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United States Security

New Snowden Revelation: Terrorists Attempting To Infiltrate CIA 250

cold fjord writes "The Washington Post reports, 'The CIA found that among a subset of job seekers whose backgrounds raised questions, roughly one out of every five had "significant terrorist and/or hostile intelligence connections," according to the document, which was provided to The Washington Post by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. The groups cited most often were Hamas, Hezbollah, and al-Qaeda and its affiliates, but the nature of the connections was not described in the document. So sharp is the fear of threats from within that last year the NSA planned to launch at least 4,000 probes of potentially suspicious or abnormal staff activity .... The anomalous behavior that sent up red flags could include staffers downloading multiple documents or accessing classified databases they do not normally use for their work, said two people familiar with the software used to monitor employee activity.'"
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New Snowden Revelation: Terrorists Attempting To Infiltrate CIA

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  • Snowden beware (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jodido ( 1052890 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @02:45PM (#44740131)
    If they can make Snowden out to be a terrorist, or a supporter of terrorism, or someone who knew a terrorist, or knew someone who knew a terrorist, they will try to justify assassinating him.
    • Labeling everything as "terrorist" like a girl that just got a new glittery labelmaker is more of a media and crowd control thing. If they try and label him a terrorist, zero US citizens are going to buy it so that would just cheapen the word. It's not worth the damage. They're just going to call what he did illegal and stick with that. They're also never going to get their hands on him.
    • by Anonymous Coward

      If the UK can use terrorist laws to detain Miranda, the US will not be far behind.

      At any rate, you don't need a drone to have people assassinated in Russia.

      • At any rate, you don't need a drone to have people assassinated in Russia.

        Anonymous or not, this should be marked insightful. Unless maybe they left off the journalist or newsworthy person who promotes democracy part.

    • That's actually why he identified himself -- to help avoid assassination.

      • Re: Snowden beware (Score:4, Interesting)

        by myowntrueself ( 607117 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @09:05PM (#44742281)

        That's actually why he identified himself -- to help avoid assassination.

        And he has some security in the form of encrypted documents scattered around the world with instructions to release the key should anything 'happen' to him. And these documents contain stuff that would be VERY damaging to the US government.

        So, naturally, the US doesn't want to assassinate him. But the US has many enemies who would like to see these documents released. Do the math.

  • Paranoia... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Meditato ( 1613545 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @02:47PM (#44740141)

    or actual infiltration?

    The original Bin Laden al-Qaeda is practically non-existent, its Islamist affiliates are too busy trying to win over regimes in the mideast, Hamas is trying not to piss off the US considering that Obama has been much more pro-Palestinian. Hezbollah....maybe. We're talking about a few tens of thousands of eligible individuals here, most of them with Hezbollah and Hamas.

    I have serious doubts that this is anything other than the Three Letter agencies trying to project a Cold War interpretation ("big centralized nation-state entity out to get us") onto a set of data that only shows small, disparate groups who are all actually too busy trying to avoid being smashed by the US, Israel, or the Arab League.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by GameboyRMH ( 1153867 )

      On one hand, your typical AQ member is probably dumb enough to try to get hired at the CIA...on the other, the CIA is probably dumb enough to think that anyone from a certain region of the middle east is a terrorist even if they are just as closely connected to Kevin Bacon...hey, they blow people up with drones for the same.

    • Why would it be at all surprising to anyone that various foreign groups (I wouldn't even say 'enemies', as that's too specific) would be trying to infiltrate an intelligence agency that operates internationally? The CIA isn't domestic spies, after all -- it makes perfect sense that everyone else's non-domestic spies would work to figure out what you know about them (and maybe get some information about other countries as a bonus!).

      It's not the Cold War, no. But the very existence of the CIA is enough to war

    • Re:Paranoia... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by CrimsonAvenger ( 580665 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:45PM (#44740437)

      From TFA:

      roughly one out of every five had âoesignificant terrorist and/or hostile intelligence connections,â

      I would guess that the definition of "signficant...connections" is in this case.

