Report: Britain Has a Secret Middle East Web Surveillance Base 237
wiredmikey writes "Britain is running a secret Internet surveillance station in the Middle East, according to a recent report citing the latest leaked documents obtained by fugitive US security contractor Edward Snowden. The Independent newspaper said it was not disclosing the country where the base is located, but said the facility can intercept emails, telephone calls and web traffic for the United States and other intelligence agencies and taps into underwater fibre-optic cables in the region, the newspaper said. The Independent did not disclose how it obtained the details from the Snowden files."
Yes, and? (Score:4, Insightful)
that is what they are supposed to be doing right? Gathering intel? The problem is when they do it against their own citizens.
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Insightful)
Ah, but you're missing the key point on how the "game" is played.
The GCHQ in the UK isn't allowed to spy on UK citizens, so they spy on the rest of the EU's citizens, and apparently on the Middle East.
The NSA isn't allowed to spy on US citizens, so they spy on Canadians and others.
The Canadian spy agency isn't allowed to spy on Canadians, so it spies on Americans and others.
Australia and New Zealand spy on anyone close to their networks as well.
Even the Germans are into spying.
Then after everyone has spied on the "foreigners" who aren't protected by each nation's laws, they get together, exchange their data, and end up with the intel on their own citizens, all while claiming "but we don't spy on our own citizens."
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Which is why we need a world government.
No more "foreigners."
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Oh, I think you'll find we have one of those. It's just that everyone disagrees about who is running it: Aliens, the Devil, God, the Jews, the Nazis, the British Monarchy, the Templars, the Roman Catholics, the Free Masons, the UN, the US, the USSR, the Bankers, the Illuminati, an AI, etc.
Tell you what. Everyone get together, and decide who is, and isn't running this Universe, and when you all agree on the same people (and I want this in writing), come and find me; I'll be busy getting high, and trying to a
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Ah ha! I've got you now greenskin! I can tell by your deliberate omission that you, lightknight, must be one of our true overlords, the Lizard Men from the Hollow Earth!
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Ugh. What say we figure out how to keep a national government from sliding into tyranny for more than a couple centuries or so before we even discuss a world government? I'd hate to think how this would play out if instead of the US of A it was the US of Earth. Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.
There's absolutely no reason we couldn't get the same effect via international treaty. We did it with war crimes. We did it with human rights. We could do it with individual privacy. Heck, we could even do it wit
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Which is why we need a world government.
No more "foreigners."
On the off chance your tongue is not firmly in your cheek...
If you think we have trouble controlling our own governments how successful would be be
controlling a world government which would quickly become an untouchable permanent ruling class?
You are Mad Sir, simply Mad.
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It's so crazy it just might work.
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Insightful)
Right, they all spy on each other's citizens then exchange data, which amounts to exactly the same thing. Honoring the letter and shitting on the spirit seems to a trend these days.
And by the NSA's own logic, exchanging data is "two or three degrees of separation," which apparently should make them equally liable. Not that government hypocrisy surprises me in the least.
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For a glib value of "same thing". I understand the Americans and the British are pretty tight, but I bet there's friction at every other point of exchange, even if it's just the petty little-brother/big-brother dynamic between Canada and the US.
When you're in the thought-crime business, all boundaries are porous. The correct question to the NSA is this: Do you access information on American citizens who have not yet committed a crime? And the obvious answer is: "Of
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Then after everyone has spied on the "foreigners" who aren't protected by each nation's laws, they get together, exchange their data, and end up with the intel on their own citizens, all while claiming "but we don't spy on our own citizens."
When pundits refer to the USA as the dominant global superpower, I think they really mean the United Security Agencies.
Re:Actually that's completely and fantastically wr (Score:5, Insightful)
Uhunh. Yeah. Right. So all the "bi-lateral security agreements" that the government has bragged about are for what purpose, then?
Your NSA has been caught ignoring the rulings of the FISC that said their actions were illegal. They've been caught spying on Americans. What in all that's holy makes you think they wouldn't take data from a foreign government's spy agency when the Americans have repeatedly sent people to foreign nations to be tortured and to use that intelligence data despite the fact that it's illegal to do so?
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The United States cannot target a foreigner to intercept the communications of one of its own citizens, nor can it use a second party nation (UK, CAN, AUS, or NZ), or anyone else, to target US citizens or anyone else it would be otherwise prohibited from targeting.
