@ Apex
There are data mining programs searching social media constantly for key words and phrases.
Just type ( DON'T DO THIS ) something about a threat of bodily harm against our top man and see if you don't have cops at your door.
Cowboy, I am sure you know the history here, that Snowdon's "revelations" were really nothing new. The ability to mine data began with the advent of telephony and radio utilizing the ground wire and direct radio intercepts. The public may think ECHELON began in the 60s but it dates back to the 1947 agreement between the US and England (actually all the Commonwealth nations) to share the data. The data at that time began by jumping into bed with Mother Bell; voice, telegraph, and fax. The reason for the agreement from the US perspective is the prohibition by Charter, for the CIA (and other members of the so called intellegence community,) from collecting and using the intel on US citizens. The concept is simple. England simply gives that information back to the US thereby circumventing the mandate and obtaining data on a US citizen who is a target. I became aware of ECHALON in the mid 90s.
Having literally lived in the middle of this since the late 70s and knowing people who are essentially the cogs in the machine, I can attest to the fact that certainly prior to 9-11 interagency rivalries, the constant jockying for position, interferes with the utilization of the data.
While I do not beleive the government with respect to either the forensics (the what) of what transpired on 9-11 or the who, I found the response rather interesting. The claim was interagency rivelry and a failure to share information. The CIA and the DCI (Director, Central Intellegence,) had been created as
the point agency (person) for the collation and analysis of data/information. If I am correct on 9-11 there were 13 member agencies. In 1947 the "community was a lot smaller." If you would like to see copy of the original, and I am not kidding, the original declassfied documents pertaining to the fouding of the CIA and the intelligency community, you can see it by clicking on the link that follows. Essentially, in addition to creating the CIA, the then existing agencies that were collecting intelligency were brought under the umbrella of the new CIA(while I think it is availabe from the government printing office...this was gift from DCI George Tenet, see the third page if curious
Please don't tell anybody that it came from me lol)::angel
Original Documents, Founding of the CIA
The history is really interestting involving Wild Bill Donovan's OSS which he allong with Allen Dulles tried to create out of the OSS but squashed by Trumen mainly due to intelligenc breaches at the time. CIA failures in the next years were in part due to James Angelton's relationship with Kim Philby. (The early agents spent time learning from MI6.) However, the one lesson they did not learn was this:
Trust No one because Philby was of course a Soviet double agent who did his best to prevent detection, including making sure there were certain things the Americans would not learn thereby thwarting their counterintelligency capabilities.
Present members of the intelligency community:
Air Force Intelligence
Army Intelligence
Central Intelligence Agency
Coast Guard Intelligence
Defense Intelligence Agency
Department of Energy
Department of Homeland Security
Post 9-11
Department of State
Department of the Treasury
Post 9-11
Drug Enforcement Administration
Post 9-11
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Marine Corps Intelligence
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (Grew out of Defense Mapping)
National Reconnaissance Office
National Security Agency
Navy Intelligence National Intelligence
Office of the Director of National Intelligence
Post 9-11
Getting back to post 9-11, one would think that if the US government came to the conclusion that interagency rivalries and the shear size of the entire member community prevented sharing and proper colation of information, that if anything, they would consolodate and make the community
smaller!
Instead, of course, they did the opposite adding other layers over the DCI...DHS and DNI (the Office of the Director of National Intellegence) who became the superspy that the original DCI of the CIA was supposed to be!
If anything, they should have looked to Israel with its compact MOSAAD. One thing that most people do not know is that in a sense they have a lot more intelligency employees than publicly known. Their orginizational chart depends upon
sayanims , helpers who are the citizens of other countries, to either obtain intelligence or otherwise get something done or lend a hand to MOSAAD agents. In this way, their network of spis is quite large. In addition, they have the Shen Bet, that has a number of duties and in some was like the CIA dealing with internal security and counterintelligence which in addition to law enforcement is what the FBI does.
I think all the US government accomplished by adding more layers was to further complicate the gathering, analysis, and disemination of intel to the proper people that make the informational actionable.
As for the data center...suposedly "metadata," even if they manage to get it stored will they be able to connect the dots? Of course, the problem is if they can. If the dots lead to you, you are in trouble!
Aldous Huxley got it right.
With much irony, in my opinion, another, rather unlikely person got it right in his books regarding the ever increasiong authoritarian nature of the US goverment, none other than John Dean.
