Domestic Surveillance is necessary to stop terror and foreign espionage – the NSA has found a happy medium between privacy and security now Honorof 13 – Marshall “How the NSA's Spying Keeps You Safe” http://www.tomsguide.com/us/nsa-spying-keeps-safe,review-1899.html

The U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) may have taken some fairly extreme liberties when it comes to collecting user data, but the organization hasn't acted on a whim. Call the NSA's surveillance unethical or unconstitutional or dangerous, but it has a responsibility to protect the United States with every tool at its disposal. If you haven't been keeping up with the issue, Americans and Britons are very angry with their governments right now. Reports from The Guardian and The New York Times indicate that the NSA and its British counterpart, Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), have the capacity to intercept just about everything their citizens do online, from social media information to encrypted emails. While this anger is both understandable and

justifiable, relatively few people have stopped to consider the other side of the coin. You can have total privacy or total national security , but

you cannot have both . A modern democratic society requires a compromise between the two extremes. The most important thing to

keep in mind is that there is , at present, absolutely no indication that the NSA has done anything illegal or outside the

parameters of its mission statement. The NSA monitors external threats to the U.S., and, in theory, does not turn its attention to American citizens without probable cause. There is no evidence to the contrary among the documents that Edward Snowden leaked. "How do we protect our nation? How do we defend it?" asked Gen. Keith Alexander, the NSA's director, at the Black Hat 2013 security conference, held in Las Vegas in July. "[This information] is not classified to keep it from you: a good person. It's classified because

sitting among you are people who wish us harm." While the thought of the NSA controlling every bit of information that the average American citizen posts online is disconcerting, Alexander maintained that a terrorist attack is even worse for a country's basic freedoms . "What we're talking about is future terrorist attacks," Alexander said, discussing a number of planned attacks

that the NSA foiled over the last 10 years. "It is worth considering what would have happen ed in the world if those attacks — 42 of those 54 were terrorist plots — if they were successfully executed . What would that mean to our civil liberties and

privacy?" James Lewis, a researcher at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, agrees. "The NSA said there were 54 cases where they were able to detect plans and stop them, and 50 of them led to arrests ," Lewis told Tom's Guide. "Fifty doesn't sound like a lot compared to the number of records [the NSA collected], but would you have preferred to have 50 more Boston bombings?" Counterterrorism is not the only function of the NSA's widespread surveillance.

Although it cannot report exact numbers, Lewis theorizes that the data-mining has allowed the NSA to put a stop to a number of international espionage plots . "The original intent of all these programs was to find foreign spies ," he said. "They haven't talked about that, but presumably there have been some successes there, too. A lot of times when you see things and there doesn't appear to be any

explanation of how we seemed to magically know about it, it might very well be espionage." As an example of how domestic surveillance can unearth international plots , Lewis pointed to the North Korean ship stopped in Panama in August 2013.

The vessel turned out to be smuggling illegal arms from Cuba. "The Panamanians just woke up one day and decided to look in their ship? I think not," Lewis said. The NSA is not the only government in the world that runs surveillance programs. In fact, if the NSA is keeping tabs on you, there's a good chance that other countries are as well. If you're lucky, they'll be Germany and Australia; if not, then Russia and China may have you under the microscope. Robert David Graham, founder and chief executive officer of

Errata Security, spoke with Tom's Guide about how countries leverage surveillance data. "There are two parts to the information," he said. "Information about foreigners and information

about your own citizens. The information you get about your own citizens affects political processes within your own country." He went on to explain that if you stir up negative sentiment about Germany, for example, the Germans can hoard your emails just the same as the NSA. Just like the NSA, though, they are unlikely to do anything with those emails unless you represent some kind of clear threat. "The Russians and the Chinese don't have anything to learn about how to do

surveillance from us," Lewis said. He explained that the Scandinavian countries and Australia have programs that rival the NSA's as well. " It's just par for the course everywhere in the world." Lewis believes that the NSA's surveillance is much less problematic than its transparency on the issue. "[Security and privacy] have to be balanced, and the debate has largely been 'they should stop doing this,'" he said. "It's weird seeing Rand Paul and the ACLU getting together [to condemn the NSA]. If Rand Paul is for it, it's probably a bad idea." The NSA is also taking the lion's share of the blame for a problem that began at the dawn of the consumer Internet age, got worse after 9/11, and still continues to this

day: Internet privacy, or more accurately, the almost total lack thereof. "There really isn't any privacy anymore , and I don't think Americans have realized that," Lewis said. Credit card companies, for example, know just about everything about you, right down to what street you've lived on every

year of your life. "This was commercial … The NSA just happens to be the poster child for this at the moment." There's one thing on which both staunch critics like Graham and fierce proponents like Lewis agree: The U.S. government must be clear and open with its citizens regarding the need for security, even when that security becomes

invasive. "Total security means zero privacy. Total privacy means zero security ," Graham said. "The extremes are what we have to fear … The NSA should be monitoring people. It's just the issue of monitoring Americans without probable cause that really bothers the heck out of me." "If you have the right rules, if you have the right laws, if you have the right amount of transparency, you can feel comfortable with this," Lewis

said. "Comfortable" is a very strong word, but if the choice is between invasive surveillance and the very real threats of terrorism and espionage, it's not so easy to write the NSA off entirely.

Going Dark DA

1NCCurrent NSA has control of deep web by using existing backdoors to bypass encryption methods. Franceschi 07/15/15 (LORENZO FRANCESCHI-BICCHIERA is a staffwriter at motherboard, “The FBI Hacked a Dark Web Child Porn Site to Unmask Its Visitors” http://motherboard.vice.com/en_uk/read/the-fbi-hacked-a-dark-web-child-porn-site-to-unmask-its-visitors)

It’s no secret that the FBI hacks into suspects’ computers during its investigations . But the bureau is certainly not a fan of publicizing its methods.¶ A recent case involving two frequent users of an unnamed dark web child pornography site is no different. Last week, two men from New York were indicted on child pornography charges, and in court documents, the prosecutors and the FBI were careful not to reveal too many details about the investigation. ¶ But a passage in the court documents, spotted by Stanford computer science and law expert Jonathan Mayer, reveals that the feds deployed a “Network Investigative Technique” to unmask the two men and obtain their real IP address. ¶ “That's the agency's current euphemism for hacking,” Mayer told Motherboard in an email. While the court document stops short of explaining exactly what hacking technique the FBI used, the description seems to point in the direction of a “watering hole” attack or a “drive-by download,” techniques where hackers hijack a website and subvert it to deliver malware to all the visitors. ¶ On February 20, 2015 the FBI seized the server hosting what the FBI refers to only as “Website A,” according to court documents. That allowed the bureau to use a Network Investigative Technique, or NIT, to “monitor the electronic communications” of all visitors of the site until March 4.¶ The NIT was designed was designed to trick the computers of the more than 200,000 visitors of the site into sending the FBI a host of information about the target, such as his or her “actual” IP address, the computer’s operating system, and its MAC address, a computer’s unique identifier, according to court documents.’¶ Given the way the FBI describes how it unmasked the two suspects, Alex Schreiber and Peter Ferrell, for Mayer, there’s no other “technical explanation” that this was a case of hacking and use of malware.

