A Stitch in Haste

What exactly do the NSA warrantless wiretapping program and government data mining of telecommunications entail?

AT&T provided National Security Agency eavesdroppers with full access to its customers' phone calls, and shunted its customers' internet traffic to data-mining equipment installed in a secret room in its San Francisco switching center, according to a former AT&T worker cooperating in the Electronic Frontier Foundation's lawsuit against the company.
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[Mark] Klein's job eventually included connecting internet circuits to a splitting cabinet that led to the secret room. During the course of that work, he learned from a co-worker that similar cabinets were being installed in other cities, including Seattle, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego.
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The secret room also included data-mining equipment called a Narus STA 6400, "known to be used particularly by government intelligence agencies because of its ability to sift through large amounts of data looking for preprogrammed targets," according to Klein's statement.

There is, of course, no reason to believe that this clandestine rerouting of telecommunication traffic and construction of "secret rooms" is limited to AT&T.

And there is also, of course, no reason to believe that the government would go to such extraordinary lengths (and costs) just to intercept a handful of international phone calls — even if they're to al Qaeda.

This is a systematic, comprehensive and unapologetic plan by the Bush Administration to enable the monitoring of all telecommunications. Voice and data, international and domestic, related or unrelated to the War on Terror, with or without probable cause.

Keep in mind that warrantless wiretapping apologist-in-chief Alberto Gonzales said as much just a few days ago.

The transmogrification of the War on Terror into the War on Privacy has reached a whole new plateau.

One can only wonder what next big idea — or Big Brother idea — Bush, Hayden, Gonzales and the rest of the warrantless wiretapping cabal will come up with.

Especially given that they probably won't tell us about it.

More thoughts at Mixed Signals, Hit & Run, Catallarchy.