Newswires: Surveillance / CCTV

FISA Court Proposes New Court Rules

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has proposed new rules to comply with the provisions of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008.  The Court reviews government applications for intelligence surveillance and physical search under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The proposed FISA Court rules (pdf) provide new procedures by which telecommunications companies can petition the [...] more >>

Where Do We Go from Here? The G20 Summit, Black Bloc, and the Canadian Left

_By Ali Mustafa_ Background Public outcry continues to grow across Canada over the widespread abuse of civil liberties during the recent G20 Summit in Toronto. Over 1,000 people were rounded-up and arrested between June 26th- 27th, resulting in the largest mass arrest in Canadian history. While the majority of those arrested have since been released, at least 16 people remain under strict bail conditions and face a variety of serious criminal charges. Countless others who managed to avoid arrest were indiscriminately searched, detained for hours, and even violently attacked by police. Indeed, all the warning signs of a ‘police state’ were present: a pervasive state of fear and paranoia loomed over the city; freedom of movement was heavily restricted; massive police presence was encountered at every turn; ‘Big Brother’-like CCTV cameras closely watched over every move; and demonstrators stayed tightly together in groups, too afraid to travel the streets alone. more >>

Seattle: Cops kill another person

From The Arctic Circle Collective: At 4:15 PM today, a Seattle cop shot to death a man whose identity has not yet been released. According to mainstream media, the cop claims he confronted a man who was sitting and whittling with a knife on the corner of Howell and Boren. The cop claims the man [...] more >>

Kashmiris defy curfew after boy killed

THOUSANDS of angry residents defied a curfew in the Indian portion of Kashmir on Tuesday, protesting the overnight killing of an 11-year-old boy by government forces, reports Aijaz Hussain of The Canadian Press.Fifteen people were wounded in the southern town of Anantnag late Monday when government forces shot into a crowd despite an appeal last week from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that they use non-lethal measures to control the demonstrations that have become a near daily occurrence in the volatile region.At least 65 people have died in anti-India demonstrations and clashes between security forces and protesters in Kashmir since June. Each death has triggered more protests despite a rigid curfew in the Kashmir valley.Anger against Indian rule runs deep in the region, which is divided between Hindu-majority India and predominantly Muslim Pakistan and claimed by both nuclear-armed nations in its entirety.The latest deadly unrest against Indian rule shows no signs of abating despite the deployment of thousands of troops.Thousands of residents marched in Anantnag early Tuesday within hours of the death of the young boy.Police and paramilitary soldiers fired warning shots and tear gas to quell the protests, wounding three people, said a police officer on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to speak to media.In Srinagar, the region's main city, hundreds of men, women and children also held angry protests. They chanted "Go India, go back" and "We want freedom."Police and paramilitary soldiers withdrew from the area to avoid clashes but sealed off the streets with razor wire and steel barricades. more >>

Gradisca, Italy - 3 military police wounded in escape attempt from detention centre

informa-azione(ANSA) 29/08/2010 - TRIESTE - A new escape attempt, unsuccessful, last night in the middle of identification and deportation from Gradisca d'Isonzo. Three military wounded.Around 21:30 am thirty detainees were up on the roof of the centre of the structure trying to climb over the railings, but the intervention of the military surveillance foiled the attempt.It resulted in a brief scuffle, with three soldiers slightly injured by blunt objects used by immigrants.[No mention of the condition of the prisoners] more >>

Seattle Cops Kill; Fuck the Police, and Fuck Calming Down

From the Arctic Circle Collective. At 4:15 PM today, a Seattle cop shot to death a man whose identity has not yet been released. According to mainstream media, the cop claims he confronted a man who was sitting and whittling with a knife on the corner of Howell and Boren. The cop claims the man stood up and refused to drop the knife; the cop then fired three to five shots, killing the man. The only witness quoted other than the killer cop says the victim had no knife. Cops are liars and do plant evidence—we see no reason to believe the cops’ claim that the victim was holding a knife. But we would be missing the point to focus so narrowly. After all, we know all know well that cops are experts at using violence to escalate simple situations—like whittling or jaywalking. Cops believe, often correctly, that they will ultimately get away with any attack—even murder. And so they pepper spray, taser, beat, stomp, and shoot, wielding violence to maintain the systematic order of misery in which we find ourselves—to keep us under control. But as their attacks become more apparent to more people, even mainstream news internet comments (typically rather conservative) have begun to question their authority to do so. Here is a selection of comments from the PI coverage: read more more >>

Predator Drones to Patrol Entire U.S.-Mexico Border from September 1

Via: Reuters: The U.S. government will have unmanned surveillance aircraft monitoring the whole southwest border with Mexico from September 1, as it ramps up border security in this election year, a top official said on Monday. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said U.S. Customs and Border Protection would begin flying a Predator B drone out [...] more >>

