
Government likely to open criminal probe into NSA leaks - teawithcarl
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/08/us-usa-security-leaks-idUSBRE95700C20130608
======
paul
If the government hasn't done anything wrong, then they shouldn't have
anything to hide from us :)

More seriously, some amount of surveillance is probably necessary, but they
need to be a lot more open and transparent about it. Secret laws and secret
courts are not the stuff a free society is made of.

~~~
mtgx
Apparently, they do. FISA spying has been found unconstitutional since 2011,
but they are keeping it a secret:

[https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/06/government-says-
secret...](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/06/government-says-secret-court-
opinion-law-underlying-prism-program-needs-stay)

This is happening in the "beacon of democracy" of the world.

~~~
enraged_camel
For the record, the only people who see the USA as the "beacon of democracy"
are Americans.

I'm not saying this to start a flame war, but to simply point out that the USA
is no more democratic than many other Western nations.

(My personal opinion is that the USA is much more of a beacon of imperialism
than of democracy. But that's neither here nor there.)

~~~
deelowe
s/americans/american government and media(for a lot of us at least)

~~~
jlgreco
To be fair, those people are exclusively Americans.

Not all Americans think of America as a "beacon of democracy", but pretty much
anyone who _does_ is themselves American. Also, rectangles are not squares,
though squares are rectangles.

~~~
gknoy
Nearly every American __wants__ our country to be a beacon of democracy,
however, which is why this type of behavior by our government is so
frustrating.

~~~
tomp
Nearly every person wants their country to be a beacon of democracy (and
freedom). Except those in power, of course (in America and elsewhere).

------
mtgx
So which is it? Is he "welcoming a debate over spying on Americans" or is he
prosecuting the whistleblowers (again) and requesting state privileges to
protect themselves against further scrutiny? I don't think the two can really
co-exist. And if all of this was "already known" what's there to prosecute
then? The amount of double-speak from the Obama administration astonishes me.

~~~
mayneack
What's the point of classified information if you don't punish those that leak
it?

Don't get me wrong, the treatment of Bradley Manning is absurd, and there
shouldn't be any sort of prosecution of the journalists involved (which has
been happening recently), so it's fair to complain that they are coming down
too hard on whistle-blowers. However, you have to expect some sort of
investigation into who did the original leaks.

We can also have the debate about whether they overly classify things and
should be more open in the first place, but that's not the same thing.

~~~
mtgx
So the whistleblower law is just a "pretend-law"? Whistleblowers are needed
for a healthy democracy, unless we have a pretend-democracy at this point,
too. How do you uncover dirt on the government if every single act of
whistleblowing and investigative journalism on the government is being
prosecuted? Not only does that create a very chilling effect, but it also
takes out everyone who did it, "before they cause too much damage". And
doesn't this begin to resemble a little too much with some of _those_
oppressive regimes?

The government classifies everything it doesn't want the public to know these
days, and then tries to arrest everyone who leaks those documents. I think we
need to stop thinking about what's legal and what's illegal, and start
thinking about what moral and immoral. Many of these laws are immoral.

~~~
doktrin
> _So the whistleblower law is just a "pretend-law"?_

Not sure why you used the phrase 'pretend-law' in scare quotes, since the post
you responded to said no such thing.

Either way, there isn't really such a thing as _the whistleblower law_
(IANAL). Aside from the first amendment, the closest thing I could find was
the Whistleblower Protection Act [1]. It's a young law by any standard (1989),
so you'd be hard pressed to argue that we didn't have a functioning democracy
in its absence.

Your central point is well received, but you rebutted a partial straw man.

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_Protection_Act](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_Protection_Act)

~~~
logn
I found this which explains a variety of protections:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_protection_in_Uni...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_protection_in_United_States)

Additionally it would be interesting if the leakers leaked more to get a
softer punishment:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turn_state%27s_evidence](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turn_state%27s_evidence)

Also, I have to add, I'm a little ashamed of my country today. But I feel
vindicated as a programmer that _we were right_! We knew it all along. Things
like this have been reported for years. But no one cared. Finally this is
plastered on every major publication and people no longer think it's some
conspiracy theory or exaggeration of normal security measures. So now's the
real test. What do we do? How do we fix this? Our innate liberties have been
trampled and threatened. Have some self-respect and speak your mind at work,
people. Tell your boss to fuck off and dig through server logs himself. If you
work in the NSA or other secret data labs, go ahead and accidentally take a
dump on the floor by the toilet, step in it, and walk back through your
offices and out the doors to rejoin normal society.

------
detcader
Greenwald replies to a Twitter user asking "when do we see the full redacted
deck?" "@markskogan @nycsouthpaw You won't - it contains very specific
technical NSA means for collection - we'd probably be prosecuted if we did."
\-
[https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/343454484917280770](https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/343454484917280770)

Everyone should be keeping their eye on @ggreenwald's twitter, reveals much
about the debate and what's going on with him. He gives bits and pieces of
background info..

~~~
mpyne
Greenwald of all people should just redact and spill it. He's under no legal
bar toward publishing that material (OBVIOUSLY, as he's already published TS)
and he can simply redact anything he's that worried about.

By Greenwald's own logic I shouldn't have to "just trust him" either, no? Be
transparent, spill the beans! Or is there an ulterior motive?

~~~
detcader
The Guardian as a news outlet could be prosecuted/gone after for releasing
certain things. It isn't just him making the decisions. On Twitter he seems to
express the desire to release as much as he can without earning himself a
Disappearance; I feel that once this is all over, he might just release the
docs the Guardian won't publish somehow.

~~~
mpyne
Neither the Guardian nor Greenwald are "read in" to the U.S. national security
information apparatus. They literally have _no legal requirement_ to avoid
publishing what they have.

As far as being Disappeared, even Greenwald can't possibly be _that_ dumb, can
he? If he has information that the NSA would want to remove him for, and he
hasn't already deleted it, it is _by far_ in NSA's best interests to
"disappear him" right now.

If they wouldn't find it politically possible to disappear him now then it
wouldn't be politically possible to disappear him then.

Does he just think he's going to string NSA along and that they're
simultaneously angry enough to kill him and dumb enough to let him choose to
leak it after all?

The very fact that you (and surely many others) feel that Greenwald might
release this "super sensitive material" later should be all the reasoning you
need to understand why NSA will have to remove him now or not remove him at
all.

Obviously I'm saying the latter will happen, but this means that Greenwald is
acting like a tinfoil-hat conspiracy nutter. Hell, even if the former will
happen Greenwald is acting like a nutter; his logic is _all wrong_ even for
the world he thinks he lives in.

Once he releases the information he can pose no further risk to NSA for now,
which would make harming him far more politically damaging (as it would be
revenge, and not to protect further disclosure).

I don't think he's stringing NSA along at all, I think he's stringing the rest
of us along.

~~~
detcader
Check again: The Guardian US is an American LLC. [1]

It would be in their best interest to disappear him ASAP? Maybe that's why The
Atlantic's Washington Editor-at-Large just tweeted that he overheard four
government officials on a plane (I believe that's where he was) discussing
loudly that the leakers and Greenwald should be "disappeared". [2] He recorded
the conversation and is getting together an article as we type.

Greenwald has been writing on NSA abuses and other government fraud and
corruption for years. He poses a (the biggest) threat ideologically and now he
is a source that leakers can release actual classified information through, if
they want. He is obviously very thorough with what he has been doing; he had
his computer physically rigged (in the sense of software and probably hardware
too) to allow for most secure communications by "someone familiar with those
matters" who came to his house to do it for him. He's probably in Hong Kong
for safety reasons, or at least reasons related to this story. Who else can
travel to Hong Kong at will just to leak stuff?

Try reading his actual articles and Twitter posts. He doesn't actually fear
disappearing, he fears being sought-after or... I don't know, maybe he doesn't
fear anything from acting alone and will release it all himself later! I just
interpreted what I have read, "earning [myself] a Disappearance" is not a
quote from him at all.

If you care that much about Greenwald, might want to read the Frequently Told
Lies list he has compiled [3] so you don't get tripped up. He usually lives in
Brazil but pays U.S. taxes as an American citizen (which is what he is, more
than most of us). He can not move because the U.S. does not recognize bi-
national same-sex partnerships upon immigration.

