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T.J. Caune Instructor: Malcolm Campbell English 1103 11/5/13

NSA Operation Bullrun

Every American is being watched daily, but a majority of them will never know. The National Security Agency is in charge of protecting the nation under all cost; maybe this is why our betrayal by them has gone unnoticed for so long. One thing is certain though, their new operation code named "Bullrun" is not the national security savor that most Americans have been lured into believing. The National Security Agency is in charge of protecting the nation under all cost; think of them as the security guards of the United States. In order to do so, the NSA has created a secret operation named Bullrun. Nicole Perlroth with the New York Times recently stated that Bullrun has cracked much of the encryption, or digital scrambling, that guards global commerce and banking systems, protects sensitive data like trade secrets and medical records, and automatically secures the e-mails, web searches, Internet chats and phone calls of Americans and others around the world (Perlroth). The NSA is using a program called XKeyscore to access all of this information via the World Wide Web. XKeyscore is the "widest-reaching" system for gathering online intelligence, the NSA boasted in internal documents obtained by The Guardian says NY Daily. All of this information came to light after Edward Snowden, a former employee of the NSA, leaked this information to foreign powers. One part of the material says the spying program covers "nearly everything a typical user does on the Internet," according to The Guardian (Otis). To me, this is the most shocking part of
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operation Bullrun all together. I am not a terrorist, and I am surely not plotting a scheme that could possibly put national security at risk. What gives the NSA the right to cover everything I do on the internet? Well, they don't have the right! I agree with spying on foreign enemies or potential individuals that have ties to known terrorist organizations, but not on citizens of the United States. While watching the Colbert Report on the Comedy Central channel, Mr. Colbert briefly talked about an agreement the US has to not spy on "English Speaking" countries. Mr. Colbert humorously stated that we must not have that agreement with ourselves because the US spies on its own citizens (Colbert). To be blunt, this is sadly true. This act of internet spying is occurring everyday by the NSA, and this is all made possible through using technical trickery, supercomputers, court orders and behind-the-scenes persuasion to undermine the major tools protecting the privacy of everyday communications in the Internet age (Perlroth). Most people dont know the full reason of why the NSA is doing all this, but they claim it is for protecting the country and boosting national security. Is it ethical for the NSA to conduct operation Bullrun as a means of protecting national security? Is what the NSA is doing right now constitutional or unconstitutional? Is it okay for the government to break the constitution to protect the American people? These are all very important questions to be answered, but depending on who you ask, you could get very different answers. So what do we know at this point? Well, we know what operation Bullrun is, we know it has been active since 2010, we know it was created by the NSA, we know it is overseas as well as in the USA, and we know that this operation was created to aid in the fight against terrorism. But what exactly does this operation mean in terms of the American people? Often I will tell my classmates that the government is looking at EVERYTHING they do on their cell phones. At first they are shocked, but then they go on with their daily life. Is the government that good at

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concealing this information, do everyday citizens just not care, or does everyone just not understand what is going on? I know that when I first found out about this operation, I was shocked. From that day on, I went out to seek as much information as I could about operation Bullrun. The largest debate on my topic is that it is either okay to conduct operation Bullrun as a means of protecting national security, or it is not okay to conduct operation Bullrun as a means of protecting national security. Many Americans are questioning the ethical concerns of operation Bullrun. Some Americans find it completely ethical, while others believe this operation is an invasion of their privacy. As reported in The Guardian , The New York Times, and Propublica, the NSA has the ability to decrypt most of anything that is on the internet (Casaretto). So what does this mean as far as an everyday American's internet searching? Well, it merely means that they're being watched, whether they are searching for nuclear bombs or for what they are going to buy for Christmas that winter. The government claims that they don't actually look at all the data, they just look at the small percentage that makes up threats to national security. I find this hard to believe because the NSA still isn't revealing anything to the public as far as what they are doing within the operation; even after it has already been leaked by Edward Snowden. The media, such as NY Times and The Guardian, have posted concerns regarding the betrayal of operation Bullrun; and then there are groups of people such as security bloggers, including myself, that blog about what the NSA is doing in good and bad ways. Bruce Schneier, a security blogger, stated that, "The government has betrayed the internet and us" (Casaretto) and he is right! It feels more like a betrayal rather than a safety net. Both sides of the argument have concerns about what the NSA is doing; ratherwhether it be for the protection of the American

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people or not. One thing is certain though, tension is arising amongst the American people over what the government has been doing over the past few years. The common argument when considering operation Bullrun is simply whether or not it is ethical. My classmates had many opinions to express on our 1103 Facebook webpage in regards to the ethical bounds of operation Bullrun. For instance, Nic Vaughn said, more of invasion of privacy it feels like, in regards to operation Bullrun. Kimber said, It's highly unconstitutional. This is illegal search and seizure. Even as a federal institution, they still need a warrant. Malcolm Campbell professionally disagreed with his statement; Yes, it's okay only in the interest of national security." The key word in Malcolm's statement was, "in interest of national security," the thing is, I do not think the NSA is just interested in the national security aspect of their spying. If they were, they wouldn't need to watch EVERYONE'S internet interactions. That is like a police officer stopping every individual they see cause they could possibly be involved in criminal activity, it just doesn't happen. Well, the NSA is basically stopping every American and it is just wrong in so many ways. To start, it is tedious, there is no way they can view all the information they gather. It is also uncalled for, think of all the protest there would be if police officers started stopping everyone they saw! Lastly, it is crossing major privacy boundaries that would be deemed very illegal in the physical world; such as searching someone's property without a warrant. At a recent Constitution day at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, two speakers spoke about the conflicts of Edward Snowden, and the problems faced by the NSA and the American people. The ACLU, or the opposing side, gave their point of view on operation Bullrun and how it is affecting the country. On the other side was former CIA agent (Never got his first name) Mr. Walten, who looked at the operation from a counter-terrorism standpoint. So