Reading, Writing, and RFID Chips: A Scary Back-to-School Future in California

Scary news from California's Contra Costa County — school officials there have reportedly decided to track some preschoolers with RFID chips, thanks to a federal grant supplying the funding. According to a story from the Associated Press, the students will wear a jersey at school that has the RFID tag attached. The tag will track the children's movements and collect other data, like if the child has eaten or not. According to a Contra Costa County official, this is a cost-savings move, as teachers used to have to manually keep track of a child's attendance and meal schedule. But of course, an RFID chip allows for far more than that minimal record-keeping. Instead, it provides the potential for nearly constant monitoring of a child's physical location. If readings are taken often enough, you could create an extraordinarily detailed portrait of a child's school day — one that's easy to imagine being misused, particularly as the chips substitute for direct adult monitoring and judgment. If RFID records show a child moving around a lot, could she be tagged as hyper-active? If he doesn't move around a lot, could he get a reputation for laziness? How long will this data and the conclusions rightly or wrongly drawn from it be stored in these children's school records? Can parents opt-out of this invasive tracking? How many other federal grants are underwriting programs like these? These are questions that desperately need answers. California is in the middle of a terrible budget crunch, but the solution is not federally funded surveillance of children who are too young to understand the implications. more >>

Colmar, France experimental field of GM vines sabotaged

informa-azioneIn the night between 14 and 15 August, sixty reapers and harvesters destroyed the 70 plants of the experimental field of the Institut National de Recherche Agronomique (INRA) in Colmar. After entering into the ground at about 5 am they started to destroy the biotech variety, then they alerted the media.The same variety, planted in 2005, had been sabotaged in 2009.The director of the INRA at Colmar Jean Masson says that after the previous attack, at a cost of 16,000 euros, the researchers were able to re-graft the cut plants. This time however, with great regret, he announces that it will be very difficult to save the project since the trees were also uprooted [unwittingly providing an interesting suggestion to Night mowers].After the attack of 2009, for which a man was sentenced to a fine of $ 2000, INRA had taken several precautions to protect the site: a double fence, military barbed wire, an intruder alarm and cctv camera system that would have prevented further acts of vandalism.The alarm worked, but the reapers closed themselves in the field with chains and took time to eradicate it. The police arrived 10 minutes after the break in, but were unable to do anything decisive. The mowers were taken to the police station of Colmar and interrogated before being released.In 2007 France introduced the "crime of mowing" involving a tightening of penalties from simple damage. The introduction of this repressive tool is, however, crippled by the environment that gave birth to it: in fact it refers only to the mowing of GM maize, which has been widespread in these years, not the destruction of other biotech varieties. more >>

Car Registration Snoops Banned

David Jarvis and Matthew Davis write in the Sunday Express: Town hall snoops have been caught red-handed using the DVLA’s database to spy on people. The Big Brother tactics emerged after councils were given the green light to use DVLA car registration records, strictly to track down owners of abandoned vehicles. Instead, and in breach of the rules, [...] more >>

Good News: Security Researcher Released on Bail

Hari Prasad, the Indian security researcher arrested for allegedly stealing an electronic voting machine, has been released on bail. Earlier this year, an anonymous source gave the machine to Prasad and a team of researchers, who discovered critical security flaws. Under questioning by authorities last weekend, Prasad refused to divulge the identity of the source who gave them the machine. He was then arrested and reportedly charged with theft and trespass on the theory that he stole the machine himself. According to the Indian news agency PTI, the magistrate who released Prasad on bail noted that "no offence was disclosed with Hari Prasad's arrest and even if it was assumed that [the electronic voting machine] was stolen it appears that there was no dishonest intention on his part...he was trying to show how [electronic voting] machines can be tampered with." The court reportedly also asked the Election Commission of India to confirm or disprove Prasad's claim that the country's electronic voting machines can be compromised. If Prasad's claims are false, action could be taken against him, the magistrate said. more >>

Apples and Indians

Apples and Indians is a whimsical and profound 5-minute ride that sees Lorne Olson speeding through decades in search of his true identity. When Lorne Olson was a young boy, growing up on the Broken Head Reserve in Manitoba, a teacher told him that...  more >>

