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back to article Obama prepares to crawl up NSA's ass with microscope

President Barack Obama has quietly put together an intelligence review group to look at how to make people more comfortable with the US's snooping. In a short statement, the White House said Obama had met with the panel, made up of intelligence officials including former CIA deputy director Michael Morrell and academics like …

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  1. sisk

    How to make people comfortable with your snooping

    Step 1: Follow all applicable laws, ignore none of them. In the event of a conflict, the highest law takes precedence, so the Constitution trumps all others.

    Step 2: We're sorry Mr. President, but we couldn't get any of the alphabet soup agencies to agree to step 1.

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  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    how the US "can employ its technical collection capabilities in a way that optimally protects our national security and advances our foreign policy while respecting our commitment to privacy and civil liberties

    Ooo, oo, oo I know this one... you create a system where you are only allowed to capture the data of people who you actually suspect of involvement in terrorism (or to be safe, "involvement in acts likely to endanger the national security of the US of A")... and to be sure it's operated correctly, you have a judicial process before data capturing is allowed... say by having a judge issue a warrant allowing the communications interception only once he/she is satisified that you have 'reasonable grounds' for your suspicions, and therefore should be investigating that person...

    Did I get it right?

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    1. Pascal Monett Silver badge
      Reply Icon
      Big Brother

      Yes, you did get it right.

      And by Special Order 1287, you are hereby banned from taking any public office or speaking in public in any official capacity. You will now come quietly with us as we bring you to a reeducational facility where you will be reprogrammed to be a good citizen and appreciate total surveillance for your own good.

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  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Prove that it works?

    Call me stupid, but wouldn't one way of encouraging the populace to go along with such wide-scale monitoring would be to... prove that it works?

    If this bugging/spying works so well, perhaps the authorities can signal their confidence in it by relaxing airport security requirements? (Internal flights at least, even if johnny foreigner is still mistrusted).

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  4. Herby

    Maybe a better title would be...

    NSA prepares to crawl up Obama's ass with Microscope.

    Might even work, but from outward appearances, there isn't anything there of significance.

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  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Do I smell flowers?

    A chocolate starfish is still a chocolate starfish no matter how much cheap perfume or cologne you pour on it. Eau de shite will always be an issue.

    On a side note, an intelligence agency with a public image issue...amusing.

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  6. codejunky Silver badge

    Pay attention

    See the hand moving.... hovering over the problem..... keep watching...... hey look! chemical weapons in syria! And hey presto when you look again at the hand the spying problem has vanished.

    Glad you liked the show... have a good night everyone and dont forget to visit the gift shop on the way out.

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    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Happy

      Re: Pay attention

      Like it!

      Do you do kids' parties?

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  7. Red Bren
    Joke

    Security through Absurdity

    The NSA are going to snoop on your email regardless of any legal niceties, so muddy the water a little bit. Just CC a random senator or congressman on every email you send. They're not going to read it, just treat it as spam, but the metadata will be still be collected and before long, every single US politician will be at the centre of a web of "interest".

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    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Security through Absurdity

      Just CC a random senator or congressman on every email you send. They're not going to read it, just treat it as spam, but the metadata will be still be collected and before long, every single US politician will be at the centre of a web of "interest".

      Now that's an interesting idea... maybe that would be one best implemented by loads of 'foreign terrorists', as the NSA systems place no controls over the capture and analysis of all of our data.

      Where can we find a list of all of their email addresses... oooo can we have an email address for Obama as well? Given his stance on this, he definitely should get lots of foreign emails...

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  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    director of national intelligence James Clapper

    Clapper? The name rings a bell.

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  9. JaitcH

    ... crawl up NSA's ass with microscope

    Given the unwieldy size of a microscope shouldn't that be proctoscope?

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  10. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    Big Brother

    It's like someone saw "Enemy of the State" in 1998 and thought "I want that."

    And 15 years later they have it.

    The programme has been completely successful.

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