they know what you are doing

[petrus4]

This has to be meant to foment...or is she that ungrateful, that
blind, that callous? Even the word "Prison" ....does she even
think before she speaks?

With respect, burntheships, your naivete is showing, here.  The single greatest problem that most who seek power have, is that they fail to realise that they will still be unhappy (if not become even moreso) once they get it.

Michelle Obama could definitely be considered fortunate in physical and logistical terms.  I'm sure she eats luxuriously, never has to worry about hypothermia, and is in visually gorgeous surroundings, most of the time. 

Yet the needs of the body and the needs of the spirit, are very often diametrically opposed.  She would never be able to go anywhere unscheduled, and whenever she did so, would have to be attended to by the Secret Service (America's Praetorians) at all times, to avoid the possibility of abduction or assassination.  I also could not be paid enough, to live subjected to the negative aetheric bombardment which you can be sure that she and her husband are constantly under, due to the anger of the people.

To conclude, if Michelle Obama's position is judged purely in terms of physical requirements, then yes, it could be said that she is in a good position.  If we are to look at a person's less tangible needs, on the other hand, then the opposite becomes true.  A gilded cage can be just as much torture as a non-guilded one, in its' own ways.

[sky otter]

ohhh  did you really think this was over?..


U.S. Postal Service Logging All Mail for Law Enforcement
By RON NIXON
Published: July 3, 2013

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail-mail.html?_r=0

WASHINGTON — Leslie James Pickering noticed something odd in his mail last September: A handwritten card, apparently delivered by mistake, with instructions for postal workers to pay special attention to the letters and packages sent to his home.

"Show all mail to supv" — supervisor — "for copying prior to going out on the street," read the card. It included Mr. Pickering's name, address and the type of mail that needed to be monitored. The word "confidential" was highlighted in green.
"It was a bit of a shock to see it," said Mr. Pickering, who owns a small bookstore in Buffalo. More than a decade ago, he was a spokesman for the Earth Liberation Front, a radical environmental group labeled eco-terrorists by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Postal officials subsequently confirmed they were indeed tracking Mr. Pickering's mail but told him nothing else.

As the world focuses on the high-tech spying of the National Security Agency, the misplaced card offers a rare glimpse inside the seemingly low-tech but prevalent snooping of the United States Postal Service.

Mr. Pickering was targeted by a longtime surveillance system called mail covers, but that is only a forerunner of a vastly more expansive effort, the Mail Isolation Control and Tracking program, in which Postal Service computers photograph the exterior of every piece of paper mail that is processed in the United States — about 160 billion pieces last year. It is not known how long the government saves the images.

Together, the two programs show that snail mail is subject to the same kind of scrutiny that the National Security Agency has given to telephone calls and e-mail.

The mail covers program, used to monitor Mr. Pickering, is more than a century old but is still considered a powerful tool. At the request of law enforcement officials, postal workers record information from the outside of letters and parcels before they are delivered. (Actually opening the mail requires a warrant.) The information is sent to whatever law enforcement agency asked for it. Tens of thousands of pieces of mail each year undergo this scrutiny.

The Mail Isolation Control and Tracking program was created after the anthrax attacks in late 2001 that killed five people, including two postal workers. Highly secret, it seeped into public view last month when the F.B.I. cited it in its investigation of ricin-laced letters sent to President Obama and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. It enables the Postal Service to retroactively track mail correspondence at the request of law enforcement. No one disputes that it is sweeping.

"In the past, mail covers were used when you had a reason to suspect someone of a crime," said Mark D. Rasch, the former director of the Justice Department's computer crime unit, who worked on several fraud cases using mail covers. "Now it seems to be 'Let's record everyone's mail so in the future we might go back and see who you were communicating with.' Essentially you've added mail covers on millions of Americans."

Bruce Schneier, a computer security expert and an author, said whether it was a postal worker taking down information or a computer taking images, the program was still an invasion of privacy.

"Basically they are doing the same thing as the other programs, collecting the information on the outside of your mail, the metadata, if you will, of names, addresses, return addresses and postmark locations, which gives the government a pretty good map of your contacts, even if they aren't reading the contents," he said.

But law enforcement officials said mail covers and the automatic mail tracking program are invaluable, even in an era of smartphones and e-mail.

In a criminal complaint filed June 7 in Federal District Court in Eastern Texas, the F.B.I. said a postal investigator tracing the ricin letters was able to narrow the search to Shannon Guess Richardson, an actress in New Boston, Tex., by examining information from the front and back images of 60 pieces of mail scanned immediately before and after the tainted letters sent to Mr. Obama and Mr. Bloomberg showing return addresses near her home. Ms. Richardson had originally accused her husband of mailing the letters, but investigators determined that he was at work during the time they were mailed.

In 2007, the F.B.I., the Internal Revenue Service and the local police in Charlotte, N.C., used information gleaned from the mail cover program to arrest Sallie Wamsley-Saxon and her husband, Donald, charging both with running a prostitution ring that took in $3 million over six years. Prosecutors said it was one of the largest and most successful such operations in the country. Investigators also used mail covers to help track banking activity and other businesses the couple operated under different names.

Other agencies, including the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services, have used mail covers to track drug smugglers and Medicare fraud.

