NSA Monitored Calls of 35 World Leaders 310
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "The Guardian reports that the NSA monitored the phone conversations of 35 world leaders after being given the numbers by an official in another U.S. government department. According to a classified document provided by whistleblower Edward Snowden, the NSA encourages senior officials in its 'customer' departments, such the White House, State and the Pentagon, to share their 'Rolodexes' so the agency can add the phone numbers of leading foreign politicians to their surveillance systems. The NSA memo dated October 2006 that was obtained by the Guardian suggests that such surveillance was not isolated, as the agency routinely monitors the phone numbers of world leaders – and even asks for the assistance of other U.S. officials to do so. However, the memo acknowledges that eavesdropping on the numbers had produced 'little reportable intelligence.' At the daily briefing on Thursday, White House press secretary Jay Carney again refused to answer repeated questions about whether the U.S. had spied on German Chancellor Angela Merkel's calls in the past."
Re:US considered hostile (Score:2, Informative)
Bullshit. China, russia, and france have all recently been busted spying on the U.S.
Re:Nothing of Value (Score:4, Informative)
No, this is pretty much normal spying. If you had a spy agency and didn't monitor other nations for strategic advantage, you'd wonder what the hell they were doing. I'm not saying it's unreasonable to be opposed, because moral objections are best objections, just that pretending it's bad spycraft is silly.
Why is Anyone Surprised? (Score:2, Informative)
Here in the US countries like France are heavily restricted from operating and managing US entities that have ties to US security and law enforcement operations. (Bio-metrics, AFIS, Facial Recognition, Crypto, Official Identity and Credential Solutions, etc.) Because they are foreign? No. Because they have been caught spying on the US.
The only different here is the US isn't flopping over and whining like a European Soccer player about a little spying.
Re:Nothing of Value (Score:5, Informative)
He did it all to himself.
"The NSA memo dated October 2006"
Seems to me it is just another case of Obama getting blamed for the actions of the Bush Administration.
Perfectly normal (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Nothing of Value (Score:5, Informative)
It depends on if he knew about it. If he did then he's obviosly responsible. If he didn't then that's of course also bad. Either way is not good for him.
The French Also Spy on the US (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.france24.com/en/20131024-nsa-france-spying-squarcini-dcri-hollande-ayrault-merkel-usa-obama [france24.com]
And the french DSGE has been doing Economic INtelligence (Industrial secrets) for decades. For example in 1991 they were caught bugging all the seats in Air France jets.
Mon Du, Gambling at Ricks!
Re:Who's surprised? (Score:4, Informative)
So, the rest of the world has your permission to start spying on US citizens then?
I sincerely hope that comes true for you.
Please read the following ... (Score:5, Informative)
From http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2013/10/us-denies-tapping-merkel-mobile-phone-20131023185133142198.html [aljazeera.com] ---
US President Barack Obama had assured German Chancellor Angela Merkel that the US is not monitoring her communications, according to the White House spokesman.
From http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24647268 [bbc.co.uk]
The White House said President Obama had told Chancellor Merkel the US was not snooping on her communications.
"The United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of the chancellor," White House spokesman Jay Carney said on Wednesday.
From http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/23/merkel-phone-tapped_n_4150812.html [huffingtonpost.com]
For its part, the White House denied that the U.S. is listening in on Merkel's phone calls now.
"The president assured the chancellor that the United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of the chancellor," White House spokesman Jay Carney said. "The United States greatly values our close cooperation with Germany on a broad range of shared security challenges."
Re:Please read the following ... (Score:5, Informative)
Look at the tense of the language.
Translates as "We are not doing it at this precise instant" (as widely reported, it seems very likely they did so in the past - and, no doubt, will do so again in the future, if they think they won't get caught).
Incompetent (Score:3, Informative)
Really? So if your company SysAdmin is secretly spying on your email, it's the CEO's fault? Even though the SysAdmin is the one with the technical knowledge to both implement and hide the spying?
Not saying that Obama is innocent, but not knowing doesn't make him incompetent. It might just mean that the NSA are good at covering up.
If you want to fault him for something, fault him stepping on those who blow the whistle on these sort of activities, instead of commending them like he should.