If only they could get the press to stop using communication means they can't track

Aug 23, 2013 14:43 GMT  ·  By
The NSA would very much like it if journalists would stop traveling to contact sources and would just use email
   The NSA would very much like it if journalists would stop traveling to contact sources and would just use email

The general idea that the detainment of David Miranda and the destruction of the Guardian hard drives were simple efforts to intimidate the media had some people think journalists were starting to become paranoid.

However, that doesn’t seem to be the issue as even a former CIA agent believes this to be the case.

Barry Eisler, a Cornell Law School graduate, joined the CIA in 1989 and left it a few years later to pursue another career, namely to work as a technology lawyer and startup executive. Nowadays, he blogs and has written several novels and short stories.

In a blog post, Eisler took on the events that have gone into London at the beginning of the week – the detainment of David Miranda and the Guardian incident.

He goes to talk about the power the NSA has, including its ability to reach 75% of all Internet in the US and how all its surveillance programs give it great power to monitor anyone and everyone.

“Under these circumstances, if you were the NSA, and you learned -- say, by examining passenger manifests and customs data -- that Glenn Greenwald's spouse was traveling from the couple's home in Rio to Berlin, currently the home of Laura Poitras, Greenwald's collaborator on the blockbuster Snowden revelations, what would you do?” he asks.

Eisler comes up with a theory, stating that while no formal request would be made to the UK authorities to detain Miranda, since the NSA wants to maintain some obscurity regarding its involvement.

A simple tip via telephone could get the entire thing going and thus, a message is quickly sent to the media everywhere.

“The purpose was to demonstrate to journalists that what they thought was a secure secondary means of communication -- a courier, possibly to ferry encrypted thumb drives from one air-gapped computer to another -- can be compromised, and thereby to make the journalists' efforts harder and slower,” he says.

The former CIA agent states that under the current circumstances, the NSA might be quite annoyed they cannot spy on the emails and phone calls of those travelling to get into contact with Snowden or his associates since they decide instead to fly, rather than use traceable communication means.