WAPO: Obama Lied to American People, Had Bush-Era Restrictions on NSA Surveillance of Americans Lifted in 2011

Only a few short weeks ago, President Barack Obama spoke to the American people and said, essentially, that the government's surveillance of Americans' phone records and emails were targeted and had been "ongoing for years".

On the heels of a series of reports detailing the U.S. government's practice of tracking private citizens' phone and internet use, President Obama on Friday sought to downplay the invasiveness of the procedure, assuring a California audience that "nobody is listening to your phone calls," and that any data tracking is governed by comprehensive oversight spanning all three branches of U.S. government...

...But he reminded Americans that these programs have been ongoing for years, and that Congress regularly reauthorizes the programs and receives updates on how they are conducted.

The Washington Post reports today, however, that both assertions appear to be bald-faced lies.

The Obama administration secretly won permission from a surveillance court in 2011 to reverse restrictions on the National Security Agency’s use of intercepted phone calls and e-mails, permitting the agency to search deliberately for Americans’ communications in its massive databases...

...the court in 2008 imposed an explicit ban — at the [Bush administration]’s request — on ... searches [of U.S. communications], that officials in 2011 got the court to lift the bar and that the search authority has been used.

Together the permission to search and to keep data longer expanded the NSA’s authority in significant ways without public debate or any specific authority from Congress...

...Officials would not say how many searches have been conducted.

...The court’s expansion of authority went largely unnoticed when the opinion was released, but it formed the basis for cryptic warnings last year by a pair of Democratic senators, Ron Wyden (Ore.) and Mark Udall (Colo.), that the administration had a “back-door search loophole” that enabled the NSA to scour intercepted communications for those of Americans.

The Constitution's Bill of Rights has a Fourth Amendment for a reason.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Americans of all party affiliations should reject this administration's lawless behavior, its unconstitutional maneuvers and all of its many, attendant lies.


Hat tip: BadBlue News Service.

JUST PEACHY: Facebook shared personal data of users a mere 26 thousand times in the first six months of 2013

Guest post by Eric Boehm

On Facebook, you can share posts and pictures with friends.

But at Facebook, they can (and do) share your posts and pictures and personal information with government agents all around the world.

Facebook released a report Tuesday detailing their level of involvement with government requests for data. Since users willingly share so much about themselves on Facebook and other social media tools, it seems government agencies are looking to take advantage of the information – and Facebook is more than happy to comply.

“As we have said many times, we believe that while governments have an important responsibility to keep people safe, it is possible to do so while also being transparent,” said Colin Stretch, an attorney for the social networking mega-site. “Government transparency and public safety are not mutually exclusive ideals.”

Stretch assured users that Facebook scrutinizes each request and maintains a “very high legal bar” that governments must clear before users’ private information is passed along.

Even so, the numbers are startling.

In total, Facebook received more than 26,000 separate requests for information about nearly 39,000 different accounts from 72 different national governments during the first six months of 2013.

And guess which country’s government made the most requests for information from Facebook – so many, in fact, that it is more than all other requests from all other national governments in the entire world, combined.

Go ahead, guess.

Here’s the chart of the top 10:

It does raise some questions – like, if government surveillance is meant to stop terrorist attacks, are terrorists really posting “about to build a bomb” on their status updates?

Or, perhaps the government is collecting Facebook information for other reasons – particularly since we already know the Drug Enforcement Agency frequently gets “tips” from the National Security Agency and others (then lies about where those tips come from).

And Facebook’s willingness to share personal data with the governments of the world seems even stranger one week after Joe Sullivan, the company’s chief security officer, said “it is never acceptable to compromise the security or privacy of other people.”

Of course in that instance he was talking about one user compromising another user’s privacy. If Facebook is going to compromise everyone’s privacy at once, that must be better – somehow.

Now we really need that “dislike” button.

 

Boehm is a reporter for Watchdog.org and can be reached at Eric@PAIndependent.com. Follow him on Twitter at @EricBoehm87. Please visit Watchdog.org for more information.

Full-auto Gauss gun "has 3D printed guns running scared"

Daddy like.