Care to point to the law that says that?
I'm pretty sure that what intel the US comes by without dirtying their own hands is fair game.
Your own link proves otherwise (Score:5, Informative)
Did you even check the source/link you posted?
The very first entry as of now, is Bush Secretly Lifted Some Limits on Spying in U.S. After 9/11, Officials Say [cryptome.org]
So much for your comment that
'The United States cannot target a foreigner to intercept the communications of one of its own citizens, nor can it use a second party nation (UK, CAN, AUS, or NZ), or anyone else, to target US citizens or anyone else it would be otherwise prohibited from targeting.'
They've moved beyond that, they're targetting citizens directly, without warrants, i.e. illegally.
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I believe the Canadian surveillance division is actually CSEC. Here's a recent article about them http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Opposition+calls+halt+agency+activities+directed/8820518/story.html [montrealgazette.com]
CSIS is more akin to the CIA than the NSA.
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You mean like the US paying GCHQ?
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The UK is a region where many terrorists come from, Lots of other people who can potentially cause trouble, too.
This isn't like spying on dictators or the Soviet Union. This is mass surveillance of the citizens of a state. The privacy of regular citizens is not respected. Unless you believe in some sort of inherent racial superiority or something, a regular citizen is equally entitled to privacy whether he was born in the UK or in Egypt.
Given that, could you please send me your mail password? No need to be
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Informative)
Land, power, guards, a local cover story was once all post colonial joy or NATO like anti Soviet deals, training and some basic intel sharing.
eg Cold war Sweden got some airborne elint but no UK/US like sharing/resources.
The problem with the local "citizens" is once the locals find out the steps the local rulers/politicians/military have to take to keep the secret again.
Britain's Embassy in Peking was looted by "protesters" in 1967 and lost its Rockex cypher equipment.
Iran, Ethiopia and Turkey (via TPLA and TPLF) where often at issue to further UK/US sites in the ~1960's (and other sites later during the Cold War).
ie the Cld War offered sigint facilities extreme secrecy.
Now nations offer other types of sites just to show how thankful they are:
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/cia-black-sites-lithuania/story?id=9400744 [go.com]
http://www.thejournal.ie/british-papers-reveal-interrogation-centre-in-derry-1023719-Aug2013/ [thejournal.ie]
"Secret British papers reveal secret 1970s interrogation centre in Derry"
Sites have many uses and can become news again years later. "subject to deep interrogation under the five techniques system the European Commission has called ‘torture’"
Re:Yes, and? (Score:4, Interesting)
that is what they are supposed to be doing right? Gathering intel? The problem is when they do it against their own citizens.
Fuck that. Let's not spy on anyone's residential phone or internet traffic.
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Nonsense. Let's spy on people, but only if they're female, between the ages of consent and too ripe, and only if it's on a Friday. And have it broadcast from Mulder.FBI.gov...for 'National Security' purposes...these are dangerous times, and we need to take extra special precautions that our women are not harmed during them...which is why they need to be placed under surveillance. As it stands, there are plenty of adolescent males at home who, during this time of sequestering, are willing to do their patriot
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm thinking this may well be a middle finger aimed at the political types in the UK who had Greenwald's partner detained. It's his way of saying, this may have been about civil liberties and constitutional protections for your own citizens, but if you're going to mess with people on our side we can mess with people on your side too. A shot across their bow to give them some idea of the other information he has that he can chose to publish about, or keep secret.
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I think I heard from somewhere that the president is getting his daily secret intelligence report from WikiLeaks; it's more accurate.
Re: Yes, and? (Score:2)
Supposed to be doing?
Yes, if by that you mean running an evil empire built on pillage and oppression.
BTW: When it's "middle east" and they don't mention the country? It's always Israel.
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We have a special innovation here in the US, where the court that makes decisions about warrants and surveillance on American citizens on US soil is called the "Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court".
When the government tells you, "Don't worry, we're only looking for those foreign terrorists, that's when you need to get up and look behind you to make sure some government contractor hasn't crawled up your ass.
That's the other innovation: the surve
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Insightful)
Snowden gave the trove of files to The Guardian at least. The specific leaks, after the initial ones, are decided by Glenn Greenwald and not Snowden.
