from channel4: The #OccupyWallStreet campaign said police confined a small number of protesters before spraying them with mace. Clips of the alleged incident have appeared across social media – however, Channel 4 News cannot verify the footage independently. The New York Police Department has so far not responded to a Channel 4 News request for its response to the allegations. Protesters say they want to show their anger at, among other things, corporate greed and social inequality. So far, it is reported more than 100 people have been arrested... Police tactics have been compared to those used during the 2004 Republican convention when the NYPD made sweeping arrests of several hundred demonstrators before dropping charges against almost all of them... The alleged mace incident is the latest clash between campaigners and police since the occupation began on 17 September. Over the past few days, police barricades have prevented protesters from reaching the United Nations where the general assembly has been meeting.
In the documents, obtained by the privacy group and provided to CNN, the TSA specifies that the body scanners it purchases must have the ability to store and send images when in "test mode." That requirement leaves open the possibility the machines - which can see beneath people's clothing - can be abused by TSA insiders and hacked by outsiders, said EPIC Executive Director Marc Rotenberg.
EPIC, a public-interest group focused on privacy and civil rights, obtained the technical specifications and vendor contracts through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
cia misspells terrorists names to bypasses tsa & let patsies fly from earthtimes: One of the 9/11 hijackers appeared on the no-fly list with a deliberately misspelled name. The CIA supplied that name just like they did Umar Farouk Abulmutallab’s. DCBureau is publishing the page from the 2006 no-fly list with the misspelled 9/11 hijacker’s name. Veteran investigative reporters Susan and Joseph Trento, who first obtained and exposed the flaws in the no-fly list in 2006, have completed a new investigation of the CIA’s role in airline security. It reveals that the CIA is bypassing other government agencies and following terrorists on airplanes without telling TSA or the airlines involved. It shows how terrorists and nuclear proliferators have been allowed to fly because the CIA has refused to add their correct names or aliases to the no-fly list. Part I of their two-part investigation – “The No Fly List” – is posted on the DCBureau.org Web site. The two part investigation reveals: The CIA deliberately misspells names and does not provide aliases of suspected terrorists and criminals who are being targeted for recruitment or have relationships with the agency when it passes names on to the National Counterterrorism Center to be integrated in the Terrorism Identity Datamart Environment (TIDE), Selectee, and no-fly lists.
With dollar dumps and mountie mishaps and watch lists (oh my!) the New World Next Week continues to be the hardest working little news update in the West... or Far East. This week we cover:
During a 12-month period ended in March this year, for example, the U.S. intelligence community suggested on a daily basis that 1,600 people qualified for the list because they presented a "reasonable suspicion," according to data provided to the Senate Judiciary Committee by the FBI in September and made publiclast week.
FBI officials cautioned that each nomination "does not necessarily represent a new individual, but may instead involve an alias or name variant for a previously watchlisted person."
The ever-churning list is said to contain more than 400,000 unique names and over 1 million entries. The committee was told that over that same period, officials asked each day that 600 names be removed and 4,800 records be modified. Fewer than 5 percent of the people on the list are U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents. Nine percent of those on the terrorism list, the FBI said, are also on the government's "no fly" list.
27,000 work in pentagon pr & recruiting from danger room: Forget the drone stuff. Here is your eye-popping statistic of the day: "This year, the Pentagon will employ 27,000 people just for recruitment, advertising and public relations - almost as many as the total 30,000-person work force in the State Department." That's from an Associated Press investigation, "which found that over the past five years, the money the military spends on winning hearts and minds at home and abroad has grown by 63 percent, to at least $4.7 billion this year." Staff costs take up most of the money, more than $2 billion. Another $1.6 billion goes into recruiting. About a half-billion goes towards "psychological operations, which targets foreign audiences." And, finally, "$547 million goes into public affairs, which reaches American audiences." That last one may be the most amazing figure of 'em all. Because getting a straightforward answer out of most military public affairs shops is still a root-canal-painful procedure. You'd think it'd be easier, with all those resources brought to bear.
