https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/04/07/ what-intelligence-officials-really-mean-when-they-talk-about -unmasking/?hpid=hp_hp-cards_hp-posteverything%3Ahomepage%2Fcard
What intelligence officials really mean when they talk about ‘unmasking’ *What you need to know about 'unmasking'* *Embed* *Share* Play Video3:16 With allegations targeting former Obama national security adviser Susan E. Rice, here's what you need to know about "unmasking" U.S. persons. (Jenny Starrs/The Washington Post) Surveillance law has dominated headlines <https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/susan-rice-denies-leaking-names-of-trump-officials-in-intelligence-reports/2017/04/04/26997e56-1978-11e7-855e-4824bbb5d748_story.html?utm_term=.f7fc3d372019> over the past few weeks. As a result, many Americans are, for the first time, encountering specialized terminology about electronic surveillance and trying to make sense of an intelligence community legal framework that can seem arcane. First, there were revelations regarding calls <https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/national-security-adviser-flynn-discussed-sanctions-with-russian-ambassador-despite-denials-officials-say/2017/02/09/f85b29d6-ee11-11e6-b4ff-ac2cf509efe5_story.html?utm_term=.2077771bb754> between former national security adviser Michael Flynn and the Russian ambassador to the United States. Then, President Trump accused former president Barack Obama of having wiretapped him at Trump Tower <https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/03/04/trump-accuses-obama-of-nixonwatergate-plot-to-wire-tap-trump-tower/?utm_term=.8f6e5efb9dac>. The White House further alleged Obama may have done so through a British intelligence ally <https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/03/16/sean-spicer-just-suggested-that-obama-used-british-intelligence-to-spy-on-trump-not-so-much/?utm_term=.c064ffc6107f> in violation of the long-standing Five Eyes security agreement. Almost immediately after the directors of the FBI and National Security Agency put those allegations to rest in congressional testimony, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) announced that communications of Trump and his associates may have been incidentally collected in foreign intelligence intercepts. Revelations that the White House itself <https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/30/us/politics/devin-nunes-intelligence-reports.html?_r=0> was Nunes’s source of the information has resulted in his temporarily recusing himself <https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/house-intelligence-chairman-devin-nunes-recuses-himself-from-russia-probe/2017/04/06/8122b5bc-1ad2-11e7-855e-4824bbb5d748_story.html?utm_term=.fb22c0553203> from his committee’s Russia investigation. Now news coverage and commentary are full of suggestions that Obama’s national security adviser Susan E. Rice <http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/04/03/susan-rice-requested-to-unmask-names-trump-transition-officials-sources-say.html> requested the “unmasking” of names of Trump transition officials whose information had been incidentally collected in intelligence reports. According to media reports, Rice may have made a single request or dozens, but no public information currently suggests wrongdoing by Rice or the intelligence agencies. Making sense of the accusations and calls for surveillance reform requires some understanding of how intelligence collection works. Yet it has only grown more difficult to discern the signal amid all the noise. Here are some basics. While intelligence agencies’ work is predominantly focused on foreign actors operating outside the United States, in cases where they specifically seek information to, from or about what the law calls “U.S. persons,” they must obtain permission from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. But what has been at issue in recent news stories is “incidental collection” — the unintended collection of communications to, from or about U.S. persons in the course of collecting foreign intelligence. Incidental collection is actually inherent to many kinds of surveillance, not just foreign intelligence collection. For example, if the FBI has a warrant to listen to a drug kingpin’s phone calls, they also hear the conversations of other people with whom he speaks. While domestic law enforcement and foreign intelligence are different in many important ways, in both cases, efforts are made to protect “incidentally” collected information that is unavoidably swept up as the government conducts its regular business. *[Why the CIA won’t want to go public with evidence of Russian hacking <https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/12/27/why-its-so-hard-to-prove-russia-was-behind-the-election-hacks/?utm_term=.22e5305d738f>] * There are a number of ways this can occur. A targeted individual might be in communication with a U.S. person — if Bob, a foreign intelligence target, calls Jane, a U.S. person, then Jane’s half of the conversation may be collected in addition to Bob’s. Or Bob might be speaking to another intelligence target, Fred, and Bob and Fred talk about Jane. In both cases, the information involving Jane is entitled to additional protection under the law. In intelligence, one crucial form of protection is the “minimization” of incidentally collected information on U.S. persons. To understand how minimization works, it helps to think about how intelligence analysts work. Intelligence analysis typically starts with a topic, such as counterterrorism, or a target, who is almost always a foreign person. Usually, an analyst ignores information that seems unlikely to be of intelligence value. When she finds information worthy of including in a report, she begins to assess other people involved in the communication. If any identifiers (people talking, or people being talked about) appear likely to be associated with a U.S. person, then the analyst works to protect that information from being disclosed *unless it is necessary to understand or assess the intelligence*. That is the key standard. An intelligence report on a foreign target might read, “Bob, a non-U. S. person, communicated his interest in acquiring precursors for making weapons of mass destruction.” In that case, there isn’t any need to reference a U.S. person at all, because the report focuses on what Bob said, and not whom he might have said it to. A different report might say, “Bob talked to [U.S. Person #1] about his intention to import precursors for making weapons of mass destruction.” Here, it is necessary to refer to the fact that there was another person involved to accurately convey the intelligence. Because the person Bob was speaking to was a U.S. person, however, the U.S. person’s identity would typically be masked in the report. This enables government officials who need to see foreign intelligence to perform their duties without unnecessarily compromising the privacy of Americans. Consider a somewhat different type of report: “Bob and Fred talked about their belief that [U.S. Person #1] was actively selling precursors for weapons of mass destruction, and that [U.S. Person #1] would be willing to sell to Bob and Fred.” In this case, the identity of the U.S. person is masked, but one of the U.S. government offices or agencies