"It's a treasure trove of information," said James J. Wedick, a former F.B.I. agent who spent 34 years at the agency and who said he used mail covers in a number of investigations, including one that led to the prosecution of several elected officials in California on corruption charges. "Looking at just the outside of letters and other mail, I can see who you bank with, who you communicate with — all kinds of useful information that gives investigators leads that they can then follow up on with a subpoena."

But, he said: "It can be easily abused because it's so easy to use and you don't have to go through a judge to get the information. You just fill out a form."
For mail cover requests, law enforcement agencies simply submit a letter to the Postal Service, which can grant or deny a request without judicial review. Law enforcement officials say the Postal Service rarely denies a request. In other government surveillance program, such as wiretaps, a federal judge must sign off on the requests.

The mail cover surveillance requests are granted for about 30 days, and can be extended for up to 120 days. There are two kinds of mail covers: those related to criminal activity and those requested to protect national security. The criminal activity requests average 15,000 to 20,000 per year, said law enforcement officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are prohibited by law from discussing the requests. The number of requests for antiterrorism mail covers has not been made public.

Law enforcement officials need warrants to open the mail, although President George W. Bush asserted in a signing statement in 2007 that the federal government had the authority to open mail without warrants in emergencies or foreign intelligence cases.

Court challenges to mail covers have generally failed because judges have ruled that there is no reasonable expectation of privacy for information contained on the outside of a letter. Officials in both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations, in fact, have used the mail-cover court rulings to justify the N.S.A.'s surveillance programs, saying the electronic monitoring amounts to the same thing as a mail cover. Congress briefly conducted hearings on mail cover programs in 1976, but has not revisited the issue.

The program has led to sporadic reports of abuse. In May 2012, Mary Rose Wilcox, a Maricopa County supervisor, was awarded nearly $1 million by a federal judge after winning a lawsuit against Sheriff Joe Arpaio, known for his immigration raids in Arizona, who, among other things, obtained mail covers from the Postal Service to track her mail. The judge called the investigation into Ms. Wilcox politically motivated because she had been a frequent critic of Mr. Arpaio, objecting to what she considered the targeting of Hispanics in his immigration sweeps. The case is being appealed.

In the mid-1970s the Church Committee, a Senate panel that documented C.I.A. abuses, faulted a program created in the 1950s in New York that used mail covers to trace and sometimes open mail going to the Soviet Union from the United States.

A suit brought in 1973 by a high school student in New Jersey, whose letter to the Socialist Workers Party was traced by the F.B.I. as part of an investigation into the group, led to a rebuke from a federal judge.

Postal officials refused to discuss either mail covers or the Mail Isolation Control and Tracking program.

Mr. Pickering says he suspects that the F.B.I. requested the mail cover to monitor his mail because a former associate said the bureau had called with questions about him. Last month, he filed a lawsuit against the Postal Service, the F.B.I. and other agencies, saying they were improperly withholding information.

A spokeswoman for the F.B.I. in Buffalo declined to comment.

Mr. Pickering said that although he was arrested two dozen times for acts of civil disobedience and convicted of a handful of misdemeanors, he was never involved in the arson attacks the Earth Liberation Front carried out. He said he became tired of focusing only on environmental activism and moved back to Buffalo to finish college, open his bookstore, Burning Books, and start a family.

"I'm no terrorist," he said. "I'm an activist."

Mr. Pickering has written books sympathetic to the liberation front, but he said his political views and past association should not make him the target of a federal investigation. "I'm just a guy who runs a bookstore and has a wife and a kid," he said.

[sky otter]

another country heard from...i wonder if there are any gub's
that aren't spying on the peoples..


France Intelligence Agency Spies On Phone Calls, Emails, Social Media Activity: Report
Reuters  |  Posted: 07/04/2013 10:16 am EDT  |  Updated: 07/05/2013 12:20 pm EDT

PARIS, July 4 (Reuters) - France's external intelligence agency spies on the French public's phone calls, emails and social media activity in France and abroad, the daily Le Monde said on Thursday.

It said the DGSE intercepted signals from computers and telephones in France, and between France and other countries, although not the content of phone calls, to create a map of "who is talking to whom". It said the activity was illegal.

"All of our communications are spied on," wrote Le Monde, which based its report on unnamed intelligence sources as well as remarks made publicly by intelligence officials.

"Emails, text messages, telephone records, access to Facebook and Twitter are then stored for years," it said.

The activities described are similar to those carried out by the U.S. National Security Agency, as described in documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

The documents revealed that the NSA has access to vast amounts of Internet data such as emails, chat rooms and video from large companies such as Facebook and Google, under a programme known as Prism.

They also showed that the U.S. government had gathered so-called metadata - such as the time, duration and numbers called - on all telephone calls carried by service providers such as Verizon.


France's DGSE was not immediately available for comment.

Le Monde said the French national security commission whose job it is to authorise targeted spying, and the parliamentary intelligence committee, had challenged the paper's report and said it worked in accordance with the law. It said the only body that collected communications information was a government agency controlled by the prime minister's office that monitors for security breaches.

Le Monde's report comes amid a storm over media allegations that Washington regularly spies on European citizens and embassies. The allegations, made in the German magazine Der Spiegel, sparked concern from data protection watchdogs and irked European governments just as major transatlantic trade talks are about to start.