Whether Greenwald gave some stuff to the Independent or Snowden did that earlier is unknown.
But my guess would be the whole episode of the UK Gov't detaining Mr. Miranda and forcing The Guarding to shred some systems seriously pissed off the British Press. Releasing UK-specific material is most likely payback. Spreading it around to other papers is most likely a signal that "threaten the Guardian with prior restraint, you better be ready to shut down every paper in the UK".
GCHQ and Whitehall fucked up royally with that and they are now going to pay for threatening a major newspaper.
Just a guess, mind you.
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Informative)
You may be right. From the linked article....
"But there are fears in Government that Mr Greenwald – who still has access to the files – could attempt to release damaging information.
He said after the arrest of Mr Miranda: “I will be far more aggressive in my reporting from now. I am going to publish many more documents. I have many more documents on England’s spy system. I think they will be sorry for what they did.”"
And in news not too far away ... (Score:3)
1) Poor Mr Greenwald: so young and healthy and yet he suffered a fatal heart attack.
2) Poor Mr Greenwald: his vehicle careening off the road like that.
3) Poor Mr Greenwald: killed last night while being mugged for cash and his cell phone.
4) Poor Mr Greenwald: left a note saying he decided to go backpacking around the world but no one's seen him since.
etc
Of course, I hope he lives a long and healthy life ...
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Interesting)
Whether Greenwald gave some stuff to the Independent or Snowden did that earlier is unknown.
But my guess would be the whole episode of the UK Gov't detaining Mr. Miranda and forcing The Guarding to shred some systems seriously pissed off the British Press. Releasing UK-specific material is most likely payback. Spreading it around to other papers is most likely a signal that "threaten the Guardian with prior restraint, you better be ready to shut down every paper in the UK".
GCHQ and Whitehall fucked up royally with that and they are now going to pay for threatening a major newspaper.
Just a guess, mind you.
Rather telling is that a) the story appears in the Independent and b) article makes no reference as to the source of the allegations, other than stating that the information was found in the documents leaked by Edward Snowden:
Information about the project was contained in 50,000 GCHQ documents that Mr Snowden downloaded during 2012. Many of them came from an internal Wikipedia-style information site called GC-Wiki. Unlike the public Wikipedia, GCHQ’s wiki was generally classified Top Secret or above.
The disclosure comes as the Metropolitan Police announced it was launching a terrorism investigation into material found on the computer of David Miranda, the Brazilian partner of The Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald – who is at the centre of the Snowden controversy.
Prior to this story most UK articles appeared in the Guardian and clearly stated that Glenn Greewald provided the information. The game has changed, and I think it is going to get a whole lot uglier from here.
Peace,
Andy.
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Insightful)
And I should add: huge kudos to the Independent for having the balls to stand up and keep reporting in the face of what appears to be a War on Journalism.
Peace,
Andy.
50,000 GCHQ documents? (Score:2)
And this:
Examined? As in they broke the encryption? Or is this misinformation?
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It's definitely not disinformation:
we found Snowden's leaks stored in his electric toothbrush, so there>
Quoted an unnamed official who then blew a raspberry.
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Mr Miranda supplied the police with all his passwords (as you must under the law in the UK) so no encryption needed breaking, just unlocking.
He may have been forced to supply all of his [i]own[/i] passwords, but that does not mean he had passwords for all of the documents he was carrying!
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Oblig. XKCD [xkcd.com].
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Interesting)
But my guess would be the whole episode of the UK Gov't detaining Mr. Miranda and forcing The Guarding to shred some systems seriously pissed off the British Press. Releasing UK-specific material is most likely payback. Spreading it around to other papers is most likely a signal that "threaten the Guardian with prior restraint, you better be ready to shut down every paper in the UK". GCHQ and Whitehall fucked up royally with that and they are now going to pay for threatening a major newspaper.
Just a guess, mind you.
Yeah, and it wouldn't bee too hard to figure out where this secret location is either.
You could just pick likely places from here: http://www.telegeography.com/telecom-resources/submarine-cable-landing-directory/ [telegeography.com]
Gibraltar would be a good guess.
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Yeah, and it wouldn't bee too hard to figure out where this secret location is either. You could just pick likely places from here: http://www.telegeography.com/telecom-resources/submarine-cable-landing-directory/ [telegeography.com] Gibraltar would be a good guess.
