Tag Archives: Michael Hayden

Civil Liberties, Featured, Government Accountability, Privacy

Former NSA Director Says ‘Golden Age Of Electronic Surveillance’ Is Coming To An End, NSA Numbers Show He’s Wrong

May 31, 2018 TIMP Staff Leave a comment

(DCNF) Former National Security Agency and Central Intelligence Agency director Michael Hayden said in a podcast on Monday that the “golden age of electronic surveillance” is coming to an end, despite reports that indicate the opposite is true.

“Now we might be actually seeing another shift,” Hayden said on the podcast “Recode Decode,” citing the Christopher Steele dossier, adding that the new era will include “all human-sourced” information.

The NSA tripled its collection of American phone calls in 2017, going from 383 million records in 2016 to 534 million records in 2017, according to a U.S. intelligence agency report published on May 4. (RELATED: NSA Tripled The Amount Of Surveillance It Conducted In 2017)

Hayden, who was appointed Director of the NSA by both former presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, made clear he was talking about “legitimate targets, and legitimate targeting,” implicitly trying to distant himself from the NSA’s collection of U.S. citizens’ data. “But it was the golden age of that,” he added.

But U.S. agencies also spied on more non-U.S. citizens living abroad in 2017 than in 2016, according to the same report. U.S. authorities spied on more than 129,000 non-U.S. citizens living abroad in 2017, which was 22,000 more than the previous year. The surveillance of foreigners increased about 45 percent in the past five years.

The U.S. government is not the only entity that conducts electronic surveillance — tech giants have come under fire recently for their role in collecting users’ data. Companies like Google, Facebook, Twitter and Amazon have all been scrutinized for either collecting phone calls, messages or even listening to conversations.

A Portland, Ore., family discovered their Amazon Echo listened, recorded and sent a private conversation to a person on their contacts list. Amazon said in a statement to The Daily Caller News Foundation on May 25 that the device allegedly “woke up due to a word in background conversation sounding like (the wake-up word) ‘Alexa.’ Then, the subsequent conversation was heard as a ‘send message’ request. At which point, Alexa said out loud ‘To whom?’ At which point, the background conversation was interpreted as a name in the customer’s contact list.”

Election, Featured, Foreign Policy, Hot

Trump Calls for Laws Allowing Expansion of Torture ‘To Beat ISIS’

Mar 7, 2016 Rachel Blevins Leave a comment

After he was criticized for claiming that he could force the United States military to break the current law banning torture methods like waterboarding, Donald Trump backtracked his comments and said instead that he would like to change the laws to include waterboarding “at a minimum.”

Trump has been vocal in the past regarding the issue of how to deal with suspected terrorists, and in December he said that not only should the U.S. target terrorists, but also their families.

“The other thing with the terrorists is you have to take out their families, when you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families,” Trump said. “They care about their lives, don’t kid yourself. When they say they don’t care about their lives, you have to take out their families.”

Trump has also voiced support for bringing back waterboarding. In November, he said, “I think waterboarding is peanuts compared to what they do to us.”

When asked about his stance on waterboarding at a GOP debate in February, Trump said he would “bring back a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding,” because in the Middle East, “we have people chopping the heads off Christians, we have people chopping the heads off many other people.”

In response to Trump’s comments, former NSA and CIA Director Michael Hayden said that Trump’s plans to target the families of terrorists, and to bring back “enhanced interrogation techniques” that are “worse than waterboarding,” would result in the American armed forces refusing to act.

“[U.S. military personnel] are not required — in fact you are required not to follow an unlawful order,” Hayden said. “That would be in violation of all the international laws of armed conflict.”

During a GOP debate Thursday, Fox News Host Bret Baier asked Trump what he would do if the military “refused to carry out” his orders.

“They won’t refuse,” Trump replied. “They’re not going to refuse me. Believe me.”

“But they’re illegal,” Baier said.

Trump said he wants to bring back waterboarding because members of ISIS are “chopping off the heads of Christians” and “drowning people in steel cages.” He also said he justifies targeting the families of terrorists, because in the case of the terrorists hijacking airplanes on 9/11, their families “knew what was happening.”

When Baier questioned Trump’s suggestion to “target” the families of terrorists, Trump responded, “I’m a leader. I’m a leader. I’ve always been a leader. I’ve never had any problem leading people. If I say do it, they’re going to do it. That’s what leadership is all about.”