Le Monde said France's DGSE was more interested in finding out who was speaking to whom than in combing through the content of private communications. It said the DGSE stored a mass of such metadata in the basement of its Paris headquarters.

France's seven other intelligence services, including domestic secret services and customs and money-laundering watchdogs, have access to the data and can tap into it freely as a means to spot people whose communications seem suspicious, whom they can then track with more intrusive techniques such as phone-tapping, Le Monde wrote.

The Guardian newspaper reported last month that Britain had a similar spying programme on international phone and Internet traffic and was sharing vast quantities of personal information with the American NSA. (Reporting by Natalie Huet; Editing by Catherine Bremer and Kevin Liffey)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/04/france-spying_n_3546226.html?ir=Technology&ref=topbar

[sky otter]

Edward Snowden Encouraged By Russian Official To Accept Venezuela's Offer Of Asylum

By LYNN BERRY 07/07/13 04:05 PM ET EDT 

In this handout photo provided by The Guardian, Edward Snowden speaks during an interview in Hong Kong. (Photo by The Guardian via Getty Images) .112Share195Tweet6Email1383CommentGet World Newsletters:

Subscribe ..Follow:Russia, Venezuela, Edward Snowden Venezuela, National Security Agency, edward snowden, Edward Snowden Nsa, Edward Snowden Russia, nsa, Nsa Surveillance, Surveillance, World News .MOSCOW -- An influential Russian parliament member who often speaks for the Kremlin encouraged NSA leaker Edward Snowden on Sunday to accept Venezuela's offer of asylum.

Alexei Pushkov, who heads the international affairs committee in Russia's parliament, posted a message on Twitter saying: "Venezuela is waiting for an answer from Snowden. This, perhaps, is his last chance to receive political asylum."

Venezuelan Foreign Minister Elias Jaua said Saturday his country hasn't yet been in contact with Snowden, who Russian officials say has been stuck in the transit area of Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport since arriving on a flight from Hong Kong two weeks ago. He has been unable to travel further because the U.S. annulled his passport.

Jaua said he expects to consult with Russian officials on Monday about Snowden's situation.

Pushkov's comments appeared to indicate that the Kremlin is now anxious to be rid of the former National Security Agency systems analyst, whom the U.S. wants returned to face espionage charges.

There has been no response from the Kremlin or Russian Foreign Ministry to the asylum offer made by Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro in the early hours of Saturday, Moscow time.

For Snowden to leave for South America, he would need for Venezuela to issue him travel documents and he would need to find a way to get there. The only direct commercial flight from Moscow goes to Havana, Cuba, and Snowden had booked a seat on this flight the day after arriving from Hong Kong, but failed to show up.

The Moscow-Havana flight goes over Europe and the U.S., which could cause complications. Some European countries refused to allow Bolivian President Evo Morales to fly through their airspace on his way home from Moscow last week because of suspicions that Snowden was onboard his plane.

Pushkov joked that if Snowden doesn't find shelter in Venezuela, "he will have to stay and marry Anna Chapman," the redheaded Russian spy who was among 10 sleeper agents deported from the U.S. in 2010. The 31-year-old Chapman proposed to Snowden, who just turned 30, on Twitter last week.


The presidents of Bolivia and Nicaragua also said over the weekend that Snowden was welcome in their countries. Bolivia's foreign minister, David Choquehuanca, said Sunday on state television that his country hasn't yet received a formal petition for asylum from Snowden. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega said his country's embassy in Moscow has received Snowden's application and is studying the request.

Snowden has applied for asylum in more than two dozen countries, including Bolivia, Nicaragua and Venezuela, according to WikiLeaks, the secret-spilling website that has been advising him.

U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he wasn't surprised that those three Latin American nations were offering asylum.

"They like sticking it to the United States," Menendez told NBC's "Meet the Press."

He also mentioned re-examining U.S. trade policies and foreign aid to any country that might take in Snowden.

Brazil's foreign minister said his government is worried by a newspaper report the U.S. has collected data on billions of telephone and email conversations in his country and promised an effort for international protection of Internet privacy.

"The Brazilian government has asked for clarifications" through the U.S. Embassy in Brazil and Brazil's embassy in Washington, Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota said.

The spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in Brazil's capital, Dean Chaves, said diplomats there wouldn't have any comment.

___

Associated Press writers Fabiola Sanchez in Caracas, Venezuela, Carlos Valdez in La Paz, Bolivia, and Jenny Barchfield in Paraty, Brazil, contributed to this report.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/07/edward-snowden-venezuela-russia_n_3558780.html

[sky otter]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/10/edward-snowden-russia_n_3573844.html

video at link

Michael Calderone                michael.calderone@huffingtonpost.com

  Edward Snowden: Russia, China Did Not Get Any Documents From Me

Posted: 07/10/2013 1:11 pm EDT  |  Updated: 07/10/2013 4:53 pm EDT



NEW YORK -– Former U.S. national security contractor Edward Snowden has refuted media speculation that he provided classified documents to China and Russia, or that those governments seized them.

"I never gave any information to either government, and they never took anything from my laptops," Snowden said in new interviews with Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian columnist who has broken several stories based on documents Snowden obtained and leaked from the National Security Agency.

