Interesting People mailing list archives
more on Bank Transactions?
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Sat, 13 May 2006 17:35:15 -0400
Begin forwarded message: From: Barry Steinhardt <bsteinhardt () aclu org> Date: May 13, 2006 8:28:15 AM EDT To: David Farber <dave () farber net> Subject: Re: [IP] Bank Transactions? Dave, I don't think we know for certain what access the NSA has to financial information, but the Federal Government has a financial center known as FinCen to which the banks and other institutions report millions of financial transactions. FinCen has a staggering amount of financial data about Americans. Below you will find a short description of FinCen from Privicilla.org.A big outstanding question about the NSA is the extent to which they data mine or otherwise use the communications data they have obtained from the "program", in conjunction with other data, including financial data, that is in the hands of the Federal Government or is available from the commercial
sector. You may recall that the Pentagon's (DARPA's) Total Information AwarenessProgram (TIA) sought to analyze a vast quantity of public and private data
about Americans to identify and profile suspects. http://www.aclu.org/privacy/spying/14956res20040116.html The Congress shut down the public version of TIA run by Admiral JohnPoindexter, but allowed significant portions of it to continue to operate applying to non-US persons. That view includes the power to troll through the communications records of hundreds of millions of Americans looking for
clues to contact with "foreign terrorists".The NSA may well have a piece of the TIA action or may be a part of a larger
effort within the Pentagon to continue the work of TIA. When asked about this in a Senate hearing by Senator Ron Wyden, GeneralHayden said he could not respond in public. All these matters are classified and we don't know what, if anything ,he told Senator Wyden in private, but
this question needs to be very carefully examined. Barry Steinhardt ACLU From Privicilla.org: "FinCEN," the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, is a network ofdatabases and financial records maintained by the U.S. federal government. Housed within the Treasury Department, FinCEN handles more than 140 million computerized financial records compiled from 21,000 depository institutions and 200,000 nonbank financial institutions. Banks, casinos, brokerage firms
and money transmitters all must file reports with FinCEN on cash transactions over $10,000. And FinCen is the repository for "SuspiciousActivity Reports" which must be filed by financial institutions under the
Bank Secrecy Act. FinCEN also uses a variety of law enforcement databases, including those operated by the Drug Enforcement Agency and the Defense Department, in addition to commercial databases of public records. FinCEN may also use databases held by the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, and the Defense Intelligence Agency. FinCEN shares information with investigators from dozens of agencies,including the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms; the Drug Enforcement
Administration; the Federal Bureau of Investigation; the U.S. SecretService; the Internal Revenue Service; the Customs Service; and the the U.S. Postal Inspection Service. Agents from all these agencies can investigate names, addresses, and Social Security numbers through FinCEN. Field agents and state and local law enforcement can access data from FinCEN remotely.
On 5/13/06 7:42 AM, "David Farber" <dave () farber net> wrote:
Begin forwarded message: From: anitaclaremadsen () netscape net Date: May 13, 2006 7:16:38 AM EDT To: dave () farber net Subject: Bank Transactions? Anyone know if the NSA also is collecting/data mining customer bank/ credit card records under the historic, "Follow the Money" advice give to Woodward by Deep Throat? ___________________________________________________ Try the New Netscape Mail Today! Virtually Spam-Free | More Storage | Import Your Contact List http://mail.netscape.com ------------------------------------- You are subscribed as bsaclu () earthlink net To manage your subscription, go to http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ipArchives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting- people/
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