NSA Whistleblower: ‘Metadata’ of Phone Call Can Be More Revealing Than Listening In

Megyn Kelly got some revealing insights today from two NSA whistleblowers.

From America Live with Megyn Kelly
Fox News Insider
6/7/2013

NSA whistleblowers J. Kirk Wiebe and Bill Binney have been sounding the alarm about government intrusion into Americans’ privacy for years. They joined Megyn Kelly today to give us some revealing insights into how the agency works after President Obama defended the need to monitor Americans’ phone calls.

Obama said today that nobody at NSA is listening to your phone calls, saying they are gathering “metadata” like the numbers involved in a call, how long it was, and where it was made from. But Wiebe said there is a common misconception going around about this aspect of the program.

“Aggregated metadata can be more revealing than content. It’s very important to realize that when an entity collects information about you that includes locations, bank transactions, credit card transactions, travel plans, EZPass on and off tollways; all of that that can be time-lined. To track you day to day to the point where people can get insight into your intentions and what you’re going to do next. It is difficult to get that from content unless you exploit every piece, and even then a lot of content is worthless,” he explained.

Watch the full interview at FoxNewsInsider.com

Also at the site: Napolitano, Shep Rail Against NSA Spying: ‘Slippery Slope Is Covered in Grease’  [video]

“This Is AMERICA!” Enraged Mark Levin Takes to Shouting  [video]

If You Think Obama’s Defense of NSA Monitoring Is ‘Laughable,’ You’re Not Alone  [video]  Constitutional law expert Jonathan Turley told Megyn Kelly he is “astonished” at President Obama’s dismissive attitude toward criticism of NSA monitoring.

…”Telephone companies were demanding every single phone call made by every single citizen. It’s the type of surveillance that once was though futuristic, that wasn’t even technically possible, but it is now. … I’m really astonished by the dismissive attitude of the president,” said Turley, calling it a “major violation of privacy.”…

Watch the interview at the link.

Related: Obama: If you can’t trust government, we’re going to have some problems [video]

President Obama this afternoon addressed recent reports of the National Security Agency secretly obtaining phone records and private data for surveillance.

During his speech he indicated that Americans needed to trust the system of government set up to thwart abuse.

“If people can’t trust not only the executive branch but also don’t trust Congress, and don’t trust federal judges, to make sure that we’re abiding by the Constitution with due process and rule of law, then we’re going to have some problems here.”

Obama added that the National Security agents behind the surveillance programs “cherish our Constitution.”

“The last thing they’d be doing is taking programs like this to listen to someone’s phone calls,” he said…

CAJ note: Houston: We have a problem.

GLENN GREENWALD: The US Wants To ‘Destroy Privacy Around The World’

The journalist who took part in breaking two attention-grabbing stories on government surveillance charged that the United States is interested in destroying privacy all over the world.

“There is a massive apparatus within the United States government that with complete secrecy has been building this enormous structure that has only one goal,” Greenwald said on CNN’s “Piers Morgan Live” on Thursday.

“And that is to destroy privacy and anonymity not just in the United States but around the world.”…

…”It’s well past time that we have a debate about whether that’s the kind of country and world in which we want to live,” Greenwald said on CNN. “We haven’t had that debate because it’s all done in secrecy and the Obama administration has been very aggressive about bullying and threatening anybody who thinks about exposing it or writing about it or even doing journalism about it. It’s well past time that that come to an end.”…

Watch the interview at the link.

Senate Dems Condemn Obama’s Verizon Phone Spying Program

On Thursday, Senate Democrats were harshly critical of the the Obama administration’s collection of private domestic and international phone records from Verizon customers…

NSA Director May Also Have Misled Congress About Data Collection

…In March of 2012, Keith Alexander, the NSA Director, testified at a House hearing on surveillance issues and, according to Forbes, denied at least 14 times that the agency engaged in intercepting the phone and Internet records of Americans. Earlier this week, Breitbart News uncovered testimony from another administration official, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, in which Clapper denied that the NSA collected “any type of data” on Americans.

Like Clapper’s, Alexander’s testimony came before this week’s revelations about the agency’s PRISM program and the court orders the federal government has used to force Verizon to turn over the domestic and international phone records of all of its customers…