A new “cold war”? Started by Bush, but multiplied many times by a paranoid Obama, spying on every person on the planet with the full aid and compliance of Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, and the rest of Silicon valley? Yeah, that’s what’s happening.
Obama, the NSA and CIA have destroyed relations with China and Russia, cyberspying and cyberwarfare. We head down a slippery slope and the rest of the world realizes what an outright evil country the USSA has become. It’s bad enough our freedom is being taken away by the surveillance police state, but the rest of the world is waking to the fascism we’re spreading, and they don’t like it much….
Merkel Slams Obama’s “Cold War” Espionage “Doesn’t Belong In 21st Century”
Tyler Durden’s picture
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/12/2014
On the heels of John Kerry’s accusation that Russia’s behavior does not belong in the 21st century, Germany’s Angela Merkel has come out swining against the escalating spying scandal with the US (which saw allegations that the US had recruited two Germans to sell secrets this week). During an interview with ZDF, the German leader blasted “that we have different perceptions on the work of intelligence services,” adding that “we don’t live in the Cold War anymore.” The White House’s response, so far, a shrug of ‘business-as-usual’ from Josh Earnest; which fits with Merkel’s conclusion: “I think it’s not that easy to convince the Americans … to completely change the way their intelligence services work.”
As AP reports,
German Chancellor Angela Merkel is doubtful the U.S. will stop spying on Germany.
The chancellor said in an interview with public broadcaster ZDF “I think it’s not that easy to convince the Americans … to completely change the way their intelligence services work.”
Germany on Thursday demanded Washington’s top spy in Berlin leave the country as a new round of allegations of U.S. espionage worsened the friction between the two allies.
That move followed reports that U.S. intelligence had recruited two Germans — a man who worked at the country’s foreign intelligence agency and a defense ministry employee.
Asked whether she expected the Americans to change their behavior when it comes to spying on Germany, Merkel said “I can’t predict that, but certainly hope it will change.”
Topped off by her slamming Obama’s approach…
The past week’s clash over espionage shows “that we have different perceptions on the work of intelligence services,” Merkel says. “We don’t live in the Cold War anymore.”
Merkel says “methods of the past” don’t belong to 21st century
The US does not seem to care too much… (as The Hill reports)
On Friday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest appeared to indicate the U.S. believed the alleged spying between the allies was par for the course in comments to reporters.
“Allies with sophisticated intelligence agencies like the United States and Germany understand with some degree of detail exactly what those intelligence relationships and activities entail,” Earnest said.
“Any differences that we have are most effectively resolved through established private channels, not through the media. These private channels include regular discussions between intelligence officials, diplomatic officials, and national security officials from those two countries. So pursuing that dialogue through those channels is exactly what we’re doing.”
* * *
Making friends and influencing people wherever they go…
China Fears iPhone Is “Threat To National Security”
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/12/2014 – 20:34
With threats and promises over cyber-crimes fleeting back and forth between the US and China, it appears – through the ‘back-channel’ of the nation’s state broadcaster CCTV – China has stepped it up once again. As AFP reports, China has accused US technology giant Apple of threatening national security through its iPhone’s ability to track and time-stamp a user’s location. While not exactly a ‘new feature’ of the phones, the timing of China’s public lambasting reflects the escalating mutual distrust between the US and China over the extent of cyber-espionage.
As AFP reports, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV has accused US technology giant Apple of threatening national security through its iPhone’s ability to track and time-stamp a user’s location.
The “frequent locations” function, which can be switched on or off by users, could be used to gather “extremely sensitive data”, and even state secrets, said Ma Ding, director of the Institute for Security of the Internet at People’s Public Security University in Beijing.
The tool gathers information about the areas a user visits most often, partly to improve travel advice. In an interview broadcast Friday, Ma gave the example of a journalist being tracked by the software as a demonstration of her fears over privacy.
