The government spied on me because I was protesting the stolen election

[Kip Humphrey]

The Bush administration tapped my phone and intercepted my emails. They tried to spy on my constitutional efforts to expose and protest the stolen 2004 election. From December 8 2004 until the day after the presidential inauguration, my telephone was tapped and my emails intercepted. The telltale echo on the phone and email "bounce-backs" persisted without interruption until the tap was pulled on January 19th at which time my phone immediately became unusable due to excessive static on the line. On that same day I lost the need to send emails twice to ensure they were received. When the telephone company technician came down from the pole after restoring service, he informed my son that the ends of our phone wires had been stripped which, left exposed, caused the excessive static.

On December 10th, we received an inquiry from a "volunteer" who expressed keen interest in where we lived and details of our lives not normally a part of our election reform effort. This "volunteer" persisted in personal questions, raising our suspicions. With the help of some "white hat" hackers, this volunteer's email was traced back to a server in Atlanta which contained directions for hacking into servers of various types and security protocols. The server's name was "Fed One".

I am not a terror threat. However, I might well be considered a political threat given my efforts to expose and protest the stolen 2004 election (SEE http://www.51capitalmarch.com)

Whether I was spied on by the NSA, Defense Intelligence Agency, Rumsfeld's secret spying organization, or the FBI is irrelevant. What is relevant is this administration is violating our civil rights and our Constitution by using the resources of the Federal Government for purely political reasons.

Kip Humphrey


Are there any other election activists out there with similar experiences?

[Botany]

1. In Ohio @ Kerry's HQ ......

Phone lines were blocked & or hacked and computers w/ 5 & 6 firewalls were
hacked into.

This could explain why * is so scrambly about the NSA story getting out.

[redacted]

13. Thanks Botany, is there a source for your post we can use?

[Botany]

18. Sorry

No links .... 1st hand knowledge

[leveymg]

33. Probably not NSA - "private sector" GOP operatives more likely

A lot of them have some fairly sophisticated electronic snooping and hacking skills picked up working for military intelligence or government contractors.

Problem is, anti-wiretap laws aren't nearly draconian enough to deter these guys, and what is on the books isn't enforced in most places.

Did someone document these hacks? A competent investigator could probably trace some it back to the sources.

[Botany]

37. my guess the phone hack came from SBC

.... the computer hack was traced back to an Island in the south Pacific ...... and when an
IT person got it to there it went bye bye.

[Conker]

2. That's really creepy.

F*** the NSA.All of this secret spying reminds me of the People's Liberation Army in the Soviet Union, and Stalin's Great Purge.

[Ladyhawk]

3. Can you try filing a FOIA?

If I were in your position I'd be suspicious, too, but I don't think I could be certain. :shrug: You lived it, so you probably feel quite differently. Had I lived it, I might be "sure" too.

We know the shrubbies are spying on us. We just don't know which of us were so "blessed." :grr:

[Boredtodeath]

4. Yeah, lots

But the victims have no intention of discussing them on a public message board.

[Kip Humphrey]

6. Too bad! If only other victims would stand up and speak out,

maybe more Americans would begin to understand what's happening to our country.

[Boredtodeath]

21. And more journalists would point and laugh

This kind of unprovable accusation only assists with the "tin foil hat conspiracy theorists" label.

You have no proof. So your wires were exposed........happens every day of the week.

You don't do this movement any favors with this bullshit.

[FogerRox]

5. Not as bad as yours

Once in a while I get voice mail on my cell phone a day or 2 late.


But since I have been outspoken, just as you have Kip-- I just assume they are checking all of us out.

I am the Nj co-ordinator for the dec 12 - 2004 stolen lection protest in NJ & have this email-- [email protected]

Everything I do is of interest to the BUSH Regime. I am his political oppenent. I have about 150 million friends-- we all want to see BUSH Removed from office.


And since I have had phone conversations with Judith Leblanc of the Coalition for Peace Action in NYC-- they were co-hosts for the 9-24-05 DC protests, and on the list of organizations who have been spied on....

Well damn Kip-- its a slam dunk that you've been spied on.

[smoogatz]

24. When I used Sprint wireless

my voicemail would show up days after the fact, too. And that was during the Clinton administration.

[TomInTib]

26. That has happened to me with both Sprint and t-mobil.

I switched and it persisted.

Generally, I would get a one-month block of calls I had erased at least one month earlier.

[Quakerfriend]

7. I too, have been spied on.

I believe this has happened only thru my PC. I can see quite clearly that the DoD has visited my computer almost daily for some time. I only know this because I can see the name and address from the list of people hitting the firewall.

I suspect it's because I'm a DUer. (Of course the name Quakerfriend is pretty scarey, too!):scared:

The notion that they are simply spying on Al'Q is just silly! I wish that someone would tell them that the real terrorists are using disposable phones that can't be tracked!!

[Kip Humphrey]

9. Makes one think that terrorists aren't the primary targets

[Quakerfriend]

16. Exactly, Kip!

I wish everyone would monitor their firewall. It's a very simple way to see who's visiting your computer. And, a verifiable way to document spying by the gov't!!

