Surveillance

Via Electronic Frontier Foundation Justices Rule Changing Technology Demands Limits for Police but Requires Permission from TV Broadcasters San Francisco – The U.S. Supreme Court issued two big rulings in important technology cases today. In a groundbreaking decision on cell phone privacy, the court set powerful limits for police searches of cell phones, ruling in […]

Democracy

Lighting the Darkest Corners of Government: Review of Glenn Greenwald’s No Place to Hide

contributors

Book review and discussion questions for reading groups In No Place to Hide, Glenn Greenwald shows that a modern investigative reporter doesn’t just need the courage to take on the United States government and established media. He also needs a whole…

Constitution

5 Falsehoods Defenders of NSA keep Repeating that Destroy their Credibility

Juan Cole

By Cindy Cohn and Nadia Kayyali Over the past year, as the Snowden revelations have rolled out, the government and its apologists have developed a set of talking points about mass spying that the public has now heard over and over again. From the President, to Hilary Clinton to Rep. Mike Rogers, Sen. Dianne Feinstein […]

al Qaeda in the Arabian Penisula

NSA Intercepting Millions of Personal Images for Facial Recognition Tech

contributors

By Sarah Lazare The National Security Agency is mass collecting facial images through its surveillance programs for use in facial recognition technology, journalists James Risen and Laura Poitras revealed Saturday in the New York Times. Secret documents exposed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden reveal that the spy agency views facial recognition as the next frontier […]

Dissent

Snowden: Clapper pattern of Lies about My Complaints to NSA

contributors

After NBC confirmed Ed Snowden’s earlier claims that he had tried to make use of internal channels to question NSA surveillance programs, James Clapper released a single email from Snowden to the legal department at the NSA, which they claim shows he…

Bill of Rights

“Man-Up” Kerry tries to Swiftboat Ed Snowden

contributors

By Jon Queally U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is facing widespread criticism for his comment that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden—increasingly seen by the American public as a heroic figure for exposing government surveillance—should "man up" by returning home to face criminal charges. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s attempt to bully Edward Snowden with […]

Bill of Rights

Gov’t to Class of ’14: Getting to Know You, Getting to Know all About You

contributors

By Tom Engelhardt via Tomdispatch Internet Class of 2014, I’m in awe of you! To this giant, darkened auditorium filled with sparkling screens of every sort, welcome! It would, of course, be inaccurate to say, as speakers like me once did, that after four years of effort and experience you are now about to leave […]

Bill of Rights

Mr. Kerry: Why Snowden can’t “Make his Case” in “Our System of Justice”

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole Secretary of State John Kerry said that Edward Snowden should “return home and come back here and stand in our system of justice and make his case.” Kerry seems to have a high opinion of the Department of Justice and the US courts when it comes to national security issues. I can’t […]

Democracy

Press Freedom is the Issue, not Glenn Greenwald’s Personality

contributors

By Barry Eisler via Freedom of the Press Foundation: One of the most fascinating aspects of Glenn Greenwald’s journalism is the way it provokes various people who think of themselves as journalists to reveal their actual priorities. I wrote about this at length last week in a response to Michael Kinsley’s non-review review of Greenwald’s […]