“One can deduce places he visited, the sites where he conducted interviews, and you can even see the topics which he is working on: political and economic,” she said.
The frequent locations function is available on iOS 7, the operating system used by the current generation of iPhones released in September 2013.
We are a little surprised at the ignorance of this feature – which suggests the timing of the public broadcast is much more for propaganda purposes than actual fear of espionage…
“CCTV has only just discovered this?” said one incredulous Chinese microblogger.
The dispute is not the first time Apple has been embroiled in controversy in China, where its products are growing in popularity in a marketplace dominated by smartphones running Google’s Android operating system.
Apple lost a lawsuit against a Chinese state regulator over patent rights to voice recognition software such as the iPhone’s “Siri” just this week.
In March 2013 the Californian company was notably the target of criticism orchestrated by the Chinese media on behalf of consumers, who were critical of poor after-sales service.
And in 2012 the US firm paid $60 million to settle a dispute with another Chinese firm over the iPad trademark.
The privacy scare also reflects mutual distrust between the US and China after a series of allegations from both sides on the extent of cyber-espionage.
Leaks by former US government contractor Edward Snowden have alleged widespread US snooping on China, and this month it was reported Chinese hackers had penetrated computer networks containing personal information on US federal employees.
Apple did not immediately respond when contacted by AFP for comment.
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I like the Benito quote. It didn’t end well for him, but the quote indicates he was no idiot. Probably caught between a rock and hard place, one more causality of war.
Someone nailed it this week, maybe it was Charles Hugh Smith, that the oligarchy control the means of production, the enforcement of laws, and the currency, leaving the 99.999% with very little.
Given the US Constitution, limiting government and protecting the rights of the individual, the government has failed to protect the rights of it’s citizens by limiting corporate power. The S&L crisis in the 80’s was only a trial run for the GFC of 2008, which epitomizing the failure of our current government. Not only failing to regulate the securities industry, but to then commit $T’s in public money to the industry is the worst form of treason.
The Clinton administration repealed Glass-Stegall, Bush failed to oversee and basically committed 2 grand faults, Iraq and TARP, and Obama is the new FDR by Executive Order.
Let’s rearrange the chairs on the Titanic some more. Has anyone seen the captain and crew? And where are the life boats?
See you on the other side. God bless.
Bloggers, Surveillance and Obama’s Orwellian State
Justin Lynch July 11, 2014
President Obama Delivers Statement On Veterans Affairs Scandal U.S. President Barack Obama (R) arrives to make a statement to the news media about the recent problems at the Veterans Affairs Department with White House Press Secretary Jay Carney in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House May 21, 2014 in Washington, DC. Chip Somodevilla—Getty Images
Advancements in technology have fueled this White House’s obsession with controlling the message.
http://time.com/2976711/obama-press-surveillance/
NSA Whistleblower Speaks: “The Ultimate Goal is Total Population Control”
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/11/2014 – 21:51
Meet Bill Binney, one of the earliest NSA whistleblowers (well before anyone had ever heard of Edward Snowden). He worked for the NSA for 30 years before resigning because of concerns he had regarding illegal spying on U.S. citizens in 2001. Mr. Binney thankfully has never stopped fighting for The Constitution that he swore to defend, unlike most other government officials who happily stomp all over the basic civil liberties enshrined in our founding document. He had some very choice words recently and it would be wise for all of us on planet earth to pay very close attention – Binney recently told the German NSA inquiry committee that his former employer had a “totalitarian mentality” that was the “greatest threat” to US society since that country’s US Civil War in the 19th century.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-07-11/nsa-whistleblower-speaks-ultimate-goal-total-population-control
Spot on AWD,
I cannot believe the country we have turned into, it makes me want to puke. I am shamed to be a citizen of the United States.