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what exactly is the NSA viewing? Well, it is called meta data, and it is basically every American's phone record printed out on a sheet of paper. That means phone numbers to a caller, phone numbers from a caller, the time the call was placed, and what day it was placed. The ACLU quickly prompted after this debate was opened that they have already filed a suit against the NSA for doing this. The ACLU also informed the audience that all this became possible when Verizon issued an order to the FBI to allow the NSA to gather meta data from their servers (UNCC). The ACLU's main argument is that meta data could possibly reveal people's civil rights issues, religious affiliation, and even possible whistle blowers themselves. To look at it in a simple way, the federal government is swiping just about EVERY American's privacy books, or personal meta data, without them having any knowledge of it. This is somewhat like the government stealing from the American people. The sad thing about it is that most Americans can't stand up for themselves because they don't know this is happening. The ACLU was then upset at the fact that Verizon is immune to prosecution due to aiding the government (UNCC). In reply, Mr. Walten stated that this new globe of intelligence has allowed multiple intelligence agencies to work together, which was unheard of before 9/11. With intelligence agencies such as the CIA, the FBI, and the NSA working together, the threat of future terrorist attacks can be greatly diminished if not completely destroyed. Mr. Walten continued by saying this would make a lot of people sleep better at night, and feel safer knowing that the government has these capabilities (UNCC). But no one said the government can't abuse these capabilities. Let's take a look at the man who started it all, Edward Snowden. What is Snowden considered: a whistle blower or a traitor? The ACLU and former CIA agent Mr. Walten covered this argument very thoroughly at Constitution Day. The ACLU described him as a whistle

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blower, or someone that leaks information that is found illegal, because they believe he leaked information that was done unconstitutionally by the federal government. There is an act that protects people who do this called the Whistle Blower Protection Act, but Edward Snowden is not protected because the act exempts intelligence employees. On the other hand, former CIA agent Mr. Walten described Snowden as a traitor because he is possibly using this information to aid foreign powers such as Russia and China. In general, whistle blowers tend to try to follow regular channels to stop governmental illegal acts. In my mind Edward Snowden did break the law, which makes him a traitor, but if he would have not told foreign powers I believe he would have been a whistle blower. He revealed a horrible act committed by the government that should have never been started in the first place. If it wasn't for Snowden's confession, I possibly wouldn't be writing this right now because everyone would still be in the dark on what the government has been doing for many years already. Even if Edward Snowden is a traitor, he is often seen as a hero in many American's eyes. The NSA has a social media network and every American has already joined it. Datacoup has put together a new website called GETPRSM. This website looks like a new social networking site, but it is really the NSA scooping up data and gathering connections within it (Masnick). Everyone is already a member through the NSA's decryption process, which is simply the NSA looking at all of our online data. They then They gather everyone's meta data, and then they track the connections between the data into a bogus social networking site. The NY Times has an article describing how the NSA has created a "social graph" of pretty much everyone, American or foreign, and it all happens without a warrant: "The agency was authorized to conduct large-scale graph analysis on very large sets of communications metadata without having to check foreignness of every e-mail address,
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phone number or other identifier, the document said. Because of concerns about infringing on the privacy of American citizens, the computer analysis of such data had previously been permitted only for foreigners." (Masnick). This statement directly violates article 702 of the Patriot Act and opens up an additional debate between the ACLU and Mr. Walten. Article 702 of the Ppatriot Aact is a different act of FAZA; this act covers "Prism" or a program that collects data electronically from persons outside of the USA without a warrant. Article 702 strictly states that you cannot target people outside of the USA to attack people inside the USA and you have to notify FISK, the secret court that oversights this process, and delete the data if you get information from a person inside the US (UNCC). There is only one exception to this, and it is if a US person is affiliated with a foreign terrorist organization, or if it is necessary to prevent imminent bodily harm. The ACLU commented on this act as an attempt to gather a mass surveillance operation. Their biggest worry is if the NSA is also collecting location data from Americans. Additionally, the ACLU stated that the only protection we have currently is that the NSA cannot physically view all the data due to the mere mass of it, but they do store all of the data for extended periods of time (UNCC). Mr. Walten commented on the fact that if this is true, if the NSA is abusing article 702 of the Patriot Aact, they should quickly stop what they are doing (UNCC). Well that is the thing; even though the NSA has been publicly displayed, they still have yet to stop their operation. There are even rumors that the NSA doesn't answer to the president! If this is the case, who regulates them, and how do we know what data they are or are not using? What I initially thought about is what happens if an employee uses this cyber program in malice? Well, Thomson Reuters with gadgets.ndtv.com covered that thought to a T in his recent