And btw, thx for all your work re: our stolen election!

[Amaryllis]

29. how do you monitor your firewall?

[DemReadingDU]

31. I am also wondering how to monitor my firwall?

[adolfo]

36. Thanks

Your post reminded me to flash my router. For some reason it stopped logging traffic a while ago.

[KaryninMiami]

8. Hi Kip-- is there some way to know if we were tapped?

I've had lots of intermittent static (but I blamed it on Miami), many strange clicks on my line (I joked that they were the Patriot Act) as well as email problems from time to time and nothing would surprise me- especially with all of the election fraud stuff I've been involved with. Is there a list somewhere or some way to figure out whether we are among those who have been tapped and watched?

This is all so digesting. Spying on American citizens, reading our emails- it's beyond disgusting. And now we are about to see what's left of our rights and our privacy go down the drain with Alito.

[necso]

10. I have some questions

(and no, not of the doubting kind).

Were you using DSL or dialup?

Did you report a problem with voice service? (My understanding is that my ISP can just cut-off a user if the DSL service doesn't "support" an appropriate rate -- which is a significant multiple of the rate that they allow you to use.)

[Kip Humphrey]

20. here are some details

Beginning December 8th and continuing until the day after the inaugural, we experience an echo on our phone. For the same period, our outgoing email had to be sent twice before each would be successfully received by the intended recipient. Our Internet connection is cable. Therefore, this simultaneous event effected our telco land-line telephone and our cable-provider email. While both signal problems began on the same day, they mysteriously ended also on the same day. Sending emails once instead of twice resumed being the norm. Of course, on that day, loud static replaced the telephone echo. According to the telephone technician, the loud static was the result of water hitting the exposed wires. He couldn't explain how the water was getting into the box on top of a telephone pole.

[necso]

25. Ok,

thanks for the input.

One problem with (potential) indicators is that they often can be read in different ways and have different "causes" identified for them -- and it's often possible to rationalize them entirely away. (For example, there are any number of books that argue who was or wasn't a spy, assassin, etc, using basically the same data points.)

It's also possible to read into things that which isn't there.

However, good professionals will (relatively) rarely leave definitive indicators -- and so one guesses ("decides" or "judges" if you prefer) based on the indicators that one has.

And there's nothing quite like tapping into a phone line near the TNI. But, ah, I have nothing more to say on the subject.

One can sometimes fish for an indicator as to whether one is being surveilled (in some way) by communicating something (some lie typically) in this way to some (one) trustworthy (and forewarned) person -- and looking for indicators that this information is acted upon by those doing the surveilling (more specifically in some cases, acted upon with confidence that should not otherwise be held.)

Of course that person must really be trustworthy -- and this is also a way to smoke-out those who are not -- but it's generally much easier to solve such an "equation" if there's only one "variable". (And sometimes you say something expecting it to "get out", even if you might indicate otherwise -- tradecraft can get rather complicated.)

I can't render a judgement here, as this appears to be after-the-fact. But this doesn't mean that I dismiss it. Rather, I treat it as a collection of data points to be considered until they can be verified... if they ever can be.

However, one should realize that speaking of such things without definitive proof can make one look, ah, um... something that one might consider unflattering and inaccurate -- and that's discrediting.

[leveymg]

34. Kip - if it were the gov't, you wouldn't know it. They would tap in at

the ISP for internet, and at a phone company switching office for your voice communications.

Believe me,there would be no tell-tale stripped wires, hissing, static, echoes, clicks, or any other way of knowing your phone is being tapped -- a guy climbing the phone pole in front of your house and attaching a tap line went out in the 1960s.

Sometimes, however, real e-mail monitoring and spam operations interfere with your service, and delivery can be interrupted or blocked without explanation. You might get a delivery failed message if you e-mail yourself from a remote location. The MAILER DAEMON has a code that tells you why delivery failed, and you can check that with your e-mail company. I had that problem a month ago, and AOL told me that my service had been blocked because there had been multiple complaints about messages sent from my e-mail address. I don't mass e-mail or send spam. That probably happened because of a virus attack that turned my computer into a slave --pretty common problem.

Another time, I had a MAILER DAEMON that kicked back from a message sent from my address to the Turkish Embassy in DC -- I have never e-mailed the Embassy of Turkey. That one was pretty creepy.

[MelissaB]

11. Off to the greatest! I wonder how many of will ever know.

I suspect that because I'm in Alabama nobody will be interested in me. I've only organized a couple of protests.

[Proud2BaLiberalMom]

12. I suspect I'm being spied on too...

How can I find out for sure?
:mad:

[foo_bar]

14. what do "email 'bounce-backs'" have to do with spying?

Answer: nothing. Same for the "telltale echo", unless you're being tapped by an amateur with $5 in Radio Shack parts.

I'm not saying you aren't being spied upon (we all are, in some Echelon-Carnivore sense), but the NSA/whatever is sophisticated enough to do it without "telltale" clues. Bouncing email doesn't even enter into it, you might as well wonder which government agency causes 404 errors on the web.

