THE U.S. GOVERNMENT can monitor journalists under a foreign intelligence law that allows invasive spying and operates outside the traditional court system, according to newly released documents.
Targeting members of the press under the law, known as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, requires approval from the Justice Department’s highest-ranking officials, the documents show.
In two 2015 memos for the FBI, the attorney general spells out “procedures for processing Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act applications targeting known media entities or known members of the media.” The guidelines say the attorney general, the deputy attorney general, or their delegate must sign off before the bureau can bring an application to the secretive panel of judges who approves monitoring under the 1978 act, which governs intelligence-related wiretapping and other surveillance carried out domestically and against U.S. persons abroad.
The high level of supervision points to the controversy around targeting members of the media at all. Prior to the release of these documents, little was known about the use of FISA court orders against journalists. Previous attention had been focused on the use of National Security Letters against members of the press; the letters are administrative orders with which the FBI can obtain certain phone and financial records without a judge’s oversight. FISA court orders can authorize much more invasive searches and collection, including the content of communications, and do so through hearings conducted in secret and outside the sort of adversarial judicial process that allows journalists and other targets of regular criminal warrants to eventually challenge their validity.
“This is a huge surprise,” said Victoria Baranetsky, general counsel with the Center for Investigative Reporting, previously of Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press. “It makes me wonder, what other rules are out there, and how have these rules been applied? The next step is figuring out how this has been used.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Skin in the Game is another addition to the Incerto, now volume 5; I avoided duplication by referring to where in the Incerto some points were developed such as via negativa or monoculture of forecasters or expert problems. You simply don’t repeat in chapter 23 what was said in chapter 5, but can make reference to it.
Now it so happens that I am in the BS busting category, which includes journalists (especially journalists). And the book is designed to be hated by BS operators who can be book reviewers. I instructed publishers to send the book to only doers, not people who make a verbagiastic living.
Let me say it again. I am intolerant of BS; I suffers no fools except when the BS is harmless.
The Judgment of Cambyses
So far three journalists have, while uninvited, attempted to do a (sort of) hack job: John Gapper (FT), Zoe Williams (Guardian), and Phil Coggan (Economist; yes I am outing him, SITG). The problem however is that they agree with the general message of the book (who doesn’t ?) except in what concerns them, so the best way is to perform some assassination on side points: 1) find what appears to be a “flaw”, 2) use the technique of Sam Harris, i.e. make the author look like a hateful spiteful person who hates everybody simply because he doesn’t like bullshitters. The problem of course is that it is hard to claim I am against all experts, not just the .1% faux experts so they disguize the claim as a he is a “hates everybody” type of fellow.
Also note that the book isn’t about SITG but the weird consequences (modern slavery, looks of surgeons, rationality of survival, religious practices, commercial ethics, Lindy effects, and, mostly, risk taking). You will also notice that given the homework done by journos, the “flaws” happen to be in the beginning, never at the end.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
As Statista’s Niall McCarthy notes, nearly three-quarters of them are being held on anti-state charges while at least 21 have been charged with “false news”.
The worst three jailers are responsible for 51 percent of the total…
Turkey is the top jailer of journalists for the second consecutive year with 73 languishing behind bars. The Turkish press experienced a crackdown in early 2016 and this gained pace after July’s failed coup attempt.
The CPJ identified 41 jailed journalists in second-placed China while Egypt rounds off the top-three with 20.
PRESS FREEDOM GROUPS filed suit today to force the government to disclose more about how and when it obtains journalists’ communications, amid reports that the Department of Justice under Attorney General Jeff Sessions is pursuing a record number of leak investigations.
The question the groups hope to answer is whether the Trump administration — openly hostile toward news media — has jettisoned or modified rules that limit the government’s ability to spy on journalists while they do their jobs.
Those rules were made more stringent by former President Barack Obama’s attorney general Eric Holder in 2014, after outcry when it was revealed that the administration had secretly obtained call records from the Associated Press and surveilled a Fox News reporter, naming him a co-conspirator in a national security leak case. Holder pledged that his department would go after journalists’ records in criminal cases only as a “last resort.”
Carrie DeCell, a staff attorney with Knight First Amendment Institute, which is bringing the suit along with the Freedom of the Press Foundation, said that “we have seen the DOJ media guidelines that Obama released, but we understand that Sessions is reconsidering those guidelines, and the way the government uses subpoenas against journalists.”
In August, Sessions announced that his department was reviewing the guidelines as part of a crackdown on leaks but did not specify what changes might be made. Sessions also told Congress this month that he has 27 investigations open into leaks of classified information to reporters – compared to just three last year. (Not all leaks are illegal, and many of the disclosures that Trump has publiclycomplained about would likely not be considered criminal.)
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
On the season finale of ‘CYBERWAR,’ Ben Makuch investigates why government spyware is cropping up on Mexican reporters’ smartphones.
