ECHELON The Real Threat To Our Privacy!

This is not another PRISM thread, in fact I am quite annoyed at the PRISM threads because they all seem to be ignoring the much bigger problem.

I keep seeing all these threads about PRISM and how god awful it is because its such a huge "breach of our Civil-liberties" this is true to some extent.

but it pales in comparison to....


ECHELON!!


ECHELON can actually be tracked all the way beck to World War 2, it is believed to have started up properly in the 1960's but its origins lie in a agreement signed in 1948 by America and the UK which permitted to two allies to shear signals intelligence in what became known as the UKUSA agreement (this was before the NSA was even founded in 1952).

Anyway without a increasingly boring history lesson (actually its not boring i am just working on another thread right now) at some point in the 1960's GCHQ and the NSA devised a clever scheme to get around some of the law's governing eavesdropping on their own citizens and keep tabs of the Soviets. They used their UKUSA agreement to come up with a deal. Essentially they would spy on each other’s citizens; the NSA would spy on us Brit's and GCHQ on the yanks. Over time this system has got bigger and bigger and its now massive with bases all over the globe. It has massive satellite intercept stations, is tapped into fibre-optic cables and is believed to have intercept stations for radio frequencies in embassies around the world. Its huge and the UKUSA agreement has been expanded now it consists of

1. NSA (America)
   
2. GCHQ (UK)
   
3. CSEC (Canada)
   
4. DSD (Australia)
   
5. GCSB (New Zealand)
   

Now basically they all work together (please note there is some information that there may be more than these 5 core members), to gather up masses of Signals intelligence and the allegation is that it is then hovered up their massive technological web and fed into the massive super computers at Fort Meade (home of the NSA). So something like 3 times the entire library of Congress is sucked up every hour and fed into these supercomputers. These telecommunications are then scanned for words like "Obama", "Anthrax" and "Assassinate" and if the supercomputers flag up a communication it is sent so some lonely analyst for further assessment (hello Mr. NSA man).

PRISM is probably just another part of this system, while yes ECHELON it seems was at first just a method to allow SIGINT agencies to circumvent the laws prohibiting them from spying on their own citizens and keeping watch on the Soviets. Now its very possible that its just like one big cyber vacuum cleaner and PRISM is probably just one part feeding into this cyber-espionage web.

So....

How do we know about ECHELON?

Very good question and i am glad you asked

The first evidence of the existence of Echelon came from a freelance journalist named Duncan Campbell in 1988 who wrote the article "Somebody's Listening" in the New Statesman. In this article he talks about something called "Project 415" in it he states that

Investigators have subpoenaed other witnesses and asked them to provide complete plans and manuals of the ECHELON System and related projects. The plans and blueprints are said to show that targeting of US political figures would not occur by accident, but was designed into the system from the start. While working at Menwith ,Newsham [Duncan’s Source] is reported to have said that she was able to listen through earphones to telephone calls being Monitored at the base.

Other conversations that she heard were in Russian. After leaving Menwith Hill, she continued to have access to full details of Menwith Hill operations from a position as software manager for more than a dozen VAX computers at Menwith which operate the ECHELON system.

This was followed up by a book published by Nicky Hager gave us a very good and brief description of how ECHELON works.

“The ECHELON system is not designed to eavesdrop on a particular individual's e-mail or fax link. Rather, the system works by indiscriminately intercepting very large quantities of communications and using computers to identify and extract messages of interest from the mass of unwanted ones

This is consistent with most of what is written on ECHELON, while yes it is undoubtedly a massive risk to our civil-liberityes, just like PRISM is, really unless you start a phone call with "OK so we're bombing Downing Street next Wednesday (hello again Mr. NSA man) you're going to be ok. I have read that the biggest flaw in ECHELON is the human factor, the computers can only pick out the communications that require further assessment it requires a human to judge if the communication has any value as a intelligence product.

Dr Webb, writing for the encyclopedia of Cyber Warfare and Terrorism wrote that

The ECHELON system is widely accepted to be the most pervasive and powerful electronic intelligence gathering system in the world. It was developed and is operated on behalf of the United States and its partners (the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and New Zealand) in an intelligence alliance known as UKUSA. The system involves the automatic selection of intercepted electronic messages from target lists using a computer based system known as DICTIONARY. Those messages, which include specific combinations of names, dates, places and subjects, matching particular criteria are sent for further processing by analysts at Fort Mead, Maryland – the Headquarters of the US National Security Agency (NSA). The messages can be intercepted at ground based stations that may link directly into land lines or pick up radio or microwave frequency signals. These signals are broadcast and distributed through radio aerials or a series of microwave towers as part of a local, national or international network. Microwave signals can also be intercepted in space using specially designed satellites positioned to pick up signals which overshoot receivers and continue in a straight line into space. The satellites then downlink the intercepted signals to ground based receivers in a number of geographical locations to enable a global coverage.