3D-printed guns have been making the news a lot recently. That's not to say that they and their creators don't deserve the press — people arming themselves without so much as a permit is pretty terrifying. But whoever it was that said 3D printing was the only way for people to circumvent the law and arm themselves just might not have seen this bad boy.

This fully-automatic Gauss gun, dubbed the CG-42, has a 15-round capacity and can fire an entire clip of ammo in 1.5 seconds. What it fires is almost as frightening as the gun itself, because the CG-42 is armed with nails, side-stepping the need for even the slightest of paper trails.

A Gauss gun, also known as a coilgun, is a battery-operated, electromagnetic linear motor which pulls a projectile forward faster and faster until it exits the weapon's muzzle, no gunpowder required. The CG-42 has a muzzle velocity of 138 feet per second, which doesn't sound like a lot until you see it put a nail right through a laptop's casing. Gauss guns also get more powerful the longer you make them, so a Gauss "rifle" would be capable of much more destruction...

The video at the link won't have anyone trading in their AR-15, but the technology does show a great deal of promise.


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News.

10 Worst Technology Predictions of All Time

Writing at LaptopMag, Mark Spoonauer offers the following list, which I've summarized here along with some additional commentary.

10. “There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share.” --Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO (April 2007). Talk about a patient board of directors. Under Ballmer's stewardship, MSFT appears to have whiffed on every significant consumer technology trend over the last 10 or 15 years.

9. “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” --Ken Olson, president Digital Equipment Corp (1977). Not long after, DEC was toast, forced into a merger with Compaq to survive.

8. “We’re going to become better than No. 1 (in tablets).” --Eric Cador, senior VP, Hewlett Packard (2010).

7. “Within the next two decades autos will be made with folding wings.” --Eddie Rickenbacker, pilot (1924). Rickenbacker, the famed World War I ace, might have been off by a century or so.

6. “Cellular phones will absolutely not replace local wire systems.” --Marty Cooper, inventor (1981).

5. “In five years I don't think there'll be a reason to have a tablet anymore.” --Thorsten Heins, BlackBerry CEO (2013). Well, he could be right. He still has 'til 2018 to be proven right.

4. “The subscription model of buying music is bankrupt.” --Steve Jobs (2003). At least Jobs course-corrected quickly.

3. "Remote shopping, while entirely feasible, will flop.” --Time Magazine (1966).

2. "Windows Phone will be No. 2 in Smartphones by 2015" --IDC, Gartner, IHS. Well, two years to go.

1. “I predict the Internet in 1996 [will] catastrophically collapse.” --Robert Metcalfe (1995). Metcalfe, one of the inventors of the Internet, appears to have underestimated his own child.


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News.

HOLY CRAP: Chinese Hackers Caught Attacking a Decoy US Water Plant

But don't worry, folks: President Obama is systematically de-funding the United States military, so what could possibly go wrong?

Chinese hackers have been harassing the US in a series of cyberattacks, but we've started trying to talk it out and cool this all down. But in the meantime, a security researcher has just revealed that he caught a team of Chinese hackers hijacking a fake water plant he set up. And aside from spotting the fake, they knew exactly what they were doing.

Kyle Wilhoit, a researcher with security company Trend Micro, explained the details of the whole thing at Black Hat on Wednesday. The hackers that attacked the honeypot are known as APT1 or "Comment Crew," and have been tracked back to the Chinese Army before; this isn't just some group of high-tech hooligans.

According to Wilhoit, the whole thing was extremely and obviously deliberate. He put it this way to the MIT Technology Review:

You would think that Comment Crew wouldn’t come after a local water authority. I actually watched the attacker interface with the machine. It was 100 percent clear they knew what they were doing.

This isn't an isolated case either. Wilhoit also shared information about 12 other decoys that attracted some 74 deliberate attacks from APT1 and other groups, 10 of which were able to completely control of the fake water plants. If the targets had been real and not decoys, the attackers would have had no problem doing pretty much anything they wanted with the infrastructure they managed to snag...

