White House denies intel chief will lead NSA surveillance review | Hacker News Reader

White House denies intel chief will lead NSA surveillance review

thehill.com

79 pointsczr8029 comments

Forcing committee members to go through Clapper to get actual data is a farce.

"Mhh, so you want to examine all our internet-related projects, right? Let me check... <clickety clack> I'm sorry, we don't really keep a list of links or anything... PRISM? Ah, that's a bitch, docs are all over the place, the only one who knows how to get anything is <random clerk who'll start a two-year sabbatical tomorrow>. XKEYSCORE? That's even worse! The project manager left two weeks ago and we can't find the key to his drawer. This place is mad, I tell you! Maybe you could start with this <completely irrelevant and minuscule> project I've found here? There's full specs, meeting memos, everything, about 13436 pages... just let me know once you're done with it, I'm sure I can find you a lot of juicy stuff!"

(This looks more and more like a classic case of "let's bury the whole thing by instituting a committee that will take years and produce a pointless report nobody will ever read")

Your thinking is way too complicated. The argument is much simpler!

PRISM? Oh, nobody knows around here anymore how that thing works. Haven't you read that 90% of the administrators were let go? [1] Request? Well, this might take a while...

[1] http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/nsa-cut-system-administrat...

    Michelle Richardson, a legislative counsel for the 
    American Civil Liberties Union, said she believes the
    review group can produce meaningful results if it includes 
    privacy advocates, academics and other people who are
    independent from the surveillance agencies.

Unfortunately not going to happen...

    "The members will have access to classified information so 
    they need to be administratively attached to a government 
    element but the review process and findings will be their 
    own," Turner said.

Something as serious as this needs an adversarial process. Drawing from only people "administratively attached to a government element" guarantees that won't happen. Is there any area of the government whose sole role is protecting the rights of the people against the government? I know that the courts are supposed to provide this oversight when they declare something unconstitutional, but the courts hear from advocates who are not "administratively attached"

Personally, I would like to see a process whereby several groups independently come up with their own conclusions and publish those independent opinions separately before synthesizing one report. With only one report published, we can be certain that it will be whitewashed, diluted and redacted. At the very least if there is a report, they should include the notion of publishing a "dissenting opinion" like the courts do.

Do you have any clue what "administratively attached to a government element" means? It sounds like you don't.

The issue is that a security clearance for access to given information requires three things:

1. A screening (eligibility for a security clearance). This can be done outside of government. 2. Need to know. Our 'review group' will certainly have that. 3. Permission of the unit Director/CO/OIC. This is why people might need to be "administratively attached" to a unit. It's one of those stereotypical "Catch-22" situations.

If the persons getting a clearance have no one to give them permission, how can they get a clearance? Administratively speaking they can't.

By attaching them to a unit 'administratively' they simply declare which unit Director/CO/OIC is going to get their head put on the chopping block if one of those privacy groups leaks classified information.

Now there are reasons to be afraid of government involvements in groups. The easy thing is financial interest, so we just need to make sure the reviewers from the NGOs volunteer or are paid from outside the government.

Another concern is performance evaluation. You wouldn't want the person "signing the FITREP" to be the person with an existing interest in the outcome of the decision one way or the other. But I don't see that here.

Either way the report hasn't even been published yet, so how can you possibly know that it must be whitewashed? At least wait for the damn thing to be published before you unleash the attacks you undoubtedly already have queued up. :P

I don't know that it will be whitewashed, but historical precedence of oversight performed by those with a conflict of interest suggests that this is a likely outcome.

I would rather wait for them to list those individuals that will be tasked with oversight. Waiting for them to release the report is too late to point out obvious conflicts of interest.

Anyways, Obama made it clear that the intent of this "oversight" is not to determine whether or not these programs are constitutional, effective or necessary, but that the intent is to make the American people comfortable with what is being done. If that isn't a declaration that this committee will be chosen to guarantee delivery of conclusion aligned with his own confirmation bias, then I don't know what is.

Knowing that these people are being assembled to make the American people comfortable, means that we have a responsibility to make sure that this group gets assembled with people who are capable of coming to the conclusion that they themselves are personally not comfortable with current surveillance practices and therefore will be unwilling to communicate comfort to the American people in whatever report they happen to publish.

>If the persons getting a clearance have no one to give them permission, how can they get a clearance? Administratively speaking they can't.

This is bureaucratic legerdemain that falls within the purview of the original criticism: given the leash, bureaucracy will exonerate bureaucracy.

It's no more or less stupid than recording the name of an person where the name is unknown as "Jane Doe" or "John Doe". If you're here to tell me that admin is surreal then, hey, I agree with you. But this here is as innocuous as bureaucracy can possibly get.

> Is there any area of the government whose sole role is protecting the rights of the people against the government?

There's the Office of the Federal Public Defender in each Federal judicial district, and the umbrella Office of Defender Services inside the U.S. Courts system (fd.org). They have some staff who work on advancing the interests of Federal criminal defendants collectively (for example, by lobbying the U.S. Sentencing Commission on Sentencing Guidelines revisions), not just representing individuals.