      Maybe it means you work for Hamas. Or maybe it means one of your cousins knew a guy in college whose little brother is now a member of hamas....

    • Paranoia. Ie, "subset" of applicants who raised suspicions. 1 in 5 of those already single out for more scrutiny had a link to things related to terrorist groups. But applicants ultimately tied to terrorist networks were "small".

      Is this a surprise to anyone? A small number of people with terrorist connections tried to apply for a job at the CIA. OMG! Isn't this why there's a complicated and extensive application process already in place?

    • by sjames ( 1099 )

      I suspect it's self fulfillment. They think the terrorists are everywhere so anything looking odd to them is assumed to be a terrorist. And so their analysis confirms terrorists are everywhere, and applying for jobs with the CIA.

    • Re:Paranoia... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Jah-Wren Ryel ( 80510 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @06:40PM (#44741569)

      Paranoia... or actual infiltration?

      Or maybe just a bunch of hype.

      First thing that jumps out is the 4,000 re-investigations. According wikipedia it is estimated that the NSA has over 30,000 employees. I am going to pull some numbers out of my ass here: Let's say 25% have secret clearances and another 50% have top-secret(TS) clearances and the remaining 25% are support staff that don't need clearances. Secret clearances get re-investigated every 10 years, TS gets re-investigated every 5 years. It does not matter what TLA you work for that is standard. So (30K * 0.25 / 10) + (30K * 0.50 / 5) = 4500 re-investigations per year.

      That makes 4,000 re-investigations per year on the low side of completely unremarkable.

      Second thing is the wording quoted from the unnamed official:

      "Over the last several years, a small subset of CIA's total job applicants were flagged due to various problems or issues," one official said in response to questions. "During this period, one in five of that small subset were found to have significant connections to hostile intelligence services and or terrorist groups."

      Get that? 1 out of 5 of some unknown small subset. So we have absolutely no idea of the scale at all. It could be just 1 guy. Plus he lumped in "terrorist groups" with "hostile intelligence services" (which is basically all of them). So for all we know there were ZERO terrorists trying to infiltrate the NSA.

      Given the 'facts' in the article there is no story here.

    • Re:Paranoia... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Cassini2 ( 956052 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @06:43PM (#44741583)

      That's not how the middle-east guys work. The CIA needs Arab spies to spy on the middle east baddies (and their is a very long list including Hezbollah, Hamas, Iran, etc.) After a while, the baddies work out who is working for the CIA, and then determine who the spies family is. Then the spy either becomes a double, or the family killed. This is a huge problem for the CIA.

      This problem is also why America has made such poor progress in Afghanistan. The Taliban will wipe out your family. On the other hand, American soldiers don't go after peoples families, and mostly follow a reasonable moral code. Thus, middle-eastern students in North America look over their shoulders, because they don't know who will go after their family back home. Can you imagine convincing people to fight when they don't know who will threaten their families?

    • by Yvanhoe ( 564877 )
      My guess is that they have a hard time finding people who speak Arabic and support Israel as much as the US government would want them to.

      Considering the failry lax criterion to label someone a terrorist, I am not surprised that a lot of their potential hires had "connections" to terrorists.
  • by Roskolnikov ( 68772 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @02:47PM (#44740149)

    Bunch of bitchy little girls. Good news for you, I'm a drunk and a washout already, so I can talk to whoever I want, burned or no.

    - Sam Axe

  • by M. Baranczak ( 726671 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @02:48PM (#44740151)

    They won't hire you if you don't have job experience, and they won't hire you if you do.

  • by leftover ( 210560 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @02:56PM (#44740201) Homepage

    I think it would be an obvious move to have the NSA monitor "our" Congress-critters. Add their staffers, all the top people in the political parties, consulting companies and lobbyists. This is a manageable target size, all composed of people who presume to control public resources.
    As a group these people have caused more damage than all terrorists put together.

    • by wbr1 ( 2538558 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:11PM (#44740269)
      If they do, do you think it would be used for the people? No, it would be used as leverage to further their own agenda by pulling the congress critter's strings.
    • heh, with their 3 degree's rule I suspect they already are... I wonder how they keep their own names off the lists, or if they even bother, very likely they create alter egos and live their real lives through them.