As researcher Trevor Loudon has warned us for years, the People's Republic of China is at war with the United States. Right now.


Via: BadBlue Tech News.

Crimson Tide Buys Anti-Gravity Treadmill for Rehab Purposes

Even I might be able to run a mile on this thing.

Alabama Football Team's Anti-Gravity Treadmill Is Star Of New Facility: The Future Of Injury Rehabilitation

...Jeff Allen, UA Assistant Athletic Director for Sports Medicine, said that the program purchased the anti-gravity trainer a year ago to help current NFL running back Eddie Lacy recover from a toe injury...

"We've had this for a year now. We purchased it when Eddie Lacy had his toe injury," Allen explained... "What this allows us to do is take a guy and run them at a lower percentage of their body weight. Theoretically, if you weigh 200 pounds, I can put you in here and set this to run you at what it would feel like to run at 50 pounds."

Manufacturers of this futuristic training device claim professional athletes as well as Olympians have felt its benefits that include a shortened rehab time. Woodway Treadmills even says that its G-Trainer can help ease amputee patients into a new prosthetic limb.

The patient is placed inside a bubble chamber that surrounds his or her lower body but exposes the upper body. Pressurized air lifts the user up, making him or her feel around 20 percent lighter. Those who have used it compare the feeling to running on water or floating.

Don't look for the Woodway at your local gym anytime soon. If your gym has to ask how much it costs...


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech and Science News.

Read this before you start believing that Google searches can bring the government knocking on your door

The New York Daily News' Josh Greenman tips us off:

Read this before you start believing that Google searches can bring the government knocking on your door. http://t.co/kpfxm5BpuB

— Josh Greenman (@joshgreenman) August 1, 2013

Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News.

After 20 years in service, the SIM card has been hacked

Sebastian Anthony explains a brilliant attack:

For the longest time, I thought that SIM cards were merely a piece of laminated memory that stored the data that your phone needs to connect to a cellular network (ICCID, Ki, etc.), along with enough space to store a few phone numbers. In actuality, the SIM card in your phone is actually a small computer, with memory, a processor, and even an operating system. As you can see in the diagram below, there is a chip beneath those gold contacts, and on that chip there is a processor, ROM (firmware that stores the OS and SIM apps), EEPROM (which stores your phone book, settings, patches), and RAM (for use by the SIM’s OS and apps). In the photo below of a disassembled SIM card, you can clearly see that this is quite a complex computer chip.

And, unfortunately, like any computer chip that runs an operating system and apps, a SIM card can be hacked. In this case, modern SIM cards run a very simple OS that loads up Java Card — a version of the Java virtual machine for smart cards (of which SIMs are a variety of). Java Card essentially runs small Java applets, and each applet is encapsulated and firewalled (sandboxed) by the Java VM, preventing sensitive data from leaking to other apps. Your phone interacts with these apps via the SIM Application Toolkit (STK) to display information on your screen, and to interact with the outside world. To load apps onto the SIM or to update them, hidden text messages are sent by the carrier, containing over-the-air (OTA) programming in binary form. These messages are signed with a cryptographic key, so that the SIM knows that these messages have originated from a trusted source.

Now, German security researcher Karsten Nohl has discovered a way of finding out that all-important cryptographic key. By sending his own OTA SMSes that aren’t signed with the correct key, he discovered that some phones pop up an error message that contains a cryptographic signature. Then, using rainbow tables (a list of plaintext keys/passwords and their encrypted equivalent), Nohl found he could discover the SIM card’s cryptographic key in about one minute. Once he had this key, he could send apps and viruses to the SIM card that can send premium text messages (racking up huge bills), re-route or record calls, collect location data — you name it, with access to the SIM, you can do just about anything.

Nohl estimates that more than 12 percent of mobile phones are vulnerable to the attack. The older DES encryption standard has since been replaced by its stronger cousin Triple DES. Verizon and AT&T say that they're not vulnerable, but if you have an older SIM card it would make sense to get it upgraded. Most carriers will do it for free.


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News.

6 Diving Watches

Every guy I know who grew up watching James Bond movies has a certain hankering for diving watches. Here are six pretty affordable ones that have good reputations.

