Saturday, September 14, 2013

NSA Turns Spying Eye South

Related: The Kerry Chronicles: South America Sour on U.S. Spying

Can't say I blame them.

"US accused of spying on Brazil, Mexico leaders; Officials urge new protections against snooping" by Bradley Brooks and Marco Sibaja |  Associated Press, September 03, 2013

RIO DE JANEIRO — The Brazilian government condemned a US spy program that reportedly targeted the nation’s leader, labeled it an ‘‘unacceptable invasion’’ of sovereignty, and called Monday for international regulations to protect citizens and governments alike from cyber espionage.

You know, it's one thing to do it to the rabble, all governments do, but when you do it to a member of your own club, that's traitorous.

A report that aired Sunday night on Globo TV cited 2012 documents from NSA leaker Edward Snowden that indicated the United States intercepted President Dilma Rousseff’s e-mails and telephone calls, along with those of Mexico’s president, Enrique Pena Nieto.

Pena Nieto’s communications were being monitored even before he was elected as president in July 2012. Mexico’s government said Monday that it had expressed its concerns to the US ambassador and directly to the Obama administration.

In a sign that fallout over the spy program is spreading, the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo reported that Rousseff is considering canceling her October trip to the United States, where she has been scheduled to be honored with a state dinner. Folha cited unidentified Rousseff aides. The president’s office declined to comment.

The Brazilian Foreign Ministry called in US Ambassador Thomas Shannon and told him Brazil expects the White House to provide a prompt written explanation over the espionage allegations....

All I can think of is we are complete assholes, sorry.

Earlier, Senator Ricardo Ferraco, head of the Brazilian Senate’s foreign relations committee, said lawmakers already had decided to formally investigate the US program’s focus on Brazil because of earlier disclosures that the country was a top target of the NSA spying in the region. He said the inquiry would likely start this week.

Yeah, no kidding. I thought we were friends.

‘‘I feel a mixture of amazement and indignation. It seems like there are no limits. When the phone of the president of the republic is monitored, it’s hard to imagine what else might be happening,’’ Ferraco told reporters in Brasilia. ‘‘It’s unacceptable that in a country like ours, where there is absolutely no climate of terrorism, that there is this type of spying.’’

It seems that way because it is that way.

The “Fantastico’’ news program on Sunday interviewed US journalist Glenn Greenwald, who lives in Rio de Janeiro and first broke the story about the NSA program in Britain’s Guardian newspaper after receiving tens of thousands of documents from Snowden. Greenwald said in the interview that a document dated June 2012 shows that Pena Nieto’s e-mails were being read.

The date on the Pena Nieto document was a month before he was elected president. The document indicated who Pena Nieto would like to name to some government posts, among other information. It is not clear if the spying is continuing.

It's safe to conclude that it is.

As for Brazil’s leader, the NSA document ‘‘doesn’t include any of Dilma’s specific intercepted messages, the way it does for Nieto,’’ Greenwald said in an e-mail. ‘‘But it is clear in several ways that her communications were intercepted, including the use of DNI Presenter, which is a program used by NSA to open and read e-mails and online chats.’’

The US targeting mapped out the aides with whom Rousseff communicated and tracked patterns of how those aides communicated with one another and also with third parties, according to the document.

This is what YOUR TAX DOLLARS are being spent on in this time of AUSTERITY, Americans.

In July, Greenwald co-wrote articles in the O Globo newspaper that said documents leaked by Snowden indicate Brazil was the largest target in Latin America for the NSA program, which collected data on billions of e-mails and calls flowing through Brazil.

The spokesman for the US Embassy in Brazil’s capital, Dean Chaves, said in an e-mailed response that US officials would not comment ‘‘on every specific alleged intelligence activity.’’ But he said, ‘‘We value our relationship with Brazil, understand that they have valid concerns about these disclosures, and we will continue to engage with the Brazilian government in an effort to address those concerns.’’

Those words are so hollow.

In Mexico City, the Mexican foreign ministry said it sent a diplomatic note to the United States asking for a thorough investigation. It said officials also summoned the US ambassador to express Mexico’s concerns.

The US Embassy in Mexico declined to comment.

Rousseff and Pena Nieto are to meet with President Obama at the G-20 summit this week in St. Petersburg.

Was he too busy to meet with you, too?

In addition, Rousseff was also scheduled to visit the White House in October during the first state visit by a Brazilian leader in more than two decades.

I was told about that above. She may cancel, and I think she should.

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Related:

"British government offers explanation on seized data; Says the material posed a threat to national security" by Danica Kirka |  Associated Press, August 31, 2013

LONDON — The British government fears that material seized from the partner of a Guardian journalist could compromise counterterrorism operations, a senior national security adviser said Friday, arguing that intelligence agents in the field could be exposed as a result of the data.

Pfffffft!

It was the first time the government has offered specific reasons why security services and police are so concerned about material seized from David Miranda — the partner of Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald.

Miranda was detained at Heathrow Airport and questioned for nearly nine hours under terrorism legislation earlier this month, but the government had earlier said only that it required access to the files on national security grounds.

Greenwald has written stories based on material leaked by former US National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. Miranda, a 28-year-old university student, was traveling home to Brazil after visiting Germany, where he met with Laura Poitras, a US filmmaker who has worked with Greenwald on the NSA stories.

Oliver Robbins offered a sweeping view of the government concerns before Britain’s High Court, saying the 58,000 classified UK documents are ‘‘highly likely’’ to describe techniques used in counterterror operations and could reveal the identities of UK intelligence officers abroad.

‘‘It would cause real harm to the work of the UK’s national security and intelligence agencies if an intelligence officer were to have his or her identity disclosed on anything other than an authorized and limited basis,’’ Robbins said in the statement dated this week ahead of a Friday hearing.

Guardian editor-in-chief Alan Rusbridger dismissed the statement as containing ‘‘unsubstantiated and inaccurate claims,’’ and questioned the danger, arguing that the government had done little to address the issue before Miranda’s detention.

‘‘The way the government has behaved over the past three months belies the picture of urgency and crisis they have painted,’’ Rusbridger said. ‘‘The government claims that they have at all times acted with the utmost urgency because of what they believed to be a grave threat to national security. However, their behavior since early June — when the Guardian’s first Snowden articles were published — belies these claims.’’

The statement came as the Guardian and the government agreed to allow the authorities to keep sifting through documents as long as it was on national security grounds.

I must admit, the cooperation with government and the Washington Post worries me and makes me suspicious.

But Friday’s decision expanded that agreement, allowing the material to also be examined for ‘‘specified criminal grounds.’’ The government revealed the criminal investigation into Snowden’s leak of classified material to the Guardian during a court hearing last week.

The agreement came after the Guardian unsuccessfully sued last week to stop police from combing through digital material seized from Miranda.

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You know, when you put together the gathering up of all communications along with the point of Panamanian propaganda, you must realize nothing happens on this earth without the PTB knowing about it, and thus it all must be approved. The terrorists, the perverts, the drug dealers, the bank fraud, all of it. 

They can't NOT KNOW what is going on. 

Also see: Globe Not on Guardian 

They gave everything they had to Israel and my jewspaper never saw fit to mention it?