Snowden's remarks come after major news outlets promoted anonymous claims suggesting that Chinese and Russian authorities had likely obtained the documents, helping support a narrative that the 30-year-old fugitive committed espionage, rather than simply leaking documents to journalists and a filmmaker in hopes of shedding light on U.S. surveillance practices.

The Huffington Post earlier examined how the U.S. government was building a public case against Snowden through the media by passing along unverifiable or unsubstantiated claims about two instances where national security was supposedly jeopardized by his disclosures.

A half-dozen news outlets -– the Associated Press, Reuters, ABC News, the Washington Post, CNN and the Los Angeles Times –- all published strikingly similar claims from anonymous officials that Snowden's leaks had prompted terrorists to change the way they communicated.

The officials' claims about changing tactics were given little scrutiny in the recent slew of articles, which either neglected to mention or played down the fact that al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula had reportedly altered its communications back in 2009 because of NSA concerns.

The media was also responsible for widely circulated assumptions that China and Russia had likely seen all of Snowden's documents while he was in Hong Kong or in a Moscow airport, where he remains while seeking asylum.


"That stuff is gone," a former senior U.S. intelligence official who served in Russia told the Washington Post on June 24. "I guarantee the Chinese intelligence service got their hands on that right away. If they imaged the hard drives and then returned them to him, well, then the Russians have that stuff now."

"Given his stay in Hong Kong and the number of days he was there, the assumption has to be everything he had was compromised," an anonymous official told CNN on June 25. The same official also "didn't dismiss the notion that Russia may have done the same thing."

On June 23, The New York Times cited "two western intelligence experts" as saying "they believed that the Chinese government had managed to drain the contents of the four laptops that Mr. Snowden said he brought to Hong Kong."

Cable news programs also joined in the assumptions about what Snowden, China or Russia may have done. CNN analyst Jeffrey Toobin -- who described Snowden a "grandiose narcissist" in The New Yorker -- suggested the following night on air that Russia would do what's in its government's interest, which "presumably includes taking everything in his briefcase and making copies of it."

"Why wouldn't they?" Toobin asked. "They'd be crazy not to."

It's understandable for journalists to grant anonymity in order to get verifiable information or details that governments, agencies and companies cannot or will not provide publicly. But in granting anonymity to officials and experts to speculate about how Snowden interacted with Chinese and Russian authorities -- without evidence -- the media is amplifying the government's arguments that he damaged national security, without any accountability.

Greenwald wrote Wednesday that "Snowden's denial is not dispositive and shouldn't be treated as such," but noted that it's "the only actual evidence on this question thus far."

Snowden may or may not be telling the full story about his time in Hong Kong or Russia. But without names attached to those claims he handed over intelligence, there's no one to call up to refute him.

[sky otter]

it's not looking too good for him  in my opinion..

is Snowden Trapped?

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/07/10/196362/trapped-an-air-escape-from-moscow.html#.Ud7ep2Q6XKA
totally copyrighted and no copying ..but very interesting article.

.......................................................


http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/10/world/americas/nsa-snowden-venezuela

Is Snowden ready to take flight? WikiLeaks hints at next moveBy Ed Payne, CNN

updated 6:48 AM EDT, Thu July 11, 2013
(CNN) -- As speculation grows over Edward Snowden's path to freedom, WikiLeaks teased that his "flight of liberty" campaign starts Wednesday, promising further details.

But so far, WikiLeaks has not lived up to the Twitter promise to provide more details. And the questions are piling up.

Is the future of the U.S. intelligence leaker, grounded at Moscow's airport for more than two weeks, no longer up in the air?

Not so fast.

It's unclear whether Snowden has accepted anyone's offer of asylum. And if he has, how does he intend to get there?

Speculation centers on Venezuela, which was the first to offer asylum. With both sides expressing interest, it only appeared to be a matter of time before it is confirmed.

Venezuela extended the asylum offer to Snowden last week, and on Monday President Nicolas Maduro received a formal asylum request from Snowden.

...............................................................


Is Snowden worth the risk? Latin America weighs pros and consBy Catherine E. Shoichet, CNN
updated 2:40 PM EDT, Thu July 11, 2013

http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/11/world/americas/latin-america-snowden-asylum/index.html
CNN) -- It's been days since three Latin American presidents offered to give Edward Snowden a safe place to hide out from U.S. authorities.

But the man who's admitted leaking classified documents about U.S. surveillance programs remains holed up at Moscow's Sheremetyevo International Airport. And the global guessing game over his next steps hasn't stopped.

It's still unclear where Snowden will go, and how he'll get there.

What's the holdup?

Sure, we've heard fiery speeches offering asylum from leftist leaders who are eager to criticize the United States. But supporting Snowden's cause and wanting to make Uncle Sam look bad aren't the only parts of the equation, with so many trade and diplomatic relations hanging in the balance, said Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington.

"They want to make a point," he said, "but I think they're concerned about suffering the consequences, which I think would be serious. The United States has made that pretty clear."

Here's a look at the pros and cons that leaders are facing in five Latin American nations that are among the 27 countries where Snowden is seeking asylum.

Venezuela

President Nicolas Maduro was the first leader to say he'd give Snowden asylum. Officials have said they're waiting to hear whether Snowden accepts the offer.