How the CIA Partnered With Amazon and Changed Intelligence
Intelligence Technology
The intelligence community is about to get the equivalent of an adrenaline shot to the chest. This summer, a $600 million computing cloud developed by Amazon Web Services for the Central Intelligence Agency over the past year will begin servicing all 17 agencies that make up the intelligence community. If the technology plays out as officials envision, it will usher in a new era of cooperation and coordination, allowing agencies to share information and services much more easily and avoid the kind of intelligence gaps that preceded the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
For the first time, agencies within the IC will be able to order a variety of on-demand computing and analytic services from the CIA and National Security Agency. What’s more, they’ll only pay for what they use.
Frank Konkel is the editorial events editor for Government Executive Media Group and a technology journalist for its publications. He writes about emerging technologies, privacy, cybersecurity, policy and other issues at the intersection of government and technology. He began writing about … Full Bio
The vision was first outlined in the IC Information Technology Enterprise plan championed by Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and IC Chief Information Officer Al Tarasiuk almost three years ago. Cloud computing is one of the core components of the strategy to help the IC discover, access and share critical information in an era of seemingly infinite data.
For the risk-averse intelligence community, the decision to go with a commercial cloud vendor is a radical departure from business as usual.
In 2011, while private companies were consolidating data centers in favor of the cloud and some civilian agencies began flirting with cloud variants like email as a service, a sometimes contentious debate among the intelligence community’s leadership took place.
As one former intelligence official with knowledge of the Amazon deal told Government Executive, “It took a lot of wrangling, but it was easy to see the vision if you laid it all out.”
The critical question was would the IC, led by the CIA, attempt to do cloud computing from within, or would it buy innovation?
Money was a factor, according to the intelligence official, but not the leading one. The government was spending more money on information technology within the IC than ever before. IT spending reached $8 billion in 2013, according to budget documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. The CIA and other agencies feasibly could have spent billions of dollars standing up their own cloud infrastructure without raising many eyebrows in Congress, but the decision to purchase a single commercial solution came down primarily to two factors.
“What we were really looking at was time to mission and innovation,” the former intelligence official said. “The goal was, ‘Can we act like a large enterprise in the corporate world and buy the thing that we don’t have, can we catch up to the commercial cycle? Anybody can build a data center, but could we purchase something more?
“We decided we needed to buy innovation,” the former intelligence official said.
A Groundbreaking Deal
The CIA’s first request for proposals from industry in mid-2012 was met with bid protests to the Government Accountability Office from Microsoft and AT&T, two early contenders for the contract. Those protests focused on the narrow specifications called for by the RFP. GAO did not issue a decision in either protest because the CIA reworked its request to address the companies’ complaint.
In early 2013, after weighing bids from Amazon Web Services, IBM and an unnamed third vendor, the CIA awarded a contract to AWS worth up to $600 million over a period of up to 10 years. The deal, handled in secret, was first reported by FCW in March 2013, sending ripples through the tech industry.
A month after the deal became public, IBM filed a bid protest with GAO that the watchdog eventually upheld in June, forcing the CIA to reopen bids to both companies for the contract. A legal struggle between Amazon and Big Blue ensued, and AWS filed a lawsuit against the federal government in July 2013, claiming the GAO sustainment was a “flawed” decision.
A farewell to trust: Obama’s Germany syndrome
By Edward Luce July 13, 2014
When the president makes a promise, people are no longer inclined to take him at his word
What did the president know, and when did he know it? Such was demanded of Richard Nixon, who resigned 40 years ago next month. In no sense can President Barack Obama be morally compared with the man who brought us Watergate. He is neither a crook nor a liar.
But Mr Obama shares one problem that could cripple what remains of his presidency – most people no longer trust him. The sentiment spans foreign allies as well as domestic critics. When trust goes, respect is seldom far behind.
The most surprising example is Germany. It was in Berlin in 2008 that then Senator Obama unveiled his global promise – an America that could once again be trusted. Germans no longer believe it. In the wake of the “friendly spying” ring allegations, less than 40 per cent of Germans consider the US a trustworthy partner, according to one survey.
