http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/07/alexander-blackhat-keynote/
By Kim Zetter
Threat Level
Wired.com
07.31.13
LAS VEGAS -- Amid new revelations today about another expansive NSA
surveillance program, agency chief Gen. Keith Alexander appeared before an
audience of security professionals to defend his bulk collection of phone
records and other data.
Although Alexander promised to "answer every question to the full extent
possible" he took no open questions from the audience and only answered a
few preselected questions that had been chosen from a survey sent to
attendees of the Black Hat security conference.
Alexander was addressing surveillance programs recently disclosed by the
Guardian from documents provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.
Hours before he took the podium, the newspaper published a top secret
PowerPoint deck detailing the NSA’s XKeystore program, which maintains a
rolling archive of internet traffic vacuumed from 150 points around the
world. According to the slides, NSA analysts can query the system using a
broad range of selectors, from specific information like a target’s email
address, to category searches that might produce, for example, “all the
Microsoft Excel spreadsheets containing MAC addresses coming out of Iraq.”
Facing occasional hecklers from the audience, Alexander asserted that the
surveillance programs have been mischaracterized by the media and others
and that as a result the reputation of NSA workers has been tarnished.
Extensive oversight from Congress and the courts, as well as technical
protections in place -- including internal auditing -- prevent NSA workers
from abusing their surveillance capabilities.
[...]
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