NNSquad - Network Neutrality Squad
[ NNSquad ] WashPost: "The Secrets Next Door"
WashPost: "The Secrets Next Door"
http://bit.ly/9HZ3Ik (Next segment of the Washington Post series
on the massive "intelligence" buildup in the U.S.)
July 20, 2010
In suburbs across the nation, the intelligence community goes about its
anonymous business. Its work isn't seen, but its impact is surely felt.
By Dana Priest and William M. Arkin
The brick warehouse is not just a warehouse. Drive through the gate and
around back, and there, hidden away, is someone's personal security detail:
a fleet of black SUVs that have been armored up to withstand explosions and
Along the main street, the signs in the median aren't advertising homes for
sale; they're inviting employees with top-secret security clearances to a
job fair at Cafe Joe, which is anything but a typical lunch spot.
The new gunmetal-colored office building is really a kind of hotel where
businesses can rent eavesdrop-proof rooms.
Even the manhole cover between two low-slung buildings is not just a manhole
cover. Surrounded by concrete cylinders, it is an access point to a
government cable. "TS/SCI," whispers an official, the abbreviations for "top
secret" and "sensitive compartmented information" - and that means few
people are allowed to know what information the cable transmits.
All of these places exist just outside Washington in what amounts to the
capital of an alternative geography of the United States, one defined by the
concentration of top-secret government organizations and the companies that
do work for them. This Fort Meade cluster is the largest of a dozen such
clusters across the United States that are the nerve centers of Top Secret
America and its 854,000 workers.
...
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Lauren Weinstein (lauren@vortex.com)
http://www.vortex.com/lauren
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
Co-Founder, PFIR (People For Internet Responsibility): http://www.pfir.org
Co-Founder, NNSquad (Network Neutrality Squad): http://www.nnsquad.org
Founder, GCTIP (Global Coalition for Transparent Internet Performance):
http://www.gctip.org
Founder, PRIVACY Forum: http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/laurenweinstein
Google Buzz: http://bit.ly/lauren-buzz