[1] [http://www.myvisajobs.com/Visa-Sponsor/Guardian-
News/1127261...](http://www.myvisajobs.com/Visa-Sponsor/Guardian-
News/1127261.htm)

[2]
[https://twitter.com/SCClemons/status/343392529913356289](https://twitter.com/SCClemons/status/343392529913356289)

[3] [http://ggsidedocs.blogspot.com.br/2013/01/frequently-told-
li...](http://ggsidedocs.blogspot.com.br/2013/01/frequently-told-lies-
ftls.html)

~~~
mpyne
It doesn't matter that the Guardian is an American LLC.

If you walked up to some dude on the street, who hasn't already agreed to
protect NSI, give him a confidential sheet, he's under no legal obligation to
protect it (though, see below).

That's one of the surreal effects of our 1st Amendment rights is that for
whatever reason J. Random Citizen (and especially the press) are not bound by
classification requirements (with the exception of actual national defense
information such as war plans, military designs, etc.) unless they've already
agreed to be.

So is Greenwald sitting on military secrets? If so he'll never be able to
disclose it, so there's no point mentioning it. If not he could disclose it
today, if he felt like it.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classified_information_in_the_U...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classified_information_in_the_United_States#Claims_of_U.S._government_misuse_of_the_classification_system)

~~~
detcader
Can you explain the labeling of WikiLeaks as an enemy organization and fears
that Assange has? Why don't you tell these things to Greenwald himself on
Twitter or in an email?

The release of any secret through a media outlet could be considered a "threat
to national security"; James Rosen, the New York Times, AP, and Antiwar.com
all know this now that they've all been indicted and some of their phone
records have been targeted and seized. Glenn has written extensively on this
topic, almost daily. I think he has a better understanding of this issue than
most people.

~~~
detcader
The current incarnation of the U.S government has _tortured people_, I doubt
they'd have any problem with disobeying their own laws and just going after
Greenwald and figuring out the justification later. If you disagree, then we
differ there and on more fundamental issues as well, probably.

------
pvnick
Not surprising. This is an incredibly opaque administration that's prosecuted
more whistleblowers under the espionage act than _every other administration
combined_.

The contrast between campaign Obama and president Obama is staggering. One
would not be too far off the mark in calling him a liar, as simply an
objective observation. I say this as someone who campaigned for him in 2008,
which I now regret immensely.

------
philwelch
It's incredible how the presence of the word "leaks" turns the whole headline
from promising to sinister. Why can't they investigate the NSA for once? Isn't
that what a democratic country would do?

~~~
claudius
It appears this was justified by a specific law that was passed by the
representatives of the people for the people, so why should they investigate
the NSA, especially in a democratic country?

~~~
AnthonyMouse
Are you saying they should investigate Congress instead?

(I noticed that nobody has specified who the "they" is. In a democracy, maybe
the "they" is supposed to be "us"?)

------
ig1
"The law enforcement and security officials, who were not authorized to speak
publicly, said the agencies that normally conduct such investigations,
including the FBI and Justice Department, were expecting a probe into the
leaks to a British and an American newspaper."

So basically the fact the NSA leaker was going to be prosecuted was leaked,
how can the the security officials who leaked this piece of information not
see the irony ?

~~~
khuey
The government (especially prosecutors/police) routinely leak information to
serve their own ends.

------
eli
The author of the original WaPo story said yesterday that the source was
expecting to be caught. "I don't even think [the source] wants to stay masked
forever."

Good interview if this is a story you care about.

[http://www.washingtonpost.com/video/thefold/nsa-leak-
source-...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/video/thefold/nsa-leak-source-
believes-exposure-consequences-inevitable/2013/06/07/fb15c0fe-
cf94-11e2-8845-d970ccb04497_video.html)

------
beachstartup
anyone else notice there's been none of the usual China-bashing going on ever
since this whole thing broke?

which is funny because it should be at an all time high, what with the meeting
of the Chinese president Xi and Obama.

maybe they're sharing tips on how best to spy on and kill their own citizens!
it is the most important economic and political bilateral relationship in the
world, after all.

i kid, i kid.

but seriously, wasn't one of the talking points of the meeting going to be
Obama redressing Xi on how the Chinese hack/spy on american companies and
citizens' communications?