Casio Classic G-Shock Chronograph - Military Stealth Black (app. $70)	Men's Seiko Solar Dive Chronograph Watch with Black Dial (Model: SSC017, app. $395)
Citizen 300 Meter Professional Eco-Drive Watch (app. $165)	G-SHOCK G-FORCE MILITARY REVERSE DIAL WATCH (app. $90)
NIXON 42-20 CHRONO WATCH (app. $400)	TW Steel Grandeur Diver Black PVD Watch, 48mm (app. $485)

THE SCIENCE IS SETTLED: The Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition Helps Men De-Stress

First runner-up headline: New test-taking strategies, er, uncovered [NSFW].

Well men, we’ve done it... thanks to research conducted by Carnegie Mellon University...

The study assigned 54 straight men to view either mildly erotic (think Sports Illustrated) or neutral images of mix-sex couples before completing a social stress test. The results found that the men who viewed the semi-erotic photos were half as likely to feel stressed when taking the test compared to the guys who viewed the nonsexual pictures. The study also found that 50 per cent of men performed better on the math portion of a stress test ─ which would have been nice to know before my 11th grade math exam.

“When you’re stressed, your body produces more of a hormone called cortisol, which excites your nervous system and disrupts your brain’s problem-solving capabilities,” says the study’s coauthor, J. David Creswell, Ph.D. His research, however, proves that erotic images appear to limit this stress-cortisol response.

...So, there you have it ladies. Another study leading you to believe men are absolute pigs. Sure, we like sex. But so do you, no? I mean, pornography would likely help women feeling stressed as well. Our bodies function the same, for the most part. I’d like to see how the study would differ had they selected women to read a chapter of 50 Shades of Grey, or watch an episode of True Blood. My guess is the results would be “shockingly” similar.

Ya learn yerself something new everyday.


Hat tip: BadBlue Fame.

A New Google Maps Debuts on an Invitation-Only Basis

I just received my invitation to try a new version of Google Maps and am very pleased thus far. Here's a quick look (click to enbiggaplode):

Initial take:

• The dramatically increased screen real estate devoted to the map is excellent.

• Search results for local businesses seem improved.

• The user interface and navigation are further streamlined and impressively easy to use.

In short, great job by Google's engineers in improving an already excellent product.


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News.

THE BEARD: Built-in Sunscreen For a Man's Face

The science, as they say, is settled.

A study conducted at the University of Southern Queensland in Australia, published in the journal Radiation Protection Dosimetry, examined the effectiveness of facial hair in protecting against UV rays through dosimetry — the measurement and calculation of the absorbed amount of radiation using both direct and indirect exposure. Researchers used mannequins as the participants for the study — some had stick-on beards that ranged in one and a half to three and half inches in length and the rest were clean-shaven. The results of the study showed that beards can prevent skin cancer with an estimated 90 to 95 percent of protection against harmful UVs...

...Professor of radiation physics at the University of Southern Queensland and researcher of the study, Alfio Parisi, said beards are "...a reduction in the UV of 50 to 95 percent," reported Men's Journal. An ultraviolet protection factor (UPF) system is used for apparel; UPF rating of 15 is good, and 50+ provides the most extensive protection. Facial hair can have a UPF anywhere from two to 21, confirmed Parisi...

...Whether you opt to have a beard a la Ryan Gosling or go clean-shaven a la Leonardo DiCaprio, always remember to have in handy a sunscreen with sun protection factor (SPF) that can provide broad spectrum, or protection against both UVB and UVA rays, says the Food and Drug Administration...

And by "beard", I certainly do not mean the First Lady -- and I resent that implication.


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News.

Hey, Baby!

Via Wanda:

Writing in the U.K.'s Guardian, Cory Doctorow explains why everyone should care about the NSA and PRISM scandals. You got that Lindsey Graham, you pathetic fool?

COMFORTING: Obama Appointee Who Heads U.S. Nuclear Security Agency Is Hacked and Publicly Humiliated

When one asks -- pertaining to the Obama administration -- the rhetorical and semi-serious question "What could possibly go wrong?" the real answer is: everything.