Pros:

• Maduro regularly alleges U.S. imperialism, has accused the U.S. government of trying to destabilize his country and even suggested that U.S. officials may have infected late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez with the cancer that eventually killed him. Taking in a high-profile fugitive wanted in the United States would give him another platform to criticize the country.

• It's been months since the death of Chavez, who earned major political points at home and a place in the global spotlight with his fierce criticisms of America, including a notorious United Nations General Assembly speech where he called President George W. Bush the devil. Maduro describes himself as Chavez's son. But while he might have the same speechwriters as his predecessor, he doesn't have the same charisma, and it seems like fewer people are listening to his words. Giving Snowden asylum would be politically popular in Venezuela, shoring up support for Maduro among Chavez loyalists.

It also has regional and global implications. "This for Maduro, I think, really provides an opportunity for him to show himself on the world stage as a regional leader, as the true successor of Chavez," said David Smilde, a senior fellow at the Washington Office on Latin America.

Cons:

• Relations with the United States have been slowly thawing since Maduro's election in April. Last month, things were looking up when U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry met with Venezuelan Foreign Minister Elias Jaua. That would change if Venezuela granted asylum to Snowden. "This will clearly freeze the warming of relations with Venezuela," Smilde said.

• Despite years of tense Venezuela-U.S. relations, economic ties between the two countries remain strong. Imports and exports between the United States and Venezuela totaled more than $56 billion last year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Venezuela's state-run oil company makes tens of billions of dollars annually from exports to the United States. Venezuela is the United States' fourth-largest supplier of imported crude oil, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Would offering Snowden asylum put that relationship in jeopardy? It might. But this isn't the first time Venezuela has run afoul of the United States. Smilde argues that in offering Snowden asylum, Maduro gains more than he loses.

"Surely there's going to be legislators in the Senate who are going to want sanctions against Venezuela, but I don't think it's going to get very far," Smilde said.

Shifter says it's unclear whether the benefits are worth the costs.

Bolivia

President Evo Morales says he's furious about what happened last week with his presidential jet, which had to land in Austria after European countries allegedly closed their airspace amid suspicions that Snowden was aboard. Now Morales says he's willing to give Snowden asylum as a "fair protest" of the incident.

Pros:

• Morales has long slammed what he calls U.S. imperialism, kicking out the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. ambassador, and the U.S. Agency for International Development. Accepting Snowden would fall in line with the Bolivian president's argument that his country would be better off without any U.S. interference. And in terms of its relationship with the United States, Bolivia has little goodwill left to lose.

• The United States' trade ties with Bolivia are weaker than its links with other countries in the region. "Bolivia's a country that I think has the least real economic interest with the United States," Shifter said.

Cons:

• Still, there's some economic connection. Exports and imports between the United States and Bolivia totaled more than $2.4 billion last year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

• Despite Morales' fierce criticism of European countries and the United States after the plane incident, Shifter said, it's unclear whether he really wants Snowden to come to Bolivia.

Nicaragua

President Daniel Ortega says his country will grant asylum to Snowden "if circumstances permit." Was that a way to sound supportive, but give himself a way out? It's unclear.

Pros:

• Like Maduro and Morales, Ortega is a vocal critic of the United States, and his allegations of U.S. imperialism play well with his supporters.

Cons:

• Business is big for Ortega's government, and it's about to get a lot bigger. Chinese investors and Nicaraguan leaders have just signed a deal to build a $40 billion canal through the country. Does that mean Nicaragua is now looking East but not West when it comes to business? Quite the opposite, Shifter said. "I think the canal project is another factor that makes them even more interested in staying on the good side of the United States," he said.

• That's not all. Exports and imports between the United States and Nicaragua totaled more than $3.8 billion last year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. And Nicaragua gets trade preferences from the United States. As concerns about Snowden from business leaders mount, they won't fall on deaf ears with Ortega, Shifter said. "Ortega has good relations with the business community in Nicaragua. He's somebody that I think also has a pragmatic streak in him," Shifter said. "Rhetorically, at times, he's confrontational, but behind the scenes, he's making deals."

Ecuador

Snowden set his sights on Ecuador with his first asylum request after leaving Hong Kong on June 23. President Rafael Correa railed against the United States in fiery speeches over the issue earlier this month. But the government has said it's still weighing the request, but can't act until Snowden's in Ecuadorian territory. Some speculate that the delay in getting a clear response from Ecuador is what inspired Snowden to apply for asylum in dozens more countries.

Pros:

• Ecuador granted asylum to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange last year, and has touted the decision as a clear sign that the South American nation is a defender of human rights. Giving Snowden asylum would give officials another platform to make that case.

• Defiant authorities in Ecuador said last month that they wouldn't bow to U.S. pressure in Snowden's case, vowing to reject trade benefits so U.S. officials couldn't manipulate them.

Cons:

• When Ecuadorian officials said they didn't need U.S. trade preferences, business leaders issued a swift response: Not so fast.

And with about half of Ecuador's exports heading to the United States and trade between the two nations totaling more than $16 billion last year, Correa probably will weigh their comments carefully, Shifter said. "Correa is a guy who on the one hand, he's very defiant of the United States and wants to be the rhetorical leader of the left in Latin America," Shifter said. "On the other hand, he's got a very broad coalition in Ecuador and is trying to be more pragmatic and attract foreign investment."

