Yahoo asks government to explain email scanning order -afterwards.

On Thu, 20 Oct 2016 09:26:47 -0400, Silver Slimer wrote:

On 2016-10-19 9:08 PM, Nathan Hale wrote:
Yahoo secretly scanned its users emails at the behest of a U.S.
government agency — and now it wants the government to explain
why.

In a letter to James Clapper, the Director of National
Intelligence, Yahoo carefully avoids admitting that it scanned
users’ email or that it received an order to do so, but asks
Clapper to “clarify this matter of public interest.�

The program had access to all incoming email and may have been
able to access outgoing mail as well, a source told TechCrunch,
and was terminated just days after it was discovered by the
security team. The implementation of the program was poor and
could have been exploited by external hackers, the source said.
The New York Times reported that the program was searching for a
specific signature tied to a terrorist organization.

Of course, Yahoo can’t fess up to the email scanning or describe
the order that led to it — National Security Letters and FISA
court orders are typically accompanied by gag orders that
prevent companies from talking about the requests they receive
from government. Yahoo’s letter is carefully sprinkled with
plenty of ifs, most notably in the section where it asks Clapper
to clarify several points:

“We urge your office to consider the following actions to
provide clarity on the matter: (i) confirm whether an order, as
described in media reports, was issued; (ii) declassify in whole
or in part the order, if it exists; and (iii) make a
sufficiently detailed public and contextual comment to clarify
the alleged facts and circumstances.�

But there are still plenty of hints dropped in the letter,
penned by Yahoo general counsel Ron Bell, about what went on at
Yahoo during the spring months of 2015, when the email scanning
took place.

The biggest revelation is that Yahoo was likely ordered to scan
users’ email through a FISA court order rather than a National
Security Letter. This distinction was previously a topic of
debate, with The New York Times reporting that the order had
come from a FISA court and other outlets claiming that the email
scanning stemmed from an NSL. Although Yahoo is, of course,
constrained from clarifying this point, Bell does seem to
address it in the letter. “Transparency is critical to ensure
accountability and in this context must include disclosing how
and under what set of circumstances the U.S. government uses
specific legal authorities, including the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act, to obtain private information about
individuals’ online activities or communications,� Bell writes.

Although NSLs and FISA orders can result in similar forced
disclosures from companies, NSLs require no court approval and
FISA orders do — which means, presumably, that a judge approved
the Yahoo order in this case (the FISA court has been viewed as
a rubber stamp because it very rarely denies requests).

Yahoo began scanning all its users’ emails last spring at the
behest of the U.S. government, Reuters reported. Bell was
reportedly one of the Yahoo employees who approved the scanning,
along with CEO Marissa Mayer. The scanning program was
implemented by Yahoo’s mail team and was discovered by members
of the company’s security team shortly thereafter, a source
confirmed to TechCrunch. Security engineers initially thought
the program was the work of external hackers and investigated it
as a high-severity issue.

Alex Stamos, who then led Yahoo’s security team and decamped
shortly thereafter for Facebook, reportedly discovered that the
program was installed by Yahoo’s own mail engineers. The
bombshell led to his departure from the company, and influenced
other security team members in their decisions to leave, as well.

The email scanning does not appear to have been disclosed in
Yahoo’s biannual transparency report on government requests for
user data, but Bell argues in his letter that Yahoo maintains
its commitment to transparency and user privacy.

It's time for Yahoo to die.

It has already been doing an excellent job of killing itself. It has the
worst e-mail service, a news service that nobody uses, no social
network, no exclusive video, and a search engine that everyone just
laughs at. It might have been something in the 1990s, but it has since
become worse than a joke.


Do not feed the troll. A convicted kiddie fiddler and Christian hater. You live upto you name. Once we find out where you live, all you family - quote you racist hate false religion "from unborn to elderly" will be applied to you.