For the more visually inclined, a graphical map [submarinecablemap.com].
And based on that, I'll give dollars to doughnuts that it's Egypt. Virtually all traffic between Europe and Asia transits through the Suez canal.
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But why set up your shop in an unstable country lime Egypt, when following your own map shows that the bulk of those cables continue on to Palermo and then Gibraltar, then to the rest of Europe.
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But why set up your shop in an unstable country lime Egypt, when following your own map shows that the bulk of those cables continue on to Palermo and then Gibraltar, then to the rest of Europe.
Because they want to get the stuff that's bound for your Good Friend [sic] France, and because they're not 'setting up shop', they've been there since the early 19th Century. This is just a continuation of their strategic look-in on the canal and the global traffic that passes through it. Oh, and Gibraltar's not in the Middle East. :-)
... But none of this is to say they don't have similar facilities in Gibraltar.
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Interesting)
For the more visually inclined, a graphical map [submarinecablemap.com].
And based on that, I'll give dollars to doughnuts that it's Egypt. Virtually all traffic between Europe and Asia transits through the Suez canal.
I'd agree with this analysis because there were some massive interuptions with middle eastern internet comms when the SEA-ME-WE_4 [wikipedia.org] cable was apparently snagged by ships at anchor of Alexandria. Interestingly, Egypt actually arrested 3 men for cutting though cable [bbc.co.uk] off Alexandria in March this year. makes you wonder what they were actually doing.
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It is in the perfect place to moniter the middle east. The primary fiber optic cables run through that area directly to India. The actual headline in TFA mentioned a middle east web monitoring base using that exact phrase. Doesn't actually say it's located in any specific place.
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Chelsea is indiscriminate? No, just preparing for a new mating season.
Re:Yes, and? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why ?
Does the UK need to spy on the middle east ?
The British Empire of the past is OVER. The UK is just a formerly great power which is sinking into oblivion by its own greed, incompetence, arrogance, sense of entitlement, and stupidity.
Er, the UK is home to one of the most important financial centres on the planet. It's got a huge (commercial and strategic) incentive to know what other countries are doing. And it's not just spying on the Middle East - it's spying in the Middle East on all the Europe-Asia traffic that passes through the Suez Canal. Which is pretty much all of the Europe-Asia traffic there is (Russia excepted).
And you can rest assured that at least some of the US$100 million that the NSA gives GCHQ is being used to maintain these facilities. Draw what conclusions you like.
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Finance has no relevance any more. What??
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We're talking about greatness, not relevance, aren't we?
The British empire was full of asshattery, but also a great deal of philosophical, scientific, technological and practical productivity.
Modern Britain is a Politburo.
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Why ?
Does the UK need to spy on the middle east ?
.
Of course it does. We have a problem with Muslim terrorists as much as any other country
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You have bigger problems with car fatalities, much as any other country.
Governments don't hate terrorism for moral reasons. It's not because it's violence, or innocents die. No, the great powers tolerate and use violence themselves that is equally bad or worse.
The reason is that it threatens their power to do as they please, since it messes with public opinion in unpredictable ways.
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As in, hardly at all. Spying on Muslim countries just encourages them anyway.
WHO REMEMBERS THIS LITTLE NUMBER? (Score:3)
I JE'd about it, and tried to get a Slashdot frontpage submission. Linked stories?
After what you've learned over the past 3-4 months, it's hard to discredit this, outright.
A total of five cables being operated by two submarine cable operators have been damaged with a fault in each.
These are SeaMeWe-4 (South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe-4) near Penang, Malaysia, the FLAG Europe-Asia near Alexandria, FLAG near the Dubai coast, FALCON near Bandar Abbas in Iran and SeaMeWe-4, also near Alexandria.
The
Well.. (Score:4, Interesting)
As a British citizen, I'm so used to assuming that the government is intercepting every piece of electronic communication, I get really confused that other countries are annoyed they get spied on. Do these other people actually trust their governments? Because that's weird.
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Re:Well.. (Score:5, Insightful)
As a British citizen, I'm so used to assuming that the government is intercepting every piece of electronic communication,
As one that lived more than half of his life in one of those European countries in the communist block, I am afraid that you are properly fucked already.
