Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1999 20:20:32 +1000
Subject: AUT: Fw: Interception of communicaton


----- Original Message -----
From: JUSTICE ACTION <JA-AT-justiceaction.org.au>
To: Justice Action <JA-AT-justiceaction.org.au>
Sent: Tuesday, 1 June 1999 11:37
Subject: Interception of communicaton


>
> Dear Friends,
>
> Below is info on privacy and an offer from a very competent computer
company
> to assist in defence.
>
> Brett
>
> ----------
> >From: "Igor de Oliveira Couto" <info-AT-pixelmedia.com.au>
> >To: info-AT-pixelmedia.com.au
> >Subject: Government-sanctioned intrusion
> >Date: Tue, 1 Jun 1999 6:45 PM
> >
>
> > Dear Clients and Friends,
> >
> > Last Sunday, a 'small' public announcement was made, and a rather light
> > article published in The Melbourne Age, about a
communications-interception
> > system which has been in place in Australia, New Zealand, USA and UK
since
> > 1948. This system monitors ALL fax, telephone, and e-mail communications
> > throughout Australia, South-East Asia and the world, 'scanning' the
> > communications periodically for information that might be useful to the
> > powers that be.
> >
> > The implications of this are absolutely phenomenal - it affects all of
us,
> > our businesses, our national economy, our safety. I ask you to please
spend
> > 10 minutes of your time reading Duncan Campbell's article, which is
> > available in full, on-line, at:
> >
> > http://www.theage.com.au/daily/990523/news/news3.html
>
> REPRODUCED BELOW
>
> > Please pass on this message to other friends and acquaintances, in order
for
> > the population at large to realise the implication of this 'small
> > announcement'.
> >
> > If you are concerned about the privacy of your personal and business
> > communications, I also advise you have a quick look at:
> >
> > http://www.pgpi.com/
> >
> > While there are NO encryption programs that are absolutely safe against
> > systematic hacking and dedicated code-breaking, they do make it harder
for
> > automated systems such as 'Echeleon' to detect your information, and
help
> > you retain your privacy.
> >
> > PGP is one of the best ones around, it is extremely easy to install and
use,
> > and it is absolutely FREE. Should you have any concerns or questions
about
> > implementing it into your workflow, please feel free to give me a call!
> >
> > If you would like to receive the Pixel Media PGP key, please drop me a
line.
> >
> >
> > Kind Regards,
> >
> >
> >
> > Igor de Oliveira Couto
> > --
> > Pixel Media Pty ltd
> > P. O. Box 4545
> > North Rocks NSW 2151
> > Australia
> > info-AT-pixelmedia.com.au
> > ph:(61 2) 9872 7022
> > fx:(61 2) 9872 7033
>
> Careful, they might hear you
>
> By DUNCAN CAMPBELL
> Australia has become the first country openly to admit that it takes part
in
> a global electronic surveillance system that intercepts the private and
> commercial international communications of citizens and companies from its
> own and other countries. The disclosure is made today in Channel 9's
Sunday
> program by Martin Brady, director of the Defence Signals Directorate in
> Canberra.
> Mr Brady's decision to break ranks and officially admit the existence of a
> hitherto unacknowledged spying organisation called UKUSA is likely to
> irritate his British and American counterparts, who have spent the past 50
> years trying to prevent their own citizens from learning anything about
them
> or their business of ``signals intelligence'' - ``sigint'' for short.
> In his letter to Channel 9 published today, Mr Brady states that the
Defence
> Signals Directorate (DSD) ``does cooperate with counterpart signals
> intelligence organisations overseas under the UKUSA relationship".
> In other statements which have now been made publicly available on the
> Internet (www.dsd.gov.au), he also says that DSD's purpose ``is to support
> Australian Government decision-makers and the Australian Defence Force
with
> high-quality foreign signals intelligence products and services. DSD
> (provides) important information that is not available from open sources".
> Together with the giant American National Security Agency (NSA) and its
> Canadian, British, and New Zealand counterparts, DSD operates a network of
> giant, highly automated tracking stations that illicitly pick up
commercial
> satellite communications and examine every fax, telex, e-mail, phone call,
> or computer data message that the satellites carry.
> The five signals intelligence agencies form the UKUSA pact. They are bound
> together by a secret agreement signed in 1947 or 1948. Although its
precise
> terms have never been revealed, the UKUSA agreement provides for sharing
> facilities, staff, methods, tasks and product between the participating
> governments.
> Now, due to a fast-growing UKUSA system called Echelon, millions of
messages
> are automatically intercepted every hour, and checked according to
criteria
> supplied by intelligence agencies and governments in all five UKUSA
> countries. The intercepted signals are passed through a computer system
> called the Dictionary, which checks each new message or call against
> thousands of ``collection'' requirements. The Dictionaries then send the
> messages into the spy agencies' equivalent of the Internet, making them
> accessible all over the world.
> Australia's main contribution to this system is an ultra-modern
intelligence
> base at Kojarena, near Geraldton in Western Australia. The station was
built
> in the early 1990s. At Kojarena, four satellite tracking dishes intercept
> Indian and Pacific Ocean communications satellites. The exact target of
each
> dish is concealed by placing them inside golfball like ``radomes''.
> About 80 per cent of the messages intercepted at Kojarena are sent
> automatically from its Dictionary computer to the CIA or the NSA, without
> ever being seen or read in Australia. Although it is under Australian
> command, the station - like its controversial counterpart at Pine Gap -
> employs American and British staff in key posts.
> Among the ``collection requirements" that the Kojarena Dictionary is told
to
> look for are North Korean economic, diplomatic and military messages and
> data, Japanese trade ministry plans, and Pakistani developments in nuclear
> weapons technology and testing. In return, Australia can ask for
