Written by: Manu Meel and Isaiah Sirois #mags lab
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- ---Metadata
- Metadata too unreliable- plan makes drones more reliable
- --Spending
- Government spending is driving the drone market now
- Law enforcement is integral to the commercial market – there’s opportunity now but no guarantees
NSA---GenericCurtailing NSA surveillance resolves faulty data- results in effective drone strikesStorm 14 Darlene Storm, freelance writer with a background in information technology and information security, “Whistleblower: NSA targets SIM cards for drone strikes, 'Death by unreliable metadata,'” ComputerWorld, 2/10/14, http://www.computerworld.com/article/2475921/data-privacy/whistleblower--nsa-targets-sim-cards-for-drone-strikes---death-by-unreliable-metadata-.html // IS Some targets know about the NSA geolocating SIM cards and “have as many as 16 different SIM cards associated with their identity within the High Value Target system.” Taliban leaders would toss SIM cards in a bag and mix them up, so everyone left with a different SIM card. But some targets don’t know about it and might lend their phone to a family member or friend who gets taken out in a drone strike. As high value targets also know, switching a phone to “airplane mode” to disable all wireless connections doesn’t cut it. After photographer and writer Michael Yon, a former Green Beret, was embedded with U.S. combat troops Iraq and Afghanistan, he talked about how smartphones are pocket spies that provide actionable intelligence for tracking. He said even "if location services/GPS-aware apps are turned off," or the cell phone itself is shut off, “if there is any juice to the battery at all” then the phone acts as a “homing beacon.” While overseas with U.S. troops, an officer told him that if you leave the battery in your phone, “you can practically watch it drain as the Iranians ping the phone.“ The anonymous former JSOC drone operator estimated that 90% of the drone strikes in Afghanistan relied on the SIGINT, “signals intelligence, based on the NSA’s phone-tracking technology.” Mission reports would state, “triggered by SIGINT, which means it was triggered by a geolocation cell.” But he claims that too often the wrong people are killed; “Tracking people by metadata and then killing them by SIM card is inherently flawed.” ---MetadataMetadata-based strikes fail- plan makes drones more reliable- resolves criticismGreenwald and Scahill, 14 Glenn Greenwald and Jeremy Scahill, *Snowden-exposé leaker, founder of the Intercept **investigative reporter, war correspondent and author of the international bestselling books Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield and Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army. “THE NSA’S SECRET ROLE IN THE U.S. ASSASSINATION PROGRAM,” The Intercept, https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/02/10/the-nsas-secret-role/ // IS One problem, he explains, is that targets are increasingly aware of the NSA’s reliance on geolocating, and have moved to thwart the tactic. Some have as many as 16 different SIM cards associated with their identity within the High Value Target system. Others, unaware that their mobile phone is being targeted, lend their phone, with the SIM card in it, to friends, children, spouses and family members. Some top Taliban leaders, knowing of the NSA’s targeting method, have purposely and randomly distributed SIM cards among their units in order to elude their trackers. “They would do things like go to meetings, take all their SIM cards out, put them in a bag, mix them up, and everybody gets a different SIM card when they leave,” the former drone operator says. “That’s how they confuse us.” As a result, even when the agency correctly identifies and targets a SIM card belonging to a terror suspect, the phone may actually be carried by someone else, who is then killed in a strike. According to the former drone operator, the geolocation cells at the NSA that run the tracking program – known as Geo Cell –sometimes facilitate strikes without knowing whether the individual in possession of a tracked cell phone or SIM card is in fact the intended target of the strike. “Once the bomb lands or a night raid happens, you know that phone is there,” he says. “But we don’t know who’s behind it, who’s holding it. It’s of course assumed that the phone belongs to a human being who is nefarious and considered an ‘unlawful enemy combatant.’ This is where it gets very shady.” Metadata too unreliable- plan makes drones more reliableNo Author 2014 [Cites Glenn Greenwald, “New Whistleblower Reveals NSA Picking Drone Targets Based On Bad Data: 'Death By Unreliable Metadata',” https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140209/22440726160/new-whistleblower-reveals-nsa-picking-drone-targets-based-bad-data-death-unreliable-metadata.shtml, 2014, mm] Late last night, the new publication from Laura Poitras, Glenn Greenwald and Jeremy Scahill launched. It's called The Intercept, and I imagine that it's going to be a must-follow for a variety of reasons. Its first major article digs deep into the NSA's role in killing people with drones (often innocent people) based on questionable metadata. Remember how NSA defenders kept insisting that "it's just metadata" as if that was no big deal? Well, what about when that metadata is being used to kill people? Just last week, we wrote about Rep. Mike Rogers complaining about new "red tape" that was making it more difficult to indiscriminately kill people with drones. That "red tape" is actually just a new set of guidelines designed to try to prevent more killing of innocent people with drones. This new report highlights how the US government's infatuation with drones, combined with the NSA's obsessive collection of metadata, means that drones are frequently used to kill people based on very little evidence that the people being killed are actually terrorist threats. One noteworthy point about this article: it relies on two new sources, one named, one kept secret, backed up by Snowden documents. That is, it appears that at least one other source (in this case, a recent member of JSOC’s High Value Targeting task force -- the group