'DIPITY Echelon revisited, again

Wed Oct 20 14:00:26 UTC 1999

A rumor that scares me enough that I want the word out...

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>From: ishgooda at tdi.net
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>Date: Wed, 20 Oct 1999 19:12:27 -0400
>To: serendipity at mLists.net
>Subject: 'DIPITY Echelon revisited, again
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>ishgooda at tdi.net replies:
>Eternera - http://get.to/eternera
>
>Echelon revisited, again
>
>
>I learned a long time ago to notice changes. Changes indicate "something"
>and are in many ways a natural early warning device. We may not know at
>the time what that "something" is, but awareness leads to preparedness. If
>you sit in a forest, a swamp, or a jungle and actively "listen," you can
>easily identify a change. Background noise of birds and critters will get
>less, or increase; you can hear the difference. Something caused that
>change. Likewise most people can even smell a change. It might be the
>smell of a salt marsh at low tide, or a campfire or diesel engine. I've
>known guys who could smell the oil on a gun amongst assorted mountain
>fragrances. There is also what I believe to be a very real instinctive
>warning device designed I guess to spark the "fight or flee" reaction. The
>Godan (fifth degree black belt) test in one martial art requires the
>testee to kneel with his back to the teacher. The teacher "projects" a
>killing intention and swings a sword at the kneeling st!
>uden
>t's head. If the target head isn't there when the sword arrives, the
>student passes and is promoted.
>
>April 20th of last year (1998) I wrote a WorldNetDaily column entitled
>"Big Brother Watching" that referred to a program called, "Echelon". Since
>then I have seen Echelon stories in a variety of magazines and European
>newspapers.
>
>The movie, "Enemy of the State," although fiction, shed light on the real
>world realities of Echelon, and the unbridled assault on both the concept
>and essence of personal privacy.
>
>Lawmakers in both the United States Congress and British Parliament are
>now asking questions I raised last year. Even the San Diego Union has
>written about Echelon: "Is the government listening in on your phone
>calls? Reading your e-mail for words like 'plutonium,' 'Clinton' or
>'terrorism'?"
>
>An eclectic and strange collection of distaff allies have joined the
>"What's the deal with Echelon" crowd. Congressman Bob Barr, himself a
>former CIA analyst, The European Parliament, and a gaggle of computer
>mavens calling themselves "hacktivists" are all looking into the what,
>where, when, why, and how of Echelon. They are not having joint board
>meetings, but they are pursuing similar objectives along fairly parallel
>lines. This Thursday the "hacktivists" are planning what may be the first
>mass protest using electronic mail as a weapon. It cannot be confirmed or
>denied that FBI Director Louis Freeh has bought out the entire D.C. stock
>of Imodium.
>
>The target may sound more like something out of "The X-Files" than a real
>computer network operated by five countries. But it is real. Echelon is
>not officially acknowledged by the U.S. government despite more than ample
>documentation of the treaty that sparked it, and the facilities from
>Menwith Hill in England to Alexandria, Va. "We don't confirm or deny the
>existence of Echelon," said a spokeswoman for the U.S. National Security
>Agency, although they are the agency believed tasked with operating the
>system.
>
>The European Parliament started asking questions about Echelon last year.
>The European press has been reporting on it longer than I have. Yet again,
>either as a function of malfeasance or complicity, the United States
>mainstream has been silent.
>
>Then Congressman Barr actually said the word ("Echelon") out loud on the
>floor of the House for God and everyone to hear.
>
>As I noted last year, Echelon is a complex, interconnected worldwide
>network of satellites and computerized interception stations operated by
>the governments of the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia and New
>Zealand.
>
>According to Christopher Simpson, an American University professor who has
>written four books about national security technology, Echelon scans
>e-mail for hot-button words like "militia," "Davidian," "terrorism" and
>"AK-47." It can recognize individual voices in telephone calls and track
>who is calling whom.
>
>I have often received e-mail with a long litany of "key words and phrases"
>(Death to the New World Order, Clinton, Butch Reno, Branch Davidians, TWA
>800, Ruby Ridge, Oklahoma City, Abolish the Federal Reserve, None Dare
>Call it Treason, Cocaine, AK-47, Stinger, Vince Foster, etc.) above a
>routine note such as "Like your column. Keep it up." When I asked, "Why
>the laundry list?" I was told it was a small protest intended to
>overburden the snoopers.
>
>The European Parliament published an official report last year and
>concluded Echelon has listening posts all over the world that can
>intercept any phone calls, e-mail or faxes transmitted by satellite.
>"Echelon is designed for primarily nonmilitary targets: governments,
>organizations and businesses in virtually every country," the report said.
>
>In May a follow up report said there is evidence that the U.S. government
>has used Echelon to pick up the secrets of foreign corporations and pass
>them on to American companies. Some of you may recall talk that when the
>Cold War allegedly ended, intelligence assets would shift focus from
>military to industrial espionage.
>
>Congressman Barr has called for congressional hearings on Echelon. "By all
>appearances, what we have is a massive government program that scoops up
>unbelievably huge numbers of private communications, indiscriminately,
>without any oversight or court involvement," Barr said. "There's a very
>important, but fine, line between legitimate foreign intelligence
>gathering and unconstitutional eavesdropping on American citizens, and it
>appears that line has been crossed."
>
>Concerns that Echelon could and would illegally intercept Americans'
>private communications sparked the ACLU to write to congressional
>representatives back in April. They said, "The troubling aspect is that
>Echelon is this huge system that operates without any oversight or
>scrutiny from anybody." THAT was and is the whole idea.
>
>I'm not going to re-write last year's column again, you can check out the
>link. However, Echelon is the bastard child of the UKUSA Treaty. The
>primary purpose of the treaty AND Echelon was to maintain perception, and
>obscure reality.
>
>It is illegal (supposedly) for the United States government to spy on its
>citizens.
>
>It is illegal for the British government to spy on its citizens.
>
>Likewise in Canada and Australia.
>
>So, these cousin countries sit down and "in the interest of national
>security" with a wink and a nod agree to the following:
>
>"Here's the deal, Nigel: Let's set up an inter-connected information
>gathering apparatus. I'll spy on your citizens to determine if they mean
>us any ill, and you spy on my citizens to see if anyone is planning
>nastiness to your country. THEN I'll show you my data, and you show me
>your data. You'll know what's going on with your blokes, and I'll know
>what's happening with Joe-six-pack, and it's all legal ... kinda."
>
>If you sit in the shadows of the international intelligence jungle, you
>can hear a change in the background noise, and the background silence. You
>can smell "something" different. Right about now there are Echelon
>managers and operatives who can feel that uncomfortable tingle? The same
>premonition that martial artist feels just before the sword swings for his
>head ... the same tingle a rat feels the heartbeat before the lurking cat
>springs.
>
>
>                   Geoff Metcalf is a talk-show host for KSFO in
>                   San Francisco.
>
>
>Reprinted under the Fair Use
>http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html doctrine of international
>copyright law.
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>           Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit)
>                      Unenh onhwa' Awayaton
>                   http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/
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>

peter