who are authorized to receive classified intelligence reports might decide that they need to know the identity of the U.S. person to understand the intelligence. Knowing who U.S. Person #1 is allows them to evaluate the nature of the threat — is this someone who is actually in a position to obtain the materials? A similar decision might be made if a foreign intelligence operative is in communication with a U.S. person; that intelligence report has an entirely different meaning if the U.S. person in question is just a random person than if he is a government contractor with access to sensitive military secrets. At this point, the official who needs more information can request that the identity of U.S. Person #1 be “unmasked.” If the request is granted, the official will receive a new report from the intelligence agency that reads “Bob and Fred talked about their belief that Jane was actively selling precursors for weapons of mass destruction, and that Jane would be willing to sell to Bob and Fred.” *[Government lawyers don’t understand the Internet. That’s a problem. <https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/09/23/government-lawyers-dont-understand-the-internet-thats-a-problem/?utm_term=.667c27364368>] * As for what Rice might or might not have done, there is nothing inherently improper or unusual about requesting that NSA provide an “unmasked” name. Requests can only be made where it is necessary to understand the foreign intelligence information; personal curiosity or political purposes would fail to satisfy the stringent requirements for unmasking. Relatively few people in the executive branch are authorized to request unmasking, though the national security adviser would certainly qualify. Furthermore, no unmasking decision is unilateral: The system provides checks to verify proper requests, and requests must be approved by the director of the FBI or the director of the NSA, or their designees. Recently, NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers testified <https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/03/20/full-transcript-fbi-director-james-comey-testifies-on-russian-interference-in-2016-election/?utm_term=.3fc22ae8064a> that only 20 senior-level officials in the entire NSA have the authority to approve such requests, which is an indication of how seriously this responsibility is taken. These requests are documented and subject to internal and external oversight and review. When an unmasking request is approved, the unmasked identity is released only to the person who requested it, not to everyone who might have seen the original version of the report. All intelligence reports remain classified at whatever level is appropriate for the information, and they are disseminated only to people who hold the appropriate clearances and have a need to know the information to carry out their lawfully authorized function. And the intelligence community has worked to increase transparency about unmasking in recent years; the Office of the Director of National Intelligence now routinely publishes statistics on unmasking in publicly available annual reports. In the annual Transparency Report <https://www.dni.gov/files/icotr/ODNI%20CY15%20Statistical%20Transparency%20Report.pdf> released last spring, ODNI noted that in 2015, NSA approved the release of the identities of 654 U.S. persons in response to unmasking requests, with “U.S. person” defined under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act as including U.S. citizens, green-card holders and corporations. *[Why does Wikileaks keep publishing U.S. state secrets? Private contractors. <https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/03/16/the-reason-wikileaks-receives-so-many-u-s-state-secrets-private-contractors/?utm_term=.02b6389e1a46>] * It is also important to distinguish unmasking requests from instances in which it is appropriate to identify the U.S. person at the outset. “Minimization” and “masking” are not identical things: “Minimization” is the process, while “masking” is often — but not always — the result of that process. Information can be properly minimized *and* include a U.S. person’s identity *if* the identity is necessary to understand or assess the intelligence. For example, an initial report might read “Bob and Fred exchanged plans to launch a WMD attack with the help of Jane, a U.S. person who is currently under investigation authorized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.” This could be proper and not require any additional “unmasking.” Despite attempts by current and former intelligence officials to describe how surveillance law and practices might or might not be related to these stories, there still seems to be public confusion about what is permissible and what should be cause for concern. We see the problem as threefold. First, the information that is publicly available around the accusations of improper unmasking is unclear. It is hard to tell which of the complex set of legal authorities may have been involved, who the intelligence target(s) or topic(s) may have been or whether information was unmasked at the outset or came later, or both. Second, and critically: Each decision about unmasking is inherently fact-specific. Even where there are no indications of wrongdoing, it’s impossible say with certainty whether an unmasking decision was proper without knowing all of the facts. Third, the specific details remain classified, meaning the individuals with knowledge have to tread carefully in how they discuss it. The inability to comment fully and the public uncertainty regarding what is being discussed raise understandable fears that any comments could be distorted in a partisan manner. This is a particularly painful prospect for intelligence professionals who are accustomed to a decades-long tradition of nonpartisanship on national security matters. But the result is a missed opportunity to provide clearer explanations. The unfortunate effect is that, when further information emerges later — requiring additional explanations — the intelligence community risks looking evasive. With surveillance matters so widely in the news today, this is a critical time for current and former officials to lean forward as much as possible to explain how processes like incidental collection and unmasking work and to clear the confusion and perception of illegitimacy that can result from public misunderstanding or misinformation. *The views expressed here are the authors’ own and do not reflect those of the National Security Agency or the U.S. government.* <https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=emailclient&utm_term=icon> Virus-free. www.avast.com <https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=emailclient&utm_term=link> <#m_-7312453526239016633_m_3099124429685109730_m_-6716163243233220127_DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2> __._,_.___ ------------------------------ Posted by: "Beowulf" <[email protected]> ------------------------------ Visit Your Group <https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/grendelreport/info;_ylc=X3oDMTJmZTljamJrBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzIwMTk0ODA2BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTMyMzY2NwRzZWMDdnRsBHNsawN2Z2hwBHN0aW1lAzE0OTE3MTk1NDA-> [image: Yahoo! 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