    • They already do this...but not for any altruistic purpose.

  • by bmo ( 77928 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @02:59PM (#44740219)

    Look at who signed this.

    http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/experts-obama-here-what-do-syria_751267.html [weeklystandard.com]

    The same old bunch of neocon bastards that lied us into Iraq as far back as the "Open Letter to Bill Clinton back in 1998.

    http://www.newamericancentury.org/statementofprinciples.htm [newamericancentury.org]
    http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqclintonletter.htm [newamericancentury.org]

    And really, read the rest of the PNAC site.

    PNAC morphed into the Foreign Policy Initiative

    http://www.foreignpolicyi.org/about/staff [foreignpolicyi.org]
    http://www.foreignpolicyi.org/about [foreignpolicyi.org]

    Even during Mitt Romney's candidacy Mittens had a fucking wb page *titled* "new american century* with much of the above philosophy basically cut-and-pasted. Which shouldn't be surprising since his foreign policy "brain trust" consisted of FPI bastards. Up to and including Dan Senor (FPI and PNAC alum) on Meet The Press saying that we should bomb Iran back then.

    Read. It's not conspiracy theory when it's from their own mouths.

    I wouldn't put it past these bastards to hire someone to detonate a sarin bomb in Damascus to gin up an excuse for an invasion. And now they're wondering what the fuck to do now that the President just said "Well, we should have Congress' input on this."

    Fuck these guys for wanting to get us involved in another war where there is no winning, just more death.

    --
    BMO

    • by caballew ( 2725281 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:11PM (#44740273)

      I wouldn't put it past these bastards to hire someone to detonate a sarin bomb in Damascus to gin up an excuse for an invasion. And now they're wondering what the fuck to do now that the President just said "Well, we should have Congress' input on this."

      Looking at his actual record, Obama is more George Bush that George Bush was . He's owned and controlled by the same people who own and control Congress. I'll give you a hint; it's not the American people. I wouldn't be surprised if the sarin wasn't released to benefit and promote our political agenda at home (NSA, etc.) as well as our foreign policy. He just wants it all wrapped up nicely with Congressional approval to deflect responsibility.

      • by bmo ( 77928 )

        Indeed.

        But they really were caught off guard this weekend. He didn't follow the script like his advisors thought he should. Whether this really matters remains to be seen.

        --
        BMO

        • by Nyder ( 754090 )

          Indeed.

          But they really were caught off guard this weekend. He didn't follow the script like his advisors thought he should. Whether this really matters remains to be seen.

          --
          BMO

          That's what happens when you don't hire actors to be presidents.

      • And then there's this... Politicians enraged that Britain gave export licenses to sell Syria 'nerve gas chemicals' [rt.com]

        The rebels in Syria have been covertly funded by U.S. and NATO for the past four years via Turkey, Israel, and Saudi Arabia. So, no, I wouldn't put it past them either.

        Sigh.

        It's really disheartening when you know so much yet so little about geopolitics that you're able to predict the next move from the Elites. Just like Bush, Sr. said, "I don't need to read the news, I already know what's goin

        • I would never had guessed at any time during my first 50 years that I would have thought that the U.S. government would become the Bad Guys that the last three years have proven it to be. And what's worse, I now believe the whole process is so corrupt that our government has passed the point of no return. Congress is so corrupt that they have made their corruption legal and no longer answer to the American people who either don't care or are too stupid to realize what's going on. Maybe it's always been a
          • by tramp ( 68773 )
            Welcome to reality. USA: the land of the great bastards also called U.S. government.
          • by c0lo ( 1497653 )

            Congress is so corrupt that they have made their corruption legal and no longer answer to the American people who either don't care or are too stupid to realize what's going on. Maybe it's always been an illusion.

            Maybe there's still hope [informatio...house.info] for the congress critters to consider other info [wnd.com]

      • by Jeremi ( 14640 )

        [Obama] just wants it all wrapped up nicely with Congressional approval to deflect responsibility.