Deep web is a host of crimes specifically with drug traffickingGrossman 11/11/13 (Lev Grossman, lead technology writer for the times, Nov. 11, 2013, “The Secret Web: Where Drugs, Porn and Murder Live Online” http://time.com/630/the-secret-web-where-drugs-porn-and-murder-live-online/)

On the afternoon of Oct. 1, 2013, a tall, slender, shaggy-haired man left his house on 15th Avenue in San

Francisco. He paid $1,000 a month cash to share it with two housemates who knew him only as a quiet currency trader named Josh Terrey. His real name was Ross Ulbricht. He was 29 and had no police record. Dressed in jeans and a red T-shirt, Ulbricht headed to the Glen Park branch of the public library, where he made his way to the science-fiction section and logged on to his laptop–he was using the free wi-fi.

Several FBI agents dressed in plainclothes converged on him, pushed him up against a window, then escorted him from the building.¶ The FBI believes Ulbricht is a criminal known online as the Dread Pirate Roberts , a reference to the book and movie The

Princess Bride. The Dread Pirate Roberts was the owner and administrator of Silk Road, a wildly successful online bazaar where people bought and sold illegal goods–primarily drugs but also fake IDs, fireworks and

hacking software. They could do this without getting caught because Silk Road was located in a little-known region

of the Internet called the Deep Web. ¶ Technically the Deep Web refers to the collection of all the websites and

databases that search engines like Google don’t or can’t index, which in terms of the sheer volume of information is many

times larger than the Web as we know it. But more loosely, the Deep Web is a specific branch of the Internet that’s distinguished by that increasingly rare commodity: complete anonymity. Nothing you do on the Deep Web can be associated with

your real-world identity, unless you choose it to be. Most people never see it, though the software you need to access it is free and takes less than three minutes to download and install . If there’s a part of the grid that can be considered

off the grid, it’s the Deep Web.¶ The Deep Web has plenty of valid reasons for existing. It’s a vital tool for intelligence

agents, law enforcement, political dissidents and anybody who needs or wants to conduct their online affairs in private–which is, increasingly, everybody. According to a survey published in September by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 86% of Internet users have attempted to delete or conceal their digital history, and 55% have tried to avoid being observed online by specific parties

like their employers or the government.¶ But the Deep Web is also an ideal venue for doing things that are unlawful, especially when it’s combined, as in the case of Silk Road, with the anonymous, virtually untraceable electronic currency Bitcoin. “It allows all sorts of criminals who, in bygone eras, had to find open-air drug markets or an

alley somewhere to engage in bad activity to do it openly,” argues Preet Bharara, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of

New York, whose office is bringing a case against Ulbricht and who spoke exclusively to TIME. For 2½ years Silk Road acted as an Amazon-like clearinghouse for illegal goods, providing almost a million customers worldwide with $1.2 billion worth of contraband, according to the 39-page federal complaint against Ulbricht. The Dread Pirate Roberts, the Deep Web’s Jeff Bezos, allegedly collected some $80 million in fees.

Earlier today, FBI Director James Comey implied that a broad coalition of technology companies, trade

associations, civil society groups, and security experts were either uninformed or were not “fair-minded” in a letter they sent to the President yesterday urging him to reject any legislative proposals that would undermine the adoption of strong encryption by US companies. The letter was signed by dozens of organizations and companies in the latest part of the debate over whether the government should be given built-in access to encrypted data (see, for example, here, here, here, and here for previous iterations).

The comments were made at the Third Annual Cybersecurity Law Institute held at Georgetown University Law Center. The transcript of his encryption-related discussion is below (emphasis added).

Increasingly, communications at rest sitting on a device or in motion are encrypted . The device is encrypted or the communication is encrypted and therefore unavailable to us even with a court order . So I make a showing of probable cause to a judge in a criminal case or in an intelligence case to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judge that the content of a particular defense or a particular communication stream should be collected to our statutory authority, and the judge approves, increasingly we are finding ourselves unable to read what we find or we’re unable to open a device. And that is a serious concern.

I am actually — I think encryption is a good thing. I think there are tremendous societal benefits to encryption. That’s one of the reasons the FBI tells people not only lock your cars, but you should encrypt things that are important to you to make it harder for thieves to take them.

But we have a collision going on in this country that’s getting closer and closer to an actual head-on, which is our important interest in privacy — which I am passionate about — and our important interest in public safety. The logic of universal encryption is inexorable that our authority under the Fourth Amendment — an amendment that I think is critical to ordered liberty — with the right predication and the right oversight to obtain information is going to become increasingly irrelevant. As all of our lives become digital, the logic of encryption is that all of our lives will be covered by strong encryption, therefore all of our lives — I

know there are no criminals here, but including the lives of criminals and terrorists and spies — will be in a place that is utterly unavailable to court ordered process.

And that, I think, to a democracy should be very, very concerning. I think we need to have a conversation about it. Again, how do we strike the right balance? Privacy matters tremendously. Public safety, I think, matters tremendously to everybody. I think fair-minded people have to recognize that there are tremendous benefits to a society from encryption. There are tremendous costs to a society from universal strong encryption. And how do we think about that?

A group of tech companies and some prominent folks wrote a letter to the President yesterday that I frankly found depressing. Because their letter contains no acknowledgment that there are societal costs to universal encryption. Look, I recognize the challenges facing our tech companies. Competitive challenges, regulatory challenges overseas, all kinds of challenges. I recognize the benefits of encryption, but I think fair-minded people also have to recognize the costs associated with that. And I read this letter and I think, “Either these folks don’t see what I see or they’re not fair-minded.” And either one of those things is depressing to me. So I’ve just got to continue to have the conversation.

I don’t know the answer, but I don’t think a democracy should drift to a place where suddenly law enforcement people say, “Well, actually we — the Fourth Amendment is an awesome thing, but we actually can’t access any information.”

We’ve got to have a conversation long before the logic of strong encryption takes us to that place. And smart people, reasonable people will disagree mightily. Technical people will say it’s too hard. My reaction to that is: Really? Too hard? Too hard for the people we have in this country to figure something out? I’m not that pessimistic. I think we ought to have a conversation.

Turns case - drug trafficking has harsh economic consequencesUN 2012 (United Nation, 26 June 2012, “Thematic Debate of the 66th session of the United Nations General Assembly on¶ Drugs and Crime as a Threat to Development” http://www.un.org/en/ga/president/66/Issues/drugs/drugs-crime.shtml )

On the occasion of the UN International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking

¶ In the past decade, there has been significant growth in the illicit trafficking of drugs , people, firearms, and natural resources.

