XPost: alt.news-media, ca.general, alt.connecticut   
   XPost: co.politics   
   From: apes@splcenter.org   
      
   ANALYSIS/OPINION:   
      
   The question of what kinds of communications got Donald Trump   
   aides caught up in incidental U.S. wiretaps may be answered by   
   the ultra-leaker on such matters: Edward Snowden.   
      
   Mr. Snowden, a former National Security Agency contractor,   
   provided The Guardian in 2013 with top secret documents that   
   showed the U.S. wiretaps a wide array of embassies in   
   Washington, friend and foe.   
      
   The bugging would be done under the Foreign Intelligence   
   Surveillance Act, which allows the NSA to tap electronic   
   communications of virtually any foreign operative. Targets do   
   not have to be suspected spies or terrorists to fetch   
   surveillance. They can simply be foreign agents conducting   
   diplomacy.   
      
   Mr. Trump, as the Republican presidential nominee and then as   
   president elect, would have attracted a number of phone calls   
   and emails from Washington diplomats seeking any information   
   they could then relay to their respective capitals about the   
   unpredictable incoming president.   
      
   It is likely that these types of communications become part of   
   intelligence reports.   
      
   Susan Rice, President Barack Obama’s National Security Adviser,   
   asked for dozens of such reports from intelligence agencies,   
   Bloomberg View reported. She requested that the names of Mr.   
   Trump’s aides be “unmasked,” in other words mentioned by name in   
   the reports instead of being redacted. FISA was written to   
   protect the privacy by masking innocent U.S. citizens   
   incidentally caught up in a wiretap.   
      
   The Snowden-provided documents show that in 2010 the U.S. bugged   
   the European Union mission in New York and its embassy in   
   Washington. Other targeted embassies in Washington included,   
   France, Italy, Greece, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, India and   
   Middle East countries.   
      
   Today, it is known that the U.S. bugged the Russian embassy. It   
   intercepted calls between retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn,   
   then Mr. Trump’s incoming National Security adviser, and   
   Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the transition.   
      
   Mr. Flynn’s name was “unmasked” by the Obama administration, and   
   the contents of the calls were leaked to the news media. Legal   
   experts say the leaking amounts to a felony.   
      
   The Guardian said one of the spy operations was dubbed   
   “Dropmire.” It involved placing a bug in the EU’s fax machine in   
   Washington.   
      
   Other code names for such intercepts were “Perdido,” Blackfoot,”   
   “Wabash”, and “Powell.”   
      
   Blackfoot and Wabash were operations against the French mission   
   at the United Nations and its embassy in Washington.   
      
   Mr. Snowden lives in exile in Moscow.   
      
   http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/apr/4/susan-rice-edward-   
   snowden-may-hold-key-unmasking-s/   
             
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)