, if they do not now exist.
Dear Deputy Cole, Senators Leahy, Wyden, and Durban and Rep Sellsenbrenner,
I am directing this email to you, because you were each mentioned in a recent article by the Washington Times covering various questions and disagreements concerning the collection of citizen telephone data by the National Security Agency (NSA).
The basis of the disagreement appears to be a lack of understanding on exactly what the NSA has been doing. It is said that the NASA requires phone companies to turn over data for every phone call made in the U.S., including which numbers were dialed and the length of the conversations. It was also reported that NSA Director Gen. Keith Alexander said data-collection does not include information on where the calls were made on mobile phones, or the names or addresses of individual telephone subscribers.
While I am not an expert in data processing, I have some experience with it. If I collect a large number of telephone numbers of calls that have been made, all I have is a mixed compilation of telephone numbers. I can sort them by area code and likely by local municipality, and can then count the number of calls made from each area and each municipality. If there are repeat calls, I can then also count the number of calls repeated. However, if to each telephone number a time is related, I then know that for each of my telephone numbers listed the call was made at a specific indicated time. That's all I know. I don't know who made the call, who they called, or the subject of the conversation in addition, my area code information is valid only for land lines, for cell phones, my area code information is useless, since the call might have been placed in any location where the person holding the cell phone happened to be.
This all means to me that I am completely ignorant concerning the finer points of telephone surveillance or the NSA is trying to hoodwink me. I suspect the latter. The telephone companies have substantially more information on each telephone call than just the fact that a number made a telephone call at a specific time. It is likely that that information is going to the NSA. While the NSA may honestly be claiming that they have not gone further into the detail than just the telephone number and the time of call, that seems unlikely to me, because the ancillary information is available to the NSA, and without that ancillary information, all of the other records are useless in any attempts to uncover a potential terrorist.
With all that said, I encourage each of you to continue your investigations of what the NSA is doing and the techniques that it is using. The claim will always be made by the NSA that this is confidential information, which if publicly released, would be of great value to terrorist organizations. I'm sure that has a modicum of truth, but like anything else done by government agencies, the claim will be abused. I'm sure that you can collect substantial information of non-confidential nature, wherein you can come to a conclusion as to whether the NSA is violating the Fourth Amendment of civilian rights, as I strongly suspect it is.
However, I am not claiming that the NSA should be shut down, nor any other similar extreme measure. Citizens are entitled to a program of protection from terrorism from their government, and I am sure this can be accomplished without contradicting the citizen's Fourth Amendment rights. I have mentioned in a previous message the obvious ways to determine potential terrorists, which are messages from foreign governments, terrorist organization websites, CIA agents, etc. Each of these then leads to a suspicion of wrongdoing, on which further investigative techniques can be used through issuance of warrants. Simply put, I find it unnecessary to usurp the privacy of the average US citizen in order to protect him.
As previously mentioned, government agencies routinely have a tendency for abuse. All of these agencies have been set up by Congress with appointment to the President and his Administration to operate each of the programs. However, Congress obviously sees the fallacy of ignoring any subsequent responsibility and generally has established an oversight committee. Both the Senate and the House probably have an oversight committee with respect to activities of the NSA. If they do not, those committees should be established for routine attention to NSA activities. In this relationship, any confidential and secretive information being used by the NSA and which could be deleterious if known to the enemy, should be discussed with the oversight committee. If employees of the NSA are considered good security risks, there is no reason to consider that Senators and House members should be any poorer risks.
Please keep up the good work of investigation to your complete satisfaction that you are familiar with all NSA activities. If necessary, change the law and be sure to set up the oversight committees, if they do not now exist.
No comments:
Post a Comment