Bill Binney believes he helped create a monster.<\/p>\n
Sitting in the innocuous surroundings of an Olive Garden in the Baltimore suburbs, the former senior National Security Agency (NSA) official even believes he owes the whole American people an apology.<\/p>\n
Binney, a tall, professorial man in his late 60s, led the development of a secret software code he now believes is illegally collecting huge amounts of information on his fellow citizens. For the staunch Republican, who worked for 32 years at the NSA, it is a civil liberties nightmare come true.<\/p>\n
So Binney has started speaking out as an NSA whistleblower \u2013 an act that has earned him an armed FBI raid on his home. \u201cWhat\u2019s happening is a violation of the constitutional rights of everybody in the country. That\u2019s pretty straightforward. I could not be associated with it,\u201d he told the Guardian.<\/p>\n
Binney, a career NSA employee who first volunteered for the army in the mid-1960s, has now become a high-profile thorn in the side of NSA chiefs when they deny the programme\u2019s existence.<\/p>\n
At a hacking conference this summer in Las Vegas, NSA director General Keith Alexander said the NSA \u201cabsolutely\u201d did not keep files on Americans.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnyone who would tell you that we\u2019re keeping files or dossiers on the American people knows that\u2019s not true,\u201d the NSA chief told an audience of computer and security experts. But Binney himself was at the same conference and publicly accused Alexander of playing a \u201cword game\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce the software takes in data, it will build profiles on everyone in that data,\u201d he told a convention panel there.<\/p>\n
More at RawStory.com: http:\/\/www.rawstory.com\/rs\/2012\/09\/15\/nsa-whistleblower-illegal-data-collection-a-violation-of-everybodys-constitutional-rights\/ <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bill Binney believes he helped create a monster. Sitting in the innocuous surroundings of an Olive Garden in the Baltimore suburbs, the former senior National Security Agency (NSA) official even believes he owes the whole American people an apology. Binney, … Continue reading