Trafficking in these and other commodities is generally characterized by high levels of organization and the presence of strong criminal groups and networks . While such activities existed in the past, both the scale and the geographic scope of the current challenge are

unprecedented. In 2009, the value of illicit trade around the globe was estimated at US$1.3 trillion and is increasing.¶ ¶ Transnational organized crime and drug trafficking is of growing concern, and particularly illicit trade’s broad impact on development . Few, if any, countries are

exempt. Drug trafficking has particularly severe implications because of the vast illegal profits it generates: an estimated 322 billion dollars a year. In several drug production and transit regions, criminal groups undermine state authority and the rule of law by fuelling corruption, compromising elections, and hurting the legitimate economy. In all cases, criminal influence and money are having a significant impact on the livelihoods and quality of life of citizens, most particularly the poor, women and

children.¶ ¶ The 2005 World Summit Outcome Document expressed Member States’ “grave concern at the negative effects on development, peace and security and human rights posed by transnational crime, including the smuggling of and trafficking in human beings, the world narcotic drug problem and the illicit trade in small arms and light weapons.” (A/RES/60/1 at 111). The General Assembly has most recently reiterated this concern and noted the increasing vulnerability of states to such crime in Resolution A/Res/66/181 (Strengthening the United Nations Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice Programme, in particular its technical cooperation capacity). The Assembly has also recognized that “despite continuing increased efforts by States, relevant organizations, civil society and non-governmental organizations, the world drug problem…undermines socio-economic and political stability and sustainable development.” See A/Res/66/183 (International cooperation against the world drug problem).¶ ¶ A number of international conventions on drug control, and more recently the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC) and its protocols on human trafficking, migrant smuggling and trafficking of firearms, as well as the UN Convention against Corruption (UNCAC), constitute the key framework for a strategic response. Such instruments call upon State Parties to take “into account the negative effects of organized crime on society in general, in particular on sustainable development”, and “to alleviate the factors that make persons, especially women and children, vulnerable to trafficking, such as poverty, underdevelopment and lack of equal opportunity.” See article 30 of the UNTOC and article 9 of the Trafficking Protocol. See also article 62 of the UNCAC. They also commit parties to respect fundamental human rights in countering organized crime and drug trafficking.¶ ¶ The Secretary General’s 2005 "In Larger Freedom” report highlighted that “We will not enjoy development without security, and we will not enjoy security without development". The Secretary-General’s 2010 “Keeping the Promise” report (A/64/665) recognized that in order to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, “integrity, accountability and transparency are crucial for managing resources, recovering assets and combating the abuse, corruption and organized crime that are adversely affecting the poor.” Par. 57.¶ ¶ As we move towards 2015, and

take stock of the Millennium Development Goals, there is a growing recognition that organized crime and illicit drugs are major impediments to their achievement.¶ ¶ As economic development is threatened by transnational organized crime and illicit drugs, countering crime must form part of the development agenda, and social and economic development approaches need to form part of our response to organized crime. If we are to ensure that the MDGs are achieved, we must strengthen strategies to deliver these goals , including stepping up efforts to address issues such as money

laundering, corruption and trafficking in wildlife, people and arms, and drugs. Organized crime and drugs impact every economy , in every country, but they are particularly devastating in weak and vulnerable countries. Weak and fragile countries are particularly vulnerable to the effects of

transnational organized crime. These countries, some devastated by war, others making the complex journey towards democracy, are preyed upon by crime. As a result, organized crime flourishes, successes in development are reversed, and opportunities for social and economic advancement are lost. Corruption, a facilitator of organized crime and drug trafficking, is a serious impediment to the rule of law and sustainable development . It can be a dominant factor driving fragile countries towards failure. It is estimated that up to

US$40 billion annually is lost through corruption in developing countries.¶ ¶ Drugs and crime undermine development by eroding social and human capital. This degrades quality of life and can force skilled workers to leave, while the direct impacts of victimisation, as well as fear of crime, may impede the development of those that remain . By

limiting movement, crime impedes access to possible employment and educational opportunities, and it discourages the accumulation of assets. Crime is also more “expensive” for poor people in poor countries, and disadvantaged

households may struggle to cope with the shock of victimisation. Drugs and crime also undermine development by driving away business .

Both foreign and domestic investors see crime as a sign of social instability , and crime drives up the cost of doing business. Tourism is a

sector especially sensitive to crime issues. Drugs and crime, moreover, undermine the ability of the state to promote development by destroying the trust relationship between the people and the state , and undermining democracy and confidence

in the criminal justice system. When people lose confidence in the criminal justice system, they may engage in vigilantism, which further undermines the state.

Link

Backdoors key to solving for encryption on the InternetKravets 07/08/15 (David Kravets, July 8, 2015, “FBI chief tells Senate committee we’re doomed without crypto backdoors” https://www.benton.org/headlines/fbi-chief-tells-senate-committee-were-doomed-without-crypto-backdoors)

James Comey, the director of the FBI, told the Senate Judiciary Committee that the government should have the right to lawfully access any device or electronic form of communication with a lawful court order, even if it is

encrypted. Director Comey and Deputy Attorney General Sally Quillian Yates briefed the committee and complained that keys necessary to decrypt communications and electronic devices often reside "solely in the hands of the end user"-- which they said is emblematic of the so-called "Going Dark problem." Companies should bake encryption backdoors into their products to allow lawful acces s , they said. "We are not asking to expand the government's surveillance authority, but rather we are asking to ensure that we can continue to obtain electronic information and evidence

pursuant to the legal authority that Congress has provided to us to keep America safe," read the joint prepared remarks.¶ " Mr. Chairman, the Department of Justice believes that the challenges posed by the Going Dark problem are grave, growing, and extremely complex." To counter this, the duo said the government is actively developing its own decryption tools. The

remarks said, "We should also continue to invest in developing tools, techniques, and capabilities designed to mitigate the increasing technical challenges associated with the Going Dark problem . In limited circumstances, this investment may help mitigate the risks posed in high priority national security or criminal cases, although it will most likely be unable to provide a timely or scalable solution in terms of addressing the full spectrum of public safety needs.

Mandates that ban decryption methods hurt FBI’s ability to navigate sites like the dark web. We should hold off on mandates to ban decryption methods in the status quoWittes 07/12/15 (Benjamin Wittes is editor in chief of Lawfare and a Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution, July 12, 2015, “Thoughts on Encryption and Going Dark, Part II: The Debate on the Merits” http://www.lawfareblog.com/thoughts-encryption-and-going-dark-part-ii-debate-merits)

There's a final , non-legal factor that may push companies to work this problem as energetically as they are now moving toward end-to-end encryption: politics. We are at very particular moment in the

cryptography debate, a moment in which law enforcement sees a major problem as having arrived but the tech companies see that problem as part of the solution to the problems the Snowden revelations created for them. That is , we have an end-to-end encryption issue , in significant part, because companies are trying to assure customers worldwide that they have their backs privacy-wise and are not simply tools of NSA. I think those politics are likely to change. If Comey is right and we start seeing law enforcement and intelligence agencies blind in

investigating and preventing horrible crimes and significant threats, the pressure on the companies is going to shift . And it may shift fast and hard. Whereas the companies now feel intense pressure to assure customers that their data is safe from NSA, the kidnapped kid with the encrypted iPhone is going to generate a very different sort of political response. In extraordinary circumstances, extraordinary access may well seem reasonable. And people

will wonder why it doesn't exist.¶ Which of these approaches is the right way to go? I would pursue several of them

simultaneously. At least for now, I would hold off on any kind of regulatory mandate , there being just too much doubt at this

stage concerning what's doable. I would, however, take a hard look at the role that civil liability might play. I think the government, if it's serious about creating an extraordinary access scheme, needs to generate some public research establishing proof of concept. We should watch very carefully how the companies respond to the mandates they will receive from governments that will approach

this problem in a less nuanced fashion than ours will. And Comey should keep up the political pressure. The combination of these forces may well produce a more workable approach to the problem than anyone can currently envision.