If this persist for longer (say 15-20 years... it only takes one generation of used to, everybody will be teaching it to their children!), the society you'll be living would show the same weird behaviour of its people as during the secret police in communist countries: use of paraphrases when speaking, carefully planning/doing your everyday actions so that they don't appear to have any element of verboten, every neighbour... heck even members of you family... may be turning you to the authorities.
Walk only a little in the past and you'll find Gestapo as another example.
My point is: stop being just so used to... and do something if you don't want there
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If this persist for longer (say 15-20 years... it only takes one generation of used to, everybody will be teaching it to their children!), the society you'll be living would show the same weird behaviour of its people as during the secret police in communist countries: use of paraphrases when speaking, carefully planning/doing your everyday actions so that they don't appear to have any element of verboten, every neighbour... heck even members of you family... may be turning you to the authorities.
Well normally I would be with you on this sentiment, you are generally correct but you don't me or sadly my less thoughtful United States of American counter parts very well. We basically bask in giving someone official the middle finger, I seriously doubt any secret police will do well here
I bet that, about an year ago, you wouldn't have belived US spies en-mass on its own citizens.
Time will tell, grasshopper, time will tell...
There's a reason the world hates us and it's because we've basically told it and everyone in charge of it to go fuck itself for many years.
I used to admire you for this... late '60 to mid '70-ies must have been a good time to live there for this very reason. Nowadays...? I'm not so sure there's still something to admire, I'm not seeing the birdie-to-the-man gesture anymore (actually, I'm seeing EFF, but I'm not that sure I can equate EFF with the ethos of an entire american generation).
Hell we leak all your secrets ... etc
Apropos leaking ...
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Actually, there may have been people in the US for Big Government who really did believe that their government, if given these kinds of widespread powers, would never abuse them. They've been stoically making the arguments for years at this point, jumping on everyone about how the government can be totally trusted, and how any distrust of a government (brought on by reading just about any history book) was a sign of paranoid schizophrenia.
When they heard that the NSA was intercepting every piece of electron
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I get really confused that other countries are annoyed they get spied on. Do these other people actually trust their governments? Because that's weird.
You're implying that you don't trust your government, but aren't annoyed that you're being spied on. That seems weirder.
Remember all those times the cables were cut? (Score:5, Insightful)
Now we know why.
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Wonder what happened to those poor local saps who took the fall. Hope they at least got paid.
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Re:Remember all those times the cables were cut? (Score:4, Informative)
Remember Skype's blackout? Six weeks later on 2/6/2011 they joined NSA's PRISM program. And given the P2P nature of Skype, I'm sure it was a more difficult conversion than the other services.
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Now we know why.
You don't need to *cut* a submarine cable to listen to it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ivy_Bells [wikipedia.org]
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When I'm so tired (Score:4, Funny)
that I read "Secret Middle Earth Web Surveillance" and Slashdot becomes, for just a few moments, a bit cooler.
Not just the UK (Score:2)
Actually, there are separate ones for the UK, US, France.
And, of course, Israel.
But everyone knew that.
In case you were wondering, even if you are a citizen of the EU or US, all four listen to any email or phone call you make, even the ones you think are encrypted.
I'm surprised you didn't know this.
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I'm surprised you didn't know this.
It is just like PRISM: we knew it, but now we have proofs. That kind of disclosure has merit IMO
Re: Not just the UK (Score:2)
I feel like I'm living in a world full of awful people. All this shit is happening and half the people I see claim to have known all along but just conveniently forgot to make the biggest fucking deal about it. Why are so many smug to be living under this?
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You couldn't make a big deal about it until recently because there was no hard proof, you'd be treading into tinfoil hat territory. The Snowden leaks are that hard proof.
what country (Score:2)
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Where would the UK like its Room 641A http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A [wikipedia.org] ?
Down the list of hints:
"for the United States" seems to show no huge existing US bases/ports/forts/camps (AFRICOM/past CENTCOM) ie a very short list. A region (historically?) friendly to the UK with a 'new' US base on the way?
"underwater fibre-optic cables" so less need for a site with lots of bulk optical landing.
Why "secret" Middle-East internet surveillance base? Some regional lead
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It exists because they could sell the massive load of oil the country was sitting on. That counts as a business.
Your tax money at work (Score:2)
The data-gathering operation is part of a £1bn internet project still being assembled by GCHQ. It is part of the surveillance and monitoring system, code-named “Tempora”, whose wider aim is the global interception of digital communications, such as emails and text messages.
