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In a February 2012 paper laying out the four-year strategy for the N.S.A.’s signals intelligence operations, which include the agency’s eavesdropping and communications data collection around the world, agency officials set an objective to “aggressively pursue legal authorities and a policy framework mapped more fully to the information age.”
Written as an agency mission statement with broad goals, the five-page document said that existing American laws were not adequate to meet the needs of the N.S.A. to conduct broad surveillance in what it cited as “the golden age of Sigint,” or signals intelligence. “The interpretation and guidelines for applying our authorities, and in some cases the authorities themselves, have not kept pace with the complexity of the technology and target environments, or the operational expectations levied on N.S.A.’s mission,” the document concluded.
Using sweeping language, the paper also outlined some of the agency’s other ambitions. They included defeating the cybersecurity practices of adversaries in order to acquire the data the agency needs from “anyone, anytime, anywhere.” The agency also said it would try to decrypt or bypass codes that keep communications secret by influencing “the global commercial encryption market through commercial relationships,” human spies and intelligence partners in other countries. It also talked of the need to “revolutionize” analysis of its vast collections of data to “radically increase operational impact.”
After years of secrecy, the National Security Agency’s phone records surveillance program had its day in open court on Friday, as civil liberties lawyers asked a federal judge in New York to shut it down, and government lawyers claimed ordinary Americans cannot legally challenge it.
U.S. District Court Judge William H. Pauley III did not immediately rule on issuing an injunction against the NSA program. But he did push the government on whether it respected Americans’ rights to privacy and freedom of association, and whether Congress was adequately informed about the program.
“Never before has the government attempted a program of dragnet surveillance on this scale,” warned Alexander Abdo, a staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union. The group brought its lawsuit against the program in June, just days after NSA leaker Edward Snowden revealed its existence. The ACLU is arguing that the government’s surveillance exceeds both its powers under the Patriot Act, and under the First and Fourth amendments.
bigfatfurrytexan
reply to post by GrantedBail
When you see terms like, "The law is not prepared to handle the complexity of....", you know you are reading a bunch of power grabbing nonsense. If the law is inadequate to mete out justice, then that means justice would not be served by being meted out.
We don't need more laws. We need the NSA to go away, along with the CIA, DIA, and all other "intelligence agencies". The law is inadequate for their missions because their missions were not meant to be allowed.
The OP link detailed 5 pages of Orwellian double speak meant to trick fools into bleating more and talking less.edit on 25-11-2013 by bigfatfurrytexan because: (no reason given)