PRISM scandal - Britons ARE being spied on by surveillance agencies: GCHQ using phone records and online data gleaned by US government to snoop on citizens

Britons ARE being spied on by surveillance agencies: GCHQ using phone records and online data gleaned by US government to snoop on citizens

• NSA's Prism program launched in 2007 to mine personal data from 9 firms
• Includes Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, YouTube, Skype, AOL
• GCHQ has secret deal with America's NSA to share intelligence
• Piles pressure on David Cameron as he attends top-secret Bilderberg meet
• Anonymous leak US government documents, including various from Prism
• Details of data collection were outlined in classified 41-slide PowerPoint presentation that was leaked by intelligence officer

By Jack Doyle
PUBLISHED: 09:53 GMT, 7 June 2013 | UPDATED: 07:38 GMT, 8 June 2013

British spies have had access to a US government programme that monitors the web activity of millions of Britons, it was claimed last night.
Secret documents published yesterday suggest the US National Security Agency (NSA) has direct access to data held by internet giants including Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, Facebook, YouTube, Skype and Apple.
The documents – which appear to be slides from a training presentation for intelligence agents – suggest the agency can access email, photographs, social network information, chat records and other ‘stored data’ held by the companies, as part of its ‘Prism’ project.

Sinister powers: Britain's Government Communications Headquarters, based in Cheltenham, Gloucs., is largely responsible for monitoring the phone calls and emails of terror suspects

They also suggest the British government’s listening centre, GCHQ, has had access to the system since at least June 2010.
During this period the project generated nearly 200 intelligence reports.
It is unclear whether other agencies, such as MI5 and MI6, were also involved, meaning the true extent of the snooping could be higher.

 

More...

• 'You can't have 100% security and 100% privacy': Obama defends NSA's secret 'data-mining' and tries to dismiss it as 'a modest encroachment'
• Is this where your personal information will be stored? The one-million square-foot Utah data mining facility being built by NSA
• Cameron to attend secretive Bilderberg conference (but will not say who he meets)
• Inside America's $1.9billion data mine: How all your private details will soon be stored in this vast NSA nerve center in Utah Valley

A GCHQ spokesman said ‘we do not comment on intelligence matters’, but added: ‘Our work is carried out in accordance with a strict legal and policy framework.’
Privacy campaigners warned that the revelations suggested the creation of a ‘Snooper’s Charter by the back door’.
They come after a proposed plan to pay internet companies to collate user data from UK computers was dropped only last month in the face of opposition from Tory backbenchers and Liberal Democrats.

Pressure: The disclosure will pile pressure on David Cameron to explain how much he knew about the intrusion as he prepares to attend the secretive Bilderberg conference today, a closed-door meeting that conspiracy theorists already believe is where leaders plot world domination

I know what you're doing this summer: The Obama administration defended the order on Thursday, calling it 'a critical tool in protecting the nation from terrorist threats'

'Reprehensible': Director of National Intelligence James Clapper branded the program 'reprehensible' and said it risks Americans' security

Last night Labour called on David Cameron to come clean to MPs on the extent of Britain’s role.  Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: ‘In the light of these media reports, the Prime Minister should brief the Intelligence and Security Committee on what ministers know and should ask the Intelligence and Security Committee to report on the UK’s relationship with the Prism programme, the nature of intelligence being gathered, the extent of UK oversight by ministers and others, and the level of safeguards and compliance with the law.’
The Guardian said it obtained the slides from a whistleblowing intelligence officer worried about invasions of privacy.
Reports by the paper and The Washington Post suggested the FBI and the NSA can tap directly into the central servers of nine leading internet companies.
But a number of them, including Google, Apple, Yahoo and Facebook denied the government had ‘direct access’ to their servers.
Microsoft said it does not voluntarily participate in any government data collection and only complies ‘with orders for requests about specific accounts or identifiers’.
Yet one slide appears to be a timeline of when the companies began to participate in Prism, starting with Microsoft in September 2007 and ending with Apple in October 2012.
According to the reports, Prism was established under President Bush in 2007 and has grown ‘exponentially’ under President Obama.

Bombshell: NSA and FBI have been extracting audio, video, photos, e-mails, documents and other data from Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, YouTube, Skype, AOL and PalTalk

Key source: PRISM has been described by NSA officials 'as the most prolific contributor to the president's Daily Brief,' providing analysts with a wealth of 'raw material'

Classified: The particulars of the PRISM data-mining program have been outlined in a top-secret PowerPoint presentation for senior intelligence analysts, which ended up being leaked

Participants: This graph shows when each of the nine tech companies joined PRISM, with Apple being the latest addition in October 2012

Spying: The NSA has been getting millions of phone records from Verizon on a daily basis for months without any justification for the order, that was only revealed today

Plundered: The NSA and FBI have been pulling personal data directly from the mainframes of top US tech giants, including YouTube, Google, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and Verizon for the past six years

The Director of US National Intelligence said that the law ensures that only ‘non-US persons outside the US are targeted’, raising the likelihood that Britons are among those captured in its net.
Emma Carr, of Big Brother Watch, said: ‘We already have laws which allow law enforcement officials to request information about British citizens using American services.
‘If these laws are being circumvented by using these NSA spying arrangements then that would be a very serious issue.’
Revelations about the snooping programme follow separate reports about the NSA being allowed to collect all telephone user data from Verizon, one of the largest telephone firms in the US, for three months.

NSA IN THE USA: HOW AGENCY HAS TAPPED ITS OWN CITIZENS

Set up by Harry Truman in 1953, the NSA is the eyes and ears of America across the globe, intercepting 1.7 billion emails, phone calls a day’.
It is the the secretive body that serves the military and intelligence communities by collecting all forms of foreign communications to prevent attacks on the US.
It was prohibited by law from intercepting domestic communications without a warrant until George W. Bush issued a caveat in the wake of 9/11 under the controversial 'terrorist surveillance program'.
Nonetheless, over the years the NSA has been engulfed in a number of snooping scandals.
They include President Nixon's illegal wiretapping, through the NSA, of five members of his national security staff, two newsmen, and a staffer at the Department of Defense in a bid to uncover who was leaking information about his plans for the Vietnam War.
In 2005 it was revealed George W Bush had authorized the NSA to eavesdrop on Americans calling abroad without warrants in a bid to thwart terrorism. He strenuously denied the allegations until he finally conceded he had committed an impeachable offense.
And in 2009, under President Obama, the US Department of Justice acknowledged the NSA had gone beyond its remit in tapping the phonelines of American citizens, including a Congressman, but claimed that the acts were unintentional and had since been rectified.

Last month, it was accused of building an £800million cyber base to keep tabs on American citizens.
The state-of-the-art data centre in the Utah desert – codenamed Bumblehive – is intended to bolster online security efforts.
But former employees say it could be used to monitor people’s private emails.
The NSA branded the allegations 'unfounded', adding that it remained 'unwavering' in its respect for U.S. laws and American citizens' civil liberties, and noted that it was subject to broad oversight by all three branches of government.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2337377/Britons-ARE-spied-surveillance-agencies-GCHQ-using-phone-records-online-data-gleaned-US-government-snoop-citizens.html#ixzz2VcDGIDRe