The Obama administration official who heads the agency responsible for maintaining the country’s nuclear stockpile as well as securing “loose nukes” worldwide is the latest victim of “Guccifer.”

Neile Miller, acting administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) recently had her Facebook account breached by the notorious hacker, who also apparently illegally accessed one of Miller’s personal e-mail accounts.

In 2010, Obama nominated Miller, 55, for the principal deputy administrator’s post at NNSA (she was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in August 2010). Following the departure of the agency’s administrator in January, Miller stepped up into the post of acting administrator.

Miller, who has top secret security clearances, runs an agency with a broad portfolio of nuclear-related responsibilities, including managing and securing the nation’s nuclear weapons and keeping weapons of mass destruction “out of the hands of state and non-state actors.” The NNSA has a $12 billion annual budget, 2500 employees, and 35,000 other contract workers.

...Through an NNSA spokesperson, Miller--who last month announced that she was leaving her government post effective June 14--declined to comment beyond noting that “these were personal accounts and no classified information was accessed.”

...Several months into an online strafing campaign, “Guccifer” appears unconcerned about the law enforcement effort to capture him/her/them. “My end is far,” the hacker noted in an e-mail “Remember this is another chapter of the game.”

Feel better yet?


Hat tip: BadBlue.

Using Metadata to Find Paul Revere

Absolute brilliance from Kieran Healy.

London, 1772.

I have been asked by my superiors to give a brief demonstration of the surprising effectiveness of even the simplest techniques of the new-fangled Social Networke Analysis in the pursuit of those who would seek to undermine the liberty enjoyed by His Majesty’s subjects. This is in connection with the discussion of the role of “metadata” in certain recent events and the assurances of various respectable parties that the government was merely “sifting through this so-called metadata” and that the “information acquired does not include the content of any communications”. I will show how we can use this “metadata” to find key persons involved in terrorist groups operating within the Colonies at the present time. I shall also endeavour to show how these methods work in what might be called a relational manner.


The analysis in this report is based on information gathered by our field agent Mr David Hackett Fischer and published in an Appendix to his lengthy report to the government. As you may be aware, Mr Fischer is an expert and respected field Agent with a broad and deep knowledge of the colonies. I, on the other hand, have made my way from Ireland with just a little quantitative training—I placed several hundred rungs below the Senior Wrangler during my time at Cambridge—and I am presently employed as a junior analytical scribe at ye olde National Security Administration. Sorry, I mean the Royal Security Administration. And I should emphasize again that I know nothing of current affairs in the colonies. However, our current Eighteenth Century beta of PRISM has been used to collect and analyze information on more than two hundred and sixty persons (of varying degrees of suspicion) belonging variously to seven different organizations in the Boston area.

Rest assured that we only collected metadata on these people, and no actual conversations were recorded or meetings transcribed. All I know is whether someone was a member of an organization or not. Surely this is but a small encroachment on the freedom of the Crown’s subjects. I have been asked, on the basis of this poor information, to present some names for our field agents in the Colonies to work with. It seems an unlikely task...

...Rest assured that we only collected metadata on these people, and no actual conversations were recorded or meetings transcribed. All I know is whether someone was a member of an organization or not. Surely this is but a small encroachment on the freedom of the Crown’s subjects. I have been asked, on the basis of this poor information, to present some names for our field agents in the Colonies to work with. It seems an unlikely task.

If you want to follow along yourself, there is a secret repository containing the data and the appropriate commands for your portable analytical engine... Here is what the data look like.


...I cannot show you the whole Person by Person matrix, because I would have to kill you. I jest, I jest! It is just because it is rather large. But here is a little snippet of it. At this point in the eighteenth century, a 254x254 matrix is what we call ”Bigge Data”. I have an upcoming EDWARDx talk about it. You should come. Anyway:


...The analytical engine has arranged everyone neatly, picking out clusters of individuals and also showing both peripheral individuals and—more intriguingly—people who seem to bridge various groups in ways that might perhaps be relevant to national security...