Uniqueness http://blog.acton.org/archives/71950-deep-dark-web-like-cockroaches-human-traffickers-prefer-dark.html

Recent stops of drug trafficking sites proveEuropol 14 ( Europol 7 November 2014, “Global Action Against Dark Markets on Tor Network”

“ https://www.europol.europa.eu/content/global-action-against-dark-markets-tor-network)

On 6 November, law enforcement and judicial agencies around the globe undertook a joint action against dark markets r unning as hidden services on Tor* network. 16 European countries,** alongside counterparts from the United States, brought down several marketplaces as part of a unified international action from Europol’s

operational coordination centre in The Hague.¶ The action aimed to stop the sale, distribution and promotion of illegal and harmful items, including weapons and drugs, which were being sold on online ‘dark’ marketplaces. Operation Onymous, coordinated by Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre (EC3), the FBI, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and Eurojust, resulted in 17 arrests of vendors and administrators running these online marketplaces and more than 410 hidden services being taken down. In addition, bitcoins worth approximately USD 1 million, EUR 180 000 euro in cash, drugs, gold and silver were seized. The dark market Silk Road 2.0 was taken down by the FBI and the U.S. ICE HIS, and the operator was arrested.¶ The Joint Cybercrime Action Taskforce (J-CAT), located at Europol’s headquarters, supported the operation. The J-CAT was created to serve as a platform for targeted operations against global criminal networks and infrastructure, carried out by EC3 and our

colleagues in EU Member States and beyond. ¶ “Today we have demonstrated that, together, we are able to efficiently remove vital criminal infrastructures that are supporting serious organised crime. And we are not 'just' removing these services from the open Internet; this time we have also hit services on the Darknet using

Tor where, for a long time, criminals have considered themselves beyond reach . We can now show that they are neither invisible nor untouchable. The criminals can run but they can’t hide. And our work continues....”, says Troels

Oerting, Head of EC3.¶ “Our efforts have disrupted a website that allows illicit black-market activities to evolve and expand, and provides a safe haven for illegal vices, such as weapons distribution, drug trafficking and murder-for-hire,” says Kumar Kibble, regional attaché for HSI in Germany. “HSI will continue to work in partnership with Europol and its law enforcement partners around the world to hold criminals who use anonymous Internet software for illegal activities

accountable for their actions.”¶ “Working closely with domestic and international law enforcement, the FBI and our

partners have taken action to disrupt several websites dedicated to the buying and selling of illegal drug s and other unlawful goods. Combating cyber criminals remains a top priority for the FBI, and we continue to aggressively investigate, disrupt, and dismantle illicit networks that pose a threat in cyberspace”, says Robert Anderson, FBI Executive Assistant Director of the of the Criminal, Cyber, Response and Services Branch.

.terror impactBioweapons are easily accessible by terrorists and lead to mass deathsWilson 13 (Grant, 1/17/13, University of Virginia School of Law, “MINIMIZING GLOBAL CATASTROPHIC AND EXISTENTIAL RISKS FROM EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES THROUGH INTERNATIONAL LAW,” professor @ University of Virginia School of Law,

http://lib.law.virginia.edu/lawjournals/sites/lawjournals/files/3.%20Wilson%20-%20Emerging%20Technologies.pdf, 7/15/15, SM)

ii. Risk of bioterrorism∂ The threat of the malicious release of bioengineered organisms (i.e.,∂ bioterrorism) poses a GCR/ER.75

Bioengineering enables a malicious∂ actor to create an organism that is more deadly to humans, animals, or∂ plants than anything that exists in the natural world.76 Experts contend∂ that the barriers for a terrorist to order a DNA

sequence for a highly∂ pathogenic virus online or acquire a DNA synthesis machine online are∂ “surmountable.” 77 Alternatively, bioterrorists could break into∂ laboratories housing dangerous bioengineered organisms—like the∂ H5N1 virus, for example—and release them. Meanwhile, third world∂ countries with laxer standards and lower laboratory accountability are∂ rapidly discovering and using bioengineering, which may give∂ bioterrorists an easier pathway to obtain deadly bioengineered∂ organisms.78∂ There have already been several occasions in which groups attempted∂ to use or successfully used biological weapons. One unsophisticated∂ example of bioterrorism occurred when an individual contaminated∂ salads and dressing with salmonella in what apparently was an attempt∂ to decide a local election.79

Another example occurred in 2001, when∂ bioterrorists sent envelopes containing anthrax spores through the mail, infecting twenty-two people and killing five of them.∂ 80 While these∂ particular acts of bioterrorism did not cause

widespread death,∂ deploying extremely deadly bioengineered organisms over a large area∂ is a real possibility: tests by the United States in 1964 demonstrated that∂ a single aircraft can contaminate five thousand square kilometers of land∂ with a deadly bacterial aerosol.81∂ The recent engineering of an airborne H5N1 virus demonstrates∂ society’s concern over risks of bioterrorism arising from∂ bioengineering. Before scientists could publish their results of their∂ bioengineered airborne H5N1 virus in the widely read journals Nature∂ and Science, the NSABB determined that the danger of releasing the∂ sensitive information outweighed the benefits to society, advising that∂ the findings not be published in their entirety.82 The main risk is that∂ either a state or non-state actor could synthesize a “weaponized” version∂ of the H5N1 virus to create a disastrous pandemic.83 There is precedent∂ of outside groups recreating advanced bioengineering experiments, such∂ as when many scientists immediately synthesized hepatitis C replicons∂ upon publication of its genetic code. 84 However, the NSABB’s∂ recommendation was nonbinding, and there is nothing to stop other∂ scientists from releasing similar data in the future. Furthermore, while∂ the NSABB merely asserts that the “blueprints” of the virus should not∂ be printed, other biosecurity experts argue that the virus should never∂ have been created in the first place because of risks that the viruses∂ would escape or be stolen.85

Split-Key CPCounter-plan: The United States federal government should protect backdoors by using split crypto keys.