The European Union started to get worried, so worried that they commissioned a report into to ECHELON, this report provides lots of very interesting information on ECHELON that i doubt the 5 core members ever wanted to go public (Link to EU Report).

For example the EU have this to say

A report which STOA commissioned from the Omega Foundation for the European Parliament in 1997 on ‘An Appraisal of Technologies of Political Control’ described ECHELON in a chapter concerning ‘national and international communications interception networks’. The author claimed that all e-mail, telephone and fax communications in Europe were routinely intercepted by the US National Security Agency. As a result of this report, the alleged existence of a comprehensive global interception system called ECHELON was brought to the attention of people throughout Europe.

Concern was aroused in particular by the assertion in the report that ECHELON had moved away from its original purpose of defence against the Eastern Bloc and was currently being used for purposes of industrial espionage. Examples of alleged industrial espionage were given in support of the claim: in particular, it was stated that Airbus and Thomson CFS had been damaged as a result. Campbell bases his claims on reports in the American press

and this report goes on and on with evidence that ECHELON has been used to conduct massive corporate espionage but it also includes former members of the NSA confirming the existence of the network.

Wayne Madsen, former NSA employee, also confirms the existence of ECHELON. He is of the opinion that economic intelligence gathering has top priority and is used to the advantage of US companies. He fears in particular that ECHELON could spy on NGOs such as Amnesty International or Greenpeace. He argues that the NSA had to concede that it held more than 1000 pages of information on Princess Diana, because her conduct ran counter to US policy, owing to her campaign against land mines.

Well look at that, ECHELON was also spying on Princess Diana......

other former members have also spoken to the EU

Mike Frost worked for more than 20 years for the CSE, the Canadian secret service. The listening post in Ottawa was just one part of a worldwide network of spy stations. In an interview with CBS, he said that all over the world, every day, telephone conversations, e-mails and faxes are monitored by ECHELON, a secret government surveillance network. This also included civilian communications

and

Fred Stock says he was expelled from CSE, the Canadian secret service, in 1993 because he had criticised the new emphasis on economic intelligence and civil targets. The communications intercepted contained information on trade with other countries, including negotiations on NAFTA, Chinese purchases of cereals and French arms sales. Stock says the service also routinely received communications concerning environmental protests by Greenpeace vessels on the high seas.

Overall this report does not pain a pretty picture of ECHELON.

Unfortunately i have struggled to find any documentations on ECHELON that are in English however i have found these videos.




Final Thoughts.

The reason i wrote this thread is because I could not understand why people, including members of ATS were talking about PRISM like it was something new or like it was some grand disclosure of what our intelligence services have been getting up to. While i do recognize that PRISM is significant there is something far bigger going on that we have known about since the 1980's that in the discussion regarding PRISM seems to be being largely ignored.

This is not something started by Obama or Bush, this spans the political landscape, every government since the end of World War two has been engaged in this is one form or another.

I can understand why governments may justify this in the name of national security but with evidence that it has been used for targeting non-government organizations, may have been targeting private individuals and the evidence from the EU that it has been used for massive corporate espionage I have to question the cost benefit of this. It would appear to me that corporate-greed and a thrust for power is being put before civil-liberties using ECHELON (and therefore probably also PRISM) under the guise of "national security".

NOTE: As i said previously in this thread I am working just now on another larger thread so i have kind of put this together in one morning so there are bound to be some mistakes or inaccuracies and i know i have omitted some information. The intention of this thread is really to get people talking about this so i would really appreciate it if we could get some discussion going.

Thank's for reading!

ECHELON is a subject that i know alot about. Within Western Australia there are many bases. The revamp of the NBS is to enable this to a higher level.

reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin


Great thread, particularly as i am sat at work about 10 miles from Menwith Hill!

As i keep repeating on these threads, ECHELON always used to work by identifying key words and phrases. If these were triggered, the call / text / email is flagged up and then investigated. If these keywords / phrases are not triggered then the data is ignored.

So whilst it is an invasion of privacy on the one hand, it really isn't like someone is listening to everything you say.

There is the possibility though that with expanding technological savvy since the start of ECHELON that things could have progressed there - and we won't find out unless some whistleblowers come out and say so or it is declassified.

