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.
1,846 Articles
It’s Time to Pass Legislation Governing a Key Part of the Government’s Hacking Policy
An example of the splash screen from the Petya malware that was suspected of relying on an exploit developed by the U.S. National Security Agency. It’s well known that government…
National Security-Related Congressional Hearings, October 2-7
Tuesday, October 3 9:30am – Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee — Nomination of John M. Mitnick to be General Counsel, U.S. Department of Homeland Security…
How US Surveillance Helps Repressive Regimes—the Ethiopia Case
Recent stories from Edward Snowden’s disclosures show how the US government’s involvement with Ethiopia presents a case study in enabling repressive regimes to carry out…
Method to the “Madness”: Dissecting Roger Stone’s Statement to Congress, by a Former Fed Prosecutor
Dissecting Roger Stone’s statement was a very different exercise than my prior dissections of statements by Jared Kushner, Donald Trump Jr., and Michael Cohen. Stone’s statement…
What the FISA Warrants Against Paul Manafort Tell Us About Mueller’s Investigation
The Trump-Russia saga has more characters than War and Peace and plot twists harder to follow than Game of Thrones. So making sense of the latest news – that the FBI had…
What Does it Mean that Mueller Got a Warrant to Obtain Facebook Data?
The Wall Street Journal and CNN recently reported that Facebook provided data about Russian advertising purchases made in the run-up to the 2016 election to Special Counsel Robert…
Episode 37 of the National Security Law Podcast: Enemy Combatants, Agents of Foreign Powers
In this week’s episode, Bobby Chesney and I explore three big national security law developments from the past few days. First is that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court…
We Need to Know More About Government Searches of Travelers’ Electronic Devices
Relying on directives from the George W. Bush administration, U.S. border patrol and immigration officers have been subjecting travelers crossing U.S. borders to intrusive searches…
Episode 36 of the National Security Law Podcast: NSA General Counsel Glenn Gerstell on Section 702
We have a special treat in this off-cycle episode! National Security Agency General Counsel Glenn Gerstell is in Austin to speak to our students here at UT, and (no doubt against…
We Know a Lot More About U.S. Spying Since Section 702’s Last Reauthorization
As Congress finally starts to debate whether to reauthorize Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act before it expires at the end of this year, it’s important to remember that…
A Security Clearance Nightmare
As President, Donald Trump obviously has the right to hire and fire his top advisors as he sees fit. However, when the President indicates he may fire someone because they are…
A Baker’s Dozen of Additional Questions for the Russia Investigation
In her recent post, “20 Questions That Should Be Answered by the Russia Investigations,” Faiza Patel enumerates a series of questions that should be addressed by the various…