• After speaking with U.S. Vice President Joe Biden last month, Correa adopted a more measured tone. "We have to act very carefully but with courage," he said, "without contradicting our principles but with a lot of care, responsibility and respect, of course, towards the U.S. but also respect for the truth."

Cuba

President Raul Castro hasn't shied away from talking about the Snowden case. He's hailed the former National Security Agency contractor's revelations and stressed that he supports fellow Latin American countries' right to grant Snowden asylum. But there are two key things he hasn't said: whether Cuba will grant asylum to Snowden and whether he'd allow a plane carrying the U.S. intelligence leaker to make a stopover in Cuba on the way to South America.

Pros:

• Decades of hostile relations between the United States and Cuba and a tough economic embargo could mean that Cuba would have less to lose than other Latin American nations when it comes to granting asylum. With so many sanctions in place, said Philip Peters, president of the Cuba Research Center in Washington, "I don't know what more the United States could add."

• Official media in Cuba have painted Snowden as a hero. Cuba could decide to step in, Shifter said, "if there's an issue where it would have to do with Latin American pride and dignity and sovereignty."

• While granting Snowden asylum might be a step too far, letting a connecting flight carrying him land in Cuba might be an option. "I think there's a measure of risk in that for Cuba, but it may be OK if he doesn't stay there, if they're facilitating it as a transit stop," Shifter said. "But I think it would make them uneasy."

Cons:

• There are signs that Washington's relationship with Havana is improving, such as a recent agreement to hold talks over bringing back direct mail between the two nations. And Cuba is hopeful about more developments in U.S. President Barack Obama's second term.

"I think that maybe Cuba does not want to complicate this process and risk the advances that have been made recently," Peters told CNN en Español. "I would guess that Cuba does not have an interest in receiving this man, and does not want to complicate the relationship with Washington. Even though it isn't a very good relationship, it is a relationship that has gotten a little better in recent months."

CNN's Mariano Castillo, Patrick Oppmann and Patricia Janiot and journalist Samantha Lugo contributed to this report.

[sky otter]

ohhhhhhhh poor baby.. i wonder if he can spell naive...


http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/07/12/19430597-nsa-leaker-edward-snowden-accuses-us-of-threatening-behavior-plans-to-meet-rights-groups




NSA leaker Edward Snowden accuses US of 'threatening behavior,' plans to meet rights groups


The NSA leaker is reportedly planning to meet with human rights groups in Moscow today, and there is a possibility he may accept asylum there, despite withdrawing his petition after Putin said he would be required to stop sharing secrets. NBC's Michelle Kosinski reports.

By Jim Maceda and Alastair Jamieson, NBC News
MOSCOW -- Fugitive Edward Snowden accused U.S. officials of "threatening behavior" and waging "an unlawful campaign" against his attempts to seek asylum on Friday.

The self-declared leaker of classified NSA documents made the comments in an open letter given to human rights groups in Moscow, where he is believed to be holed up in the transit zone of Sheremetyevo Airport.

One of the groups, Amnesty International, confirmed it had received an invitation to meet Snowden privately later Friday.

Snowden, wanted by Washington on espionage charges, flew to Moscow from Hong Kong on June 23, and is not believed to have left the airport transit area despite offers of asylum from three countries.

"I have been extremely fortunate to enjoy and accept many offers of support and asylum from brave countries around the world," Snowden wrote in the letter. "These nations have my gratitude, and I hope to travel to each of them to extend my personal thanks to their people and leaders.

"By refusing to compromise their principles in the face of intimidation, they have earned the respect of the world. Unfortunately, in recent weeks we have witnessed an unlawful campaign by officials in the U.S. government to deny my right to seek and enjoy this asylum under Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

It's believed NSA leaker Edward Snowden is holed up inside this hotel at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport. NBC's Jim Maceda reports.
"The scale of threatening behavior is without precedent: never before in history have states conspired to force to the ground a sovereign president's plane to effect a search for a political refugee," he added, referring to the grounding of Bolivian President Evo Morales' jet in Austria last week amid suspicions that the leaker was on board.

"This dangerous escalation represents a threat not just to the dignity of Latin America or my own personal security, but to the basic right shared by every living person to live free from persecution," Snowden said.

Russia news agency Interfax reported that Human Rights Watch and Transparency International were also invited by Snowden to Friday's meeting. It was not immediately clear how the groups would meet Snowden inside the transit zone.

Amnesty International last week called on the U.S. not to "persecute" Snowden by pressuring other countries into handing him over to authorities.

"Yes, I have received a brief email. It said that he would like to meet with a representative of a human rights organization - there was not much information there. I'm planning to go," Sergei Nikitin, the head of Amnesty International Russia, told Reuters.

Russia has already indicated it would like Snowden to accept one of the asylum offers and leave the airport as soon as possible. Experts say it is possible Snowden could refuse all the offers and formally enter Russia, creating a potential diplomatic headache for Putin who would have to choose whether to hand the leaker over to U.S. prosecutors.


A crowd of reporters in Cuba greeted an Aeroflot flight from Moscow on Thursday after its flight path appeared to avoid U.S. airspace, prompting speculation Snowden was on board, en route to Venezuela.

