FC: New Yorker article on how NSA surveillance is ineffective

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

The New Yorker in its December 6 issue includes this article:

http://cryptome.org/nsa-hersh.htm
   The Intelligence Gap
   How the digital age left our spies out in the cold. 
   By Seymour M. Hersh

While much of it resonates as true, the timing -- just before crucial
oversight
hearings and concerns about illegal NSA spying -- is a little coincidental:
  http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,32770,00.html

Last week's CNN article and televised report raised near-identical concerns
about newfound NSA eavesdropping ineffectiveness:
  http://www.cnn.com/US/9911/25/nsa.woes/

One critic emailed me to say:

> Hersch couldn't even get through the first sentence without
> revealing the absurdity of his argument.
>
>         THE National Security Agency, whose Cold War research into
>         code breaking and electronic eavesdropping spurred the
>         American computer revolution, . . . .
>
> It would be far more accurate to say that the NSA's elaborate
> classification scheme, restrictions on publication, and attempts
> to control the development of open source cryptographic methods
> did much to slow the computer revolution in the US. (The literature
> on the cost to the hi-tech economy of classified research is
> voluminous.)
>
> I wonder how much money the NSA allocates for spinning journalists.
> They are obviously having more success with this program than
> they did with Clipper.


-Declan



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