Split crypto key solves Crawford 15 (Douglas Crawford, freelance writer quoting NSA Chief Mike Rodgers, 2015, “NSA suggests ‘split crypto keys’ to protect data” https://www.bestvpn.com/blog/16988/nsa-suggests-split-crypto-keys-to-protect-data/)

The stand-off between the US government and its various surveillance and law enforcement agencies on the one hand, and just about everybody else on the other, over encryption continues to deepen. The government has become increasingly alarmed at tech companies’ (and in particular Apple’s) push to provide their customers with strongly

encrypted products that are genuinely secure – even against the best efforts of law enforcement and national security agencies.¶ Such agencies use the time-worn boogeymen of terrorists and pedophiles to argue that they must have access everyone’s personal data (I argue in this article that such demands have nothing to with catching criminals, and everything

to do with exerting state control), while privacy advocates, businesses, and anyone who does not feel the

government has an automatic right to paw through their metaphorical undies drawer disagrees, while also pointing out that encryption with a backdoor is really no encryption at all.¶ Perhaps even more to the point, US tech companies are still reeling from the damage done (to the tune of billions of dollars) by Edward Snowden’s revelations about their

cooperation with the NSA in spying on their customers, and desperately need to regain their trust.¶ According to The Washington Post, NSA chief Mike Rodgers recently gave a rare hint at what he considers might be a technical solution to the ‘problem’, suggesting that companies be forced to create a digital crypto key that can be used to decrypt their customers data, but that this keys be split into different parts that single entity (except presumably the owner of the data) would have full access to without court orders, subpoenas, warrants etc. This would require the government and tech companies to work together to access the data.¶ ‘I don’t want a back door. I want a front door. And I want the front

door to have multiple locks. Big locks.’

SOLVENCY: 1nc - NSA circumvention

Redundant capabilities from other agencies circumvent

Schneier, 15 - fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, a program fellow at the New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute, a board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an Advisory Board Member of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, and the Chief Technology Officer at Resilient Systems, Inc (Bruce, Data and Goliath: the Hidden Battles to Collect Your Data and Control Your World, Introduction)//AK

The NSA might get the headlines, but the US intelligence community is actually composed of 17 different agencies. There’s the CIA, of course. You might have heard of the NRO—the National Reconnaissance Office—it’s in charge of the country’s spy satellites . Then there are the intelligence agencies associated with all four branches of the military. The Departments of Justice (both FBI and DEA), State, Energy, the Treasury, and Homeland Security all conduct surveillance , as do a few other agencies. And there may be a still-secret 18th agency. (It’s unlikely, but possible. The details of the NSA’s mission remained largely secret until the 1970s, over 20 years after its formation.)

After the NSA, the FBI appears to be the most prolific government surveillance agency. It is tightly connected with the NSA , and the two share data, technologies, and legislative authorities . It’s easy to forget that the first Snowden document published by the Guardian—the order requiring Verizon to turn over the calling metadata for all of its customers—was an order by the FBI to turn the data over to the NSA. We know there is considerable sharing amongst the NSA, CIA, DEA, DIA, and DHS . An NSA program code-named ICREACH provides surveillance information to over 23 government agencies, including information about Americans.

AT Cyber Sec

Alt causes to data localization – surveillance isn’t key

Hill 14* Technology policy consultant at Monitor 360, fellow of the Global Governance Futures 2025 program at the Brookings Institution (Jonah, “THE GROWTH OF DATA LOCALIZATION POST-SNOWDEN: ANALYSIS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR U.S. POLICYMAKERS AND BUSINESS LEADERS” p.19-20)//GK

Upon first glance, the preceding case studies present a consistent narrative: for the nations now considering localization for data, the Snowden revelations exposed an NSA that had overstepped the boundaries of acceptable surveillance, violated citizen privacy, and catalyzed public and

government opinion in favor of forceful action in response. For policymakers, data localization offers a seemingly simple and effective solution. Under closer examination, however, a more complicated picture emerges. The localization movement is in fact a complex and multilayered phenomenon, with the objective not only—or even primarily— of protecting

privacy. Depending on the country in which it is being advanced, localization also serves to protect domestic businesses from foreign competition, to support domestic intelligence and law enforcement ambitions, to suppress dissent and to stir up populist enthusiasms for narrow political ends . Direct evidence of these other objectives for which privacy seems to be a pretext is by its nature difficult to uncover: rarely to policy-makers admit to seeking protectionist goals, to spying on their populations, to suppressing dissent or to exploiting populist emotions. Yet, by viewing the localization movement in the context of other state and corporate

interests and activities, it is possible to uncover these other, less exalted ends. Powerful business interests undoubtedly see data localization as an effective and convenient strategy for gaining a competitive advantage in domestic IT markets long dominated by U.S. tech firms. To localization proponents of this stripe, the NSA programs serve as a powerful and politically expedient excuse to pursue policies protective of domestic businesses . As an

illustration, data localization in Germany presents clear economic benefits for a most powerful industry advocate for localization, Deutsche Telekom (DT). Whether by way of its “email made in Germany” system or the Schengen area routing arrangement, DT looks poised to gain from efforts to reduce the prominence of American tech firms in Europe. It is no wonder that the company has been spearheading many of the localization proposals in that country. As telecommunications law expert Susan Crawford has noted, DT has been seeking to expand its cloud computing services for years, but has found its efforts to appeal to German consumers stifled by competition from Google and other American firms. 79 T-Systems International GmbH, DT’s 29,000-employee distribution arm for information-technology solutions, has been steadily losing money as a result.80 Moreover, Crawford suggests that DT would not be content with gaining a greater share of the German market; she points out that through a Schengen routing scheme, “Deutsche Telekom undoubtedly thinks that it will be able to collect fees from network operators in other countries that want their customers’ data to reach Deutsche Telekom’s customers.”81 Similarly, companies and their allies in government in Brazil and India look to profit from data localization proposals. Indeed, the governments of both nations have for years sought to cultivate their own domestic information technology sectors, at times by protecting homegrown industries with import tariffs and preferential taxation. Brazilian President Rousseff has on numerous occasions stated that her government intends to make Brazil a regional technology and innovation leader; in recent years the government has proposed measures to increase domestic Internet bandwidth production, expand international Internet connectivity, encourage domestic content production, and promote the use of domestically produced network equipment.82 India, more controversially, has at times required foreign corporations to enter into joint ventures to sell e- commerce products, and has compelled foreign companies to transfer proprietary technology to domestic firms after a predetermined amount of time.83 Brazil and India are, of course, not alone in this respect. Indonesian firms are constructing domestic cloud service facilities with the help of government

grants, 84 while Korea is offering similar support to its own firms. For the governments and corporation s of these nations, long frustrated by their inability to develop a domestic IT industry that can compete on an even playing field with the U.S. technology giants, data localization is one means to confront , and perhaps overcome, the American Internet hegemony . 85

No impact to cyberattacks – empirics – their ev is fear-mongering

Valeriano and Maness 5/13/15 – co-authors of Cyber War versus Cyber Realities, AND *Senior Lecturer in Social and Political Sciences at the University of Glasgow, AND **Visiting Fellow of Security and Resilience Studies at Northeastern University (Brandon and Ryan C., The Coming Cyberpeace: The Normative Argument Against Cyberwarfare, Foreign Affairs, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2015-05-13/coming-cyberpeace