On Tuesday, VICELAND is airing the season finale of CYBERWAR, sending Ben Makuch to Mexico to investigate the government’s potentially fraught use of hacking tools. Mexican authorities purchased spyware for their fight against drug cartels—but now a spate of watchdog journalists covering government corruption have detected the invasive software on their smartphones.
So what do you do when you fail to elect your chosen candidate and your former political allies and mainstream media turn against youby painting you not as the ‘progressive’, open-minded, friendly tech company that you used to be but as an evil, racist, Russian-colluding corporate villain intent upon destroying all that is sacred in the world? Well, you just buy the media, of course.
As Poynter notes today, after a series of public relations debacles in recent weeks, from the firing of James Damore to news last week that Google’s algos served up some fairly disturbing keywords to potential advertising buyers (e.g. “Why Do Black People Ruin Neighborhoods“), Google is ramping up its media presence with the announcement that the Google News Lab will be working with Report For America (RFA) to hire 1,000 journalists all around the country.
Many local newsrooms have been cut to the bone so often that there’s hardly any bone left. But starting early next year, some may get the chance to rebuild, at least by one.
On Monday, a new project was announced at the Google News Lab Summit that aims to place 1,000 journalists in local newsrooms in the next five years. Report For America takes ideas from several existing organizations, including the Peace Corps, Americorps, Teach for America and public media.
Unlike foreign or domestic service programs or public media, however, RFA gets no government funding. But they are calling RFA a national service project. That might make some journalists uncomfortable – the idea of service and patriotism. But at its most fundamental, local journalism is about protecting democracy, said co-founder Charles Sennott, founder and CEO of the GroundTruth Project.
“I think journalism needs that kind of passion for public service to bring it back and to really address some of the ailments of the heart of journalism,” he said.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The United States Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities found in 1975 that the CIA submitted stories to the American press:
After 1953, the network was overseen by Allen W. Dulles, director of the CIA. By this time, Operation Mockingbird had a major influence over 25 newspapers and wire agencies. The usual methodology was placing reports developed from intelligence provided by the CIA to witting or unwitting reporters. Those reports would then be repeated or cited by the preceding reporters which in turn would then be cited throughout the media wire services.
The Office of Policy Coordination (OPC) was funded by siphoning off funds intended for the Marshall Plan [i.e. the rebuilding of Europe by the U.S. after WWII]. Some of this money was used to bribe journalists and publishers.
During the early years of the cold war, [prominent writers and artists, from Arthur Schlesinger Jr. to Jackson Pollock] were supported, sometimes lavishly, always secretly, by the C.I.A. as part of its propaganda war against the Soviet Union. It was perhaps the most successful use of “soft power” in American history.
A CIA operative told Washington Post owner Philip Graham … in a conversation about the willingness of journalists to peddle CIA propaganda and cover stories:
You could get a journalist cheaper than a good call girl, for a couple hundred dollars a month.
Famed Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein wrote in 1977:
More than 400 American journalists … in the past twenty?five years have secretly carried out assignments for the Central Intelligence Agency, according to documents on file at CIA headquarters.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
LUXEMBOURG IS TRYING to throw two French whistleblowers and a journalist in prison for their role in the “LuxLeaks” exposé that revealed the tiny country’s outsized role in enabling corporate tax avoidance.
The trial of Antoine Deltour and Raphael Halet, two former employees of the international accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, and journalist Edouard Perrin began Tuesday.
Deltour and Halet were charged in connection with theft of PwC documents. Perrin is charged as an accomplice for steering Halet toward documents that he considered of particular interest.
Perrin, a reporter with Premières Lignes Television in Paris, produced the first LuxLeaks reporting. PwC documents were later obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and, together with records from other accounting giants, formed the basis for the 2014 “LuxLeaks” series involving over 80 journalists across the world.
Among the many prominent supporters of the defendants, France’s Finance Minister Michel Sapin told the French parliament Tuesday that Deltour was “defending the general interest” and that he “would like to offer him all our solidarity.” Almost 175,000 people have signed a petition in support of Deltour.
The European Federation of Journalists has demanded that Luxembourg drop the charges against Perrin. EFJ general secretary Ricardo Gutierrez called Perrin’s prosecution “shameful,” saying that Luxembourg “is going after a journalist who has acted entirely in the public interest.” Reporters Without Borders criticized Luxembourg for being “more concerned about deterring investigative journalism than protecting the public’s right to information.”
So why has Luxembourg’s behavior been so ferocious?
The answer can be found, appropriately enough, in a publication of PricewaterhouseCoopers itself.
According to PwC’s January 25, 2016 “Global Regulatory Briefing,” its international client base now faces “new far reaching developments” on matters including “corporate governance and tax.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Russian news agency Sputnik’s Turkish bureau chief has been blacklisted by Ankara, who refused him entry to the country in an airport, and seized his residence permit and press credentials.
“I landed in Istanbul at 0:40 today with Aeroflot’s flight 2134. The border control staff held me at the passport control for some 10 minutes, then ushered me to the passenger control premises without explaining anything,” Sputnik’s Turkish bureau Chief Tural Kerimov told RT from the waiting room for passengers attending inspection and screening at Istanbul’s Ataturk Airport.