...Look at that person right in the middle there. Zoom in if you wish. He seems to bridge several groups in an unusual (though perhaps not unique) way. His name is Paul Revere.


Once again, I remind you that I know nothing of Mr Revere, or his conversations, or his habits or beliefs, his writings (if he has any) or his personal life. All I know is this bit of metadata, based on membership in some organizations. And yet my analytical engine, on the basis of absolutely the most elementary of operations in Social Networke Analysis, seems to have picked him out of our 254 names as being of unusual interest...

Read the whole thing.


Hat tips: V and Postcardiness's Blog.

The Mars Rover That Just Won't Die

Interesting article by William Herkewitz at Popular Mechanics, via BadBlue Car News:

The rover rolls its way across a barren red sea. It has just finished a geologic survey of Mars's massive Endeavor crater–finding more proof of the planet's watery past–and already has its eyes set on the next landmark.

No, this isn't Curiosity, the $2.5 billion dollar extra-planetary playboy that landed last August. This is Opportunity, its older, meeker, and pared-down cousin. By most measurements, Opportunity is less impressive. Well, with one exception: It will not die.

Opportunity is just a month shy of its 10-year launch anniversary, and the rover is still active. The mobile geologist has now survived its original stated mission length of 90 Martian days by three dozen times over (though that initial timeframe was charitably conservative). It has also far outlived the intended lifespan of its parts, its identical twin Spirit, and the expectations of everyone involved in the project.

"We've been on borrowed time for a while," John Callas, the project manager of the NASA Opportunity mission, said at a press conference today. "I don't think there's anyone on this planet that would have imagined this rover lasting this long when we started ten years ago." What makes Opportunity's lifespan so bizarre is that robot has always been just a step away from crisis. Many NASA projects, including the new Curiosity rover, have been engineered to be chock-full with redundant back-up mechanisms. When there's no hope of traveling to Mars to fix vital parts that break, engineers often double down on engines, processors, and other important machinery with backup system. This is usually a good move: When you have a million parts, each with a one-in-a-million chance of breaking, failure is almost assured.

Opportunity, however, lacks this redundancy. The reason is that it landed ballistically Mars, like a bullet surrounded by giant airbags (unlike Curiosity's the Mission Impossible-style "seven minutes of terror" descent.) To help it survive its landing, Opportunity was built light—stripped down to its essential equipment. "We have a single processor." Callas says. "A single power supply," When those die, Mars will lose an explorer and gain a monument. "If we have a solder joint that breaks, its game over," Callas says. "It's just instant death. … That said, the batteries are in shape, there's been no indication of anything [wrong]."

Considering all that could go wrong on a mission to Mars, the fact that Opportunity is still going strong after a decade is nothing short of amazing.

U.S. Tech Industry "Could Pay Stiff Price for PRISM"

Reports that U.S. tech giants are siphoning the private data of their users off to the federal government have vast implications not only for the nation's citizens, but ultimately for the global reach of the businesses themselves.

The NSA's PRISM program is drawing outrage for invading the privacy of U.S. citizens, but that's not the only cause for concern now that it's come to light. "Access to information by the U.S. government on any communications platform can kill sales outside of the U.S.," noted tech analyst Rob Enderle. "That's one of the reasons we can't sell a telecom switch in most countries, for instance."


Technology firms in the United States might be impacted adversely by the National Security Agency's controversial PRISM program.

Classified documents about the program leaked to The Washington Post and The Guardian indicate that major U.S. high-tech companies -- including Microsoft, Google, Apple, Yahoo and Skype (now owned by Microsoft) -- provide it data. This data is the major source of raw intelligence for the NSA's analytical reports, according to the agency.

The leaked documents indicate that 98 percent of the data collected by PRISM comes from Google, Yahoo and Microsoft... All three, along with other technology companies, have denied involvement.


"We do not provide any government organization with direct access to Facebook servers," Joe Sullivan, chief security officer at Facebook, told TechNewsWorld... When the company receives requests for information about specific individuals, it scrutinizes them carefully and provides information "only to the extent required by law," he said.