The era of cyber conflict is upon us; at least, experts seem to accept that cyberattacks are the new normal. In fact, however, evidence suggests that cyberconflict is not as prevalent as many believe. Likewise, the severity of individual cyber events is not increasing, even if the frequency of overall attacks has risen. And an emerging norm

against the use of severe state-based cyber tactics contradicts fear-mongering news reports about a coming cyber apocalypse. The few isolated incidents of successful state-based cyberattacks do not a trend make. Rather, what we are seeing is cyberespionage and probes, not cyberwarfare. Meanwhile, the international consensus has stabilized around a number of limited acceptable uses of cyber technology—one that prohibits any dangerous use of force.¶ Despite fears of a boom in cyberwarfare , there have been no major or

dangerous hacks between countries. The closest any states have come to such events occurred when Russia attacked Georgian news outlets and websites in 2008; when Russian forces shut down banking, government, and news websites in Estonia in 2007; when Iran attacked the Saudi Arabian oil firm Saudi Aramco with the Shamoon virus in 2012; and when the United States attempted to sabotage Iran’s nuclear power systems from 2007 to 2011 through the Stuxnet worm. The attack on Sony from North Korea is just the latest overhyped cyberattack to date, as the corporate giant has recovered its lost revenues from the attack and its networks are arguably more resilient as a result. Even these are more probes into vulnerabilities than full attacks. Russia’s aggressions show that Moscow is willing to use cyberwarfare for disruption and propaganda, but not to inflict injuries or lasting infrastructural damage. The Shamoon incident allowed Iran to punish Saudi Arabia for its alliance with the United States as Tehran faced increased sanctions; the attack destroyed files on Saudi Aramco’s computer network but failed to

do any lasting damage . The Stuxnet incident also failed to create any lasting damage, as Tehran put more centrifuges online to compensate for virus-based losses and strengthened holes in their system. Further, these supposedly successful cases of cyberattacks are balanced by many more examples of unsuccessful ones . If the future of

cyberconflict looks like today, the international community must reassess the severity of

the threat. ¶ Cyberattacks have demonstrated themselves to be more smoke than fire . This is not to suggest that incidents are on the decline, however. Distributed denial-of-service attacks and infiltrations increase by the minute—every major organization is probed constantly, but only for weaknesses or new infiltration methods for potential use in the future. Probes and pokes do not destabilize states or change trends within international politics. Even common cyber actions have little effect on levels of cooperation and conflict between states.

No risk of a blackout on grids because of a cyberattack

Perera 9/10/14 (David Perera is a cybersecurity reporter for POLITICO Pro, 9/10/14, “U.S. grid safe from large-scale attack, experts say” http://www.politico.com/story/2014/09/power-grid-safety-110815.html#ixzz3gTzSBgeP)

The specter of a large-scale, destructive attack on the U.S. power grid is at the center of much strategic thinking about Cybersecurity. For years, Americans have been warned by a bevy of would-be Cassandras in Congress, the administration and the press that hackers are poised to shut it down. ¶ But in fact, the half-dozen security experts interviewed for this article agreed it’s virtually impossible for an online-only attack to cause a widespread or prolonged outage of the North American power grid. Even laying the groundwork for such a cyber operation could qualify as an act of war against the U.S. — a line that few nation-state-backed hacker crews would wish to cross. None denied that determined hackers could penetrate the networks of bulk power providers. But there’s a huge gap between that and causing a civilization-ending sustained outage of the grid. ¶ Electrical-grid hacking scenarios mostly overlook the engineering expertise necessary to intentionally cause harm to the grid, say experts knowledgeable about the power generators and high voltage transmission entities that constitute the backbone of the grid — what’s called the bulk power system. ¶ There’s also the enormity of the grid and diversity of its equipment to consider. “The grid is designed to lose utilities all the time,” said Patrick Miller, founder and director of the Energy Sector Security Consortium. “I’m not trying to trivialize the situation, but you’re not really able to cause this nationwide cascading failure for any extended duration of time,” he added. ¶ “It’s just not possible.” ¶ ICS security in a nutshell ¶ Controlling the boilers, fans, valves and switches and other mechanical devices that turn raw inputs and high-voltage transmission into flip-of-a-switch electricity is a class of computers known as industrial control systems. Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition Systems, or

SCADA, is a type of ICS.¶ ICSs aren’t general purpose computers like desktops. At the level of direct control over electromechanical processes — via a device often classified as a Programmable Logic Controller — programming is mainly done in specialized languages on obscure operating systems. Even just accessing a PLC requires particular software. Hiding malware in field devices is difficult to impossible. Many of the devices “aren’t running multi-thread, multi-tasking operations like our laptops,” noted Chris Blask, chair of the Industrial Control System Information Sharing and Analysis Center. ¶ And penetration is just a starting point. “Just hacking into the system, and even taking complete control of

a computer or crashing a bunch of computers, won’t necessarily bring down the bulk electric system,” said Dale Peterson, founder of Digital Bond, an industrial control system cybersecurity consultancy. ¶ For example, hackers could cause a SCADA system to crash, causing grid operators to lose system visibility — decidedly not a good thing. But the grid doesn’t need the SCADA system to continue operating. “There has to be an understanding that simply taking out the cyber assets doesn’t cause a blackout,” Peterson said.

AT ECON

International norms maintain economic stability

***Zero empirical data supports their theory – the only financial crisis of the new liberal order experienced zero uptick in violence or challenges to the central factions governed by the US that check inter-state violence – they have no theoretical foundation for proving causality

Barnett, 9 – senior managing director of Enterra Solutions LLC (Thomas, The New Rules: Security Remains Stable Amid Financial Crisis, 25 August 2009, http://www.aprodex.com/the-new-rules--security-remains-stable-amid-financial-crisis-398-bl.aspx)

When th e global financial crisis struck roughly a year ago, the blogosphere was ablaze with all sorts of scary

predictions of , and commentary regarding, ensuing conflict and wars -- a rerun of the Great Depression leading to world war, as it were. Now, as global economic news brightens and recovery -- surprisingly led by China and emerging markets -- is the talk of the day, it's

interesting to look back over the past year and realize how globalization's first truly worldwide recession has had virtually

no impact whatsoever on the international security landscape. None of the more than three-dozen ongoing conflicts listed by GlobalSecurity.org can be clearly attributed to the global recession. Indeed, the last new entry (civil

conflict between Hamas and Fatah in the Palestine) predates the economic crisis by a year, and three quarters of the

chronic struggles began in the last century. Ditto for the 15 low-intensity conflicts listed by Wikipedia (where the latest entry is the Mexican "drug war" begun in 2006). Certainly, the Russia-Georgia conflict last August was specifically timed, but by most accounts the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics was the most important external trigger (followed by the U.S. presidential campaign) for that sudden

spike in an almost two-decade long struggle between Georgia and its two breakaway regions. Looking over the various databases, then, we see a most familiar picture: the usual mix of civil conflicts, insurgencies, and liberation-themed terrorist movements. Besides the recent Russia-Georgia dust-up, the only two potential state-on-state wars (North v. South Korea,

Israel v. Iran) are both tied to one side acquiring a nuclear weapon capacity -- a process wholly unrelated to global economic trends. And with the United States effectively tied down by its two ongoing major interventions (Iraq and Afghanistan-bleeding-into-

Pakistan), our involvement elsewhere around the planet has been quite modest, both leading up to and following the

onset of the economic crisis: e.g., the usual counter-drug efforts in Latin America, the usual military exercises with allies across Asia, mixing it up with pirates off Somalia's coast). Everywhere else we find serious instability we pretty much let it burn, occasionally pressing the Chinese -- unsuccessfully -- to do something. Our new Africa Command, for example, hasn't led us to anything beyond advising and training local forces.

