Sunday, June 04, 2006

ATT Warrantless Surveillance Program Petition

Here is the Petitioner's Request for Injunctive Relief that will be argued next week asking ATT to stop collecting and providing information to the government. It is in a redacted form, but still helpful to understand the corporate collusion with the government to undermine fundamental rights of Americans. Part of the petition includes the following:
Numerous major newspapers and other reputable accounts have shown that major U.S. telecommunications companies, including AT&T, are assisting the NSA with the Program. See Cohn Decl., Exs. A and B (Leslie Cauley and John Diamond, Telecoms Let NSA Spy on Calls, USA Today (Feb. 6, 2006) andDionne Searcey, ShawnYoung andAmol Sharma,Wiretapping Flap Puts Phone Firms Under Fire, Wall St. J., Feb. 7, 2006, at B3). Government officials have confirmed that “the N.S.A. has gained the cooperation of American telecommunications companies to obtain backdoor access to streams of domestic and international communications.” Cohn Decl., Ex. C
(James Risen and Eric Lichtblau, Spy AgencyMined Vast Data Trove, Officials Report, N.Y. Timesn (Dec. 24, 2005)).

As early as 2001, “the NSA approached U.S. carriers and asked for their
cooperation in a ‘data-mining’ operation, which might eventually cull ‘millions’ of individual calls and e-mails.” Cohn Decl., Ex. D (Shane Harris and Tim Naftali, Tinker, Tailor, Miner, Spy: Why the NSA’s Snooping Is Unprecedented In Scale and Scope, Slate (Jan. 3, 2006)). Following President Bush’s order, U.S. intelligence officials secretly arranged with top officials of major telecommunications companies to gain access to large telecommunications switches carrying the bulk of America’s phone calls. The NSA also gained access to the vast majority of American e-mail traffic that flows through the U.S. telecommunications system.
Cohn Decl., Ex. E at 48 (James Risen, State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration (Simon & Schuster 2006))
Nice.

4 comments:

Da Weaz said...

Grunt, Soc, cheers to you both,

Interesting points, both of you. Soc, you're right, the position is bleak, but I do know that. And yes, I yell the fascists are coming (are here), but nobody really gives a shit. But that's okay. We do what we can. Really doesn't mean much. But that's alright.

Da Weaz said...

Grunt,

You ole sly devil, I didn't know you were up on the jonesy, donut, soc, stuff? You really are a trickster. Anyway, don't need to defend Soc, cause he can handle himself, but don't believe the "foul reprobate" stuff, for weaz (yerz truly) was a major part of the campaign, which while not being true, was worth a chuckle or two.

Now let's get back to it . . . (whatever it is ;-)

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