Big Brother is watching you! (AT&T helps NSA read your emails)

[JohnyCanuck]

Run time: 09:15 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYOUolZnGIs   Posted on YouTube: February 18, 2007 By YouTube Member: rainboyknows Views on YouTube: 91529   Posted on DU: February 20, 2007 By DU Member: JohnyCanuck Views on DU: 877

 

EFF's Class-Action Lawsuit Against AT&T for Collaboration with Illegal Domestic Spying Program

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a class-action lawsuit against AT&T on January 31, 2006, accusing the telecom giant of violating the law and the privacy of its customers by collaborating with the National Security Agency (NSA) in its massive, illegal program to wiretap and data-mine Americans' communications. On July 20, 2006, a federal judge denied the government's and AT&T's motions to dismiss the case, allowing the lawsuit to go forward.

The EFF lawsuit arose from news reports in December 2005, which first revealed that the NSA has been intercepting Americans' phone calls and Internet communications without any court oversight and in violation of the privacy safeguards established by Congress and the U.S. Constitution. This surveillance program, purportedly authorized by the President at least as early as 2001, apparently intercepts and analyzes the phone and Internet communications of millions of ordinary Americans.

But the government did not act—and is not acting—alone. EFF's lawsuit alleges that AT&T has given the NSA unchecked backdoor access to its communications network and its record databases. On behalf of a nationwide class of AT&T customers, EFF is suing to stop this illegal conduct and hold AT&T responsible for violating the law and the fundamental freedoms of the American public.

AT&T moved to dismiss the case, basically arguing that it should be immune from suit because "whatever we did, the government told us to." The U.S. government also moved to dismiss the case, arguing that allowing the case to go on would necessarily reveal "state secrets" that would harm national security. But in July, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker issued a decision denying both motions.

As Judge Walker wrote when dismissing AT&T's immunity claims, "AT&T cannot seriously contend that a reasonable entity in its position could have believed that the alleged domestic dragnet was legal." Judge Walker also flatly rejected the government's secrecy argument: "The compromise between liberty and security remains a difficult one. But dismissing this case at the outset would sacrifice liberty for no apparent enhancement of security."

http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/att/

[wordpix]

1. serious breach of privacy laws---AT&T should be investigated & BushCo hauled up before courts & Cong

ress for this.

The sheeple will yawn as usual, tho.

:puke:

[billyoc]

2. Can't beat 'em, join 'em:

http://www.cafepress.com/truth2powerproj/1805142

[Warren DeMontague]

3. Yeah, but that eff... sometimes the principles they advance sound positively (small l) "libertarian"

And for some folks here, that's a MIGHTY dirty word! :wow: :hide:

As for me, I say hats off to Barlow and the EFF. :patriot:

[ClintonTyree]

4. If we can't trust our government who can we trust?

I mean, if you have nothing to hide why should this be a big deal, right? They'd NEVER abuse the collection and use of this information, right? :sarcasm:

Big Brother is much more than a reality TV show. Most people like to think that "Big Brother" is still some futuristic concept we don't have to worry about. Right......... :eyes:

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

5. Time to start using PGP (Pretty Good Privacy)

http://www.pgp.com

...and I'm not even confident THAT program is secure anymore...

[JohnyCanuck]

6. Wouldn't be surprisised if you marked yourself for special attention

just by the fact you are using encrypted emails. Not that I am suggesting that any freedom-loving, American citizen with nothing to hide should worry about that of course.

PGP is perhaps the strongest and best encryption standard for commercial use because it is difficult to break, even by the US government. The US government usually frowns upon strong encryption, and relies on the ole "national security/terrorism" argument that terrorists can use encryption tools like it to pass information, so they advocate requiring backdoors (key escrows) installed into any encryption standard so "their jobs will be easier" in conducting wiretap investigations. Privacy advocates warn that backdoors and weak encryption are subject to abuse by the government. Fortunately, there is no backdoor into PGP, and encryption standards proposed by the government (those that do include backdoors such as the Clipper chip) have failed politically.

Footnote 1: The government also has a cryptographic algorithm called DES, and recommends it for public commercial use, but as for the government using it for its own classified information, that, it doesn't recommend. Partly because standard DES uses a small 56-bit key that can be broken quite easily, speedily, and routinely.

However, PGP can still be vulnerable through brute-force hacking. Brute force hacking is exactly what it means; you try and guess the encryption key by trying many combinations hopefully stumbling unto the right one. With patience, you can break the password, but this takes time and much effort. However, the encryption behind PGP is difficult to crack. But there are those rare cases that demonstrate it can be done.

The one government agency that does have the computing power to possibly decode PGP might be the super secret NSA (whenever you mention the NSA, you must also mention super secret, it's the law!) The NSA is the largest employer of cryptologists and mathematicians in the world. They use Cray supercomputers to help in its mission to decode electronic intercepts around the world, and theoretically, can be used to break PGP when the need arises. Whether or not the NSA can break PGP on a regular basis, and the size of the keys broken are not known.

http://www1.epinions.com/content_46417022596