So, to sum up: •No significant uptick in mass violence or unrest (remember the smattering of urban riots last year in places like Greece, Moldova and Latvia?); •The usual frequency maintained in civil conflicts (in all the usual places); •Not a single state-on-state war

directly caused (and no great-power-on-great-power crises even triggered); •No great improvement or disruption in great-power cooperation regarding the emergence of new nuclear powers (despite all that diplomacy); •A modest scaling back of international policing

efforts by the system's acknowledged Leviathan power (inevitable given the strain); and •No serious efforts by any rising great power to challenge that Leviathan or supplant its role. (The worst things we can cite are Moscow's occasional deployments of strategic assets to the Western hemisphere and its weak efforts to outbid the United States on basing rights in Kyrgyzstan; but the best include

China and India stepping up their aid and investments in Afghanistan and Iraq.) Sure, we've finally seen global defense spending surpass the previous world record set in the late 1980s, but even that's likely to wane given the stress on public budgets created by all this unprecedented

"stimulus" spending. If anything, the friendly cooperation on such stimulus packaging was the most notable great-power dynamic caused by the crisis. Can we say that the world has suffered a distinct shift to political radicalism as a result of the

economic crisis? Indeed, no. The world's major economies remain governed by center-left or center-right political factions that remain decidedly friendly to both markets and trade. In the short run, there were attempts across the board to insulate economies from immediate damage (in effect, as much protectionism as allowed under current trade rules), but there was no great slide into "trade wars." Instead, the World Trade Organization is functioning as it was designed to function, and regional efforts toward free-trade agreements have not slowed. Can we say Islamic radicalism was inflamed by the economic crisis? If it was, that shift was clearly overwhelmed by the Islamic world's growing disenchantment with the brutality displayed by violent extremist groups such as al-Qaida. And looking forward, austere economic times are just as likely to breed connecting evangelicalism as disconnecting fundamentalism. At the end of the day, the economic crisis did not prove to be sufficiently frightening to provoke major economies into establishing global regulatory schemes, even as it has sparked a spirited -- and much needed, as I argued last week -- discussion of the continuing viability of the U.S. dollar as the world's primary reserve currency. Naturally, plenty of experts and pundits have attached great significance to this debate, seeing in it the beginning of "economic warfare" and the like between "fading" America and "rising" China. And yet, in a world of globally integrated production chains and interconnected financial markets, such "diverging interests" hardly constitute signposts for wars up ahead. Frankly, I don't welcome a world in

which America's fiscal profligacy goes undisciplined, so bring it on -- please! Add it all up and it's fair to say that this global financial crisis has proven the great resilience o f America's post-World War II international liberal trade order.

Backdoor reform is key to solve, not abolishment

Burger et al 14

(Eric, Research Professor of Computer Science at Georgetown, L. Jean Camp, Associate professor at the Indiana University School of Information and Computing, Dan Lubar, Emerging Standards Consultant at RelayServices, Jon M Pesha, Carnegie Mellon University, Terry Davis, MicroSystems Automation Group, “Risking It All: Unlocking the Backdoor to the Nation’s Cybersecurity,” IEEE USA, 7/20/2014, pg. 1-5, Social Science Research Network, http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2468604)//duncan

This paper addresses government policies that can influence commercial practices to weaken security in products and services sold on the

commercial market. The debate on information surveillance for national security must include consideration of the potential cybersecurity risks and economic implications of the information collection strategies employed. As IEEE-USA, we write to comment on current discussions with respect to weakening standards, or altering commercial products and services for intelligence, or law enforcement. Any policy that seeks to weaken technology sold on the commercial market has many serious downsides, even if it temporarily advances the intelligence and law enforcement missions of facilitating legal and authorized government

surveillance.∂ Specifically, we define and address the risks of installing backdoors in commercial products, introducing malware and spyware into products, and weakening standards. We illustrate that these are practices that harm America’s cybersecurity posture and put the resilience of American

cyberinfrastructure at risk . We write as a technical society to clarify the potential harm should these strategies be adopted.

Whether or not these strategies ever have been used in practice is outside the scope of this paper.∂ Individual computer users, large

corporations and government agencies all depend on security features built into information technology products and services they buy on the commercial market. If the security features of these widely available products and services are weak, everyone is in greater danger. There recently have been allegations that U.S. government agencies (and some private entities) have engaged in a number of activities deliberately

intended to weaken mass market, widely used technology. Weakening commercial products and services does have the benefit that it becomes easier for U.S. intelligence agencies to conduct surveillance on targets that use the weakened technology, and more information is available for law enforcement purposes. On the surface, it would appear these motivations

would be reasonable. However, such strategies also inevitably make it easier for foreign powers, criminals and

terrorists to infiltrate these systems for their own purposes. Moreover, everyone who uses backdoor technologies may be vulnerable, and not just the handful of surveillance targets for U.S. intelligence agencies. It is the opinion of IEEE-USA’s Committee on Communications Policy that no entity should act to reduce the security of a product or service sold on the commercial market without first conducting a careful and methodical risk assessment. A complete risk assessment would consider the interests of the large

swath of users of the technology who are not the intended targets of government surveillance.∂ A methodical risk assessment would give proper weight to the asymmetric nature of cyberthreats, given that technology is equally advanced and

ubiquitous in the United States, and the locales of many of our adversaries. Vulnerable products should be corrected , as

needed, based on this assessment. The next section briefly describes some of the government policies and technical strategies that might have the undesired side effect of reducing security. The following section discusses why the effect of these practices may be a decrease, not an

increase, in security.∂ Government policies can affect greatly the security of commercial products, either

positively or negatively. There are a number of methods by which a government might affect security

negatively as a means of facilitating legal government surveillance. One inexpensive method is to

exploit pre-existing weaknesses that are already present in commercial software, while keeping

these weaknesses a secret. Another method is to motivate the designer of a computer or

communications system to make those systems easier for government agencies to access. Motivation

may come from direct mandate or financial incentives. There are many ways that a designer can facilitate government access

once so motivated. For example, the system may be equipped with a “backdoor.” The company that creates it — and, presumably, the government agency that requests it — would “know” the backdoor, but not the

product’s (or service’s) purchaser(s). The hope is that the government agency will use this feature when it is given authority to do so, but no one else will. However, creating a backdoor introduces the risk that

other parties will find the vulnerability, especially when capable adversaries, who are actively

seeking security vulnerabilities, know how to leverage such weaknesses .∂ History illustrates that secret backdoors do not remain secret and that the more widespread a backdoor, the more dangerous its existence. The 1988 Morris worm, the first widespread Internet attack, used a number of backdoors to infect systems and spread widely. The backdoors in that case were a set of secrets then known only by a small, highly technical

community. A single, putatively innocent error resulted in a large-scale attack that disabled many systems. In recent years, Barracuda had a completely undocumented backdoor that allowed high levels of access from the Internet addresses assigned to Barracuda. However, when it was publicized, as almost inevitably happens, it became extremely unsafe, and Barracuda’s customers rejected it. ∂ One example of how attackers can subvert backdoors placed into systems for benign reasons occurred in the network of the largest commercial cellular operator in Greece.