Trump then released a statement to The Wall Street Journal on Friday claiming that he “will not order our military or other officials to violate those laws.”

[pull_quote_center]I will use every legal power that I have to stop these terrorist enemies. I do, however, understand that the United States is bound by laws and treaties and I will not order our military or other officials to violate those laws and will seek their advice on such matters. I will not order a military officer to disobey the law. It is clear that as president I will be bound by laws just like all Americans and I will meet those responsibilities.[/pull_quote_center]

On an appearance on CBS’ Face the Nation, which aired Sunday, host John Dickerson asked Trump what made him change his position on the issue.

Trump claimed he wasn’t asked about “violating laws,” and said that because the U.S. has “an enemy that doesn’t play by the laws,” that enemy is “laughing at us right now.”

“I would like to strengthen the laws so that we can better compete,” Trump said. “It’s very tough to beat enemies that don’t have any restrictions, all right? We have these massive restrictions.”

Dickerson questioned how Trump would go about expanding the law, and Trump said he wants waterboarding to be allowed “at a minimum.”

“I happen to think that when you’re fighting an enemy that chops off heads, I happen to think that we should use something that is stronger than we have right now,” Trump said. “Right now, basically water-boarding is essentially not allowed, as I understand it.”

When asked why waterboarding has been banned, Trump said he believes it is because the U.S. is weak. “I think we have become very weak and ineffective,” he explained. “I think that’s why we’re not beating ISIS. It’s that mentality.”

[pull_quote_center]I think we’re weak. We cannot beat ISIS. We should beat ISIS very quickly. General Patton would have had ISIS down in about three days. General Douglas MacArthur — we are playing by a different set of rules. We are — let me just put it differently. When the ISIS people chop off the heads, and then they go back to their homes and they talk, and they hear we’re talking about water-boarding like it’s the worst thing in the world, and they just drowned a hundred people and chopped off 50 heads, they must think we are a little bit on the weak side.[/pull_quote_center]

Trump claimed that he wants to bring back waterboarding because while the U.S. is “playing by rules,” ISIS has no rules.

Dickerson questioned whether the current rules were what “separates us from the savages.”

Trump insisted that “we have to beat the savages,” and he said that could only be done if the U.S. will “play the game the way they’re playing the game.”

[pull_quote_center]Look, you have to play the game the way they’re playing the game. You’re not going to win if we are soft, and they are — they have no rules. Now, I want to stay within the laws. I want to do all of that. But I think we have to increase the laws, because the laws are not working, obviously. All you have to do is take a look what is going on. And they’re getting worse. They’re chopping, chopping, chopping, and we’re worried about waterboarding. I think our priorities are mixed up.[/pull_quote_center]

For more election coverage, click here.

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Election, Featured, Politics

Ex-CIA Chief: ‘American Armed Forces Would Refuse to Act’ If Trump Ordered Torture

Video Mar 1, 2016 Barry Donegan Leave a comment

“I would be incredibly concerned if a President Trump governed in a way that was consistent with the language [on military tactics] that candidate Trump expressed during the campaign,” said former National Security Agency and Central Intelligence Agency director Michael Hayden.

In the above-embedded clip from Friday’s episode of Real Time with Bill Maher, Hayden specifically pointed to Trump’s advocacy of the use of enhanced interrogation techniques that he described as “worse than waterboarding” and the killing of terror suspect’s families as examples of policies that would violate international norms and drive American soldiers and intelligence agents to refuse orders.

“Look, we did tough stuff,” said Hayden. However, he said that extremes like killing terrorists’ non-combatant family members were not options that even crossed his mind as an intelligence chief.

“If he were to order that once in government, the American armed forces would refuse to act,” he said.

Hayden concluded, “[U.S. military personnel] are not required — in fact you are required not to follow an unlawful order. That would be in violation of all the international laws of armed conflict.”

In an interview with CNN, Hayden said of Trump’s military tactics rhetoric and Ted Cruz’s advocacy of carpet bombing to deal with ISIS, “We have taken … very complicated, serious issues and we’ve pushed them down to the level of bumper stickers. That scares me and I’m sure it scares a lot of the rest of the world.”

Ex-CIA attorney John Rizzo said that intelligence agents who participated in enhanced interrogation techniques have turned against using them after feeling the backlash of a shift in public opinion.