Kerimov says he presented all of the documents he had: Russian passport, boarding pass, Turkish press card and Turkish residence permit he had been granted earlier. The Russian journalist specifically stressed that Turkish border guards and airport authorities acted in a polite and supportive manner. The border guards were not informed about the reason for the entry ban, Kerimov insisted.
After being held for about an hour, Kerimov was handed written notification that he is considered unwelcome in the Turkish Republic and his entrance to the country is barred. He was ordered to leave Turkey on the first available flight, but Kerimov insisted that it ought to be an Aeroflot flight. Turkish authorities agreed and he remained until 2:55 p.m. local time (11:55 GMT). Kerimov met with Russia’s consular representative and related the incident.
In an interview with RT, Kerimov said that Turkey has not issued any explanation for denying him entry, but he nevertheless remains hopeful that he will eventually receive one.
“A number of media representatives have been having certain problems in Turkey recently, both figures from the Turkish media and from international news outlets.
I can’t predict what the Turkish authorities plan to do further, but hopefully [we] will be given the reasons for what happened.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
When right wingers go off on NPR and the New York Times for being mouthpieces of the Democratic Party or left wingers criticize Fox News and PBS for having too many conservatives on the air, it makes my head spin. Is there no such thing as truth anymore or not a single honest reporter in town?
No. And we shouldn’t expect there to be. Journalism is one of those bedrock institutions that are critical to a democratic society. Reporters are supposed to inform citizens of things they need to know, to help them navigate the world confidently, effectively, to live well and prosper. Such a noble calling reporters have. From the outside journalism looks like public service. Sometimes it is. But from the inside, the news business is like making sausage or politics. The average person really wouldn’t like to watch how the news is actually made. It’s a pretty dirty and disgusting business even if people like the news product they consume every day.
Reporters are supposed to be fair and thorough but they are often fatuous and sloppy. In order to make their deadlines they take short cuts, make deals, trade information, manipulate gate-keepers, misrepresent themselves, snivel, dissemble and act disingenuously or even dishonestly. Some are quite vindictive and write just enough of the truth to tell a lie or support one. Judith Miller’s shameless reporting about Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction when he didn’t have any comes to mind. Not exactly the kind of people who follow the golden rule in their work life. But theirs is such a noble calling.
There is a kind of catechism you learn when you go to J-School: get the facts, get the story, get if first, but get it right.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Pentagon has released an 1,176-page book of instructions on the “The Law Of War” detailing acceptable ways of killing the enemy. The manual also states that journalists can be labeled “unprivileged belligerents,” an obscure term that replaces the Bush era “unlawful enemy combatant.”
As The Washington Times reports, an eye-catching section deals with a definition of journalists and how they are expected to stay out of the fight –
“In general, journalists are civilians. However, journalists may be members of the armed forces, persons authorized to accompany the armed forces, or unprivileged belligerents.”
While the Pentagon did not specify the exact circumstances under which a journalist might be declared an unprivileged belligerent, lumping terrorist writers with bona fide reporters prompted a civilian lawyer who opines on war crime cases to call the wording “an odd and provocative thing for them to write.”
Michael Rubin, a Middle East expert at the American Enterprise Institute, said the manual reflects today’s muddled world of journalism.
“It’s a realization that not everyone abides by the same standards we do,” said Mr. Rubin. “Just as Hamas uses United Nations schools as weapons depots and Iran uses charity workers for surveillance, many terrorist groups use journalists as cover.”
Mr. Rubin recalled that two al Qaeda terrorists posed as journalists to assassinate anti-Taliban leader Ahmad Shah Massoud. Chechen Islamists went on missions with camera crews.
“Journalists are the new consultant. Anyone can claim to be one,” he said. “No American serviceman should ever be killed because a politician told them they had to take a foreign journalist at his or her word.”
The 1,176-page “Department of Defense Law of War Manual” explains that shooting, exploding, bombing, stabbing, or cutting the enemy are acceptable ways of getting the job done, but the use of poison or asphyxiating gases is not allowed.
Surprise attacks and killing retreating troops have also been given the green light.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Two Russian journalists have been attacked, beaten and robbed during a radical torchlight march in central Kiev. Thousands took to the streets in the Ukrainian capital for the birthday anniversary of radical nationalist WWII leader.
The rally was dedicated to Stepan Bandera, the figure which is officially banned in Russia as extremist.
A reporter and a cameraman of LifeNews media outlet were attacked during the march.
“Unknown people pushed the journalist, she fell and hit her head. Her phone was also stolen,” the statement by LifeNews said.
The people took the TV camera, and broke it, too, the statement added.
The incident happened right after the reporter went on air. Before that, the participants of the rally hadn’t shown any interest in the crew, reporter Zhanna Karpenko stressed.
The attack took place in front of Kiev police, but the law enforcement didn’t interfere, she added.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The United States Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities found in 1975 that the CIA submitted stories to the American press:
