Do you support the NSA spying on purely domestic calls and the whole internet?

Question

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2004001159_spying08.html

A former employee of AT&T states how the NSA not only built a secret room in AT&T buildings to monitor calls, but most of them were purely domestic, and where he worked the NSA had split all internet signals into 2 identical copies, one going to be monitored, that's the whole internet being watched.

The reason I ask this is because so many people here seem to follow the "well you shouldn't worry if you have nothing to hide" mind set.

Answer 1

Not sure how I feel about this one. Do I like it? No. But do I have a better idea on how to catch terrorists already at work in the US? Not really, and I probably would have done the same thing. Will we lose freedoms? Scary. Who said: He who trades liberty for security has neither? Ben Franklin?

Answer 2

You bet I'd worry about this data mining. But this goes on more than you think. Large companies do it all the time on their internal networks. So if you're using Yahoo Answers during work hours, they know it. Reading your link, it looks like the NSA was able to collect data rather than monitor it. They can then take it somewhere else to analyze it. Could you imagine trying to monitor the Internet? Impossible. Too much data. And what do you think monitor and analyze means? They aren't sitting there listening to phone calls or manually looking through electronic traffic. They search out key words and strings.

It's not only Bush that has done this. It goes way back into WWII. Clinton also did some. Just not on the scale of this. But then again, the data pushed today is much different than it was then. If they had the same capabilities then that they have now, you can bet they would have done the same. I have no problem with this so far. It's if someone comes along and uses the data to gain a political advantage over rivals or round up political adversaries, then we have a real problem. It still comes down to trusting your leadership. I do not see Bush's adversaries in jail. So I'm not worried about his administration. I am worried about the precedent it has set.

And if the next President has a crisis where data mining is required, it will be done.

Answer 3

Sure. Its not like there is someone listening in on the other line. There is far too much traffic for something like that. There is specific points there are looking for, not what little crimes you are committed. Besides, they couldn't use that information against you in a court of law, as it is considered an illegal wire tap. Their premise is to utilize the traffic stream as a means of filtering out the 99.9% of crap that is on the internet for anything that may likely be an indicator of a terrorist sleeper cell within the US. There is NO other way to locater a sleeper cell, as they are essentially cut off from external traffic to the HQ element in their clandestine operation. Only a small que will be given to activate them...so we are trying to sift through the mess to find them. One of the most used means is through the traffic of JPEGs and other picture software. It is easy to encrypt messages within these pictures, which cannot be seen with the naked eye when glancing at the actuall picture. This is why the PATRIOT Act made it mandatory to have a 'back door' in all digital picture encryption. So the NSA can take a quick peak and make sure there is nothing there, or if there is an ecrypted file with no back door, they can pull all the information on it to include a copy of the pic: this way they know what it says, where it came from, when it was delivered and where it was going. Very valuable stuff.
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by the way, please don't use the Seattle Times. They are such a horrible periodical. Use something with more merit and value, as this will strengthen your argument.

Answer 4

Absolutely not. Only useful idiots could support this totally baseless invasion of privacy which is being done by our government under false pretenses. Telephone eavesdropping was going on in the former USSR under Josef Stalin's communist totalitarian regime. Stalin sent to prison camps over 40 million people half of them about 20 million people either were executed or died in those camps. This is so unbelievable and even hard to imagine that those things are happening in America. Where are we coming to?

Those people who say "well you shouldn't worry if you have nothing to hide" either useful idiots or were brainwashed by Republican Neocon propaganda.

If so called terrorists are aware that telephone eavesdropping is going on and that internet is being monitored they would never use those means of communications. What is the real reason behind all that???

Answer 5

Anyone that says why should I worry, I have nothing to hide, should be taken from thier homes by hooded federal police and beaten by huge rolled up copies of the bill of rights for being complete idiots.

Anyone in an administration who orders the wiretapping of American citizens without a warrant or probable cause should be hung for treason, just like Saddam because there is no difference in their method of operation.

Answer 6

This is for one ILLEGAL, for 2 dangerous, when one starts spying especially one who is so unpopular this leads to bad things, 3 he didn't start this after 9/11 as many sheep still think he started this like 2 months after he got into office, how do you explain that, so to this if your not doing anything wrong you don't have anything to worry about mentality, how would you like a competitor of yours being able to view and hear everything you have to say this can cause problems in many ways , its hard to have a strategy if your competitor already knows about it.

Answer 7

I certainly do suppport the NSA collecting intelligence

Answer 8

2 completely countless issues...... 2d substitute supporters want a loose state - to no longer have the gubermint undercover agent on us......I propose you study the form or have somebody clarify it to you.

Answer 9

No its against the law remember the law of the United States, but it doesnt seem like we have a say? your the only person who asked me if it was okay to do that??

Answer 10

1984 is here! Big Brother is watching! Terrorism is Bush's excuse to scare the American public into "keeping their mouth's shut and being good little Nazi's."