One could also argue that the PCLOB and individual agencies' privacy offices are in the category that you mention, although I don't know if that's the way that their staff would see or describe their missions.

> Is there any area of the government whose sole role is protecting the rights of the people against the government?

In the US, a form of grand jury which is far more expansive than the indictment rubber-stamping machine most are familiar with, and which has largely fallen into disuse, acted in such a capacity on a local level. They had extensive, autonomous powers to investigate anything from mundane bureaucratic crap (think "this pothole still hasn't been fixed!") to corruption.

A few states, like California, maintain this in one form or another, but they don't often get a lot of attention these days.

Once in a great while, a rubber-stamp grand jury discovers they still technically have vast powers, goes "rogue", and brings down the local good-ol'-boys network.

We need more of these, and we need them on a federal level with powers to investigate all federal agencies.

> Once in a great while, a rubber-stamp grand jury discovers they still technically have vast powers, goes "rogue", and brings down the local good-ol'-boys network.

Do you know of any specific instances of this occurring? I'm sure it would make for interesting reading.

It would, if it were something that got documented well. Grand jury investigations are secret, so we mostly hear about the results rather than the how, and on the rare occasions something like this happens, it's almost always small town.

The highest-profile case I can point you to is somewhat disappointing. A few years ago, a grand jury in Harris County (Houston), Texas kicked the prosecutors out and proceeded to run its own investigation into issues surrounding BAT vans. They didn't return criminal indictments before disbanding, but made clear there were ethical violations.

Last I heard, though, the DA's office had succeeded in thoroughly pissing off some local judges and was under investigation by a special prosecutor and yet another grand jury for intimidation of jurors and other misconduct involving the first grand jury. I don't know what's happened since.

It's theater. They don't intend to let anything interfere with their surveillance of everyone.

In other societies, what you're referring to might be called an Ombudsman, or in our judicial system, a district attorney.

There is no such counterpoint in government, save our elected officials. Specifically, the reason the Commander in Chief is a civilian seems to be for this exact reason.

Anyways, I think the concept of a dissenting opinion would be welcome from the public's perspective and shunned from the bureaucratic one.

Funny though, the elected lot want votes. On one hand "we" give them power; on the other hand, they really don't want our opinions.

> "The members will have access to classified information so they need to be administratively attached to a government element but the review process and findings will be their own," Turner said.

Annnd we see how we got here in the first place.

How can a representative government be representative when vast portions of it are protected with total secrecy? ...with artificial attempts at transparency?

In practice, the US government is hardly a representative one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_current_United_States_S...

"They'll consider how we can maintain the trust of the people, how we can make sure that there absolutely is no abuse in terms of how these surveillance technologies are used, ask how surveillance impacts our foreign policy — particularly in an age when more and more information is becoming public," Obama said.

This quote illustrates the problem. Overturning the 4th amendment requires a congressional super-majority, not the assurance of a politician who has already violated the public's trust.

Is the public expected to believe that a panel hand-picked by someone deeply involved with surveillance, and appointed by the administration will conclude that the investigators' benefactors were guilty of anything?

Based on what President Obama said during his news conference, he's seeking to make the Americans "more comfortable" with the NSA program - not overhaul, stop, or find-guilty.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-11/obama-aims-to-build...

The administration is hands down adamant that this is happening, do not pass go.

It's absurd to me that this is the same administration that wouldn't even entertain the idea of single-payer health care, for fear of reprisal from the opposing party, yet they flaunt their power at the general public.

This is like how the US lets the police investigate police misconduct. Absolute joke.

Clapper having any say into the matter is unacceptable; Have they not heard of independent third parties?

Here's a conspiracy theory: Clapper will sit in the panel, come up with perfectly valid reasons to veto anyone his thugs do not have dirt on, and will proceed to blackmail his agency's way into being completely unchecked. Corruption is not rooted out by the corrupt; It is rooted out by having third parties check everything until well after the corruption is gone, to give the latent seeds no chance to take root.

Put Snowden's dad and Swartz's dad on the review board.

I'd prefer Bruce Schneier.

I'm going to do what might seem like a 180 on my previous stance in this topic; neither would have the bureaucratic/administrative expertise necessary to craft policy even if their input might be invaluable in directing that craft.

Figureheads on committee make for limp politics.

What I was going for was not a figurehead, but people who are outside the establishment and who have an interest in forging a better policy.

"...Republican congressman Justin Amash, who led a revolt that narrowly failed in its effort to cut NSA funding, tweeted:

"Pres Obama believes man who lied to public in congressional hearing about NSA should lead NSA review process meant to build public trust".

Can anyone wrap their head around that the `Pres' is this oblivious to both DC and public opinion?

Could someone rectify the apparent contradictions between yesterday's memo and today's announcement? Was it misread or something? How could they do an about face so quickly?

I'm sure it will be some other puppet on a string.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com