Senior German figures cannot agree whether Mr Obama was unaware of Washington’s double agents, or dissembling. Either way, when Mr Obama spoke to Angela Merkel the day before the initial revelations he did not raise it. It was enough to make you want to cry, said Wolfgang Schäuble, the finance minister. Never before has a close US ally expelled a CIA station chief.
Mistrust is a nebulous concept. In the case of Mr Nixon, people rightly suspected he was crooked. In the case of Mr Obama, it is based on the perception that he is ineffectual. His words are so rarely joined to deeds. The net result is not radically different. When Mr Obama promises something will happen – say a tightening of data surveillance safeguards, or a drive to overhaul US immigration policy – people are no longer inclined to take him at his word. They may believe he means what he says. But they do not trust his ability to deliver.
There are Republicans who will swallow any number of preposterous stories about Mr Obama – that he has used the Internal Revenue Service to hound conservatives, or has plans to liquidate old people in order to control healthcare costs. But the conspiracy theorists have been around since the day he took office. What has changed is the mindset of ordinary people. Most Americans say they no longer personally trust Mr Obama. And fewer than 30 per cent express trust in the office of the presidency.
Mr Obama’s instinct has been to march away from the sound of gunfire. On the one hand, he has made it known that he hates being in Washington. From now on Mr Obama will take every opportunity to get out into the real world, say aides. On the other, he blames the messenger for his predicament. Mr Obama says he enjoys interacting with ordinary people, as opposed to the “cynics” who live in Washington, including the US media. The word now crops up in nearly every speech. “It’s easy to be cynical, in fact these days it’s kind of trendy,” he said. “Cynicism is a choice, and hope is a better choice.”
Journalism has more than its fair share of cynics. But most reporters are better described as sceptical. A cynic believes there is nothing new under the sun. A sceptic resists gullibility. On the basis of the latter, Mr Obama does not appear to relish being chief executive.
According to Mark Knoller, who chronicles the habits of US presidents, Mr Obama has now played golf 179 times – considerably more than George W Bush, his golf-loving predecessor. Mr Obama dislikes spending time with fellow politicians. But he seems happy to attend endless fundraisers. He has now clocked up 393 fundraising events since becoming president, almost double that of Mr Bush.
“If you seek an explanation for why Mr Obama riles so many voters, the perception of double standards is at the root of the problem”
If Mr Obama put half as much effort into co-opting or wrongfooting his opponents as he does raising cash from the wealthy, people might be less sceptical. It is not only journalists who remember Mr Obama’s promise in 2008 to limit his spending to public funding on condition that his Republican opponent agreed to do the same. Sure enough, his opponent (John McCain) accepted the deal. By then Mr Obama had discovered his great flair for raising money. He dropped the offer.
Mr Nixon’s aides were caught laundering illegal campaign funds and imprisoned for it. Mr Obama’s methods are legal and transparent. They are like night and day. But nobody expected better from “Tricky Dicky”. Mr Obama, on the other hand, made large ethical claims – that he would change the tone in Washington, that he would restore America’s moral authority in the world and that he would drive big money out of politics.
If you seek an explanation for why Mr Obama riles so many voters – and not just Tea Party conservatives – the perception of double standards is at the root of the problem. Leaders who make grand moral promises set themselves up for a fall. If they cannot live up to them, the backlash is all the greater.
That is why Mr Obama is so often compared to Jimmy Carter. For all his turpitude, Nixon was good at working the machinery of state to get things done, some of them very impressive. Even when they disagree, people want action from their leaders, rather than explanations for inaction. Nixon’s actions were sometimes heinous. Obama’s are often innocuous.
“When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal,” Nixon told David Frost. “If I do something, it is moral,” Mr Obama appears to believe. Except when it isn’t moral, which brings on greater disillusion. Call it Mr Obama’s Germany syndrome.