NSA Spies Running Dry?

[mea culpa <jericho () DIMENSIONAL COM>]

From: Magical Zombie Cow <waste () zor hut fi>

http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,32770,00.html

NSA Spies Running Dry?
Wired News Report

2:15 p.m. 29.Nov.1999 PST

Spies at the US National Security Agency may be having trouble
eavesdropping on information transmitted through the Internet and fiber
optic cables.

NSA officials also cannot readily decipher encrypted communications
exchanged by North Korean officials, according to an article in the 6
December issue of The New Yorker.

Advances in computer technology -- some helped along by the US government
-- have made the once-secret spy agency's job much more difficult,
according to the article written by Seymour Hersh.

The NSA failed, for instance, to uncover information about India's 1998
nuclear tests, which took Washington by surprise.

"The NSA's party line to Congress is 'We're fine. We don't need to
change,'" one source told Hersh. "It's like a real Communist organization.
Free thought is not encouraged."

But some critics believe the NSA is trying to use the media to downplay
its broad intelligence-gathering capabilities before planned congressional
oversight hearings next year.

CNN's David Ensor last week aired a very similar report that also said new
technologies "threaten to make the NSA's big ears go increasingly deaf."

"The worldwide move to digital, rather than analog, phones and other
equipment is making eavesdropping more difficult. So are fax machines and
the move to fiber optic cables, which are much harder to tap into.  So is
the increasing availability of good encryption software," Ensor said.

Widespread rumors that the NSA regularly engages in illegal surveillance
of US citizens -- aided by such techno-thrillers as Enemy of the State --
gained more credibility this year when the agency refused to turn over
important information to Congress.

Citing attorney-client privilege, the NSA declined to reveal information
about its internal operating procedures.

In an angry response, the House Select Committee on Intelligence drafted a
requirement forcing the NSA and the attorney general to prepare a report
by the end of January "providing a detailed analysis of the legal
standards employed by elements of the intelligence community in conducting
signals intelligence activities, including electronic surveillance."

Signals intelligence refers to the collection of intelligence data from
sources that include electronic or radio communications.

The legislation is part of the large spending bill that President Clinton
signed on Monday. (Just to make their point absolutely clear, House
appropriators also sliced the NSA's legal budget by 33 percent.)

"The information we get back in that report will shape how any hearings
turn out," said an aide to Rep. Bob Barr (R-Georgia), a frequent NSA
critic.

The aide said one focus of the hearings, which will happen no earlier than
February, will be "how well do 1970s laws governing surveillance work in
the 1990s?"

The ACLU and the Electronic Privacy Information Center recently launched
Echelon Watch, a site designed to prompt governmental investigation into
the reality -- and the legalities -- of a global electronic surveillance
system code-named Echelon.

"The solution is oversight, accountability, and reform," says Marc
Rotenberg, director of EPIC.

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