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article. The article states that, "In one instance in 2005, a military member of the NSA queried six email addresses of a former American girlfriend, on the first day he obtained access to the data!" This, in large part, was before the full scale operation took place (Reuters). I, as a common internet blogger, blogged about how I was afraid of the government looking at EVERYTHING I do or say online just in large part to the lack of privacy. Are Americans safe with personal information anywhere besides in person? Many would say yes, but only the wise would say no. After conducting mass amounts of research on operation Bullrun I have found that the government doesn't always do as they say. The government in itself almost reminds me of a teenage adolescent in the fact that they say one thing and do another. The funniest part about that is the government works for the American people, but yet they lie to us daily about what exactly they are doing. I feel somewhat uneasy on the fact that the only way we know about these acts is through Edward Snowden. Does this make Snowden a traitor or a national hero? That is somewhat hard to visualize in itself. No one knows how much information Snowden has actually gathered, but what we do know is that the information he has leaked so far has kept the NSA on their toes. Norman Solomon with The Huffington Post recently wrote an article on how much data the NSA could actually store. Because yeah the NSA receives all this data, but where the hell is it all stored? Well, theThe Huffington Post post stated that: "During a PBS NewsHour interview that aired on August 1, NSA whistleblower William Binney pointed out that the Bluffdale facility has a "massive amount of storage that could store all these recordings and all the data being passed along the fiberoptic networks of the world." He added: "I mean, you could store 100 years of the world's communications here. That's for content storage. That's not for metadata. " (Solomon).
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Let me rephrase this, that is CONTENT like every voice on every phone call, or every word ever typed on a computer, or every picture ever posted online, or every business secret on every server of every business. Think about how many things are automated today: cell phones, credit cards, computers, laptops, iPods, tablets, game consoles, banking, business, and automobiles,. ect. The NSA could possibly be setting up the largest surveillance operation in the world, and the average American wouldn't know a damn thing about it. This worries me and it should worry you too. In a nut shell, this is completely unconstitutional, it is completely illegal, and it is scary. It is scary to me, you, and everyone else in the world. I hate to say it, but the government has gotten way out of hand, and something has to be done. The most important question to answer is why does this matter? Why should Americans care about operation Bullrun? To start, they are unknowingly being robbed. They are having their e-mails, their phonebooks, their internet searches, and even possibly their locations stolen. No one likes to be robbed, so why should the American people be okay with having the NSA cyber rob them? There are many other ways the NSA can counter-act a terrorist attack without infringing on many American's private data. Such ways include conducting investigations on individuals, and then compiling data from the ones that are targets; rather than compiling data from nearly everyone. Additionally the NSA could use a website such as GETPRSM, but instead of linking everyone between it, only link contacts of known terrorist. The main argument was is it ethical for the NSA to conduct operation Bullrun as a means of protecting national security? More like is it okay for the NSA to lie and cheat us into giving up all of our information to them? Hell no it is not okay! If I would have known what was happening earlier, such as gathering meta data, or compiling a hidden social network, I would have pushed myself to do more. A government shutdown is on its way, and I would like for the

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main shutdown to be of the NSA, PERMANENTLY (This was written pre-shutdown). In my eyes the NSA never had a right to start this program, and they don't have a right to continue this program. Will the NSA continue to gather this information despite American protest? Only time will tell.

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Works Cited Casaretto, John. "Bullrun: The NSA Backdoor Anti-Encryption Bug Program."SiliconANGLE. N.p., 6 Sept. 2013. Web. 04 Nov. 2013.
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Colbert, Stephen. "Germany's NSA Outrage - Mark Mazzetti." Colbert Nation. N.p., 28 Oct. 2013. Web. 04 Nov. 2013.

Masnick, Mike. "NSA Has Built Its Own, Secret, Warrantless, Shadow Social Network, And You've Already Joined It." Techdirt. N.p., 30 Sept. 2013. Web. 04 Nov. 2013.

Otis, Ginger A. "NSA Can Read Emails, Online Chats and Track Web Browsing Habits without Warrant, Documents Leaked by Edward Snowden Show ." NY Daily News. N.p., 31 July 2013. Web. 22 Oct. 2013.

Perlroth, Nicole. "N.S.A. Able to Foil Basic Safeguards of Privacy on Web." The New York Times. The New York Times, 5 Sept. 2013. Web. 22 Oct. 2013.

Reuters, Thomson. "NSA Employees Used Spy Tools to Track Spouses, Former Lovers | NDTV Gadgets." NDTV Gadgets. NDTV Convergence Limited, 30 Sept. 2013. Web. 04 Nov. 2013.

Solomon, Norman. "The NSA Deserves a Permanent Shutdown." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 30 Sept. 2013. Web. 04 Nov. 2013.

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Walten, Mr. ACLU "UNCC Constitution Day." UNCC Constitution Day. University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte. 17 Sept. 2013. Speech.