ECHELON The Real Threat To Our Privacy!

No offense, but as state earlier this is old news.

Echelon is quite old, as you stated. It's technology is antiquated as compared to todays intelligence gathering capabilities. Further, Echelon's purpose is SIGINT (Signals Intelligence), only one of many realms of intelligence gathering. Here's a small snippet of the different Intelligence gathering domains.

HUMINT - Human Intelligence
GEOINT - Geospatial Intelligence
MASINT - Measurement and Signature Intelligence
OSINT - Open Source Intelligence
SIGINT - Signals Intelligence
TECHINT - Technical Intelligence
CYBINT - Cyberspace Intelligence
FININT - Financial Intelligence


Echelon only covered ONE of those domains, and a very limited one at that. Meaning, it could only intercept signals over the air. AFAIK it was a by product that some phone calls, which may or may not have been transmitted over satellite or microwave technologies that may have been intercepted by Echelon. Phone calls that were carried by trunk lines could not be intercept by Echelon, unless the carrier specifically installed a device on their trunk systems that intercepted them. Case in point by the infamous AT&T Room 641A.

PRISM, on the other hand, draws intelligence from a number of sources, albeit all still considered Signals Intelligence. Plus, there were a number of other systems released that we have only heard a snippet about...I'm sure we'll learn more as the Guardian continues to release more information.

Point being is that Echelon is old technology - and since the NSA relies on 'high technology' in order to spy on anybody they must be, by the very nature of their business, using the latest and greatest technology.
Echelon is not the latest and greatest. PRISM is (that we know of).

reply to post by zeeon

Echelon is quite old, as you stated. It's technology is antiquated as compared to todays intelligence gathering capabilities. Further, Echelon's purpose is SIGINT (Signals Intelligence), only one of many realms of intelligence gathering. Here's a small snippet of the different Intelligence gathering domains.

people keep making this point but its mute point.

ECHELON is not the technology, ECHELON is the name give to the system were by 5 states all contribute to a vast SIGINT network that sucks up our telecommunications and agree to spy on the citizens of each others home states to circumvent domestic spying laws that prohibit such behavior. They suck it all up and pass it through computers to scan for key words

PRISM could actually be a part of ECHELON however that is still speculation.

Don't mess up the cards, OP...

Prism is PART of Echelon, not separate!

I hate it when posters here are dividing issues as is they were completely unrelated, or whatever... this is a mind game that is not very clever.

Originally posted by Echtelion
Don't mess up the cards, OP...

Prism is PART of Echelon, not separate!

I hate it when posters here are dividing issues as is they were completely unrelated, or whatever... this is a mind game that is not very clever.

Read the post above yours!

I am quite clear that I think there is very strong grounds to argue that PRISM is just another part of PRISM

This thread is looking at the bigger picture behind PRISM which includes ECHELON

I am not messing up the cards or trying to divide the issue.

I hate it when posters don't read before they post.....

Originally posted by butcherguy
I am patiently waiting to see what further stories the Guardian comes out with (as they have promised) with the information that Snowden gave them.

(puts on swami hat) The Guardian will throw him under the bus this week. You'll discover that he's not the Duke of Data, nor is he exactly sans peur et sans reproche. It's a combo of a blow and a snowjob.

You're going to discover that PRISM is a data management tool for cataloging what data they have, where it's at and how they got it, more than it is a tool for snooping (which is mostly under the program you know as Echelon - which is what a lot of the community still call it). And you're going to scratch your head. Who's telling the truth? And you'll walk away puzzled.

Heads will roll, jobs will change, security mandates will be handed out, there will be a great disturbance in the Force and many will end up polygraphed.

Originally posted by OtherSideOfTheCoin

Originally posted by Echtelion
Don't mess up the cards, OP...

Prism is PART of Echelon, not separate!

I hate it when posters here are dividing issues as is they were completely unrelated, or whatever... this is a mind game that is not very clever.

Read the post above yours!

I am quite clear that I think there is very strong grounds to argue that PRISM is just another part of PRISM

This thread is looking at the bigger picture behind PRISM which includes ECHELON

I am not messing up the cards or trying to divide the issue.

I hate it when posters don't read before they post.....

edit on 12-6-2013 by OtherSideOfTheCoin because: (no reason given)

I guess reading comprehension doesn't exist on this board, and it's acceptable to mock other posters who make a legitimate point.

As I stated before, the NSA's own description says they use "high technology" (as apposed to low technology, which is what Echeleon is). There is no proof that Echelon is part of PRISM or vice versa. That is purely speculation.

