New Documents Reveal CIA Spied on Congress, Whistleblowers

Newly declassified documents reveal the CIA—which is supposed to be strictly limited in the types of surveillance and other secret operations it conducts on U.S. soil—routinely monitors U.S. government computer systems.

That information is contained in two formerly secret letters of “congressional notification” written in 2014 by the Intelligence Community inspector general at the time, Charles McCullough. In the letters, McCullough reveals the CIA secretly intercepted and collected emails between congressional staff and the CIA’s head of whistleblowing and source protection. The collection was said to occur as part of the CIA’s “routine counterintelligence monitoring of government computer systems.”

Several sources familiar with the congressional notifications at the time, but unable to speak about it until now because the material was classified, said it is extremely worrisome that the CIA intercepted private communications with Senate staff about Intelligence Community whistleblowers.

“Most of these emails concerned pending and developing whistleblower complaints,” wrote McCullough in letters to lead Democrats and Republicans at the time on the House and Senate Intelligence Committees—Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), and Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Md.).

McCullough said he was concerned about the CIA’s “potential compromise to whistleblower confidentiality and the consequent ‘chilling effect’ that the present [counterintelligence] monitoring system might have on Intelligence Community whistleblowing.”

The intercepts in question were conducted under the leadership of CIA Director John Brennan and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. Both men dragged their feet, according to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), when he originally sought to have the congressional notifications declassified. A then-staffer of Sen. Grassley was among those whose emails were intercepted by the CIA.

Brennan and Clapper, now working in private industry and as consultants for NBC and CNN respectively, have been widely criticized for a variety of alleged surveillance missteps and abuses.

Both men were involved in controversial 2016 election year “unmaskings”—identifying protected names of Americans “incidentally” captured by government surveillance. Originally, when asked under oath in 2017 about unmasking requests made by any U.S. ambassador, including President Barack Obama’s ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, Brennan claimed ignorance: “I don’t know. Maybe it’s ringing a vague bell but I’m not—I could not answer with any confidence.” It was later revealed that hundreds of unmasking requests had been made in Power’s name in 2016. Brennan also acknowledged that he requested that U.S. citizens’ names be unmasked on numerous occasions.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/new-documents-reveal-cia-spied-on-congress-whistleblowers_2715957.html

National Facial Recognition Database To Use Loyalty Rewards To Identify American Shoppers

For years, I have been warning people about facial recognition in retail stores, but this story might convince you to avoid retail stores altogether.

A recent article in Biometric Update. com (BU) reveals that retail stores have a master plan to convince Americans to accept facial biometrics.

BU interviewed four facial biometric company CEO's and what they revealed is frightening.

The article starts off innocuously enough by telling us that U.S. retail biometrics is used primarily in loss-prevention but things quickly take a turn for the worse.

BU's interview with FaceFirst CEO Peter Tripp is especially disconcerting, as he reveals how retailers plan to use a "facial recognition opt-in environment."

“There is another step though that exists which has more to do with consumer loyalty, and consumer experience, that is not quite as expensive an endeavor, and I think there are lots of folks looking at ways of doing that in a friendly opt-in environment, where privacy is not the cornerstone issue, Tripp said."

If any of this sounds familiar its because they are doing the exact same thing with digital drivers licenses.

Biometric companies are trying to convince Americans to accept digital drivers license by tying them to loyalty rewards programs. Last year the Lincoln Motor Company installed "complimentary" TSA PreCheck biometric scanners in all their new vehicles so customers can get through airport and sport stadium check-in lines quicker.

Corporate-run national biometric database

According to a recent ZDNet article a new partnership between SureID a biometric fingerprinting company and Robbie.AI a facial recognition company "could create a national biometric database."

"Adding facial recognition from Robbie.AI gives the two firms the building blocks of a nationwide biometric database that could be used in a number of settings, from retail authentication and employment verification to more speculative applications like driver-identification for keyless self-driving cars or even user recognition in future robotic platforms."

"As technology emerges and companies adopt more sophisticated forms of security, it will be crucial for safety and security to authenticate the real identity of technicians and consumers," says Ned Hayes, General Manager at SureID.

BU's article reveals how retailers plan to identify every customer.

Whoo.ai CEO Arturo Falck said, "Once companies are using this type of technology for crime prevention purposes, there’s no reason why they should not be using it for upselling their customers.”

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-11-14/national-facial-recognition-database-use-loyalty-rewards-identify-american-shoppers