US President Barack Obama, in his much-anticipated speech on Friday, proposed a series of changes to the NSA surveillance activities that have caused a stir in recent months. As we also expected from iGuRu.gr, important aspects of the issue were not mentioned at all and he very diplomatically avoided bringing to the fore important changes that had been proposed to him by the team that had undertaken the evaluation of the secret service.
Here are five points Obama said he would not change or did not mention at all during his NSA speech.
1. Other mass surveillance and data collection programs.
The US president's reference to the telephone metadata collection program, and his announcement of its semi-termination, may have deceived some Americans (until it was revealed that the service was proceeding normally) as the NSA would not stop collecting almost all the files from the their phone calls. The difference is that the database and analysts who can process the data will no longer be under the jurisdiction of the NSA. Obama supported the proposal made to him by the internal intelligence assessment team, that is, to take the database from the hands of the NSA.
But what about the massive collection of metadata on the Internet used to build American social data graphs? Obama blindly ignored the fact that he is violating Article 702 of the FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance) bill. What will happen to the SMS collection? What about collecting millions of email and instant messaging data, from Americans and non-Americans alike?
Obama did not say anything about all of this. These programs are likely to continue.
2. Public prosecutor at the FISA court.
Η εσωτερική ομάδα αξιολόγησης για την NSA συνέστησε το διορισμό ενός "εισαγγελέα για το Δημόσιο Συμφέρον " για να εκπροσωπεί τα συμφέροντα του απλού πολίτη, όπως την protection of privacy and individual liberties before the Secret Service Supervisory Authority.
Ο Obama δεν έθεσε θέμα δημόσιου κατήγορου, αλλά όπως ανέφερε, θα πρέπει να υπάρχει μια επιτροπή εμπειρογνωμόνων που θα συμμετέχει στις διαδικασίες του Δικαστηρίου της FISA. Όμως δεν θα παρεμβαίνει σε κάθε περίπτωση. Η φωνή τους θα ακούγετε μόνο "σε σημαντικές περιπτώσεις" , όταν το δικαστήριο θα πρέπει να αποφασίσει για ευρύτερες αποφάσεις που σχετίζονται με την προστασία της ιδιωτικής ζωής και το πώς η NSA διεξάγει την επιτήρηση. Με λίγα λόγια η ύπαρξη ενός συνηγόρου υπεράσπισης των ατομικών ελευθεριών στο δικαστήριο FISA είναι "περιττή" και ενδεχομένως αντιπαραγωγική. Σκεφτείτε όμως για τι "παραγωγή" μιλάμε.
3. NSA's efforts to undermine encryption standards
In September, as it passed, documents leaked by Edward Snowden revealed that the NSA is undertaking multifaceted efforts to undermine and weaken encryption and security standards to enable the secret service to gain access to communications that public opinion Internet believes it is safe.
The NSA, as well as the FBI, have been accused of undermining encryption. Of course, both agencies have denied these claims. The NSA also reportedly gave the company security RSA 10 millions dollars in a secret contract to secure weaker encryption protocols.
Read: New scandal: NSA has paid 10 million to RSA to weaken encryption
Υπό το φως αυτών των αποκαλύψεων, η εσωτερική ομάδα αξιολόγησης ενέκρινε την ισχυρή τεχνολογία κρυπτογράφησης, υποστηρίζοντας ότι η κυβέρνηση των ΗΠΑ δεν θα πρέπει "σε καμία περίπτωση να ανατρέπει, να υπονομεύει, να αποδυναμώνει ή να καθιστά ευάλωτα διαθέσιμα εμπορικά λογισμικά, κρυπτογράφησης."
[ads2]Obama did not say anything about it in his speech. Obviously, US Secretaries have never wanted and continue not to want encryption in the hands of a simple citizen.
4. Judicial review of national security letters
The FBI has been using national security letters for years, asking telephone companies and Internet companies to deliver their customer data. These letters are a special kind of administrative subpoena that does not require the FBI to get the judicial approval before they are issued. Letters simply carry orders that tell the recipients not to reveal their existence to the target (but also to the general public) whose data has been requested, not even after years of writing the letter.
The experts of the NSA secret action review committee have proposed a reform of the law to require a judge to be approved for each letter of this kind. Obama has approved more transparency, but not judicial oversight.
5. Spying on data centers across the world
Documents leaked by Snowden in October indicated that the NSA has the ability to collect data from all of them users of the Internet with the interceptions from the links connecting the data centers of Google and Yahoo.
Obama made no comment on this.
Εν ολίγοις, οι δηλώσεις - ανακοινώσεις του Obama, έγιναν για πυροσβεστικούς λόγους και όχι για να επιφέρουν μεταρρυθμίσεις στις ανεξέλεγκτες δράσεις της NSA, που ουσιαστικά παραμένει ανέπαφη. Δεν είχαμε καμία αυταπάτη για το γεγονός και θα ήταν ουτοπία να πιστεύαμε ότι οι ΗΠΑ, θα αλλάξουν την ιμπεριαλιστική πολιτική τους.
