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NSA statements to The Post
NSA statements to The Post
By Barton Gellman, Published: August 15
The National Security Agency offered these comments on The Washington Post’s article about privacy violations.
Aug. 14
In July 2012, Director of National Intelligence (James R.) Clapper declassified certain statements about the government’s implementation of Section 702 in order to inform the public and congressional debate relating to reauthorization of the FISA Amendments Act (FAA). Those statements acknowledged that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) had determined that “some collection carried out pursuant to the Section 702 minimization procedures used by the government was unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.”
The FISC’s finding was with respect to a very specific and highly technical aspect of the National Security Agency’s 702 collection. Once the issue was identified and fully understood, it was reported immediately to the FISC and Congress. In consultation with the FISC, the Department of Justice, NSA, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence worked to address the concerns identified by the FISC by strengthening the NSA minimization procedures, thereby enhancing privacy protections for U.S. persons. The FISC has continued to approve the collection as consistent with the statute and reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.
Aug. 12
Obama administration statement on ‘compliance incident’ statistics.
The NSA communications office, in coordination with the White House and Director of National Intelligence, declined to answer questions about the number of violations of the rules, regulations and court-imposed standards for protecting the privacy of Americans, including whether the trends are up or down. Spokesmen provided the following prepared statement.
Looking over a 3-year period that includes the 1st first quarter 2010 through second quarter 2013, the data for that quarter are above the average number of incidents reported in any given quarter during that period. The number of incidents in a given quarter during that 3-year period ranged from 372 to 1,162. A variety of factors can cause the numbers of incidents to trend up or down from one quarter to the next. They include, but are not limited to: implementation of new procedures or guidance with respect to our authorities that prompt a spike that requires “fine tuning,” changes to the technology or software in the targeted environment for which we had no prior knowledge, unforeseen shortcomings in our systems, new or expanded access, and “roaming” by foreign targets into the U.S., some of which NSA cannot anticipate in advance but each instance of which is reported as an incident. The one constant across all of the quarters is a persistent, dedicated effort to identify incidents or risks of incidents at the earliest possible moment, implement mitigation measures wherever possible, and drive the numbers down.
- more -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-statements-to-the-post/2013/08/15/f40dd2c4-05d6-11e3-a07f-49ddc7417125_story.html
By Barton Gellman, Published: August 15
The National Security Agency offered these comments on The Washington Post’s article about privacy violations.
Aug. 14
In July 2012, Director of National Intelligence (James R.) Clapper declassified certain statements about the government’s implementation of Section 702 in order to inform the public and congressional debate relating to reauthorization of the FISA Amendments Act (FAA). Those statements acknowledged that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) had determined that “some collection carried out pursuant to the Section 702 minimization procedures used by the government was unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.”
The FISC’s finding was with respect to a very specific and highly technical aspect of the National Security Agency’s 702 collection. Once the issue was identified and fully understood, it was reported immediately to the FISC and Congress. In consultation with the FISC, the Department of Justice, NSA, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence worked to address the concerns identified by the FISC by strengthening the NSA minimization procedures, thereby enhancing privacy protections for U.S. persons. The FISC has continued to approve the collection as consistent with the statute and reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.
Aug. 12
Obama administration statement on ‘compliance incident’ statistics.
The NSA communications office, in coordination with the White House and Director of National Intelligence, declined to answer questions about the number of violations of the rules, regulations and court-imposed standards for protecting the privacy of Americans, including whether the trends are up or down. Spokesmen provided the following prepared statement.
Looking over a 3-year period that includes the 1st first quarter 2010 through second quarter 2013, the data for that quarter are above the average number of incidents reported in any given quarter during that period. The number of incidents in a given quarter during that 3-year period ranged from 372 to 1,162. A variety of factors can cause the numbers of incidents to trend up or down from one quarter to the next. They include, but are not limited to: implementation of new procedures or guidance with respect to our authorities that prompt a spike that requires “fine tuning,” changes to the technology or software in the targeted environment for which we had no prior knowledge, unforeseen shortcomings in our systems, new or expanded access, and “roaming” by foreign targets into the U.S., some of which NSA cannot anticipate in advance but each instance of which is reported as an incident. The one constant across all of the quarters is a persistent, dedicated effort to identify incidents or risks of incidents at the earliest possible moment, implement mitigation measures wherever possible, and drive the numbers down.
- more -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-statements-to-the-post/2013/08/15/f40dd2c4-05d6-11e3-a07f-49ddc7417125_story.html
FYI: Working to address compliance issues and strengthening the minimization procedures is not an impeachable offense.
28 replies
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K & R 