France: Lille, Nantes, Toulouse one night in August

translated from cette semaineAugust 25, 2010 - Bois Blancs, LillePolice in response at Bois-Blancs were attacked by thrown missiles on Monday night when they accosted the occupants of a suspicious vehicle. It was during a routine intervention that police officers were attacked around 22:30 Monday night in rue Coli in Bois-Blancs.Officers were busy controlling the occupants of a suspicious vehicle that had been reported following a theft of car accessories carried out the same morning in the neighborhood when some unknown people emerged and started throwing projectiles at them. The windshields of two police vehicles were damaged. There were no injuries. The police, however, had to curtail their presence on site, taking with them the five occupants of the vehicle, three minors and two majors. They were released yesterday, no link having yet been established with the flight.The investigation continues on this subject, and another investigation was opened by Lille metropolitan Police regarding throwing of projectiles.Yesterday afternoon, an identity control was to be conducted in the area of Bois-Blancs. "To show the whole world that there are no zones of lawlessness," explained a police source said yesterday.Nantes: Violence in neighborhoods north of Nantes after arrests (AFP)August 25, 2010 NANTES - About thirty young people participated in urban violence during the night between Tuesday and Wednesday in a northern district of Nantes following the arrest of three of them, it was learned from the prefecture. "A group of people, some hooded, and armed with iron bars, attacked street fixtures, smashing the windows of a store, a school and two vehicles" after arrests for robbery, In addition to bus shelters and school windows being smashed, a burning car and a van were still visible late Wednesday morning in the neighbourhood. The neighbourhood was quiet, without any visible police presence.The violence occurred at about 23:00, said the prefecture. Shortly before, around 19:00, the arrests took place nearby, in which two policemen were slightly wounded, the source said. Of the three people arrested, one was able to flee, according to deputy prosecutor in Nantes. "The inquiry has been hectic," tear gas had to be used, says one police source.Shortly after 23:00, many calls from witnesses at the central state were "thirty to forty people picking on bus shelters and bus shops, some were hooded and armed with iron bars, he said. Upon arrival of police, including half a company of CRS, supported by the PBM (local security group), the CDI (Company departmental intervention) and BAC (anti-crime brigade), the demonstrators had fled, police said.Toulouse: Gunfire and stones against policeAugust 25, 2010 - Toulouse: Gunfire and stones against police (Le Parisien, 25/08/2010)Police came under heavy gunfire and stone-throwing that injured one of them in the night of Tuesday to Wednesday in the sensitive district of Bagatelle in Toulouse. Officers of the Mirail anti-crime brigade were called before midnight to intervene in the city where shots had been fired. In helping a victim of the shooting police were repeatedly fired at with a shotgun by masked individuals, reported the union Alliance. According to another professional organization, the SGP-FO police unit, the first union of peacekeepers one particular individual in a vehicle opened fire on the car of the LAC.The ensuing chase turned into an ambush when police were confronted with about fifty people engaged in classic stone throwing, said Police Unit SGP-FO.One policeman was wounded by the hail of stones. An inquest has been opened for attempted homicide of the police officers. more >>

Environmental and Animal Rights Activist Returned to Prison for Facebooking

“When friends are outlawed, only outlaws will have friends.” –Mike Roselle Ummm, yeah. Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t watching. We knew it would happen sooner or later. The surveillance state is not only watching social media sites, the social media sites are the surveillance state. Long time environmental and animal rights activist [...] more >>

Aboriginal Passports issued to asylum seekers in Australia

More than 200 public sector staff caught snooping on citizen records

Mark Ballard writes in Computer Weekly: The number of public sector workers caught snooping on personal records in the government’s largest citizen database continues to grow, with the total now 225 – and the true figure could be higher still. Yet another employee has been sacked for accessing records on the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) [...] more >>

My interrogation at the U.S. border

By Stefan Christoff | August 24, 2010, rabble.ca Under fluorescent lights at the U.S./Canada border, south of Montreal, questions on the war in Iraq and the Palestinian Intifada were fired towards me by officials from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. It quickly became clear after arriving at the border and presenting my passport to U.S. [...] more >>

09/25/08 PRESS RELEASE: Rise in Federal Policing, Surveillance and Immigration Enforcement Signals Growth and Adaptation of U.S. Criminal Justice System

US: The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America

The Bush administration’s wiretapping program has come under new scrutiny. Two influential congressional committees have opened probes into allegations US intelligence spied on the phone calls of U.S. military personnel, journalists and aid workers in Iraq. James Bamford discusses the NSA’s domestic sprying, the agency’s failings pre-9/11 and the ties between NSA and the nation’s telecommunications companies. more >>

US: Translator Who Faked Identity Pleads Guilty To Having Secret Data

An Arabic translator who used an assumed identity to get work as a contractor for the U.S. Army in Iraq pleaded guilty yesterday to federal charges of possessing classified national defense documents, including sensitive material about the insurgency that he took from an 82nd Airborne Division intelligence group in 2004. more >>