The United States Government May Be Storing All of Your Emails in a Supercomputer.

But really, you kind of already guessed that, right?

I never used to be a conspiracy theory guy.  And I’m still not, I hope.  But I remember when I first found out that Facebook and Google store and sell the data you give them to advertisers (which was only a few years ago), it was one of those moments where you can’t believe you were so gullible.  Of course they’re keeping information on you!  You think they’re just letting you play Farmville out of the goodness of their hearts?

Well, if Google can keep track of you and profile you for advertisers, obviously the government can store your information.

They do a full body scan in the airports now where you stand in a little closet thing.  They could easily store that information and have your entire genetic code in a computer somewhere.  Or if they can’t easily do it they’ll be able to before too long.

About a month ago somebody was handing out free cell phones from the government in the parking lot at church to people in the project up the street.  I don’t think the government needs to give you a cell phone to be able to hear whatever they want to hear.  We already know that the Dept. of Homeland Security (as Orwellian a name as could have been invented) has been given permission to listen to “suspected terrorists.”  But then political correctness makes it necessary to pretend that there are other terrorists besides Muslim fanatics that we have to worry about–like all those radical Methodists they keep catching with underwear bombs and so on–we all have to have someone look at us naked if we want to get on the airplane.

With that in mind, I’d be really skeptical about anything free from the government or from corporations.

But Christians don’t need to waste a lot of energy worrying about who’s monitoring whom and who’s abusing power.  If you’ve read the gospels and believe them, you already know who the master power-broker is.  He already has seized power over all the kingdoms of the world.  We also know his motivations–at least in a broad sense–to destroy Christ’s church.  Finally, we know that his insubordinate misuse of power is kept within limits by God’s grace and the prayers of Jesus togetherwith His bride, the Church.  We also know the devil’s defeat is certain.

 

‘Everyone in US under virtual surveillance’ – NSA whistleblower

Published: 04 December, 2012, 18:01

The FBI has the e-mails of nearly all US citizens, including congressional members, according to NSA whistleblower William Binney. Speaking to RT he warned that the government can use information against anyone it wants.

­One of the best mathematicians and code breakers in NSA history resigned in 2001 because he no longer wanted to be associated with alleged violations of the constitution.

He asserts, that the FBI has access to this data due to a powerful device Naris.

This year Binney received the Callaway award. The annual award was established to recognize those, who stand out for constitutional rights and American values at great risk to their personal or professional lives.

RT: In light of the Petraeus/Allen scandal while the public is so focused on the details of their family drama one may argue that the real scandal in this whole story is the power, the reach of the surveillance state. I mean if we take General Allen – thousands of his personal e-mails have been sifted through private correspondence. It’s not like any of those men was planning an attack on America. Does the scandal prove the notion that there is no such thing as privacy in a surveillance state?

William Binney: Yes, that’s what I’ve been basically saying for quite some time, is that the FBI has access to the data collected, which is basically the e-mails of virtually everybody in the country. And the FBI has access to it. All the congressional members are on the surveillance too, no one is excluded. They are all included. So, yes, this can happen to anyone. If they become a target for whatever reason – they are targeted by the government, the government can go in, or the FBI, or other agencies of the government, they can go into their database, pull all that data collected on them over the years, and we analyze it all. So, we have to actively analyze everything they’ve done for the last 10 years at least.

RT: And it’s not just about those, who could be planning, who could be a threat to national security, but also those, who could be just…

WB: It’s everybody. The Naris device if it takes in the entire line, so it takes in all the data. In fact they advertised they can process the lines at session rates, which means 10 gigabit lines. I forgot the name of the device (it’s not the Naris) – the other one does it at 10 gigabits. That’s why the building Buffdale, because they have to have more storage, because they can’t figure out what’s important, so they are just storing everything there. So, e-mails are going to be stored there for the future, but right now stored in different places around the country. But it is being collected – and the FBI has access to it.

RT: You mean it’s being collected in bulk without even requesting providers?

WB:Yes.

RT: Then what about Google, you know, releasing this biannual transparency report and saying that the government’s demands for personal data is at an all-time high and for all of those requesting the US, Google says they complied with the government’s demands 90% of the time. But they are still saying that they are making the request, it’s not like it’s all being funneled into that storage. What do you say to that?

WB: I would assume, that it’s just simply another source for the same data they are already collecting. My line is in declarations in a court about the 18-T facility in San Francisco, that documented the NSA room inside that AST&T facility, where they had Naris devices to collect data off the fiber optic lines inside the United States. So, that’s kind of a powerful device, that would collect everything it was being sent. It could collect on the order over one hundred billion one thousand character e-mails a day. One device.

RT: You say they sift through billions of e-mails. I wonder how do they prioritize? How do they filter it?

WB: I don’t think they are filtering it. They are just storing it. I think it’s just a matter of selecting when they want it. So, if they want to target you, they would take your attributes, go into that database and pull out all your data.