On 2016-10-21 8:38 AM, Nomen Nescio wrote:
On Thu, 20 Oct 2016 09:26:47 -0400, Silver Slimer wrote:

On 2016-10-19 9:08 PM, Nathan Hale wrote:
Yahoo secretly scanned its users emails at the behest of a U.S.
government agency — and now it wants the government to explain
why.

In a letter to James Clapper, the Director of National
Intelligence, Yahoo carefully avoids admitting that it scanned
users’ email or that it received an order to do so, but asks
Clapper to “clarify this matter of public interest.�

The program had access to all incoming email and may have been
able to access outgoing mail as well, a source told TechCrunch,
and was terminated just days after it was discovered by the
security team. The implementation of the program was poor and
could have been exploited by external hackers, the source said.
The New York Times reported that the program was searching for a
specific signature tied to a terrorist organization.

Of course, Yahoo can’t fess up to the email scanning or describe
the order that led to it — National Security Letters and FISA
court orders are typically accompanied by gag orders that
prevent companies from talking about the requests they receive
from government. Yahoo’s letter is carefully sprinkled with
plenty of ifs, most notably in the section where it asks Clapper
to clarify several points:

“We urge your office to consider the following actions to
provide clarity on the matter: (i) confirm whether an order, as
described in media reports, was issued; (ii) declassify in whole
or in part the order, if it exists; and (iii) make a
sufficiently detailed public and contextual comment to clarify
the alleged facts and circumstances.�

But there are still plenty of hints dropped in the letter,
penned by Yahoo general counsel Ron Bell, about what went on at
Yahoo during the spring months of 2015, when the email scanning
took place.

The biggest revelation is that Yahoo was likely ordered to scan
users’ email through a FISA court order rather than a National
Security Letter. This distinction was previously a topic of
debate, with The New York Times reporting that the order had
come from a FISA court and other outlets claiming that the email
scanning stemmed from an NSL. Although Yahoo is, of course,
constrained from clarifying this point, Bell does seem to
address it in the letter. “Transparency is critical to ensure
accountability and in this context must include disclosing how
and under what set of circumstances the U.S. government uses
specific legal authorities, including the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act, to obtain private information about
individuals’ online activities or communications,� Bell writes.

Although NSLs and FISA orders can result in similar forced
disclosures from companies, NSLs require no court approval and
FISA orders do — which means, presumably, that a judge approved
the Yahoo order in this case (the FISA court has been viewed as
a rubber stamp because it very rarely denies requests).

Yahoo began scanning all its users’ emails last spring at the
behest of the U.S. government, Reuters reported. Bell was
reportedly one of the Yahoo employees who approved the scanning,
along with CEO Marissa Mayer. The scanning program was
implemented by Yahoo’s mail team and was discovered by members
of the company’s security team shortly thereafter, a source
confirmed to TechCrunch. Security engineers initially thought
the program was the work of external hackers and investigated it
as a high-severity issue.

Alex Stamos, who then led Yahoo’s security team and decamped
shortly thereafter for Facebook, reportedly discovered that the
program was installed by Yahoo’s own mail engineers. The
bombshell led to his departure from the company, and influenced
other security team members in their decisions to leave, as well.

The email scanning does not appear to have been disclosed in
Yahoo’s biannual transparency report on government requests for
user data, but Bell argues in his letter that Yahoo maintains
its commitment to transparency and user privacy.

It's time for Yahoo to die.

It has already been doing an excellent job of killing itself. It has the
worst e-mail service, a news service that nobody uses, no social
network, no exclusive video, and a search engine that everyone just
laughs at. It might have been something in the 1990s, but it has since
become worse than a joke.


Do not feed the troll. A convicted kiddie fiddler and Christian hater.

I hope you're not referring to me because I am a proud Christian and
haven't ever touched anyone inappropriately.

You live upto you name. Once we find out where you live, all you family - quote you racist hate false religion "from unborn to elderly" will be applied to you.

Again, I hope you're not referring to me.

--
Silver Slimer
Islam is a disease
Gab.ai: @silverslimer