American Counter-Terrorism: Part 2 - Watchlists and Surveillance

In 2013 talking about government surveillance was all the rage. Edward Snowden had just spread leaks like a drunk at a urinal, and while the general public didn't really read any of the papers (there are thousands of them, so I hope there's a sparknotes somewhere) the main point of it was the American government is spying on you. Americans were angry, they felt betrayed, and the sales of George Orwell's 1984 shot up. (I looked it up - that's actually true.) Unbeknownst to the American public, the National Security Agency - the dreaded N.S.A. - has been collecting telephone messages, emails, and, I don't know, maybe Tinder profiles, all under the blanket purpose of fighting terrorism.

An American spy rocket chose this as their logo.
It looks like it belongs to the stereotypical evil
organization in a Michael Bay movie.

I'm talking about this in a drone strikes blog because finding terrorists at home and abroad falls to many of the same agencies with many of the same lists and programs. Further, military technology oftentimes gets passed down to local police departments, and counter-terrorism stuff is no exception. No, it's not the missiles (although taking out drug lords with drone strikes sounds kind of cool, albeit in a terrifying way). We're talking the surveillance equipment; they have the technology to retrieve deleted text messages, spy on SMS (essentially texts), eavesdrop on calls, extract media files, address books and notes, and so forth. Most of it is done through cell-site simulators (also called StingRays, if you want to sound cool) which function as a mobile cell tower that people can inadvertently use, thus allowing them to track the information coming in. Initially this was used to target the terrorists' devices, thus allowing for more information, locations, and so forth. However, since 2007 they've been used on American soil 4,300 times - and that's just the Baltimore Police Department. I'm glad the only text messages I send are either mundane or childish. I'm also glad I live in Canada.

The problem with this technology is it tends to drag a net across an area and brings in way more information than it wants or needs. They don't specifically target one phone; it'll sweep, meaning whomever happens to be using their phone around a StingRay will suddenly have their information put into the system. While that sounds pretty doom and gloom (I'll admit it's a little disconcerting) let's not forget that no one's really reading any of it, unless they're hunting you specifically. I sincerely doubt there are a bunch of CIA guys reading your stuff and laughing at you - unless you said something really embarrassing, (and you know what that is!) in which they totally are for sure.

So yes, a lot of data is being collected (all but an infinitesimal percentage surely completely useless). However, if they do find something about you - either at home or abroad - there's a chance you'll be placed on the terrorist watchlist. You've probably heard the terms "no-fly list" and that sort, and that's basically what we're talking about here. You would think that it would be fairly hard to get on the watchlist - and to be fair if you're a law-abiding citizen, again, the chances you'll be on it are so, so small - but in countries the States is casually bombing you have a pretty decent chance. The laws at home don't apply to the U.S. overseas (or more accurately they just kind of ignore them most of the time) so the whole "fair trial" idea doesn't really hold water. Concrete facts and irrefutable evidence would be nice, but they're far from necessary and pretty rare, meaning that if you're suspected in any way you're essentially seen as guilty enough to be placed on it. That's why there are so many on the watchlist; 680,000 as of 2014, 280,000 of them not belonging to a terrorist organization. The no-fly list is smaller, but rising at the same dramatic rate over the past ten or so years.

This is Marvel's logo for Hydra, the
fictional terrorist organization. Now, my
question is does this look more or less
evil than the world-consuming octopus?
My follow up question is how disturbing
is it that it's a tough call?

TIDE, or the Terrorist Datamart Environment, (not to be confused with the rise and falls of sea levels, or detergent) is even larger - holding over a million names. Basically everything gets funneled through TIDE, splitting into different organizations, groups, programs, etc. - some of them with names that are seemingly designed to sound as villainous as possible. The best example is Hydra, which "utilizes clandestinely acquired foreign government information" to find more info on TIDE members. Holy crap. Type "Hydra" into google and the first thing that comes up is the Marvel universe's terrorist organization of the same name. That's unfortunate.

So what we've established here is the databases are huge, the networks for collecting information are

Cub Scout Mikey Hicks immediately
regretted getting his merit badge in
bomb-making.

 massive and wide reaching, and reasonable doubt is an archaic method of justice. What we haven't talked about yet is how you get on the no-fly list while being a resident of the United States. Fortunately, it's not particularly easy to do, and I'm sure that most of the people on there are written up for a good cause - but errors do happen, like the case of Mikey Hicks. Hicks shared the name of a known terrorist and was mistakenly put on the no-fly list (so I guess there was a terrorist named Mikey out there) and was taken aside for a pat down at an airport. At first that sounds upsetting and inconvenient, but there's a troubling twist.

Mikey Hicks was two years old. They gave a pat down to an infant. (I really hope whoever gave the pat-down said "he's clean - except his diaper" once they were done.) By the time he was eight, he was still on it - and still receiving pat-downs at the airport - and that's mostly because once you're put on it it's awfully hard to get taken off. You can apply, get your information put through and so forth, but there's no actual confirmation if you're removed, leaving the possible watchlisted to sit in a state of unknowing whether or not the government sees them as potential mass murderers. Obviously with Hicks it was a case of mistaken identity, but it's not entirely uncommon if you share a name. If anything, that exposes a problem with the system where they're accepting so many names and not properly vetting them or knowing what exactly to do with them. In 2013, 468,749 "Known Suspected Terrorist" nominations were put forth, and all but 4,915 were accepted, putting it at about 99%. It certainly makes you wonder.

I know I've already used one picture of this poor kid,
but this has got to be the funniest picture I've ever seen.

Now, I tried to keep this neutral, although I'll readily admit that the book I got this information from is obviously leaning. Personal opinions on this will come in the next post, but at the very least it's information that the falls in that category of "you should probably know this is happening".

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The information for this blog has been taken from "The Assassination Complex: Inside the Government's Secret Drone Warfare Program" by Jeremy Scahill. It's... OK. The problem is it's written as a number of news stories compiled into one volume, meaning plenty of the information doubles up and makes for a frustrating read. Nevertheless, it's an interesting one.