Over at The Intercept, Greenwald and Fishman did a great job of thoroughly discrediting blatant (effectively) CIA funded propaganda that somehow passed unquestioned as journalism on National Public Radio (NPR). The propaganda itself was merely the usual run of the mill bit trying to smear Snowden or anyone who talks about real cybersecurity (tor/pgp/ssh/etc) as an enabler of terrorists. About as logical as arguing that agricultural professors are helping enable terrorists by teaching everyone, including the terrorists about how to manufacturer their own sustenance for long term survival. What made this bit of propaganda extra slimey, especially for the otherwise generally well regarded NPR, was how the CIA ties were not mentioned.
... Temple-Raston knows all of this. Back in 2012, NPR’s Morning Edition broadcast her profile of Recorded Future and its claimed ability to predict the future by gathering internet data. At the end of her report, she noted that the firm has “at least two very important financial backers: the CIA’s investment arm, called In-Q-Tel, and Google Ventures. They have reportedly poured millions into the company.”
That is the company she's now featuring as some sort of independent source that can credibly vindicate the claims of U.S. officials about how Snowden reporting helps terrorists.
I felt compelled to rebroadcast this to SN because I think it is actually helpful to see the CIA propaganda machine at work, and never forget that it is there, far better funded and at least as relentlessly vigilant as its opposition. And despite a full disclosure that a few years back I myself was effectively getting paid straight from the CIA via In-Q-Tel, and felt thoroughly guilty for it, I have to say I just ADORE the fact that Dan Geer gave up trackable smart phones for the privacy enhanced security of old school pagers.
(Score: 5, Informative) by takyon on Tuesday August 19 2014, @04:39PM
http://www.npr.org/blogs/ombudsman/2014/08/16/340624540/attacking-npr-as-a-shill-for-government-intelligence [npr.org]
Here's what the NPR Ombudsman had to say about The Intercept's piece.
TL;DR: It was a mistake to omit the connection between Recorded Future and In-Q-Tel (CIA). Temple-Raston is pro-civil liberties.
Most critically, Temple-Raston did not say in her report that there is a proven causal link between the Snowden leaks and internet encryption improvements made by al-Qaida — as Greenwald and Fishman suggest she did. (The story summary that pops up when web viewers click on the link to hear the story does use the word "proof" — and that should be corrected).
...
I would have liked a little more skepticism on the significance of the Recorded Future findings in the lead-in read by host Renee Montagne and up until this conclusion by Ahlberg. But this is a matter of editorial judgment and arguably the additional skepticism wasn't necessary. The pooh-poohing of the study that begins in the next line after Ahlberg's statement went beyond being possibly sufficient to being quietly devastating: (exchange with Bruce Schneier)
...
Recorded Future's trolling of the internet for al-Qaida references to Snowden, the tracking of encryption software used by the terrorists, and other such mining and scraping of data were an interesting academic exercise, whether the CIA was involved or not. But is anyone surprised that there might be a link between encryption improvements and the Snowden leaks? I think we all expect it.
The Intercept counters this conclusion, basically saying that "the terrorists" have been using encryption or eschewing digital communications for some time. A lot of messages are delivered by couriers - see Bin Laden. I do expect to see improvements in encryption and a wide variety of groups taking up this encryption, including terrorists, and I just don't care. It was possible to encrypt long before 2014. I'd rather see full encryption of Web communications and a measured foreign policy than handwaving over terrorists.
Aside: NPR's reporting isn't mentioning The Intercept's Ryan Devereaux's arrest at Ferguson [firstlook.org]. But it does mention the two German reporters and the Getty Images photographer.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 19 2014, @05:41PM
> TL;DR: It was a mistake to omit the connection between Recorded Future and In-Q-Tel (CIA).
I am sure it was. But I am also concerned about the fact that the NPR reporter had an "exclusive" on the report. As the ombudsman notes, an earlier, related report by Recorded Future got no NPR coverage. Getting NPR coverage can add legitimacy to a point of view, even if that coverage is mixed. Sort of like the old hollywood adage, "I don't care what you say about me, as long as you spell my name right."
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 19 2014, @06:02PM
‧̴̵̶̷̸̡̢̧̨̛̖̗̘̙̜̝̞̟̠̣̤̥̦̩̪̫̬̭̮̯̰̱̲̳̹̺̻̼͇͈͉͍͎̀́̂̄̃̅̆̇̈̉̊̋̌̍̎̏̐̑̒̓̔̽̾̿̀́͂̓̈́͆͊͋͌̕̚ͅ͏͓͔͕͖͙͚͐͑͒͗͛ͣͤͥͦͧͨͩͪͫͬͭͮͯ͘͜͟͢͝͞͠͡
(Score: 4, Insightful) by BsAtHome on Tuesday August 19 2014, @05:03PM
Putting out misinformation works. Propaganda is well organized misinformation and has worked for ages. Critical thinking as well as questioning and scrutinizing the stream of information is paramount for all. It should be the top priority for all.
Just watch "Wag the dog" and see how it works. It was supposed to be satire, but it is unfortunately much closer to what goes on in reality and in the background than you might think and hope.
(Score: 3, Funny) by wonkey_monkey on Wednesday August 20 2014, @02:42PM
No it doesn't.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Alfred on Tuesday August 19 2014, @05:06PM
First time caught is not the first time done.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by JNCF on Tuesday August 19 2014, @05:14PM
I heard this piece [wlrh.org] on the radio earlier:
I'm actually not conteding that she was wrong in her assessment of the situation, but when NPR interviews someone from an organization that recently got caught using a Cuban HIV program [theguardian.com] as a cover to communicate with agents trying to start a rebellion under the flag of democracy, and the representative of said organization is the "assistant administrator for the Bureau of Democracy, Conflict and Humanitarian Assistance," and that representative is talking about how important democracy building is... maybe they should note that this organization has a sketchy record and vested interest in only supporting democracy when it helps America? Maybe they could have asked her if USAID supports democracy in Saudi Arabia? It just seems odd that the motives of such a clear propaganda line went unquestioned and without context, even if the words themselves are true. The US government really needs to stop using humanitarian organizations for military purposes, it destorys their credibility on these issues completely.
(Score: 1) by takyon on Tuesday August 19 2014, @05:37PM
USAID, another organization The Intercept has dirt on [firstlook.org]:
Screeners are also instructed to collect data on any “pocket litter,” scuba gear, EZ Passes, library cards, and the titles of any books, along with information about their condition—”e.g., new, dog-eared, annotated, unopened.” Business cards and conference materials are also targeted, as well as “anything with an account number” and information about any gold or jewelry worn by the watchlisted individual. Even “animal information”—details about pets from veterinarians or tracking chips—is requested. The rulebook also encourages the collection of biometric or biographical data about the travel partners of watchlisted individuals.
The list of government entities that collect this data includes the U.S. Agency for International Development, which is neither an intelligence nor law-enforcement agency. As the rulebook notes, USAID funds foreign aid programs that promote environmentalism, health care, and education. USAID, which presents itself as committed to fighting global poverty, nonetheless appears to serve as a conduit for sensitive intelligence about foreigners. According to the guidelines, “When USAID receives an application seeking financial assistance, prior to granting, these applications are subject to vetting by USAID intelligence analysts at the TSC.” The guidelines do not disclose the volume of names provided by USAID, the type of information it provides, or the number and duties of the “USAID intelligence analysts.”
A USAID spokesman told The Intercept that “in certain high risk countries, such as Afghanistan, USAID has determined that vetting potential partner organizations with the terrorist watchlist is warranted to protect U.S. taxpayer dollars and to minimize the risk of inadvertent funding of terrorism.” He stated that since 2007, the agency has checked “the names and other personal identifying information of key individuals of contractors and grantees, and sub-recipients.”
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 19 2014, @08:15PM
Reading NPR repots, instead of listening to them, makes it clear they are shallow, careless, and dubious. They do not deserve a favorable reputation.
(Score: 1) by JNCF on Tuesday August 19 2014, @10:17PM
Compared to Democracy Now, of course not. Compared to mainstream media they do wonderful job, all things considered.
(Score: 2) by melikamp on Tuesday August 19 2014, @05:15PM
Somehow? I wouldn't expect anything else from a shop that runs commercial ads. NPR's version of journalist ethics somehow reconciles their mission as journalists with brainwashing on behalf of for-profit corporations.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday August 19 2014, @06:26PM
NPR is not the bastion of journalistic integrity it once was. They surrendered it when they helped sell the Iraq War for Bush.
American citizens ought to recognize by now that they do not control their government, and it is that government which constitutes the existential threat to their freedom, not some Al-Qaeda bogeyman hiding behind a rock in Afghanistan. When the leaders of the national intelligence agencies openly defy constitutional authority, and those entrusted with constitutional authority do nothing because they're in on it, then we are long past the pretense of democracy and the rule of law. This is the long, accelerating slide toward historical rupture.
We need to catalogue the cast of criminals, with their ranks, responsibilities, and whereabouts, and their crimes. Call it a Freedom Wiki. Put cameras outside their front gates, drones over their heads, tails on their movements. Let every deed be recorded. Let their privacy vanish as thoroughly as they have disappeared ours. When the time comes we need to bring all of them to justice, and our evidence must be complete.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 19 2014, @06:51PM
Examples please. Copy-and-paste 4th Amendment text gets you zero points unless you can also explain it within the context of how it is interpreted by the courts (just like those who justify assault rifles with armor-piercing shells by reciting that one sentence out of the 2nd Amendment).
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Rune of Doom on Tuesday August 19 2014, @10:11PM
How about the Director of the CIA lying to Congress about spying on Congress?
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/31/cia-director-john-brennan-lied-senate [theguardian.com]
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday August 20 2014, @03:27PM
What we have experienced is an Executive Branch soft coup. There really is no other word to describe the way the Executive Branch has usurped legislative and judicial powers.
As for the Courts, you are talking about an Executive branch "interpretation" of the third party doctrine exception to the right to privacy which evolved out of a case involving the warrantless placing of a pen register (collects phone numbers, early meta-data technique) on a SPECIFIC individual for whom there was AMPLE probable cause of criminal behavior (should the cops have not been so lazy as to skip the warrant requirement, they would assuredly have gotten one), for a SHORT period of time. How that applies to every random person in the world, with zero probable cause to suspect of criminal behavior, forever -- is an amazingly twisted and self-serving interpretation by the Executive branch. It has clearly confounded you because you apparently believe it is "the law" when in actuality, it is nothing but an argument made by Executive branch attorneys in legal memos that were entirely secret for a long time, and still largely secret now. That's not "law." Secret laws==despotism.
But it isn't just the 4th Amendment. There's the 5th Amendment:
Due process free detention (aka gulag aka gitmo).
Due process free execution (aka political assassination).
Arguably the First Amendment -- Al Awlaki seems to have been politically assassinated because of what he said in various youtube videos. His son assassinated for the sins of his father ( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/24/robert-gibbs-anwar-al-awlaki_n_2012438.html [huffingtonpost.com] ) -- cruel and unusual punishment? 8th Amendment.
Or Article 1, Section 8, Clause 11 regarding war making. War in Libya based solely on executive decision sets a terrifying precedent (only Congress can make war -- Libya ignored even the weak tea War Powers Act which was supposed to put at least some of that power back with Congress by requiring approval within 60 days -- approval 2 months after the fact is far different from a declaration, but even that is too onerous for the executive anymore).
(Score: 2, Interesting) by gallondr00nk on Tuesday August 19 2014, @09:52PM
The biggest propaganda victory for the authorities in recent memory was Al-Qaeda itself. It's easy to forget, but people were absolute terrified, and most of what we were told, frankly, was a complete fantasy.
There's a good body of evidence that suggests that Al-Qaeda didn't actually exist, beyond a few disgruntled young males prepared to carry out attacks against the west. It certainly doesn't exist in the way most media sources would have you believe.
First, a quick fact. Al-Qaeda actually translates to "the base", referring presumably to the training camp they used.
It didn't actually use the term in regard to itself until after the 2001 attacks, when it realised that's what the USA were calling them. There was no evidence whatsoever that it was anything beyond the middle east - there were no sleeper cells in the US, or anywhere else or that matter. There were no hidden bases in the Afghan mountains, or vast series of encrypted communication networks across the net.
Bin Laden himself was essentially a nonentity, used for his money rather than his leadership skills, in the Afghan war against the Soviets. The ideology behind "the base" was actually Ayman al-Zawahiri, an Egyptian doctor turned violent radical and leader of an organisation called Islamic Jihad, that attempted to cause Islamic uprisings in Egypt (by assassinating the president), Algeria, and elsewhere in the 80's and 90's, inspired by the Iranian revolution. All those attempts failed to produce their stated outcomes.
They also produced a lot of terror. The logic of these various groups inspired by Islamic Jihad was that anyone who didn't follow their beliefs was corrupted, and had defied Islam, and could legitimately be killed. This led to groups attempting to liberate their countries by attacking civilians directly, believing that absolute terror was the only way to convince people. Indeed, one group in Algeria took this so far as to say that *everyone* except for their small militia were to be killed.
In the light of these failing revolutions, al-Zawahiri, being a fairly narrow thinker, then concluded that this was not because the people *didn't* want oppressive Islamic states in their countries, but because they had been corrupted by Western ideals. This led to a change of tactics, and from then on he focused on attacking the west directly.
The trouble was very few people bought into this.
There's a video of him and Bin Laden sometime before 9/11, surrounded by armed bodyguards brandishing rifles and machine guns, prior to giving a press conference on how his organisation intends to bring down the corrupting Western influence. It all seems quite convincing, but all the fighters were actually hired for the day, and had to bring their own weapons.
The camps that were the supposed base of Al-Qaeda were mostly training facilities for fighters who were fighting in their own countries - it wasn't a centralised operation.
Instead of a determined but tiny band of genuine terrorists, we instead created an apocalyptic monster, capable of killing us all. Part due to propaganda, part due to brain dead, sensationalist media reporting. We still today link every muslim with a gun to Al-Qaeda, because we still believe the myth that there's a shadowy organisation out there that intends to destroy us.
I sometimes wonder if the Snowden revelations should be treated with more skepticism than they are, but that's a thought for another day.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 19 2014, @11:53PM
While I am familiar with some of what you've written, it sure would have been helpful for you to provide links to supporting evidence. Otherwise most readers are left thinking you are just another loon running his mouth on the internet, which isn't very conducive to informing anyone and if your goal isn't to inform people why post in the first place?
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Wednesday August 20 2014, @05:08PM
there was a bbc documentary program on that - Power of Nightmares.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Power_of_Nightmares
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Wednesday August 20 2014, @05:16PM
https://archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmares-Episode1BabyItsColdOutside [archive.org]
here, its on archive.org.
(Score: 2) by dmc on Friday August 22 2014, @06:11AM
for the comment record (? until there is a link available to the pre-SN-editor version available ?) my original submission had the following IMO (but not SN's) significant differences.
- I referred to Dan Geer as Neelix due to the picture at the destination wapost article.
- at the end I further suggest that much as I have plenty o hate for the Goog, if their Project Ara thing delivers a phone that can transform from smartphone, to sensor-less, transmitter-less pager, that would be most excellent.