Furthermore, your own OP admits that Echelon uses antiquated interception technology, along with antiquated "key word" detection algorithms that (obviously if one thinks about it for just a second) become exponentially more difficult to interpret, analyze and take action on as the input of data increases (more people, more connectivity, more data = less accuracy = less usefulness = old and outdated).

What bothers me about this thread, is mainly your title. Despite all logical and rational thought (and evidence provided by others), you are trying to make a case that Echelon is a bigger threat to our privacy than systems like PRISM.

In my personal opinion it's misleading, as if the point is to detract from the PRISM discussion, or just an attempt to obtain stars and flags.

reply to post by zeeon

As I stated before, the NSA's own description says they use "high technology" (as apposed to low technology, which is what Echeleon is).

like is have said before, ECHELON is not a technological entity it is the name given the a SIGINT agreement and part of that does include 5 core states collecting information collectively and analyzing it.

If you go though the history of ECHELON which as been about since the 1960's its quite clear that it's methods for gathering data evolve as technology moves on.

There is no proof that Echelon is part of PRISM or vice versa. That is purely speculation.

totally agree!

it is total speculation to suggest that PRISM is part of ECHELON

you are trying to make a case that Echelon is a bigger threat to our privacy than systems like PRISM

yes and i would stand by this but i suppose it comes down to ones personal opinion I think that 5 countries all working together to suck up so much SIGINT and spy on their own citizens and everyone else is pretty big.

But then again so is a whole bunch of private corporations handing over costumer data to intelligence agencies who can look at our phone conversations.

In my personal opinion it's misleading, as if the point is to detract from the PRISM discussion, or just an attempt to obtain stars and flags.

no the point is not to distract from PRISM, the point was to raise another aspect of this type of espionage to look at something other than PRISM but just as important (in my view more important). I was seeing loads of people on threads talking about PRISM like some huge disclosure that proved "Big Brother" had been watching us all along, when really that wasn't news, in very few of the discussion did ECHELON seem to be being discussed. As ECHELON is something of a interest of mine i had a few hours to through together this thread and it is relevant to a current news story that is widely discussed on ATS. It was not to grab flags and stars.

ECHELON is the name of the Hardware Communication and Information Transfer System.

I think currently it is now at version 6 could be 7 .. so that would be ECHELON VI / VII.

PRISM is software ... it is probably a new version of PROMIS.

PROMIS was modified by MICHAEL RICONOSCIUTO.... check him out.

Alongside PRISM there is also BLARNEY and FAIRVIEW and also 2 others (Redacted) which probably relate to Satellite and Cell Net communications.

Check out NSA codeword TEMPEST ... EMSEC ..

Also check out Van Eck Phreaking and Walsh Functions.

The trouble with this system is that it won't just be used for catching Terrorist's ... no .. it has and will be abused for nefarious purposes .... Industrial Espionage/Blackmail/Extortion etc etc .. the Temptation for those in control of this Technology to use it for other purposes without oversight is too great for any sane person to believe it is an acceptable risk.

Until we get similar power to eavesdrop on our Politicians and Power brokers ....

Absolute power corrupts absolutely .. always has always will.

C..

While I've been aware of Echelon for years and I personally feel that it's important for people to be informed about it, the reason that PRISM is of equal importance is because it's receiving MSM coverage (somewhat).

Even if there are greater threats to liberty out there (which I believe there are), Snowden's disclosure is vital because it's giving the average person a look into what is going on in the world of clandestine surveillance practices. If a few individuals can see that the government is doing some shady things with PRISM because they saw it on the news, maybe they will look into things further and learn about Echelon and other unethical government practices and have their views shifted. The more vigilant citizens the better. Great thread!

Yeah I have known about the older Echelon system since it was busted by someone many years ago. Before 9/11 it was supposed to be used for international calls to the U.S. and only looked for calls to listen to when someone said a key word like Bomb, target, spy or stuff like that. The computers would then listen to that call and record it.

Knowing the NSA they probably did everything they were not supposed to do back then. By law they had to not listen when it was an American on the call but using other countries to do the same thing would give them an easy out.

It is nothing but a spying system as we all know they have not prevented one terror attack using any of these so called billion dollar systems.

reply to post by Patriotsrevenge

Yeah I have known about the older Echelon system since it was busted by someone many years ago. Before 9/11 it was supposed to be used for international calls to the U.S.

actually your half right, kind of, the whole point of ECHELON was so that GCHQ for example would spy on Americans and NSA would spy on us Brits so that they couldn't get accused of spying on their own citizens when they started sucking up all this data.