blackwater's new business: training pro athletes from danger room: Blackwater Worldwide's core business - diplomat protection - is in trouble. The mercenary firm is getting kicked out of Iraq, and their actions in Afghanistan are now under investigation by the State Department's Inspector General. Which is why Blackwater is diversifying, fast. The company's latest offering: Firearms and self-defense classes for pro athletes. "The first weekend class at the company's compound in North Carolina is set for April, about six months after New York Giants receiver Plaxico Burress (pictured) shot himself in the thigh inside a nightclub," the AP notes. "No athletes have signed up yet for the weekend course, which the company only began advertising this week." In some ways, it's a return to Blackwater's roots. The firm got its start "providing such training, and last year, some 25,000 people - civilians, law enforcement and military - attended its classes," the AP adds. But Blackwater isn't simply going old school. Firm CEO Erik Prince has put together teams of spies-for-hire. The company is pushing ahead with plans to protect commercial ships, traveling through pirate-packed seas. And in case that doesn't work out, Blackwater is making custom rifles, marketing spy blimps, assembling a fleet of light attack aicraft, and billing itself as experts in everything from cargo handling to dog training to construction management. But many athletes - especially NFL players - feel these days like they have to take drastic measures, to protect themselves. Which makes me think a few of them might like the idea of being trained by the world's most notorious mercenary outfit.
house approves whitelist of people who aren't terrorists from threat level: The House overwhelmingly adopted legislation this week mandating the creation of a new kind of terrorist watchlist: a database of people who aren't terrorists, but are routinely flagged at airports anyway. The U.S. government maintains a list of about a million names of suspected terrorists that is crosschecked with passenger names ahead of airline boarding. The list has been dogged for years by sloppy name matches that have ensnared innocent travelers, children, prominent politicians and government officials, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' secretary of education and all men named David Nelson. Under the new plan, approved late Tuesday 413-3, innocent victims of the terrorist watchlist must prove to the Department of Homeland Security, through an undetermined appeals process, that they are not terrorists. They would then get their names put on what the legislation calls the "Comprehensive Cleared List." The legislation is another attempt to assist wrongly flagged passengers and would supersede the troubled DHS Traveler Redress Inquiry Program, which has been criticized for being slow or unresponsive to flier complaints. The FAST Redress Act, if approved by the Senate, requires the government to report within 240 days on its progress in implementing the new list.
govt to take over airline passenger vetting from washington post: The Department of Homeland Security will take over responsibility for checking airline passenger names against government watch lists beginning in January, and will require travelers for the first time to provide their full name, birth date and gender as a condition for boarding commercial flights, U.S. officials said Wednesday. Security officials say the additional personal information - which will be given to airlines to forward to the federal agency in charge - will dramatically cut down on cases of mistaken identity, in which people with names similar to those on watch lists are wrongly barred or delayed from flights. The changes, to be phased in next year, will apply to 2 million daily passengers aboard all domestic flights and international flights to, from or over the United States. By transferring the screening duty from the airlines to the federal government, the Secure Flight program marks the Bush administration's long-delayed fulfillment of a top aviation security priority after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and Transportation Security Administration (TSA) chief Kip Hawley said yesterday that, except in rare situations, passengers who do not provide the additional information will not be given boarding passes. "If you don't provide the data, then you are going to put yourself in a position where you are probably going to be a selectee," subject at a minimum to greater future security scrutiny, Chertoff said in remarks announcing the program at Reagan National Airport.
feds to take over airline watchlists in '09 from threat level: Under the so-called "Secure Flight" proposal - which has been six years and numerous privacy scandals in the making - airlines will submit travelers' personal information to DHS, which will compare the information against terrorist watch lists and then send the results to the airlines. Previously, airlines have performed the screening autonomously. The government hopes that a centralized checking system will reduce the number of false matches on the list, which have notoriously included senators, nuns and anyone named David Nelson. "Secure Flight is a critical tool that will further improve aviation security and fix the major customer service issue of watch list misidentifications, a frustratingly common occurrence for travelers under the existing airline-based system," said homeland security secretary Michael Chertoff in a press release. Privacy groups gave the program a lukewarm welcome, acknowledging they largely won a five-year battle to scale back the program's ambitions. "What remains to be seen is whether the revisions to Secure Flight will really work," said ACLU legislative counsel Tim Sparapani.