However, airline officials later confirmed Snowden had not been on the flight.

Speculation over the flight's potential passenger coincided with a visit to Cuba by 20 international journalists, who had been invited to see the country's economic reforms and rushed to the airport.

"It was a normal flight," one male crew member told reporters as he pushed past the cameras.

CNBC's Justin Solomon and Reuters contributed to this report.

[deuem]

After reading that I need a break

[Somamech]

One of my few story's I have been consistent with is that Telstra have been a pivotal part in this Spying/data collection here in Australia well before Snowden said so


Telstra storing data on behalf of US government

SOURCE:

http://www.theage.com.au/it-pro/security-it/telstra-storing-data-on-behalf-of-us-government-20130712-hv0w4.html

[starwarp2000]

Yes, you are spot on Soma!

http://delimiter.com.au/2013/06/13/australia-gets-deluge-of-data-from-prism-claims-fairfax/

http://delimiter.com.au/2013/06/12/attorney-general-rejects-metadata-warrants-law-enforcement-would-grind-to-a-halt/

[Somamech]

You too Starwarper

But no-one listen's to us

[sky otter]

do you think there is anyone NOT spying on us?....sigh




http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/15/business/attention-shopper-stores-are-tracking-your-cell.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

Attention, Shoppers: Store Is Tracking Your Cell

Like dozens of other brick-and-mortar retailers, Nordstrom wanted to learn more about its customers — how many came through the doors, how many were repeat visitors — the kind of information that e-commerce sites like Amazon have in spades. So last fall the company started testing new technology that allowed it to track customers' movements by following the Wi-Fi signals from their smartphones.


Tina Fineberg for The New York Times
Shelley Kohan, a vice president for RetailNext, with her company's customer-tracking system, which employs video cameras.

But when Nordstrom posted a sign telling customers it was tracking them, shoppers were unnerved. Ya think?

"We did hear some complaints," said Tara Darrow, a spokeswoman for the store. Nordstrom ended the experiment in May, she said, in part because of the comments.

Nordstrom's experiment is part of a movement by retailers to gather data about in-store shoppers' behavior and moods, using video surveillance and signals from their cellphones and apps to learn information as varied as their sex, how many minutes they spend in the candy aisle and how long they look at merchandise before buying it.

All sorts of retailers — including national chains, like Family Dollar, Cabela's and Mothercare, a British company, and specialty stores like Benetton and Warby Parker — are testing these technologies and using them to decide on matters like changing store layouts and offering customized coupons.

But while consumers seem to have no problem with cookies, profiles and other online tools that let e-commerce sites know who they are and how they shop, some bristle at the physical version, at a time when government surveillance — of telephone calls, Internet activity and Postal Service deliveries — is front and center because of the leaks by Edward J. Snowden.

"Way over the line," one consumer posted to Facebook in response to a local news story about Nordstrom's efforts at some of its stores. Nordstrom says the counts were made anonymous. Technology specialists, though, say the tracking is worrisome.

"The idea that you're being stalked in a store is, I think, a bit creepy, as opposed to, it's only a cookie — they don't really know who I am," said Robert Plant, a computer information systems professor at the University of Miami School of Business Administration, noting that consumers can rarely control or have access to this data.

Some consumers wonder how the information is used.

"The creepy thing isn't the privacy violation, it's how much they can infer," said Bradley Voytek, a neuroscientist who had stopped in at Philz Coffee in Berkeley, Calif. Philz uses technology from Euclid Analytics, of Palo Alto, Calif., the company that worked on the Nordstrom experiment, to measure the signals between a smartphone and a Wi-Fi antenna to count how many people walk by a store and how many enter.

Still, physical retailers argue that they are doing nothing more than what is routinely done online.

"Brick-and-mortar stores have been disadvantaged compared with online retailers, which get people's digital crumbs," said Guido Jouret, the head of Cisco's emerging technologies group, which supplies tracking cameras to stores. Why, Mr. Jouret asked, should physical stores not "be able to tell if someone who didn't buy was put off by prices, or was just coming in from the cold?" The companies that provide this technology offer a wide range of services.

One, RetailNext, uses video footage to study how shoppers navigate, determining, say, that men spend only one minute in the coat department, which may help a store streamline its men's outerwear layout. It also differentiates men from women, and children from adults.

RetailNext, based in San Jose, Calif., adds data from shoppers' smartphones to deduce even more specific patterns. If a shopper's phone is set to look for Wi-Fi networks, a store that offers Wi-Fi can pinpoint where the shopper is in the store, within a 10-foot radius, even if the shopper does not connect to the network, said Tim Callan, RetailNext's chief marketing officer.

The store can also recognize returning shoppers, because mobile devices send unique identification codes when they search for networks. That means stores can now tell how repeat customers behave and the average time between visits.

RetailNext also uses data to map customers' paths; perhaps the shopper is 70 percent likely to go right immediately, or 14 percent likely to linger at a display, Mr. Callan said.

Brickstream uses video information to watch shoppers. The company, based near Atlanta, sells a $1,500 stereoscopic camera that separates adults from children, and counts people in different parts of a store to determine which aisles are popular and how many cash registers to open.

"Watching where people go in a store is like watching how they looked at a second or third Web page" on an online retailer, said Ralph Crabtree, Brickstream's chief technical officer.