information
> collected at other Echelon stations to be sent to Canberra.
> A second and larger, although not so technologically sophisticated DSD
> satellite station, has been built at Shoal Bay, Northern Territory. At
Shoal
> Bay, nine satellite tracking dishes are locked into regional
communications
> satellites, including systems covering Indonesia and south-west Asia.
> International and governmental concern about the UKUSA Echelon system has
> grown dramatically since 1996, when New Zealand writer Nicky Hager
revealed
> intimate details of how it operated. New Zealand runs an Echelon satellite
> interception site at Waihopai, near Blenheim, South Island. Codenamed
> ``Flintlock", the Waihopai station is half the size of Kojarena and its
> sister NSA base at Yakima, Washington, which also covers Pacific rim
states.
> Waihopai's task is to monitor two Pacific communications satellites, and
> intercept all communications from and between the South Pacific islands.
> Like other Echelon stations, the Waihopai installation is protected by
> electrified fences, intruder detectors and infra-red cameras. A year after
> publishing his book, Hager and New Zealand TV reporter John Campbell
mounted
> a daring raid on Waihopai, carrying a TV camera and a stepladder. From
open,
> high windows, they then filmed into and inside its operations centre.
> They were astonished to see that it operated completely automatically.
> Although Australia's DSD does not use the term ``Echelon'', Government
> sources have confirmed to Channel 9 that Hager's description of the system
> is correct, and that the Australia's Dictionary computer at Kojarena works
> in the same way as the one in New Zealand.
> Until this year, the US Government has tried to ignore the row over
Echelon
> by refusing to admit its existence. The Australian disclosures today make
> this position untenable. US intelligence writer Dr Jeff Richelson has also
> obtained documents under the US Freedom of Information Act, showing that a
> US Navy-run satellite receiving station at Sugar Grove, West Virginia, is
an
> Echelon site, and that it collects intelligence from civilian satellites.
> The station, south-west of Washington, lies in a remote area of the
> Shenandoah Mountains. According to the released US documents, the
station's
> job is ``to maintain and operate an Echelon site''. Other Echelon stations
> are at Sabana Seca, Puerto Rico, Leitrim, Canada and at Morwenstow and
> London in Britain.
> Information is also fed into the Echelon system from taps on the Internet,
> and by means of monitoring pods which are placed on undersea cables. Since
> 1971, the US has used specially converted nuclear submarines to attach
> tapping pods to deep underwater cables around the world.
> The Australian Government's decision to be open about the UKUSA pact and
the
> Echelon spy system has been motivated partly by the need to respond to the
> growing international concern about economic intelligence gathering, and
> partly by DSD's desire to reassure Australians that its domestic spying
> activity is strictly limited and tightly supervised.
> According to DSD director Martin Brady, ``to ensure that (our) activities
do
> not impinge on the privacy of Australians, DSD operates under a detailed
> classified directive approved by Cabinet and known as the Rules on Sigint
> and Australian Persons".
> Compliance with this Cabinet directive is monitored by the
inspector-general
> of security and intelligence, Mr Bill Blick. He says that ``Australian
> citizens can complain to my office about the actions of DSD. And if they
do
> so then I have the right to conduct an inquiry."
> But the Cabinet has ruled that Australians' international calls, faxes or
> e-mails can be monitored by NSA or DSD in specified circumstances. These
> include ``the commission of a serious criminal offence; a threat to the
life
> or safety of an Australian; or where an Australian is acting as the agent
of
> a foreign power". Mr Brady says that he must be given specific approval in
> every case. But deliberate interception of domestic calls in Australia
> should be left to the police or ASIO.
> Mr Brady claims that other UKUSA nations have to follow Australia's lead,
> and not record their communications unless Australia has decided that this
> is required. ``Both DSD and its counterparts operate internal procedures
to
> satisfy themselves that their national interests and policies are
respected
> by the others," he says.
> So if NSA happens to intercept a message from an Australian citizen or
> company whom DSD has decided to leave alone, they are supposed to strike
out
> the name and insert ``Australian national'' or ``Australian corporation''
> instead. Or they must destroy the intercept.
> That's the theory, but specialists differ. According to Mr Hager, junior
> members of UKUSA just can't say ``no''. ``... When you're a junior ally
like
> Australia or New Zealand, you never refuse what they ask for.''
> There are also worries about what allies might get up to with information
> that Australia gives them. When Britain was trying to see through its
highly
> controversial deal to sell Hawk fighters and other arms to Indonesia,
staff
> at the Office of National Assessments feared that the British would pass
DSD
> intelligence on East Timor to President Soeharto in order to win the
> lucrative contract.
> The Australian Government does not deny that DSD and its UKUSA partners
are
> told to collect economic and commercial intelligence. Australia, like the
> US, thinks this is especially justified if other countries or their
> exporters are perceived to be behaving unfairly. Britain recognises no
> restraint on economic intelligence gathering. Neither does France.
> According to the former Canadian agent Mike Frost, it would be ``nave" for
> Australians to think that the Americans were not exploiting stations like
> Kojarena for economic intelligence purposes. ``They have been doing it for
> years," he says. ``Now that the Cold War is over, the focus is towards
> economic intelligence. Never ever over-exaggerate the power that these
> organisations have to abuse a system such as Echelon. Don't think it can't
> happen in Australia. It does.''




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