That's pretty much the party line for all the companies named.

It's possible that tech companies may lose revenue as a consequence of their participation with PRISM.

"Access to information by the U.S. government on any communications platform can kill sales for that platform outside of the U.S.," Rob Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group, told TechNewsWorld. "That's one of the reasons we can't sell a telecom switch in most countries, for instance."

...Claims by Microsoft, Google, Yahoo and other companies that they are not working with PRISM could be correct, because the program "can go right around tech companies and pull data from network providers like Verizon, and it's supported by U.S. domestic laws," Enderle said.

In fact, Google's Larry Page and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg have both adamantly denied any knowledge of the program.

The problem, according to Zero Hedge's Tyler Durden, is "they are all lying".

The companies that negotiated with the government include Google, which owns YouTube; Microsoft, which owns Hotmail and Skype; Yahoo; Facebook; AOL; Apple; and Paltalk, according to one of the people briefed on the discussions. The companies were legally required to share the data under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. People briefed on the discussions spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are prohibited by law from discussing the content of FISA requests or even acknowledging their existence...

...Tech companies might have also denied knowledge of the full scope of cooperation with national security officials because employees whose job it is to comply with FISA requests are not allowed to discuss the details even with others at the company, and in some cases have national security clearance, according to both a former senior government official and a lawyer representing a technology company...

...The slide, below, details different methods of data collection under the FISA Amendment Act of 2008 (which was renewed in December 2012). It clearly distinguishes Prism, which involves data collection from servers, as distinct from four different programs involving data collection from "fiber cables and infrastructure as data flows past".


Essentially, the slide suggests that the NSA also collects some information under FAA702 from cable intercepts, but that process is distinct from Prism... Analysts are encouraged to use both techniques of data gathering...

"You Should Use Both." You know: just in case only one is insufficient to make a mockery of all personal rights and civil liberties.

Reporter Glenn Greenwald told CNN's Piers Morgan on Thursday that the Obama administration has bullied and intimidated journalists that had intended to go public with information about PRISM.

Greenwald jump-started Thursday’s discussion over civil liberties and government surveillance with a report late Wednesday night that detailed the NSA’s collection of data from millions of Americans’ phone records.

“It’s well past time that we have a debate about whether that’s the kind of country and world in which we want to live,” Greenwald said on CNN. “We haven’t had that debate because it’s all done in secrecy and the Obama administration has been very aggressive about bullying and threatening anybody who thinks about exposing it or writing about it or even doing journalism about it. It’s well past time that that come to an end.”

Durden probably summed it up best yesterday:

In retrospect, it is sad what a farce this country has become: artificial market, centrally-planned economy, pervasive spying on the people, a tax collector that target political enemies, an administration that openly lies under oath...

If we didn't know better we would say this was 1955 Stalingrad, although Stalingrad at the height of totalitarianism was for amateurs. This is next level sh**: "Firsthand experience with these systems, and horror at their capabilities, is what drove a career intelligence officer to provide PowerPoint slides about PRISM and supporting materials to The Washington Post in order to expose what he believes to be a gross intrusion on privacy. 'They quite literally can watch your ideas form as you type,' the officer said.

Compared to Obama, Nixon was an Eagle Scout.


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News.

The digital camera is nearly 40 years old: here's the very first one

An Eastman Kodak engineer named Steve Sasson invented the first digital camera in 1975:

In a Kodak blog post written in 2007, Sasson explains how it was constructed:

It had a lens that we took from a used parts bin from the Super 8 movie camera production line downstairs from our little lab on the second floor in Bldg 4. On the side of our portable contraption, we shoehorned in a portable digital cassette instrumentation recorder. Add to that 16 nickel cadmium batteries, a highly temperamental new type of CCD imaging area array, an a/d converter implementation stolen from a digital voltmeter application, several dozen digital and analog circuits all wired together on approximately half a dozen circuit boards, and you have our interpretation of what a portable all electronic still camera might look like.

Here are some specs: The 8 pound camera recorded 0.01 megapixel black and white photos to a cassette tape. The first photograph took 23 seconds to create.