Fylingdales in North Yorkshire was also part of the system but i am not so sure these days. I do know that when we were younger (friends and i and many others) you used to be able to loiter around Fylingdales entrance, lure the guards out to investigate and then scarper - and repeat several times until they got fed up with you. You could never get away with this at Menwith Hill though, suggesting it is much higher security! There is layby on the road by Menwith Hill and if you stop there for any length of time, someone comes to ask what you are doing......

Reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin

You couldnt find anything on ECHELON in english? Where abouts are you located? Recently a minister was ousted from parliament for leaking GCSB files..


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

Originally posted by 3nLiGhT3n
Reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin

 

You couldnt find anything on ECHELON in english? Where abouts are you located? Recently a minister was ousted from parliament for leaking GCSB files..

 

Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

 

I am in the UK like i say this was put together quickly this-morning I could not find any documentaries that were in English there are quite a few in French and one in Koran i think. I was looking for a good 40-60 minute documentary on the subject but i couldn't find one.

if you can then please embed it into this thread.

reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin

Well look at that, ECHELON was also spying on Princess Diana......

When I think of the many times I saw television reports about the good things that she was doing in regard to land mines, it never occurred to me that she would be the target of the government of the US. 1000 pages. What a terrible threat she was, trying to save lives... mostly children.

What a whacky world we have created.

The story of ECHELON, and how it grew within NSA is supremely told in Body of Secrets the 2002 massive book by James Bamford, the author of his earlier best seller Puzzle Palace.

To set the tone of the birth of ECHELON, here is a couple of sentences from the book as Bamford reveals the dark history of NSA spying on Americans.

"Thus in the fall of 1967, when the U.S. Army began requesting intercepts on American citizens and groups, the agency blindly complied. At the time, the military was worried about a massive "March on the Pentagon," organized to protest the war in Vietnam. Army officials compiled a list of protesters and asked NSA to put their names on its watch lists. Over the following months, other agencies, including the CIA, FBI, and DIA, followed suit."

So folks, it didn't just start yesterday as the MSM, government and would have you believe. Nor is it as innocent as some posters here may want you to assume.

Glad to see a thread up on the topic,

I keep telling everyone who is afraid of a police state and its subsequent invasion off privacy about ECHELON, and they think i made it up.

The Governments are already monitoring all electronic communications and have been since the 90's. As stated above, then as far as we know, then it just scans and triggers a recording if a key phrase/word is entered. But then again, working within the IT branch, then i know that they most likely store everything they come across, and then wipe it at a later date (In case the data that was declared irrelevant by the computer, is needed at a later date).

Ill keep checking on this thread tonight to see if there is anything new to learn and/or if i can contribute, have to work now.

Namaste.

reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin


S + F




The other parts can be found on youtube.

Originally posted by butcherguy
reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin

 

Well look at that, ECHELON was also spying on Princess Diana......

When I think of the many times I saw television reports about the good things that she was doing in regard to land mines, it never occurred to me that she would be the target of the government of the US. 1000 pages. What a terrible threat she was, trying to save lives... mostly children.

What a whacky world we have created.

I am not that surprised that Diana was monitored actually. At the time, the landmine crusade included Cluster Bombs and the US is one of only a handful of countries globally that point blank refused to any treaties regarding the use of Cluster Bombs. Therefore, with Diana as the head of the International ban the landmine campaign, it makes sense she was monitored (whether rightly or wrongly, that is a whole separate argument!).

reply to post by WiseThinker

I keep telling everyone who is afraid of a police state and its subsequent invasion off privacy about ECHELON, and they think i made it up.

I was talking to a group of friends once over a beer and we got talking and i asked them about ECHELON,

I got a bunch of blank looks and one of them said "do you mean 3rd ECHELON because that's just something in Splinter-Cell"

I did explain it to them but yeah i have had the same reason as you have had with people if i mention something like this.

reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin


I'm going to assume that most of you have not heard of the earlier program, "carnivore?"

I can attest to the far-reaching gasp of these programs. I have been an out-spoken advocate of UFOs since my first computer days in 1985. I am a UFO abductee from 1964 and have been active in the field ever since in some form or another, all to frequently a critic of the U.S. government's position on the whole situation.

When 9/11 hit, I as on the computer as was millions of others that night. I was communicating mostly with a co-member of Riskers, an early UFO listserve. I had FireWall installed and Nortion. During the course of the evening, I was hit approximately 50 or 60 times by efforts to get into my machine. Never had I been attacked such as that. One or two a week was typical at that time.

I can't imagine why some hackers, for some reason, would chose that time to repeatedly attacked my computer. I do suspect that the people on the other end of those efforts were government people that had pulled out all stops and were attempting across broad fields of "suspects" to see what else I may have been involved in besides UFOs.