        Well, that's where O and W differ. W wouldn't have thought that far ahead -- or if he had, he would have assumed that "responsibility" would be a non-issue, because the only thing he'd need to worry about after the glorious victory would be where to put all the flowers sent to him by the thankful Syrians.

        • Well, that's where O and W differ. W wouldn't have thought that far ahead -- or if he had, he would have assumed that "responsibility" would be a non-issue, because the only thing he'd need to worry about after the glorious victory would be where to put all the flowers sent to him by the thankful Syrians.

          Obama has done plenty without explicit public Congressional approval:
          Waged war on Libya without congressional approval.
          Secretly deployed US special forces to 75 countries.
          Continued Bush's rendition program.
          Escalated the CIA drone war in Pakistan.
          Started a covert, drone war in Yemen.
          Initiated, and personally oversees a 'Secret Kill List'.
          Launched 20,000 Airstrikes in his first term.
          Obama signed executive order giving himself control of all communication systems in America
          Obama signs Execu

      • Looking at his actual record, Obama is more George Bush that George Bush was . He's owned and controlled by the same people who own and control Congress.

        Who is it that controls Obama then, the illuminati? The Bilderberg group? Aliens? Do you understand that the theory you just presented of Obama releasing the sarin in Syria puts you on the edge of nutters?

        At worst, Obama is incompetent. He isn't malicious; overall he's a nice guy.

      • by dbIII ( 701233 )
        You wanted a President that was not on vacation all the time and you got one - thus "more bush than bush" since he actually turns up to work.
        I've got no idea why people thought a constitutional lawyer was some sort of radical that was going to change everything overnight instead of the reality of a guy that was going to run things the same way as before with maybe a bit of tinkering around the edges. IMHO the other choices you were given were far worse, and it's going to be a lot of making the best of some
    • by MRe_nl ( 306212 )

      There's really no need to hire someone in Damascus.
      Just send the chemicals from the CIA to the Saudi Mukhabarat, they'll pass it on to Al Nusra or an like-minded affiliate and BOOM there's your red line.

      • "Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey have received covert support from Washington in the funneling of arms to the most virulent Islamist elements of the rebel movement, while Russia and Iran have supplied arms to Assad." -- http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2013/may/13/1 [theguardian.com]

        "In May 2007, a presidential finding revealed that Bush had authorised CIA operations against Iran. Anti-Syria operations were also in full swing around this time as part of this covert programme, according to Seymour Hersh in

      • There's really no need to hire someone in Damascus.
        Just send the chemicals from the CIA to the Saudi Mukhabarat, they'll pass it on to Al Nusra or an like-minded affiliate and BOOM there's your red line.

        And there are stories already, where some rebels tell an AP reporter that their guys were just transporting/storing the shit for another group, and didn't know what it was, and there was this accident, and a bunch of their guys got killed.

        Could even be true. Of course, it could be a cover story for a rebel gas attack intended to be blamed on the government ("we didn't do it on purpose!"), or one rebel group setting another up to take the fall, or it could be Syrian government disinformation (Russian news so

        • by c0lo ( 1497653 )

          There's really no need to hire someone in Damascus. Just send the chemicals from the CIA to the Saudi Mukhabarat, they'll pass it on to Al Nusra or an like-minded affiliate and BOOM there's your red line.

          And there are stories already, where some rebels tell an AP reporter that their guys were just transporting/storing the shit for another group, and didn't know what it was, and there was this accident, and a bunch of their guys got killed.

          You mean stories like this [voiceofrussia.com]?

          Could even be true. Of course, it could be a cover story for a rebel gas attack intended to be blamed on the government ("we didn't do it on purpose!"), or one rebel group setting another up to take the fall, or it could be Syrian government disinformation (Russian news sources are carrying this story), or it could just be another rumor in the fog of war.

          What about the WingNutDaily [wnd.com]; my guess: being a conservative [wikipedia.org] creature, WND would be as far as possible from embracing Russia as one can imagine.

  • Yea, that's the ticket. Set the ID10T terrorist up with their very own CIA infilitrator to feed them false intel, then nuke the shit out of them.

