All Three Branches Conduct Vaunted NSA Oversight!
Today, we learned this is what the vaunted Congressional oversight of NSA spying looks like.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who did not receive a copy of the 2012 audit [showing thousands of violations] until The Post asked her staff about it, said in a statement late Thursday that the committee “can and should do more to independently verify that NSA’s operations are appropriate, and its reports of compliance incidents are accurate.”
We learned this is what the vaunted FISA Court oversight of NSA spying looks like.
The chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court said the court lacks the tools to independently verify how often the government’s surveillance breaks the court’s rules that aim to protect Americans’ privacy. Without taking drastic steps, it also cannot check the veracity of the government’s assertions that the violations its staff members report are unintentional mistakes.
“The FISC is forced to rely upon the accuracy of the information that is provided to the Court,” its chief, U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton, said in a written statement to The Washington Post. “The FISC does not have the capacity to investigate issues of noncompliance, and in that respect the FISC is in the same position as any other court when it comes to enforcing [government] compliance with its orders.”
We learned this is what the vaunted internal NSA oversight of NSA spying looks like.
The NSA uses the term “incidental” when it sweeps up the records of an American while targeting a foreigner or a U.S. person who is believed to be involved in terrorism. Official guidelines for NSA personnel say that kind of incident, pervasive under current practices, “does not constitute a . . . violation” and “does not have to be reported” to the NSA inspector general for inclusion in quarterly reports to Congress. Once added to its databases, absent other restrictions, the communications of Americans may be searched freely.
In one required tutorial, NSA collectors and analysts are taught to fill out oversight forms without giving “extraneous information” to “our FAA overseers.” FAA is a reference to the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which granted broad new authorities to the NSA in exchange for regular audits from the Justice Department and the office of the Director of National Intelligence and periodic reports to Congress and the surveillance court.
Using real-world examples, the “Target Analyst Rationale Instructions” explain how NSA employees should strip out details and substitute generic descriptions of the evidence and analysis behind their targeting choices.
Vaunted. For well over 2 months. This is what they’ve been hailing.
Reggie does not sound happy about being misled.
Kind of reminds me of his thoughts about a certain amicus brief, back in the day:
I’m sensing Reggie is not pleased by the lack of substance from these intelligent people at the NSA/DOJ who come to his rather-more-secluded courtroom.
From that same post linked to in my earlier comment comes your observation about Walton and a quote from Walton regarding oversight of the executive branch:
Sadly, it would appear Walton cannot meaningfully sanction anyone at the NSA for this kind of misconduct, which — as he noted long ago in the Libby trial — means that the government’s credibility will continue to crumble.
Walton, in the post:
You know, if the FISCs orders were a bit more public, it would be harder for the government to evade compliance. With other people watching, it’s harder to hide.
From the 1st Quarter Calendar Year 2012 NSA report (http://epic.org/NSA/1qcy12-violations.pdf), there is this from page 3:
“63% (123) of 1QCY12 FISA incidents can be attributed to Operator Error as the root cause, and involved:
o Resources ( i.e., inaccurate or insufficient research information and/or workload issues (60);
o Lack of due diligence (i.e., failure to follow standard operating procedures) (39);
o Human error (21) which encompassed:
o Broad syntax (i.e., no or insufficient limiters / defeats / parameters) (12);
o Typographical error (6);
o Query technique understood but not applied (2); and
o Incorrect option selected in tool (1); and
o Training and guidance (i.e., training issues) (3).”
As you can see, the largest number “FISA incidents” “attributed to Operator Error as the root cause” involved:
“o Resources ( i.e., inaccurate or insufficient research information and/or workload issues (60);”
This says quite plainly that the vaunted NSA analysts were not only careless in making their FISA queries but did shoddy research in preparation for their FISA queries. And it also speaks to shoddy, incompetent and unthinking NSA management and approval for these NSA analyst queries.
Seems like the term “audit” is possibly being used loosely. From a read of the actual report, the numbers appear to come from a combination of self-reporting, auditor/overseer discovery and various automated alert systems. Were non-reported transactions sampled or otherwise reviewed to ensure self-reporting and automated systems were working as they should? Also, lots of different programs with apparently different systems and access procedures. I would think you would almost need a separate audit report for each program. Just a lot of loose ends in the report.