There's a small difference between ECHELON and PRISM in the way it functions according to the FISA law and process.

And, just to be clear, PRISM is just one of the ancestors of ECHELON. ECHELON was the original signals intelligence program, since then it has evolved and been joined with many other collection methods.

ECHELON tapped into telecom and used computers to monitor conversations for specific keywords. Now, the way this was supposed to work is that the NSA / CIA / DIA, etc were supposed to go to the FISA court, get warrants to monitor specific numbers and monitor them. Clearly, the capabilities of ECHELON were far in excess of this, rather than monitoring specific targets it was designed to monitor everything (which is exactly what they did with it). The new process became to use ECHELON keyword intercepts as the pointers for the numbers to get the FISA warrants for. At some point it even became acceptable to use the intercepts as justification for FISA warrants allowing full blown, black ops type monitoring of the kind seen in movies and TV where a team monitors someone 24/7.

The justification for this is that it's too easy to use mobile phones, disposable SIMs, payphones, etc so the old process of having to get warrants for each number to be monitored couldn't even keep up with your average crack dealer let alone a global network of terrorists.

The problem is that once it became acceptable to use in this manner it opened the door to wholesale collection of every type of communication. What good does wholesale telecom monitoring do when it's just as easy to use email, web chat, skype, VOIP, etc? The intelligence agencies use this to justify capabilities to monitor everything.

Where the lines get crossed is HOW they are doing it. Now, they just monitor everything, storing a certain amount of "history" on everything and more on targeted groups or individuals. If a computer goes through those emails, web chats and conversations and detects something of interest that's considered "OK" because a human did not perform the checks therefore no invasion of privacy occurred. (We call this a loop hole). Once the new NSA datacenter is fully online everyone will be stored for "x" number of weeks, months or years and when an ECHELON type detection is made on someone's phone calls / emails / web activity / etc that detection is used to get the FISA warrant and then the entire archive is open to human analysis as well as more intrusive computer analysis.

The issue is that as "fair" as this all sounds to government and the safety before liberty crowd it's still a complete and total violation of US and International law not to mention FISA itself. You cannot search everyone anywhere and at anytime in the hopes of catching the few bad people. (Even though it's becoming more and more common). But, that's what this system does, it basically wire taps everyone all the time without the legal standing to do so other than an executive order and executive legal finding to support it. This is why the ultimate responsibility for this sits in the President's office and why Obama stands to lose the most over it's exposure.

reply to post by ecoparity


hey dude thanks for that very interesting response

Looks like two legacy ECHELON sites may be closing down, Yakima WA and Sugar Grove WV

Victims of changing technology. Satellite intercept isn't what it once was, just too 1990's nowadays. Though Gov. Rockefeller is fighting to keep Sugar Grove open.

Looks like a possible mission shift to Buckley AFB CO, then of course there's the new Utah Data Center.

www.yakimaherald.com...

Here's a mission statement doc that specifically identifies Sugar Grove as an "ECHELON" site...

www.gwu.edu...

reply to post by OtherSideOfTheCoin


I came to some similar conclusions and it seems to me that Prism might be just another name for ECHELON which they presented for public relations purposes. Which raises some additional problems about the way they've been covering it. I noticed a later comment about a couple of people that think it is part of ECHELON and that is possible to but I think that the alternative media outlets and Edward Snowden himself should have known and reported on it; and they almost certainly would have if they were sincere. I went into more detail on this on my most recent string, Is Prism ECHELON by another name? with Roswell technology?, if you're interested.

reply to post by zacherystaylor


Thanks dude i will take a look, not so sure about the Roswell connection but i will take a look

Originally posted by flexy123
facebook had something in the works named PRISM (!) which sounded exactly like what we are talking about right now (data analyzing software with the potential ability to "interlink" other data sources as well, not only FB but also Google, AOL etc..all in one big pot) - for that reason I think that PRISM was actually developed by facebook first and only afterwards either being sold/traded or dealt to the NSA..or the NSA approached them after seeing what the system can do.

dude, do you have ANY idea where Facebook came from?


that question will make a lot more sense, when you go do the research......which is something you should have done before commenting on the subject..

The truth is, there is no such thing as privacy. We no matter where we are, are ALWAYS being watched by 'them'.

Originally posted by TheOneWhoKnowsTooMuch
The truth is, there is no such thing as privacy. We no matter where we are, are ALWAYS being watched by 'them'.

Ironically i just finished reading this article...essentially saying the same thing...

www.stripes.com...