  • Except ... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by six025 ( 714064 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:06PM (#44740251)

    The anomalous behavior that sent up red flags could include staffers downloading multiple documents or accessing classified databases they do not normally use for their work, said two people familiar with the software used to monitor employee activity.

    Except, apparently, one Edward Snowden. Which means for all of the paranoia, someone still got through.

    What about the other Snowdens that aren't whistleblowers but real, actual spies?

    This is another reason the NSA et al are foolish to dismiss Snowden as a threat, another reason why he should be embraced as a hero for shining light on a serious problem!

    Peace,
    Andy.

    • Public dismissal, private firestorm. If you think that the internal reviews and procedure modifications following the Snowden breach bear any resemblance to the internal process review which is actually occurring at the NSA, you're in full denial that the NSA is a very, very orderly and methodical organization. These guys make OCD look like a carefree run through the park.

      There will always be blind spots, and Snowden lit this one up pretty effectively.

      • Or it could be a race to the cognitive bottom. With the current information, the way Snowden got access was due to boneheaded procedures being used internally. So, it's possible the 4000 they were suspicious of were even dumber than the feds. I'm sure that they are trying to fix things, but that doesn't mean they will be handling it intelligently. Remember, one of their stated solutions is to cut the number of sysadmins by 90% and move things to the 'cloud.'
    • by geogob ( 569250 )

      Someone posted this [bbc.co.uk] in a comment a few days ago.
      It is a comment from Adam Curtis of the BBC on MI5, which quite well illustrates how effective paranoia driven internal witch hunts are. I can't believe it would any different in American intelligence organisation.

      I believe this comment is quite appropriate once again.Read it. Its worth the laugh.

      • by AHuxley ( 892839 )
        Yes geogob, it shows everything the US tried to avoid for 40-50 years via cash (good wages), staff education, merit based advancement, good working conditions and compartmentalization.
        The US also took an interesting view of crypto - when it fails/staff walk/spy everything was sort of under a form of compartmentalisation.
        The US wanted to get on with huge global hardware networking and code the software needed to bring it all together. Later they had the science to store more and more.
        Almost all other sp
  • I would imagine that only US citizens can apply to work for the CIA -- there may be the odd expert from other NATO countries but forget that for now -- which means that one fifth of the candidate pool of US citizens who apply is someone 'suspicious.'

    Well, I'd imagine most of the applicants are in the US military, engineers who have drifted into the military projects, and various academics and non-academic experts. Um, one in five of THOSE is a risk? How are you defining risk? Or is every Arabic speaker, bro

    • by vux984 ( 928602 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:18PM (#44740311)

      No. You misread it.

      Its saying that of the subset of those with suspicious backgrounds one in five is "linked" to terrorism.

      We don't know how big that 'subset' is. It could be (and probably is) quite small. Of 5000 applicants, there might be 20 with "suspicious backgrounds", and of that 20 there might be 4 who they linked to terrorism. The "1 in 5 with links" are of the 20 that were already flagged as suspicious, not the entire pool of applicants.

      • by mspohr ( 589790 )

        They're all "linked" to Kevin Bacon.
        (Thanks to all that metadata that NSA is snarfing up.)

    • by Urkki ( 668283 )

      which means that one fifth of the candidate pool of US citizens who apply is someone 'suspicious.'

      I didn't RTFA, but TFS does not say that, read again... Fifth of initially suspicious applicants turned out to really have suspicious connections.

  • Now add in all Israeli intelligence operative assigned to spy on the USA

  • They could have recruited them and followed them to the source. Goddamn morons over there at the CIA.
  • In the end (Score:5, Funny)

    by lesincompetent ( 2836253 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:19PM (#44740319)
    CIA, NSA, FBI etc will gradually lose interest in the general populace and, in the name of self-defense, gradually shift their investigative efforts onto themselves until they'll implode in a singularity of paranoia.
  • The anomalous behavior that sent up red flags could include staffers downloading multiple documents or accessing classified databases they do not normally use for their work, said two people familiar with the software used to monitor employee activity.

