McJoan: Why isn't Mark Klein being called to testify before Congress?

from mcjoan at daily kos, a follow-up to my post the other day on babak pasdar... important enough to post the whole thing...

Mark Klein is the former AT&T technician who exposed the infamous secret room at AT&T's facility in San Francisco, the room that was equipped to vacuum up "comprehensive customer usage data ... and transforms it into actionable information.... (It) provides complete visibility for all internet applications." For his efforts in exposing this massive warrantless wiretapping program by AT&T on behalf of the NSA, Klein received the Electronic Frontier's Foudnation Pioneer award.

What he has yet to receive is an invitation from any committee of Congress to testify about AT&T's illegal activity. In fact, the only member of Congress to make an attempt to reach out to him has been Senator Chris Dodd.

In this video, Boing Boing's Xeni Jardin interviews Klein and EFF legal director Cindy Cohn about the case, the Congress, and the Constitution. Klein has some harsh words for Democrats who care to listen.

Maybe it's time for Mark Klein to have his day testifying before Congress. While they're at it, they could invite whistleblower Babak Pasdar who tells a very similar story about one of the nation's major wireless carriers, ironically enough very likely the wireless carrier that sponsored that video you just watched.

It's unbelievable that these stories haven't been heard by Congress, that the Democratic leadership and the chairs of the Intelligence and Judiciary committees haven't given them the opportunity to tell what they know about this highly controversial, and illegal spying on Americans.

Instead, they want to sweep it all under the rug. Tell them not to. Call your Senators and Representative and tell them to demand a hearing for these allegations. No further action on FISA until they, and we, have heard the whole story.

Call leadership and the intelligence committee chairs, and tell them, too.

Harry Reid, Phone: (202) 224-3542, Fax: (202) 224-7327
Nancy Pelosi, Phone: (202) 225-4965, Fax: (202) 225-8259
Jay Rockefeller, Phone: (202) 224-6472, Fax: (202) 224-7665
Silvestre Reyes, Phone: (202) 225-4831, Fax: (202) 225-2016

Update: Adding in Judiciary Chairs, because they could probably find some angle to bring these guys in with, and frankly would be a lot more likely to do it.
Patrick Leahy, Phone: (202) 224-4242, Fax: (202) 224-3479
John Conyers, Phone: (202) 225-5126, Fax: (202) 225-0072

yeah, it may be nothing more than the little dutch boy, sticking his finger in the dike, but we gotta keep fightin' against our police state...

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Oferchrissake, NOW the FBI wants telecom immunity

i'd no sooner finished with the previous post than i ran across this totally self-serving piece about fbi director mueller recommending telecom immunity...

At the heart of President Bush's plea to give telecommunications companies legal immunity is the contention that these companies were merely being patriotic corporate citizens when they facilitated the warrantless wiretapping of Americans.

FBI Director Robert Mueller undercut that argument Wednesday, telling Congress that the 'good faith' argument should have nothing to do with whether or not they are let off the hook in dozens of pending court cases.

"I would focus more on the downsides, substantial downsides, of not providing retroactive immunity as being the principal rational of the legislation, providing immunity," Mueller told the Senate Judiciary Committee.

go back and re-read my previous post and then tell me if you don't think the fbi is making a big move to protect its OWN miserable, exposed ass...

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Wholesale FBI/NSA domestic information "vacuuming" - first Mark Klein, now Babak Pasdar

looks like we have another mark klein...

A U.S. government office in Quantico, Virginia, has direct, high-speed access to a major wireless carrier's systems, exposing customers' voice calls, data packets and physical movements to uncontrolled surveillance, according to a computer security consultant who says he worked for the carrier in late 2003.

"What I thought was alarming is how this carrier ended up essentially allowing a third party outside their organization to have unfettered access to their environment," Babak Pasdar, now CEO of New York-based Bat Blue told Threat Level. "I wanted to put some access controls around it; they vehemently denied it. And when I wanted to put some logging around it, they denied that."

Pasdar won't name the wireless carrier in question, but his claims are nearly identical to unsourced allegations made in a federal lawsuit filed in 2006 against four phone companies and the U.S. government for alleged privacy violations. That suit names Verizon Wireless as the culprit.

Pasdar has executed a seven-page affidavit for the nonprofit Government Accountability Project in Washington, which on Tuesday began circulating the document (.pdf), along with talking points (.doc), to congressional staffers hashing out a Republican proposal to grant retroactive legal immunity to phone companies who cooperated in the warrantless wiretapping of Americans.

According to his affidavit, Pasdar tumbled to the surveillance superhighway in September 2003, when he led a "Rapid Deployment" team hired to revamp security on the carrier's internal network. He noticed that the carrier's officials got squirrelly when he asked about a mysterious "Quantico Circuit" -- a 45 megabit/second DS-3 line linking its most sensitive network to an unnamed third party.

thanks babak... great info...

and, of course, we remember mark klein, don't we...?

What I observed first-hand:

In 2002, when I was working in an AT&T office in San Francisco, the site manager told me to expect a visit from a National Security Agency agent, who was to interview a management-level technician for a special job. The agent came, and by chance I met him and directed him to the appropriate people.

In January 2003, I, along with others, toured the AT&T central office on Folsom Street in San Francisco -- actually three floors of an SBC building. There I saw a new room being built adjacent to the 4ESS switch room where the public's phone calls are routed. I learned that the person whom the NSA interviewed for the secret job was the person working to install equipment in this room. The regular technician work force was not allowed in the room.

In October 2003, the company transferred me to the San Francisco building to oversee the Worldnet Internet room, which included large routers, racks of modems for customers' dial-in services, and other equipment. I was responsible for troubleshooting problems on the fiber optic circuits and installing new circuits.

While doing my job, I learned that fiber optic cables from the secret room were tapping into the Worldnet circuits by splitting off a portion of the light signal. I saw this in a design document available to me, entitled "Study Group 3, LGX/Splitter Wiring, San Francisco" dated Dec. 10, 2002. I also saw design documents dated Jan. 13, 2004 and Jan. 24, 2003, which instructed technicians on connecting some of the already in-service circuits to the "splitter" cabinet, which diverts some of the light signal to the secret room. The circuits listed were the Peering Links, which connect Worldnet with other networks and hence the whole country, as well as the rest of the world.

One of the documents listed the equipment installed in the secret room, and this list included a Narus STA 6400, which is a "Semantic Traffic Analyzer". The Narus STA technology is known to be used particularly by government intelligence agencies because of its ability to sift through large amounts of data looking for preprogrammed targets. The company's advertising boasts that its technology "captures comprehensive customer usage data ... and transforms it into actionable information.... (It) provides complete visibility for all internet applications."

My job required me to connect new circuits to the "splitter" cabinet and get them up and running. While working on a particularly difficult one with a technician back East, I learned that other such "splitter" cabinets were being installed in other cities, including Seattle, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego.

What is the significance and why is it important to bring these facts to light?

Based on my understanding of the connections and equipment at issue, it appears the NSA is capable of conducting what amounts to vacuum-cleaner surveillance of all the data crossing the internet -- whether that be peoples' e-mail, web surfing or any other data.

no WONDER the bushies want to shut down those pesky lawsuits by giving the telecoms immunity... the discovery information might just end up confirming what we all already know...

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