Reggie’s been on the court for six years and Presiding Judge for six months. I guess he just wanted to be damn sure that NSA was out of control/uncontrollable/unaccountable before he said something. And of course Feinstein is a waste of space. Great oversight guys.
@Snoopdido: Unless I misunderstand, doesn’t this level of operator error actually indicate a significant capacity for operators to do as they wish. If they were constrained, how could they make this many errors?
So, as Snowden indicated, they have open slather and can oops, make mistakes. Ex. I wonder what Marcy Wheeler has been up to? Oops, sorry, didn’t mean to look, just a mistake.
My confidence is boosted with each new revelation.
Oh, and to the prior story on Gellman, this Government fumbling with what can and cannot be seen, is a sure sign of a liar tied in knots and unable to keep his lies straight. It’s only a matter of time until it all unravels. Or is Hayden correct, they will increase surveillance, and unstated but a likely outcome of doing so, have to declare martial law, and we’ll see Tahrir-on-the-Hudson.
Wouldn’t put it past them.
@Snoopdido: I’d say “operator error” is more or less their euphemism for “doing whatever the fuck we want.”
all 3 branches… indeed! All three branches… indeed…
Aloha, Marcy…! Did you ever see such a thing… Anti-Israel Author Disinvited from University Event…
University of Michigan disinvites author Alice Walker, who compares Israel to Nazi Germany. Was money a factor?
…According to Walker, the invitation was rescinded due to pressure from donors offended by her virulently anti-Israel views.
In a blog post, she quoted her agent as saying, “This afternoon I was contacted by the University of Michigan instructing me to withdraw their invitation due to the removal of funding from the donors, because of their interpretation of Ms. Walker’s comments regarding Israel. They are not willing to fund this program and the university/Women’s center do not have the resources to finance this on their own.”
She titled the post, “In Case You’ve Ever Wondered How It Is Done: Censorship by Purse String.”
However, a university source told the Electronic Intifada blog that the change had nothing to do with donor pressure…
Err, Wolverines…!1!!???
@Snoopdido: Saw that. It also might indicate they’re just spying on too damn many people.
Just wanted to share this new “protest anthem” with you all [via Kevin Gosztola at FireDogLake]
PARTYpartyparty with the NSA!!! [20,20,24 hours a day]
Also, it’s good to see who’s on the FISA Court at the moment [via WaPo].
[There are evidently only two out of the required three currently sitting on the review panel…maybe they don’t do much work, there.]
@Snoopdido: If the NSA only had fewer than 300 queries in 2012, and according to their 1st Quarter Calendar Year 2012 NSA report (http://epic.org/NSA/1qcy12-violations.pdf), they had “123 of 1QCY12 FISA incidents [that could] be attributed to Operator Error as the root cause”, then is it the case that 41+% of their query violations happened JUST in Q1 of 2012?
Or is it the case that the “an increase of 11% for
both E.O. 12333 and FISA incidents” means that Q2 of 2012 had 136 query violations, that Q3 of 2012 had 151 query violations, and that Q4 of 2012 had 167 query violations giving us a total of 577 query violations in calendar year 2012?
And if that is approximately the case, how can 577 query violations in calendar year 2012 be more than the actual 300 queries in calendar year 2012 that the NSA states occurred?
@Snoopdido: I sure hope somebody competent checks my math. In any event, in my first paragraph I meant to say that “then is it the case that 41+% of all the NSA’s queries in 2012 were query violations and happened JUST in Q1 of 2012?”
busted.
splayed.
cuff ’em and stuff ’em.
@Snoopdido:
“‘300 queries a year’ about, or from, whom or what?” should be the next question, because that’s obviously not nearly all of the ones they had.
http://www.federalnewsradio.com/411/2908138/NSA-clears-up-misconceptions-about-compliance
http://www.federaltimes.com/videonetwork/2150661623001/NSA-Compliance-Director-on-Keeping-the-Spies-In-Line
remember, it’s not polite to sneer .