    Downloading multiple files? Gee... it sounds like the NSA watchdogs are watching NSA staff so closely the typical NSA staffer has little time to do any actual work between attending regularly scheduled interrogations related the multitude of internal affairs investigations he set in motion while trying to get a bit of work done.

  • by JoeyRox ( 2711699 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:23PM (#44740339)
    Q: What do you like doing during your off time? A: l enjoy long-distance bike rides and wishing death to Israel. I mean collecting stamps.
    • Q: What do you like doing during your off time?

      A: I bowl, drive around, the occasional acid flashback.

  • Terrorists (Score:4, Insightful)

    by cphilo ( 768807 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:33PM (#44740375)
    I think the problem is EVERYTHING is labeled Top Secret and everything is a terrorist group. Is this going to embarrass Senator X? Label it top secret. Twenty years in the future, this fact MIGHT be pertinent. Label it Super Top Secret. Annoyed with someone? Label him a terrorist. Annoyed with a situation. Must be terrorists. In the rush to cover their governmental asses, everything must be labeled top secret and everyone must be spied on, because, ya know, they might become a terrorist someday. Land of the Free, as long as you do not upset anyone in power: corporate, military or government.
  • by PopeRatzo ( 965947 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @03:44PM (#44740425) Journal

    Here's hoping that a significant portion of those intelligence employees are whistleblowers like Snowden and Manning. Whatever their personal failings, what they are doing is absolutely positive.

    The US intelligence apparatus has gone way beyond the bounds of what is acceptable for a free society. We've already lost a lot of what allows us to differentiate ourselves from countries like North Korea or Iran, and every time new revelations come out, it's another opportunity for the citizens of the US to be outraged and take a stand.

     

  • The sky is blue.

    I'd be surprised if terrorists were not trying to infiltrate the CIA.
    • by mysidia ( 191772 ) on Monday September 02, 2013 @04:01PM (#44740543)

      I'd be surprised if terrorists were not trying to infiltrate the CIA.

      Frankly.... i'd be surprised if they have not already succeeded.

      THAT is what makes me as nervous as hell about the NSA spying on Americans through service providers.

      Leaks like Snowden are proof that whatever they gather might eventually get in the wrong hands one way or another.

      One person's interest in monitoring the public looking for possible terrorists links, Is another person's blackmail material, once the bad guy infiltrators get ahold of Americans' private data

    • I'd be surprised if terrorists were not trying to infiltrate the CIA.

      I doubt it, unless you're including agents of assorted national governments as "terrorists". Private groups aren't going to have the resources to long-term plant members who may never find anything relevant. If your thing is fomenting revolution in Chechnya, having somebody end up being second attache to the embassy in the Philippines or monitoring the cocaine trade in Colombia is a waste you can't afford.

      Now, I'd be surprised if the governments of Russia, China, Israel, Cuba, India, Pakistan, et al. were

  • I've watched enough movies to know that is what spies do...infiltrate other spy organizations. Welcome to the first time someone sat around a fire with a bunch of people they just befriended in their freshly skinned furs to find out when they were going to be bringing their pointy sticks to the other camp of guys sitting around a fire eating their freshly butchered mammoth.
  • OMG, talk about an something Obvious. Shit, the Chinese, the North Koreans, the Russians, [foxnews.com] hell every country on Earth is trying to get their people into the CIA, and if they can't do that I'm sure they'll find some agency they can get into. If that fails there's always Industrial Espionage as well. [autoblog.com] Even a ex-CIA official thinks it's worse than in the cold war. [nydailynews.com]

    It's time to realize that a) we spy on the world and b) they spy on us and Industrial Espionage is probably more common than you think, even when t

  • So I know ten people and although I can be fairly certain that none of them would ever use terror tactics one might have a negative view of the nation. Now that guy probably knows someone more likely to become violent at some point in the future. One can clearly see how easily one's name might get on some watch list. Most people are probably only a couple of layers of isolation away from knowing some sort or terror nut. And we don't even know it. I would think that a good enemy agent would give of a

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