Rizzo told NBC News, “The political winds changed, they were vilified as ‘torturers’ and ‘war criminals,’ — just for doing their thankless and dangerous jobs to keep the country safe. And now, under a Trump administration, many of these same CIA career officers would be ordered to go down — perhaps double down — on that perilous path again? Who could blame for them for refusing to expose themselves and their families to a reprise someday of the ordeal they have had to endure? I hope and trust no CIA director — or its lawyer — would countenance such an order.”

For more 2016 election coverage, click here.

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Civil Liberties, Election, Featured, Privacy

Carly Fiorina Defends CIA Torture, Handed HP Servers To NSA

Sep 29, 2015 Rachel Blevins Leave a comment

GOP presidential candidate and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina defended the torture tactics used by the CIA in the aftermath of 9/11, and revealed her direct involvement in aiding the NSA’s bulk collection of Americans’ data.

In an interview with Yahoo News published on Monday, Fiorina insisted that the methods of torture used by the CIA to attempt to extract information from suspected Al-Qaeda operatives after 9/11, such as waterboarding, helped “keep our nation safe.”

“I believe that all of the evidence is very clear — that waterboarding was used in a very small handful of cases [and] was supervised by medical personnel in every one of those cases,” Fiorina said. “And I also believe that waterboarding was used when there was no other way to get information that was necessary.”

A heavily redacted summary of the Senate report on the torture methods, or “enhanced interrogation tactics,” was released in December 2014, and found that the program was abused and mishandled by the CIA.

The report claimed that the CIA misled government officials on the level of brutality being used in its torture program, and the effectiveness of the techniques used.

Fiorina also said that she had received a phone call from former NSA director Michael Hayden shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, asking her to “quickly provide his agency with HP computer servers for expanded surveillance.”

Hayden told Yahoo News that he used the HP servers to implement Stellar Wind, “the controversial warrantless wiretapping program, including the bulk collection of American citizens’ phone records and emails, that had been secretly ordered by the Bush White House.”

“I felt it was my duty to help, and so we did,” said Fiorina, confirming that she redirected a truck of HP servers from retail stores to the NSA’s headquarters.

“They were ramping up a whole set of programs and needed a lot of data crunching capability to try and monitor a whole set of threats,” Fiorina said. “What I knew at the time was our nation had been attacked.”

Fiorina also said that she has advised the NSA and the CIA to be “transparent as possible about as much as possible,” and that while she supports checks and balances, she is “not aware of circumstances” in which NSA surveillance “went too far” in its collection of Americans’ data.

Fiorina noted that she had once made a recommendation that former CIA Counterterrorism Center chief Jose Rodriguez, who was subjected to a criminal investigation after directing the destruction of videotapes showing waterboarding of detainees, should become a spokesman for the CIA. According to Yahoo News, Rodriguez was “very impressed with her then — and now.”

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Judge Napolitano Debates Michael Hayden on Privacy vs Security

Video Mar 2, 2015 TIMP Staff 6 Comments

During CPAC 2015 Judge Andrew Napolitano debates former NSA director Michael Hayden on the topic of privacy versus security.

Politics, US

VIDEO: Former NSA Director Heckled for Calling Himself a “Libertarian”

Video Feb 27, 2015 Rachel Blevins 25 Comments

Gen. Michael Hayden, former Director of the National Security Agency, was called out on Friday by audience members, after he called himself a “libertarian” at the 2015 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).

Hayden attended the conference for a debate with Judge Andrew Napolitano, the Senior Judicial Analyst for Fox News. Hayden’s comments followed comments by Napolitano saying that the audience should be “outraged” by the NSA’s massive surveillance program.

In reply, Hayden said, “If NSA were even capable of doing what the judge has just outlined for you, we wouldn’t be having a debate here today. There would be nothing to argue about.”

Hayden continued, “Let’s talk about reality. Let’s talk about facts. The judge is an unrelenting libertarian.”

Hayden’s comment about Napolitano was met with applause and cheers from the crowd.

“So am I,” Hayden said. “I’m an unrelenting libertarian who’s also responsible for four decades of his life for another important part of that document, the part that says ‘provide for the common defense.’”

The tone of the audience quickly changed, following Hayden’s second comment, and members booed, and shouted out,”No, you’re not!“

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