Heck, UK's economy must be booming.
Listening posts (Score:4, Interesting)
The region knew all about US/UK bases. The leaders and their "freedom fighters" would have be aware of:
Masirah Island, Oman (with NSA)
HMS Vacoas, Mauritius, closed 1976
Meshed, Iran lost in 1979
Mount Olympus, Cyprus, (Project Sandra/US Cobra Shoe) 1959 till?
Muharraq, Bahrain
Mutlah Ridge, Kuwait, 1961- till?
Pergamos, Cyprus 1957 -till?
Perkhar, Ceylon, 1957-65
Silvermine, South Africa (1970's)
Steamer Point and Khormaksar ~ Aden
Yarallakos, Cyprus (NSA?)
Habbaniya, Iraq till 1957
Diego Garcia 1964 - with a some slight issues for a very short time over a cash for land deal.
Optical, satellite and the govs/telcos buying/upgrading into standardised tech makes the need for many locations less of an issue.
Just the U.K.? (Score:2)
Put some old news in a new context (Score:4, Informative)
in march (and probably others undersea cable cuts that happened recently close to that zone). Or it was an "oops, i did it again" from an agent, or was meant to be done that way (i.,e. an "accidental" cut by an anchor) so the company that repaired it added the extra functionality.
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Six weeks between the Skype blackout (Dec. 22, 2010) and the day Skype came online with NSA PRISM (Feb. 6, 2011).
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I'm pretty sure they have other ways of installing listening devices other than cutting the cable and splicing in a "T" fitting.
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With fiber optics...I don't think it's very easy. Especially with the new doped fibers that do their own recharging.
It used to be that there had to be transceivers every so often along the fiber, to turn the optical signals back into electronic signals, then generate new laser pulses. The new cables basically build lasers into the fiber, allow it to refresh the signal without going through that process.
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I suspect I know where it is (Score:2)
Why is "Qatar" tagged on this story? (Score:3)
The Independent newspaper said it was not disclosing the country where the base is located
Does someone on /. know something they're not supposed to be telling us?
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So, it's in Israel.
Not necessarily. Given the, um, togetherness in that neighborhood, do you think that the countries you'd really want to listen in on run their fiber any closer to the Israelis than they absolutely have to?
Re: "...not disclosing....where the base is locate (Score:2)
Too obvious. Besides, none of Israel's neighbours expects anything but the worst from it and takes appropriate precautions.
I'd guess it's a moderate Arab state trying to balance between vociferously criticising Israel/the West and doing deals with them. Possibly a former British colony, like Kuwait, Egypt or the UAE.
Re:"...not disclosing....where the base is located (Score:5, Informative)
The UK have sovereign bases on Cyprus, about 150 miles wet of Lebanon, and having a listening post on the top of the islands highest mountain shouldn't be difficult.
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So, it's in Israel.
No, it's Egypt.
They're not spying on the Middle East; they're spying in the Middle East... on all the data traffic running through the Suez canal. And that's basically everything between Asia and Europe.
Britain have had a watch on all traffic going through the canal pretty much from day one of its existence. And they've probably had communications taps in since the very first telegraph cables were installed.
Re:news worthy? (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess it is if you live in the middle east... but as an American this unlike the purly domestic shit is exactly what the NSA and allied signal intelligence agencies should be doing.
GCHQ decided to fuck with The Guardian and with Greenwald's partner.
Greenwald said "If the UK and U.S. governments believe that tactics like this are going to deter or intimidate us in any way from continuing to report aggressively on what these documents reveal, they are beyond deluded. If anything, it will have only the opposite effect: to embolden us even further."
A little story about a probably-sensitive GCHQ listening post seems like a warning shot in exactly that direction.
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His leaks are directly damaging to the intelligence agencies of the US and its allies.
I wish that were true. In fact, I wish his leaks do so much damage to them that it utterly destroys these parasites, but sadly, I doubt that's going to be the case.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/22/us/2011-ruling-found-an-nsa-program-unconstitutional.html?_r=0 [nytimes.com]
Selling expensive useless encryption is not "friction".
What a load of lies (Score:2)
The Snowden leaks at this point are well past issues of Constitutional rights in the US.