Cameras have become so sophisticated, with sharper lenses and data-processing, that companies can analyze what shoppers are looking at, and even what their mood is.

For example, Realeyes, based in London, which analyzes facial cues for responses to online ads, monitors shoppers' so-called happiness levels in stores and their reactions at the register. Synqera, a start-up in St. Petersburg, Russia, is selling software for checkout devices or computers that tailors marketing messages to a customer's gender, age and mood, measured by facial recognition.

"If you are an angry man of 30, and it is Friday evening, it may offer you a bottle of whiskey," said Ekaterina Savchenko, the company's head of marketing.

Nomi, of New York, uses Wi-Fi to track customers' behavior in a store, but goes one step further by matching a phone with an individual.

When a shopper has volunteered some personal information, either by downloading a retailer's app or providing an e-mail address when using in-store Wi-Fi, Nomi pulls up a profile of that customer — the number of recent visits, what products that customer was looking at on the Web site last night, purchase history. The store then has access to that profile.

"I walk into Macy's, Macy's knows that I just entered the store, and they're able to give me a personalized recommendation through my phone the moment I enter the store," said Corey Capasso, Nomi's president. "It's literally bringing the Amazon experience into the store."

Nomi then uses Wi-Fi signals to follow the customer throughout the store, adding to the information it maintains. "If I'm going and spending 20 minutes in the shoe section, that means I'm highly interested in buying a pair of shoes," Mr. Capasso said, and the store might send a coupon for sneakers.

If these methods seem intrusive, at least some consumers seem happy to trade privacy for deals. Placed, a company based in Seattle, has an app that asks consumers where they are in a store in exchange for cash and prepaid gift cards from Amazon and Google Play, among others. More than 500,000 people have downloaded the app since last August, said a company spokeswoman, Sarah Radwanick, providing information like gender, age and income, and agreeing to be tracked over GPS, Wi-Fi and cellular networks. Placed then sells the data to store owners, online retailers and app developers.

"I would just love it if a coupon pops up on my phone," said Linda Vertlieb, 30, a blogger in Philadelphia, who said that she was not aware of the tracking methods, but that the idea did not bother her. Stores are "trying to sell, so that makes sense," she said.


A version of this article appeared in print on July 15, 2013, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Attention, Shoppers: Store Is Tracking Your Cell.

[sky otter]

ok.. this is interesting..
I was reading this article

North Korean ship carrying hidden 'missile equipment' detained after leaving Cuba
http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/07/16/19497159-north-korean-ship-carrying-hidden-missile-equipment-detained-after-leaving-cuba?lite=

when I got to this sentence  I was curious so looked up lloyd's

The Lloyd's List Intelligence service tracks ships' movements via satellite and Meade said its "reporting service has flagged up the fact it was arrested."




and got this..lol..very clever cookie policy they have

http://www.lloydslistintelligence.com/llint/index.htm

Our Cookie policy

In order to deliver a personalised, responsive service and to improve the site, we remember and store information about how you use it. This is done using simple text files called cookies which sit on your computer.

By continuing to use this site and access its features, you are consenting to our use of cookies. To find out more about the way lloydslistintelligence.com uses cookies please go to our Cookies page.

Close

i just copied it and left..it was on top of all kinds of neat info if you are curious
and they might be curious also so ..

ah rats the best part didn't show up
it says by clicking close you agree to their policy..


HI GUYS

[zorgon]

More Insanity...

DHS to employees: reading newspaper coverage of Snowden's NSA leaks is "classified data spillage"

The US Department of Homeland Security is warning its employees that they can be punished for opening up this Washington Post article, which includes a classified slide (above) illustrating how the National Security Agency spies on communications:

An internal memo from DHS headquarters told workers on Friday that viewing the document from an "unclassified government workstation" could lead to administrative or legal action. "You may be violating your non-disclosure agreement in which you sign that you will protect classified national security information," the communication said.

The memo said workers who view the article through an unclassified workstation should report the incident as a "classified data spillage."

http://boingboing.net/2013/07/16/dhs-to-employees-reading-news.html

[sky otter]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/wp/2013/07/15/dhs-warns-employees-not-to-read-leaked-nsa-information/


Below is the full text of the memo:

From: LARSEN, MARK R

Sent: Friday, July 12, 2013 9:50 AM

Subject: SECURITY ALERT ***Washington Post Article***

Importance: High

FYSA...From DHS HQ

Per the National Cybersecurity Communications Integration Center:

There is a recent article on the Washington Post's Website that has a clickable link titled "The NSA Slide you never seen" that must not be opened on an Unclassified government workstation.  This link opens up a classified document which will raise the classification level of your Unclassified workstation to the classification of the slide which is reported to be TS/NF.

If opened on an Unclassified system, you are obligated to report this to the SSO as a Classified Data Spillage (Opssecurity@hq.dhs.gov <mailto:Opssecurity@hq.dhs.gov> <mailto:Opssecurity@hq.dhs.gov <mailto:Opssecurity@hq.dhs.gov> >).

Again, please exercise good judgment when visiting these webpages and clicking on such links. You may be violating your Non-Disclosure Agreement in which you sign that you will protect Classified National Security Information. You may be subject to any administrative or legal action from the Government.