that's in charge of figuring out who to capture and kill) has come forward to Greenwald and others, calling foul on what the US government is doing. This person was privy to how targets are selected, and it's pretty scary how little info they're going on. The fact that the NSA was heavily involved in picking targets was revealed a while back, but this person explains how much those choosing targets rely on bad metadata from the NSA to kill people -- often revealed later to be totally innocent. One problem, he explains, is that targets are increasingly aware of the NSA’s reliance on geolocating, and have moved to thwart the tactic. Some have as many as 16 different SIM cards associated with their identity within the High Value Target system. Others, unaware that their mobile phone is being targeted, lend their phone, with the SIM card in it, to friends, children, spouses and family members. Some top Taliban leaders, knowing of the NSA’s targeting method, have purposely and randomly distributed SIM cards among their units in order to elude their trackers. “They would do things like go to meetings, take all their SIM cards out, put them in a bag, mix them up, and everybody gets a different SIM card when they leave,” the former drone operator says. “That’s how they confuse us.” The guy also points out that the metadata is often somewhat questionable in itself: What’s more, he adds, the NSA often locates drone targets by analyzing the activity of a SIM card, rather than the actual content of the calls. Based on his experience, he has come to believe that the drone program amounts to little more than death by unreliable metadata. “People get hung up that there’s a targeted list of people,” he says. “It’s really like we’re targeting a cell phone. We’re not going after people – we’re going after their phones, in the hopes that the person on the other end of that missile is the bad guy.” You would think that someone like Rep. Rogers would be happy that we were trying to improve our targeting and to stop killing innocent people, but apparently making sure the people we target are actually guilty is just too much "red tape." But it hasn't stopped these killings. The source in the article notes that the "overwhelming majority" of the strikes they're doing these days are based almost entirely on the NSA's signals intelligence. --SpendingDrones are demilitarizing now but law enforcement spending is key to the transition- plan checks enforcement spendingR&M 13 Research and Markets, “Emerging Applications for Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) Across Global Government and Commercial Sectors,” Research and Markets, December 2013, http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/75xhxl/emerging // IS The significant potential and benefits of UAS have led to increasing implementation since the mid-1980s. Through the years, these platforms have proven successful on numerous missions, leading to growing popularity. UAS now has a significant role for numerous military units worldwide. A decrease in military expenditure has, however, nudged UAS manufacturers to look towards commercial markets. The shift from military implementation has and will be gradual. Government and law enforcement have begun the shift, pressuring regulatory bodies to finalise interim legislation. This will facilitate the commercialisation of the UAS and application thereof to fields such as precision agriculture and journalism.
National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, “Domestic Drone Information Center,” NACDL, December 2013, http://www.nacdl.org/domesticdrones/ // IS Emerging Applications for Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) Across Global Government and Commercial Sectors - Research and Markets The significant potential and benefits of UAS have led to increasing implementation since the mid-1980s. Through the years, these platforms have proven successful on numerous missions, leading to growing popularity. UAS now has a significant role for numerous military units worldwide. A decrease in military expenditure has, however, nudged UAS manufacturers to look towards commercial markets. The shift from military implementation has and will be gradual. Government and law enforcement have begun the shift, pressuring regulatory bodies to finalise interim legislation. This will facilitate the commercialisation of the UAS and application thereof to fields such as precision agriculture and journalism.
Executive Summary •Regulatory processes restrain commercial growth in all but a select few countries. •Next Generation (NextGen) Air Traffic Management systems such as automatic dependent surveillance broadcast (ADS-B) are critical pieces of the puzzle to integrate UAS into the National Airspace (NAS). •Technological developments are mission enablers in the same way that mission requirements drive technological changes. Technological milestones have yet to be met to enable the safe integration of UAS into non-segregated airspace. •Green technologies and technologies giving enhanced power and endurance, coupled with higher payload capacities, will further encourage adoption of UAS. •Improved computing power and higher speed data links will allow for more sophisticated control and management techniques. •Modularity of systems and standardisation of middleware will allow for flexibility and configurability of systems. •Law enforcement and first responders lead the pack, with cautious uptake for agriculture and forestry. •Costs and inconsistent demand limit commercial buy-in, though this is expected to change gradually as UAS continue to become more efficient and less costly. •In other words, more capability at less cost encourages more market growth. Directory: file -> view view -> Western Europe after wwii view -> Author study: paul fleischman view -> Qpa1 7ela study Guide view -> Arctic Oil/Gas Neg view -> November 1970 Approximately 150,000-500,000 deaths Bhola Cyclone Bangladesh view -> Grade Level: 6 Unit of Study: Caribbean glce view -> Citation: Duffield, Katy view -> Table of Contents Lesson # view -> Chinese Wind Energy Disad Download 0.65 Mb. Share with your friends:
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