Actually, I think the government intentionally breaching the Constitution is a much bigger issue than any intelligence leak. 50 years from now no one will care about the data Snowden leaked. OTOH, the government of today has set the precedent that it can ignore the protections provided by the Constitution. Imagine what the government 50 years from now can and will do.
His leaks are directly damaging to the intelligence agencies of the US and its allies.
And I'm sure you will provide some proof of that.
That is before you get to the question of friction between the US and its allies and trading partners, or the domestic political turmoil.
Friction and anger which is caused by the government's acts of covert surveillance. If your n
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Here he comes, cold fjord, the man himself!
Snowden and Greenwald are obstructing anti-terrorist agencies throughout the civilized world. Honestly, we should just lynch them. They're a disgrace.
-- cold fjord
Terrorism is a threat to the way we live our lives. We must give up our privacy if we want security (which we do, at any cost)
-- cold fjord
Fuckin' snowden piece of shit! How dare he do this! Snowden is fuckin' guilty as fuck! Kill him! Kill! Kill! Kill!
-- cold fjord
I'm gonna fuckin' kill Snowden, that fucking piece of shit fucker ass fuck shit ass fuck supreme fuck ass! GOD! He makes me so fuckin' angry! How dare he disobey me! Get him, boys!
-- cold fjord
Snowden is the worst thing to happen to this nation since the Constitution was formed and signed.
-- cold fjord
That fuckin' Snowden piece of shit! The government can do no wrong! The terrorists! Think of the terrorists, you fuckin' insolent insects! Give me all your privacy so we can stop the terrorists, you fucks!
-- cold fjord
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Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
If there is any group of people constantly on the edge of going on killing sprees on civilians, it's the muslims.
You have conveniently overlooked the Israelis and the US, with respect to
killings of civilians. The facts indicate that the two aforementioned parties
certainly deserve to be counted as contenders in these matters.
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, it takes some talent to get them there. First you need to starve them a bit. Then you need to eradicate all of the moderate / peaceful imams. Then you need to repress the youth, and make them feel trapped. Then you need to make them feel that violence is the only answer to solving their lifestyle problems.
Sure, it takes a large investment in that kind of control / behavioral modification, but it has worked wonders on various indigenous populations, no matter which religion they choose to identify with.
I mean, let's be honest, a fat and happy populace is not a populace which is going to attack anyone. You need to lie to them, cheat them, steal from them, every single day, from every angle, so they feel that even their emotions are on loan from you; that's when you know you have them, when they will altruistically damage themselves to be just like the false image of you. You need to remove that innermost sense of peace that humans are born with, and make them uneasy to be alone with themselves.
I hope you get the dripping sarcasm in the above statements.
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And knowing who exactly they are put your government in position to give them the right push so they act. The next thing you know is that their democratically elected government got overthrown and a bunch of puppets rule there. Probably that happened in Egypt, is happening in Syria, and happened in most of the Arab Spring countries.
There is no better prediction of the future than the one that you make it happen.
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http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/22/david-miranda-court-victory-data-police [theguardian.com]
Using laws formed around the time of the Irish peace talks and turning it onto the UK press is not so smart.
The UK press is rather smart and knows the next step might be closed material procedures.
ie UK lawyers may never get to see much real evidence anymore, question, only a security-cleared lawyer or ‘special advocate’ might.
Welcome to a next gen Fra
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And how valuable is that, really? Valuable enough to enrage and piss off all kinds of countries who could be allies? See the mess that resulted after it came out GCHQ had been spying on foreign delegations to banking reform talks of all things. Who gives a shit about that? It's much more important that other countries diplomats feel secure and professionally treated when on British soil.
GCHQ is a relic, a holdover from the cold war that was never wound up properly. The vast majority of its spying is just cy
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I have been against interfering with Snowden and thought that we should just let him be in Russia.
But at this time, if he suddenly dies, and all the data is grabbed, I am fine with that.
Your willingness to "not mind" if Snowden is murdered marks you as a morally bankrupt
person. And that is sad, both for you and for those whose lives will be made poorer by
knowing you.
But your assumption that "all the data" could somehow be "grabbed" marks you
as technologically illiterate. The very idea that "all the data" could somehow be "grabbed"
when there are many mirrors of the data in multiple locations makes your idea laughable,
even to ten year old children I know who are computer literate.
So you don'
Nonsense (Score:2)