The second, third, fourth or tenth shoe to drop in these revelations is the true situation the UFO phenomena represents to our world. The reality of ETs present in our atmosphere is the whole reason for the NWO, Agenda 21, etc. agendas that confounds us as being beyond what we normally embrace and expect from our governments. Anything about "change" that you hear about these days is all directly tied to mandates that we were given to better--from an external view--manage our world. --Don't believe a word of it? That's OK, They are doing it anyway.

I agree with Madsen on this that the reasons for surveillance were primarily of economic interest. This information has allowed the mega banks and corporations to maximize profits, ensure political "goodwill" and find points of leverage in corporate take overs ( who could forget the take overs of the 80's and 90's when every week some large business was being swallowed whole. Communications groups being the primary targets.

As for catching terrorists in the act any of them worth their salt would be communicating in code anyway and wouldn't be caught up with key words. If there were a nuclear attack on the US by some terrorist group the message to proceed would likely be something innocuous like "the ice cream is melting, better hurry up and get it in the freezer HONEY!"

Who controls the economy controls the money. Everything else; political and military power are derived from that.

Good reminder of the bigger picture OP.

Why should ECHELON, that decade old system, be the "real" threat to privacy?

Anyone knows that the NSA is monitoring international phone calls/data etc...and it's not only the US but likely most countries who "listen in" in foreign communication. This is old, old, old...

PRISM, as far as I understand it, is far, far more advanced, it's the logical successor and advanced version of ECHELON where monitoring and analysis now is going on with a focus on the internet, social networking..TODAY'S way of communicating and socializing.

I have no idea how ECHELON works but learned at least that PRISM is likely an advanced system which automatically analyzes and works entirely automatically...then not only in regards to individuasl...but can then also reveal ties to friends etc.

Simple spoken: Assume you are targeted for whatever reason on Google or facebook, rest assured that all your friends and their friends and their friends will be automatically analyzed and targeted as well. This goes far, far beyond what simple monitoring of overseas call or data could achieve.

It's really an "artificial intelligence" system with huge implications.

If ECHELON would be so advanced in doing all those things they never would have established PRISM in the first place.

ECHELON I understand as a rather "simple" although automated system which works by using keywords....but PRISM is a system which would tie GIGATONS of data together, where facebook, google, Microsoft, AOL and all major email/social networks/search engines etc. are linked together to provide an immense pool of data..which, IMO would provide MUCH more information and potential what such "ordinary" data could yield.

ECHELON in all likelihood will not be able to produce a "history" if it flags calls or emails....but PRISM can, not only would it be able to create a complete, decade spanning history of whatever you ever said/purchased etc..it will also include a history of your friends/contacts with TONS of details, likely including personal information of all kinds, political opinion etc.etc.... it's like an automated "profiling software" on crack and there is no way that ECHELON does the same thing on such a scale.

reply to post by Asktheanimals


Thanks dude,

on the topic of ECHELON being used for commercial gain, the EU report has loads on that subject.

Originally posted by OtherSideOfTheCoin
reply to post by Asktheanimals

 

Thanks dude,

on the topic of ECHELON being used for commercial gain, the EU report has loads on that subject.

It is my understanding it WAS (and still is) PRISM's initial purpose as well. The "spying ability" is just an added bonus, respective came as an obvious added use after the NSA realized the potential of the system for "finding terrorists".

facebook had something in the works named PRISM (!) which sounded exactly like what we are talking about right now (data analyzing software with the potential ability to "interlink" other data sources as well, not only FB but also Google, AOL etc..all in one big pot) - for that reason I think that PRISM was actually developed by facebook first and only afterwards either being sold/traded or dealt to the NSA..or the NSA approached them after seeing what the system can do.

I am speculating here, but i REALLY think the system was not "developed" or commissioned by NSA.

reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin


Good thread.

I've been aware of Echelon for many years, but not in too much detail. I was aware that it was basically a system which intercepted people's communications etc. I knew it existed - but I didn't know how much was actually true.

If you think of this and then the Bilderberg group meeting recently and how we're told it doesn't mean anything...think of how Occupy Wall Street was crushed etc.

We all seem to be living a huge lie in some respects.

Indeed, s&f.
Prism is just the surface of what is going on beneath. Exposure of prison should leads those concerned of the spying to look deeper into what is going on, if not things may continue, as Obama wants.

reply to post by flexy123


Interesting response like you say you are speculating and while i don't know if i would agree with everything you have said i do agree with you one what you have to say about it being used for commercial gain.


We know that ECHELON has been used to conduct industrial espionage and at times even push out foreign companies in favor of a American or British company and it would stand to reason that the same thing has happened with PRISM.