U.S. intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program
The following has direct implications to smart technology. Imagine the treasure trove of information available for “intelligence mining” with the smart grid and all those Wi-Fi enabled appliances, such as WI-See, uploading their data to a wireless cloud somewhere.
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U.S. intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program
By Barton Gellman and Laura Poitras, Friday, June 7, 7:43 AM
The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio, video, photographs, e-mails, documents and connection logs that enable analysts to track a person”s movements and contacts over time.
The highly classified program, code-named PRISM, has not been disclosed publicly before. Its establishment in 2007 and six years of exponential growth took place beneath the surface of a roiling debate over the boundaries of surveillance and privacy. Even late last year, when critics of the foreign intelligence statute argued for changes, the only members of Congress who know about PRISM were bound by oaths of office to hold their tongues.
An internal presentation on the Silicon Valley operation, intended for senior analysts in the NSA”s Signals Intelligence Directorate, described the new tool as the most prolific contributor to the President”s Daily Brief, which cited PRISM data in 1,477 articles last year. According to the briefing slides, obtained by The Washington Post, “NSA reporting increasingly relies on PRISM” as its leading source of raw material, accounting for nearly 1 in 7 intelligence reports.
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