Today’s cyber roundup is brought to you by BBC News and The New York Times.
From BBC News:
Within a one-month time span, the National Security Agency (NSA) spy program allegedly secretly intercepted metadata from 60 million phone calls between Spanish citizens. Documents leaked by Snowden are serving as the basis for these allegations.
Former NSA and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director General Michael Hayden’s off-the-record phone interview with a journalist was overheard while he was aboard a train. The substance of the conversation was soon thereafter posted by the interceptor to a live Twitter feed. The tweets included posts about the U.S. rendition program and a “famous BlackBerry.” Upon learning of the live feed, General Hayden offered the former political activist, Tom Matzzie (@tommatzzie), a formal interview.
Stepping out of the BBC News article for a second, I went to Matzzie’s Twitter account to see what was actually tweeted during General Hayden’s phone interview on October 24. Here are a few snippets, although it should be noted that General Hayden told The Washington Post that Matzzie “got it terribly wrong.”
- “Former NSA spy boss Michael Hayden on Acela behind me blabbing ‘on background as a former senior admin official’ Sounds defensive.
- “Hayden was bragging about rendition and black sites a minute ago.”
- “On Acela: former NSA spy boss Michael Hayden just ended last of handful of interviews bashing admin.”
From The Times:
In addition to evidence that the NSA has been spying on Spanish citizens, details have emerged about NSA’s surveillance of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s cellphone communications. According to German magazine Der Spiegel, The Times reports, there is some evidence that the request to monitor Chancellor Merkel’s phone dates back to 2002 although the documentation refers to her as “chancellor,” a position she has only occupied since late 2005.
Earlier this month, Jason Woodring of Arkansas, 37, was arrested and charged with the destruction of an energy facility after he told Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents that he was responsible for attacks on the power grid east of Little Rock. The attack caused approximately $2.1 in damage but, although Woodring attempted to down a support tower using moving trains, no one was injured.
For the first time, the Department of Justice (DOJ) informed a criminal defendant, Jamshid Muhtorov (who was charged with providing material support to the designated terrorist organization the Islamic Jihad Union in January 2012), that the evidence used to build the case against him largely came from a warrantless wiretap. Such notice will provide Muhtorov’s legal team with the opportunity to move to suppress the evidence.
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