from raw replay: CNN’s Drew Griffin reports that an author who was critical of Bush is on the TSA’s terror watch list. Jim Moore is the author of several books including “Bush’s war for re-election,” “Bush’s Brain,” and “The Architect.” This video is from CNN’s American Morning, broadcast August 14, 2008.
from raw replay: Caroline Fredrickson, director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office spoke at the National Press Club about the need to reform the government’s terrorist watch list. The watch list now contains one million names based on the government’s own reported numbers. The ACLU says that the watch list could effect up to 5-10% of the U.S. population.
“Members of Congress, nuns, war heroes and other ’suspicious characters,’ with names like Robert Johnson and Gary Smith, have become trapped in the Kafkaesque clutches of this list, with little hope of escape,” said Fredrickson. “Congress needs to fix it, the Terrorist Screening Center needs to fix it, or the next president needs to fix it, but it has to be done soon.”
The ACLU announced the creation of an online form where victims of the terrorist watch list can tell their stories. The ACLU plans to use victims’ stories to advance their efforts to reform the watch list. The ACLU has more details here.
update: cnn reporter wants off terror watch list from raw replay: CNN’s Drew Griffin says that he found himself on the terror watch list after a report criticizing the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). The TSA responded that any implication that the Griffin is being retaliated against for his reporting is “fabricated.” This video is from CNN’s American Morning, broadcast July 16, 2008.
from abc: A terrorist watch list compiled by the FBI has apparently swelled to include more than half a million names.
Privacy and civil liberties advocates say the list is growing uncontrollably, threatening its usefulness in the war on terror. The bureau says the number of names on its terrorist watch list is classified.
A spokesman for the interagency National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), which maintains the government's list of all suspected terrorists with links to international organizations, said they had 465,000 names covering 350,000 individuals. Many names are different versions of the same identity -- "Usama bin Laden" and "Osama bin Laden" for the al Qaeda chief, for example.
In addition to the NCTC list, the FBI keeps a list of U.S. persons who are believed to be domestic terrorists -- abortion clinic bombers, for example, or firebombing environmental extremists, who have no known tie to an international terrorist group.
Combined, the NCTC and FBI compendia comprise the watch list used by federal security screening personnel on the lookout for terrorists.
While the NCTC has made no secret of its terrorist tally, the FBI has consistently declined to tell the public how many names are on its list. Because the number is classified, an FBI spokesman told the Blotter on ABCNews.com, he was unable to comment for this story.
"It grows seemingly without control or limitation," said ACLU senior legislative counsel Tim Sparapani of the terrorism watch list. Sparapani called the 509,000 figure "stunning."
"If we have 509,000 names on that list, the watch list is virtually useless," he told ABC News. "You'll be capturing innocent individuals with no connection to crime or terror."
U.S. lawmakers and their spouses have been detained because their names were on the watch list. Reporters who have reviewed versions of the list found it included the names of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, at the time he was alive but in custody in Iraq; imprisoned al Qaeda plotter Zacarias Moussaoui; and 14 of the 19 Sept. 11, 2001 hijackers, all of whom perished in the attacks.
"There's a reason the FBI has a '10 Most Wanted' list, right? We need to focus the government's efforts on the greatest threats. When the watch list grows to this level, it's useless as an anti-terror tool," Sparapani said.
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from channel4: The #OccupyWallStreet campaign said police confined a small number of protesters before spraying them with mace. Clips of the alleged incident have appeared across social media – however, Channel 4 News cannot verify the footage independently. The New York Police Department has so far not responded to a Channel 4 News request for its response to the allegations. Protesters say they want to show their anger at, among other things, corporate greed and social inequality. So far, it is reported more than 100 people have been arrested... Police tactics have been compared to those used during the 2004 Republican convention when the NYPD made sweeping arrests of several hundred demonstrators before dropping charges against almost all of them... The alleged mace incident is the latest clash between campaigners and police since the occupation began on 17 September. Over the past few days, police barricades have prevented protesters from reaching the United Nations where the general assembly has been meeting. 
