WASHINGTON, May 23 (UPI) -- Disclosure that the National Security Agency has allegedly and covertly obtained the phone records of millions of American from AT&T, BellSouth and Verizon has created a political firestorm in Washington over privacy issues.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a lawsuit requesting that a judge unseal a San Francisco courthouse file delineating AT&T's alleged participation in the NSA's warrantless domestic wiretap operation, but AT&T is insisting the file remained sealed, asserting that information in the file is proprietary and that it would suffer severe harm if it were released.
Wired News reported on May 22 that it decided to publish the complete text of documents from the Electronic Frontier Foundation primary witness in the case, former AT&T employee and whistle-blower Mark Klein.
Thirty pages of documents are now posted on the Wired News Web site along with an affidavit attributed to Klein, eight AT&T "proprietary" documents and several news articles and other public information related to government-surveillance issues.
Wired News wrote, "The AT&T documents appear to be excerpted from material that was later filed in the lawsuit under seal. But we can't be entirely sure, because the protective order prevents us from comparing the two sets of documents.
"This week, we are joining in efforts to bring this evidence to light in its entirety. We are filing a motion to intervene in the case in order to request that the court unseal the evidence, joining other news and civil rights organizations that have already done so, including the EFF, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times, the San Jose Mercury News, the Associated Press and Bloomberg.
"Before publishing these documents we showed them to independent security experts, who agreed they pose no danger to AT&T. For example, they do not reveal sensitive information that hackers might use to attack the company's systems.
"The court's gag order is very specific in barring only the EFF, its representatives and its technical experts from discussing and disseminating this information. The court explicitly rejected AT&T's motion to include Klein in the gag order and declined AT&T's request to force the EFF to return the documents."
The U.S. Navy is increasingly deploying its personnel far from the ocean, in Afghanistan.
Cmdr. Jim Hamblet, who previously commanded the Portsmouth, Va.-based Mobile Security Squadron 6, a unit that patrols Iraqi oil platforms in the Persian Gulf, is now in charge of an 82-member reconstruction team in Ghazni province.
Cmdr. Ryan Scholl, a former Blue Angels pilot and commander of an Oceana-based F/A-18 squadron, now leads a similar reconstruction team in Asadabad, near Afghanistan's eastern border with Pakistan.
The Virginian-Pilot reported on May 21 that the U.S. military heads 12 of the provincial reconstruction teams, while other International Security Assistance Force nations direct nine other teams.
Navy spokesman Lt. Trey Brown said 140 sailors are now serving on six of the 12 U.S.-run reconstruction teams in Afghanistan. According to Brown a little more than 500 sailors total are now serving in Afghanistan, not including Navy special operations forces there, the highest number since Operation Enduring Freedom began in November 2001.
Scholl said, "I think we are breaking ground in terms of what the Navy is doing, but we're utilizing a lot of the same things we did in command tours. It's not like we're left alone to do these things for ourselves. We have an idea of what's required to run a command."
On May 21 six heavily armed pirates from two high-speed cutters boarded and robbed a Russian Primorye Sea Shipping Company tanker in the Atlantic Ocean, 34 miles off the coast of Guinea's Conakry port in West Africa.
After the pirates boarded the Shkotovo the ship's captain, Alekhsei Kharitonov, sent an SOS but still handed over all the cash from fuel sales to protect his 20 crewmen.
The Shkotovo was supplying African fishermen in the area with fuel at the time of the incident. Following the attack, the Shkotovo is continuing to make fuel deliveries to the fishermen.