LOL x 10.

------
beloch
1\. A small group of people violate the privacy of people everywhere around
the world.

2\. Another, even smaller group of people violate the privacy of the above
group.

3\. The first group says, "Hey, trust us. It's for your own good", and then
promptly hunts down the second group for being dirty-stinking-traitor-
terrorist criminals.

4\. Profit?

~~~
TheCondor
Read Top Secret America by Dana Priest. These are among the highest paying
government jobs. The strongholds of NSA are in the wealthiest counties in the
nation. And we don't even know what they do... I think it's reasonable to call
it profiting.

------
venomsnake
Remove the power to classify long term information from the executive branch
and put it into the judicial. It is obvious that it is abusing it currently
with classifying everything. If they have to compelling interest to classify
something that can jump at least the standard for a warrant.

------
joelrunyon
This makes me wonder how we have the balls to go into other countries and yell
about all their problems with surveillance & censorship when we do it more &
arguably, better than all of them combined.

------
mpyne
I didn't know the WaPo story had been authored by someone working with Assange
to make a documentary on WikiLeaks. That would at least explain why "data
directly from" was misinterpreted to mean "backdoor direct access" since I
doubt she had the training to disambiguate the terms used.

Not that it matters too much anyways, I'm assuming it wasn't an OpEd and
therefore she'd still have received the normal editing and source-checking
services. But I do wonder if there is any reporting that was done by those who
don't hold quite as much of a bias as Poitras and Greenwald, for the same
reason I would be suspicious of a history of the Iraq invasion authored by
Rumsfeld...

~~~
grey-area
There are many reporters working on this, not just Greenwald or Poitras. The
most recently released slide directly contradicts the statements by Google and
Facebook:

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/08/nsa-prism-
server...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/08/nsa-prism-server-
collection-facebook-google)

Given that they used the same phrases in their denials, it would seem they
have been fed talking points, and are are using a novel interpretation of
direct access. For example if Google or FB interpret a real-time mirror as
'not direct access', their statements are technically true, while at the same
time being misleading. Doubtless the truth will come to light eventually, but
for now we'll have to wait for more information and denials.

~~~
ig1
No, if anything it supports the Google/FB interpretation.

From this slide it appears the distinction between the two types of data
collection are between "indirect" on-the-wire intercepts and "direct" where
the data's obtained from the company holding it. Given the context it could be
referring to FISA obtained documents.

------
martythemaniak
Out of curiosity, has anyone's opinion of Bradley Manning, Julian Assange or
Wikileaks changed over the last few days?

From the previous times the topic has come up, my impression is that this
community is more or less whether they're doing good work or not.

~~~
shardling
You've get some editing errors that make your comment hard to parse.

------
pvnick
I wonder how far in the future we'll have to wait before people like Glenn
Greenwald become potential drone strike targets...

~~~
khuey
If he were living in Yemen instead of Brazil it might have already happened.

------
jzs
What is there to investigate? The criminals has clearly been found thanks to
the whistleblowers. The whistle blower is the hero while the criminals are NSA
and the government for doing such acts against democracy. A democracy needs to
be transparent. Otherwise it is a system that you can put no trust in.

------
yekko
US justice system in ‘calamitous’ collapse

------
cenhyperion
I'm just hoping that Greenwald doesn't "get in a car crash."

------
EdiX
But google, facebook and microsoft all they never heard of PRISM and no such
thing exist, why would there be a criminal probe about a work of fiction?

------
neaanopri
This should give a perfect opportunity for mass protests at the trial of
whoever did the leak.

------
outside1234
Is it time to start a petition that asks that this leak not be prosecuted?

------
python3
So much for not looking back and only looking forward

------
b2spirit
This was not a leak. It was a dare.

------
onecommentonly
Expected, unless the leaked doc said "ignore court order" or "kill the
Presi..." leaking is illegal.

The person that leaked this knew that he /she would be prosecuted, if... Let's
hope that he took care not to leave any crumbs as he gave the info to the
Guardian