To play back images, data was read from the tape and then displayed on a television set:

Today's most affordable state-of-the-art camera, the Canon PowerShot SX150 IS, by comparison has the following specs:

• 12x Wide-Angle Optical Zoom and 28mm lens with Optical Image Stabilizer

• 14.1 Megapixel Image Sensor and DIGIC 4 Image Processor

• 720p HD Video in Stereo Sound

• Large 3.0-Inch Wide LCD Viewing Screen

• Movie Digest Mode Records Video Clps Before Shoting a Photo

• 12x wide-angle optical zoom

At Amazon, all of this technology can be purchased for less than $100.

TOP 20 LIST: If companies had realistic slogans what would they be?

Culled from an amusing Reddit thread:

• Motel 6: We will leave the lights on for you because we are in a dangerous f***ing neighborhood!
• Dasani: Italian for "Coke just sold you water"
• Red Robin: When you don't want to spend much taking the kids out, but you need alcohol.
• Carnival Cruise: OH COME ON. What are the chances something will happen this time?

• Geek Squad: Let us Google that for you.
• Adobe: an update is available.
• McAfee - Please don't uninstall
• Axe: Smell like a sixth grader.

• Barnes & Noble: Your Local Library Now Has A Starbucks
• Lexus: A Toyota that will get you laid.
• AOL: Still here
• Fiji: If you love the taste of water and hate money

• Air Canada: "We're not happy til you're not happy"
• NetFlix - Wait, don’t go! Arrested Development!
• Comcast - We'll be there between 7AM and go f*** yourself
• Applebee's: We figured out a way to f*** up salad.

• Monster [Energy Drinks]: For Extreme Sitting At Your Computer
• SlimJim: If we showed you how we make these you'd stop eating meat forever.
• Internet Explorer: your number 1 browser for downloading other browsers
• Denny's: because its 2 am, you're drunk, and you need pancakes.


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News - BadBlue.com/Tech.

Watch a Giant Asteroid Sail by Earth Tonight at 9:30 ET

So advises National Geographic:

Astronomers around the world are gearing up to get their first close-up views of a giant space rock and it’s new-found moon, set to hurtle by Earth Friday, May 31. The flyby will be broadcast live around the world via the web.

Remote controlled telescopes on the Canary Islands, off the coast of West Africa, will cover the asteroid’s closest approach to our planet which occurs at 4:59 p.m. EDT. You can catch the live coverage right here starting at 1:30 p.m. PDT / 4:30 p.m. EDT / 20:30 UTC...

Called 1998 QE2, this asteroid is considered a potentially hazardous object because it makes a regular close approach to Earth’s orbit... QE2 is a true mountain in motion, stretching 1.7 miles (2.7 kilometers) across—nine times the length of the 12-deck Queen Elizabeth 2 cruise ship...


...And astronomers have already made a surprising discovery... QE2 has been hiding its own moon—about 2,000 feet (600 meters) wide. Considering the hundreds of asteroids out there, NASA says this may not be that uncommon. As many as 16 percent of asteroids are actually part of binary or triplet systems.

...Luckily for us Earthlings, there is no chance of a collision. The asteroid will pass by on Friday at 4:59 p.m. EDT at a safe distance of 3.6 million miles (5.8 million kilometers)—15 times the distance separating the Earth from the moon. This is the closest approach the asteroid will make to our planet for at least the next two centuries...


Despite its relative distance from Earth, QE2 will still be visible to backyard telescopes (at least four to six inches in mirror size) as a faint 11th magnitude star (100 times fainter than what the human eye can see) silently gliding across the southern skies the next few nights...

...NASA astronomers plan to train two of the world’s most powerful radio telescopes on the asteroid as it makes its closest approach today. By bouncing radio signals off the tumbling asteroid, they hope to create a detailed map that will reveal information about its rotation, shape, and surface features as small as 12 feet (3.75 meters) across...

There is no truth to the rumor that Michael Moore's gravitational field has influenced the path of the asteroid.


Hat tip: BadBlue Tech News.