Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com Virginia Seitz, the leader of an influential Justice Department office that handles surveillance and security, quietly resigned from her job after less than three years on the job, NPR reports. Seitz received Senate confirmation in 2011, taking over the unit responsible for the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel. Sources told NPR…
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com Homeland Security hopes to build a national database based on information gathered from license-plate readers, the Washington Post reports. The idea is to help locate and arrest “absconders and criminal aliens” while also reducing surveillance hours. DHS spokesman Gillian Christensen emphasized that the database would “only be accessed in conjunction with ongoing…
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com Not even members of Congress are immune to the NSA’s wide surveillance reach. During a House Judiciary Committee meeting Tuesday, Deputy Attorney General James Cole admitted that the NSA “probably” collects phone records of lawmakers and their staff, the National Journal reports. But Justice Department official said the information isn’t used without…
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com Beginning in 1995, the FBI started experimenting with drones as a tool for video surveillance. But according to the Verge, federal authorities didn’t initially believe the drones were viable options. Now, the FBI appears to be building a drone program, according to the Verge. Records obtained by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics…
Comedian Jimmy Kimmel featured a skit about the FBI and NSA spying on ordinary Americans to prevent them from dangers like expired milk and relatives who want to borrow money.
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com The former NSA chief who oversaw the controversial warrantless surveillance found out what it’s like to be spied on Thursday. While on an Amtrack train, a passenger overheard Michael Hayden complaining about the current administration to reporters in an off-the-record conversation, USA Today reports. The passenger also happened to be MoveOn activist…
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com When someone began pointing a high-powered laser beam at airplanes descending into Portland International Airport, police and FBI agents were determined to capture the perpetrator. The Oregonian reports that agents and police flew planes over the area after dark until they could determine where the big green light was coming from. After…
Steve Neavling ticklethewire.com The NSA is collecting e-mail and instant messaging contacts from people worldwide in an attempt to keep an eye on relationships that suspects have with others, the USA Today reported. The idea is to identify any troubling relationships. “You need the haystack to find the needle,” said Gen. Keith B. Alexander, NSA…
