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Thursday, May 11, 2006

Qwest, Your Protector

Posted by on May 11 at 11:35 AM

USA Today this morning reports on the latest of NSA’s domestic spying schemes: an attempt “to create a database of every call ever made” within the nation’s borders.

Naturally, you don’t have to be suspected of a crime to be spied on by your government, according to the story. The NSA is tracking the domestic phone calls—not their content, only the details of who calls who where and when—of ordinary homes and businesses, thanks to the friendly cooperation of AT&T, Verizon, and BellSouth. Those companies weren’t required to hand over information, they just decided to go ahead and do it, for kicks.

Meanwhile:

Among the big telecommunications companies, only Qwest has refused to help the NSA, the sources said. According to multiple sources, Qwest declined to participate because it was uneasy about the legal implications of handing over customer information to the government without warrants.

Oh, regional Qwest: Captain, my captain.

This is what it has come to.


CommentsRSS icon

Well, I guess this afternoon I'm switching phone plans. Didn't like Verizon that much anyway...

Kate: Power to the People. Right On!!

I have cursed Qwest many times for their questionable billings, service interruptions and too big stadium logo, but the company really came through on this.

times are really bad, when Qwest emerges as a defender of liberties...of course, the real reason Qwest declined was that their lawyers' interpretation of the law indicated they could be liable for potentially billions of dollars of fines if their cooperation was later found unlawful...let's just hope the other giants get nailed.

Ummm yeah. See, this sort of thing was happening in the 80's, Ma Bell just made it easier back then.

I'm a switch tech, what they asked for is SMDR (or equivalent, depending on what switch you're running) reports and they got them in text formats, imported them into massive dbs, and started running trace patterns. They probably plugged in known terrorist contact numbers and did call search patterns based on usage of those numbers - cross checked with other known or suspected terrorist contact numbers. It's likely that they would have potentially been able to determine overseas numbers and then narrow them down to carrriers overseas and perhaps even ID individual subscriber lines, which if they were celluar lines could be called and the signal triangulated and the suspected terrorist located. Landlines would have required a bit more legwork in an individual's country, but still doable.

Of course, god forbid our intel agencies do their fucking jobs.

Gnossos: Agreed 100%.

And I will back that up by putting my money where I WANT it to be... paying those very same lawyers' salaries... I figure lawyers got to pay rent/mortage and eat too (just not too high up on the hog).

Does anyone know which, if any, of the big internet service providers have publicly refused to open their customer files for the Bush spy program?

it's a good thing I have Qwest.

but ... all my relatives have other phones services ... so they still tap my calls without a warrant ...

darn!

gives a whole new meaning to the phrase,"Can you hear me now? GOOOOD!"

I have Qwest DSL and Cingular Wireless. I'm so relieved that both those companies refused to comply with the government's demands. It's a pain in the ass to switch carriers.

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