Q. Recently I sometimes hear clicks and static and other weird noises on my phone line. Is this an indication the line is tapped?
A. No. Unless you hear the single click at the exact time the tap is being placed, the presence of a tap does not generate anything which will cause noises on the line. Our national telephone network is less than perfect and static, clicks and similar noises are not unusual. Often these noises were always present, but were overlooked until an event occurred which caused an increased awareness.

http://www.lpconline.com/FAQs_debugging.html

[Boredtodeath]

22. Exactly.

These people don't play around. If they wanted your ass, they'd have it before you EVER knew they were in the neighborhood.

These "clicks and beeps and static" went out with I Spy.

[EVDebs]

15. The Huston Plan under Nixon, REX84 under Reagan, and now...

let's just call it Bush's secret domestic spying plans. During Reagan's years Roberts and Alito gave a 'pass' to the suspension of the Constitution by executive orders. See post at

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2395273&mesg_id=2399089

Constitutionally 'suspending the Constitution'. Now there's an oxymoron for you !

see the executive orders at

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/pages/fema.html

(scroll down)

""In April 1984, President Reagan signed Presidential Director Number 54 that allowed FEMA to engage in a secret national "readiness exercise" under the code name of REX 84. The exercise was to test FEMA's readiness to assume military authority in the event of a "State of Domestic National Emergency" concurrent with the launching of a direct United States military operation in Central America. The plan called for the deputation of U.S. military and National Guard units so that they could legally be used for domestic law enforcement. These units would be assigned to conduct sweeps and take into custody an estimated 400,000 undocumented Central American immigrants in the United States. The immigrants would be interned at 10 detention centers to be set up at military bases throughout the country. REX 84 was so highly guarded that special metal security doors were placed on the fifth floor of the FEMA building in Washington, D.C. Even long-standing employees of the Civil Defense of the Federal Executive Department possessing the highest possible security clearances were not being allowed through the newly installed metal security doors. Only personnel wearing a special red Christian cross or crucifix lapel pin were allowed into the premises. Lt. Col. North was responsible for drawing up the emergency plan, which U.S. Attorney General William French Smith opposed vehemently.

The plan called for the suspension of the Constitution, turning control of the government over to FEMA, appointment of military commanders to run state and local governments and the declaration of Martial Law. The Presidential Executive Orders to support such a plan were already in place. The plan also advocated the rounding up and transfer to "assembly centers or relocation camps" of a least 21 million American Negroes in the event of massive rioting or disorder, not unlike the rounding up of the Jews in Nazi Germany in the 1930s""


BTW, Atlanta is close to Ft Gordon, and US SIGINT and 513th Military Intelligence Brigade, along with CNN in the city where PsyOps onceuponatime had an inhouse operation going with the network (see counterpunch's 'CNN and PsyOps' article).

[skids]

17. Ghod what a bunch of amateurs.

...if that's what happened and they did so in such a ham-handed fashion, that's not a good sign for our intelligence gathering capabilities. Cronyism sinks all boats, I guess.

[MissWaverly]

19. Please provide me an idiots guide how to check for this

I would like to check my system on this.

Thanks

[Einsteinia]

23. me, too, I suspect

I had so many echoes, clicks, and then static, that people who didn't even know that I was working diligently on that radical cause--election integrity--would even quip, "Hey, your phone is bugged, hahahah."

I guess I'm thankful that someone out that has a decent paying job. One fellow activist would ask the alleged listener-in for advice when we were stumped. It became quite a joke, because the alternative is to freak out and stop.
'
In fact, I think the technology should be seamless--so unless they just give us the low end equipment, this is really embasrassing for our government. In fact, all kidding aside, I think it is done intentionally to intimidate us.

But who really knows.

Am I 100% sure I was bugged, no am I not.

Interestingly, it seems to stopped about rather abruptly--about a month or so ago.

[Crome]

27. me too

I may have been spied on in the past few months. My phone rings several times a day and no one is there or I am get this weird sound that sounds very similar to a fax. Sometimes when I hang up the phone it rings right after, but none is there. Do yall think I am just paranoid or is something seriously going on here?

[Einsteinia]

28. No, that's a telemarketer thing

Telemarketer computers do that to see when people are home, and then they have operators call back at your "at home" times

[EFerrari]

30. I don't know for sure. But it did seem that my phone was weird

while I helped MoveOn get their book out in San Francisco. I used to be a telco "O" operator when I was in college, and I know that phone lines get messed up every time it rains so, at first I thought it was just static. We had so many elections to deal with that year -- mayor's, recall, mayoral run off, presidential -- it barely registered. At some point, I just started assuming we were being tapped and made sure to shout out to whoever was wasting their time and our tax money.

[dusty64]

32. If that isn't a reason

to believe in stolen elections I don't know what is. We all knew this shit was gonna happen. We have GOT to be able to stop this despite every effort of the extreme wrongwing and their corporate puppets, they are spinning VERY hard to try and get away with this.

[adolfo]

35. Could be the mark of an amateur

Government agencies go directly to the provider for spying on targets. For ISPs they plug in a black box to the network that functions as a logger/sniffer. For phone companies everything is done by computer (unless the system is very old). There are no tell-tale signs but these methods require paper work which leaves a paper trail.