Intelligence & Surveillance
Just Security’s expert authors provide legal and policy analysis of intelligence and surveillance activities, focusing on their impact on national security and on civil liberties and privacy rights, and their oversight by Congress and the courts.
1,805 Articles
Cybersecurity in the Intelligence Community’s 2015 Worldwide Threat Assessment
Last week Director of National Intelligence James Clapper released the 2015 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community and testified about it before the Senate…
“New Torture Files”: Declassified Memos Detail Roles of Bush White House and DOJ Officials Who Conspired to Approve Torture
An alleged CIA prison near Kabul, Afghanistan. Image credit: Trevor Paglen via Wikimedia Commons. Last week, I wrote, both here and in the New York Times, that after reading all…
Sexual Torture, Rape, and Gender-Based Violence in the Senate Torture Report
The ramifications and significance of the Senate Torture Report continue to spin out in various fora. While I have noted that the use of certain torture methods used at Guantanamo…
DOJ Inspector General Complains About FBI Foot-dragging
Late last week, the Inspector General (IG) for the Justice Department sent a letter to Congress complaining of the FBI’s refusal to set a timeline for turning over documents…
Transcript: NSA Director Mike Rogers vs. Yahoo! on Encryption Back Doors
NSA Director Adm. Mike Rogers squared off against top security experts from the tech industry today in a series of exchanges that illustrated the chasm between some leading technology…
On Rereading the Torture Report – SSCI Focus Gave Too Many Perpetrators a Pass
I have an opinion piece in today’s New York Times Sunday Review provocatively titled (by the NYT editors), “Did the Torture Report Give the CIA a Bum Rap?” Why now, and why…
Washington’s New Drone Sales Policy Could Export US-Style Drone War
This week, the United States released a new policy for the export of US-made drones. The policy conditions any drone sale on a pledge by the foreign buyer government that it will…
Guest Post: CVE Efforts Should be Based on Facts, Not Flawed Theories
Ed. note: This guest post was produced as part of the Brennan Center for Justice’s interview series, Rethinking Intelligence. Yesterday, the White House kicked-off a three-day summit…
Guest Post: US Intelligence Reforms Still Allow Plenty of Suspicionless Spying on Americans
Last week, the Obama Administration released a report and documents cataloging progress toward signals intelligence (SIGINT) reform goals set a year ago by the President in a document…
Key Questions for Today’s Senate Intelligence Committee Hearing With Nicholas Rasmussen
Sen Richard Burr (R-NC), the new chair of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, has announced that he plans to hold a public committee hearing this afternoon. This is welcome…
Surveillance and the Vanishing Right to Know
Editor’s Note: This post offers a preview of the authors’ upcoming article in the Santa Clara Law Review: The Notice Paradox: Secret Surveillance, Criminal Defendants…
Torture and the CIA’s Unaccountability Boards
Last Saturday, January 31, CIA Inspector General David Buckley resigned after a little more than four years in office. His departure came at the end of the same month his office…