US Intelligence to keep tabs on Americans with no ties to terror

US Intelligence to keep tabs on Americans with no ties to terror


Published March 22, 2012 | Associated Press
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The U.S. intelligence community will be able to store information about Americans with no ties to terrorism for up to five years under new Obama administration guidelines.
Until now, the National Counterterrorism Center had to destroy immediately information about Americans that already was stored in other government databases when there were no clear ties to terrorism.
Giving the NCTC expanded record-retention authority had been urged by members of Congress, who said the intelligence community did not connect strands of intelligence held by multiple agencies leading up to a failed bombing attempt on a U.S.-bound airliner on Christmas 2009.
"Following the failed terrorist attack in December 2009, representatives of the counterterrorism community concluded it is vital for NCTC to be provided with a variety of datasets from various agencies that contain terrorism information," Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said in a statement late Thursday. "The ability to search against these datasets for up to five years on a continuing basis as these updated guidelines permit will enable NCTC to accomplish its mission more practically and effectively."
The new rules replace guidelines issued in 2008 and have privacy advocates concerned about the potential for data-mining information on innocent Americans.
"It is a vast expansion of the government's surveillance authority," Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said of the five-year retention period.
The government put in strong safeguards at the NCTC for the data that would be collected on U.S. citizens for intelligence purposes, Rotenberg said. These new guidelines undercut the Federal Privacy Act, he said.
"The fact that this data can be retained for five years on U.S. citizens for whom there's no evidence of criminal conduct is very disturbing," Rotenberg said.
"Total Information Awareness appears to be reconstructing itself," he said, referring to the Defense Department's data-mining research program that began after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks but was stopped in 2003 because of privacy concerns.
The Washington Post first reported the new rules Thursday.
The Obama administration said the new rules come with strong safeguards for privacy and civil liberties as well. Before the NCTC may obtain data held by another government agency, there is a high-level review to assure that the data are "likely to contain significant terrorism information," Alexander Joel, the civil liberties protection officer at the national intelligence directorate, said in a news release Thursday.
The NCTC was created after the Sept. 11 attacks to be the central U.S. organization to analyze and integrate intelligence regarding terrorism.


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...eep-tabs-on-americans-with-no-ties-to-terror/

It is getting real interesting with various provisions of the Patriot Act, NDAA, and the push for unmanned drones in civilian airspace. Maybe George Orwell's writings weren't science fiction after all.......

Sheesh..this country is turning into a nanny state more and more everyday.

Seriously. Big Brother is here. Technology is our only chance.

Know it, use it, love it...Tor browser.

fify

America is just awful. I read recently that we are the most sordid and hypocritical country on this planet.

This.

Welcome to East Germany people.

All under the terrible, false flag spectre of "terrorism."

Careful, brother. They'll send the drones if they see this.

must be GWB's fault? I thought you elected this guy to dismantle the police state? What happened?

Can I give you some cheese with that whine?

And to think that many people were worried that it was Bush listening in on their personal conversations. When it's been Obama all along.

I sure hope they are bored to tears watching me.

Well I know they aren't bored watching me. Are you not interesting?

Luckily they don't know where I am because...I used Tor.

So did I. Gitmo's open and they're expanding the Patriot Act. I really would vote for Ron Paul at this point if I had the option.

Did you really think he could close Gitmo? There are some things that we should know just isn't going to happen.

I find myself very interesting. But if they are going to watch me, I hope it is as boring as it can be so they waste as much time and money as possible

It makes you wonder what data exactly are they collecting?

More and more do you feel like you're just a number? Word by word, line by line, rule by rule, regulation by regulation we are losing our personal liberties and freedoms.

I invite you to talk to someone from one of the many nations with which we've tampered over the past 60 years. Get their perspective on our treatment of other nations, then form your opinion on whether we have been hypocritical or not.

Edit: the hypocrisy I spoke of is the comparison to domestic policy versus foreign. We claim to uphold the Constitution in our domestic laws, but abandon its core principles frequently in our treatment with foreign nations.

AND repeal the Patriot Act. I'm such a sucker.

These people?



Or maybe this guy?




Why not ask people in Germany? Or France who are still alive to remember. Should we ask those people?

Maybe you should ask yourself what the world would be like today without the United States?