Switches deployed in the system came equipped with built-in wiretapping features, intended only for authorized law enforcement agencies. Some unknown attacker was able to install software, and made use of these embedded wiretapping features to surreptitiously and illegally eavesdrop on calls from many cell phones — including phones belonging to the Prime Minister of Greece, a hundred high-ranking Greek dignitaries, and an employee of the U.S. Embassy in Greece before the security breach finally was discovered. In essence, a backdoor created to fight crime was used to commit crime.

Tech high

Tech innovation sustainableOne India, 2010 (“US to compete with India, china in R&D,” September 15, http://news.oneindia.in/2010/09/15/us-to-compete-india-china-in-development.html)

Washington, Sep 15: President Barack Obama said his administration had made the largest investment in research and development so that the US can compete with China, India and Germany . In an

appearance at a private home, he said what his administration had "tried to do to lay this foundation for long-term economic growth is to put our investments in those things that are really going to make us more competitive over the long term." "So we have made the largest investment in research and development, in basic research and science, in our history, because that's

going to determine whether we can compete with China and India and Germany over the long term," he said. Today people around the world "still want to be the United States of America," he said, "as we still have a huge competitive edge and we've got the

best workers in the world. And we've got the most dynamic economy in the world. We've got the best universities, the best entrepreneurs in the world." he added.

Competitiveness Wrong

Competitiveness not key to hegBrooks and Wohlforth ‘8 - Brooks is Assistant Professor AND*** William C. Wohlforth is Professor in the Department of Government at Dartmouth College [Stephen G., “World out of Balance, International Relations and the Challenge of American Primacy,” p. 32-35]

American primacy is also rooted in the county's position as the world's leading technological power. The United States remains dominant globally in overall R&D investments, high-technology production, commercial first decade of this century. As we noted in chapter 1, this was partly the result of an Iraq-induced doubt about the utility of material predominance, a doubt redolent of the post-Vietnam mood. In

retrospect, many assessments of U.S. economic and technological prowess from the 1990s were overly optimistic; by the next decade important potential vulnerabilities were evident. In particular, chronically imbalanced domestic finances and accelerating public debt convinced some analysts that the United States once again confronted a competitiveness crisis .23 If concerns continue to mount, this will count as the fourth such crisis since 1945; the first three occurred during the 1950s (Sputnik), the 1970s (Vietnam and stagflation), and the 1980s

(the Soviet threat and Japan's challenge). None of these crises , however, shifted the international system's structure: multipolarity did not return in the 1960s, 1970s, or early 1990s, and each scare over competitiveness ended with the American position of primacy retained or strengthened .24 Our review of the evidence of U.S. predominance is not meant to suggest that the United States lacks vulnerabilities or causes for concern. In fact, it confronts a number of

significant vulnerabilities; of course, this is also true of the other major powers.25 The point is that adverse trends for the United States will not cause a polarity shift in the near future. If we take a long view of U.S. competitiveness and

the prospects for relative declines in economic and technological dominance, one takeaway stands out: relative power shifts slowly . The United States has accounted for a quarter to a third of global output for over a century. No other economy will match its combination of wealth, size , technological capacity, and productivity in the foreseeable future (tables 2.2 and 2.3). The depth, scale, and projected longevity of the U.S. lead in each critical dimension of power are noteworthy. But what truly distinguishes the current distribution of capabilities is American dominance in all of them simultaneously. The chief lesson of Kennedy's 500-year survey of leading powers is that nothing remotely similar ever occurred in the historical experience innovation, and higher education (table 2.3). Despite the weight of this evidence, elite perceptions of U.S. power had shifted toward pessimism by the middle of the that informs modern international relations theory. The implication is both simple and underappreciated: the counterbalancing constraint is inoperative and will remain so until the distribution of capabilities changes fundamentally. The next section explains why.

Surveillance is key to stopping terrorism- empirics Dozier 13

(KIMBERLY DOZIER is a Daily Beast and CNN contributor, after four years as AP’s intelligence writer including traveling to cover the conflicts in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and 17 years as an award-winning CBS News foreign and national security correspondent. “NSA: Surveillance Programs Foiled Some 50 Terrorist Plots Worldwide”, 6-18-13, AP, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/18/nsa-surveillance_n_3460106.html, TMP)

The director of the N ational S ecurity A gency insisted on Tuesday that the government's sweeping surveillance programs have foiled some 50

terrorist plots worldwide in a forceful defense echoed by the leaders of the House Intelligence Committee. Army Gen. Keith Alexander said the two recently disclosed programs – one that gathers U.S.

phone records and another that is designed to track the use of U.S.-based Internet servers by foreigners with possible links to terrorism – are critical in the terrorism

fight . Intelligence officials have disclosed some details on two thwarted attacks, and Alexander promised additional information to the panel on thwarted attacks

that the programs helped stop. He provided few additional details. The programs "assist the intelligence community to connect the dots," Alexander told the

committee in a rare, open Capitol Hill hearing. Alexander got no disagreement from the leaders of the panel, who have been outspoken in backing the programs since Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old former contractor with Booz Allen Hamilton, disclosed information to The Washington

Post and the Guardian newspapers. Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., chairman of the committee, and Rep. C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger of Maryland, the panel's top Democrat, said the programs were vital to the intelligence community and assailed Snowden's actions as criminal. "It is at times like these where our enemies within

become almost as damaging a s our enemies on the outside ," Rogers said. Ruppersberger said the " brazen disclosures" put the U nited S tates and its allies at risk . The general counsel for the intelligence community said the NSA cannot target phone conversations between callers inside the U.S. – even if one of those callers was someone they

were targeting for surveillance when outside the country. The director of national intelligence's legal chief, Robert S. Litt, said that if the NSA finds it has accidentally gathered a phone call by a target who had traveled into the U.S. without their knowledge, they have to "purge" that from

their system. The same goes for an accidental collection of any conversation because of an error. Litt said those incidents are then reported to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which "pushes back" and asks how it happened, and what the NSA is doing to fix the problem so it

doesn't happen again. Rogers previewed the latest public airing of the NSA controversy the morning after President Barack Obama, who is attending the G-8 summit in Ireland, vigorously defended the surveillance programs in a lengthy interview Monday, calling them transparent – even though they are authorized in secret. " It is transparent ," Obama told PBS' Charlie Rose in an interview.

"That's why we set up the FISA court ," the president added, referring to the secret court set up by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that authorizes two recently disclosed programs: one that gathers U.S.

phone records and another that is designed to track the use of U.S.-based Internet servers by foreigners with possible links to terrorism. Obama said he has named representatives to a privacy and civil liberties oversight board to help in the debate over just how far government data gathering should be allowed to go – a discussion that is complicated by the secrecy surrounding the FISA court, with hearings held at undisclosed locations and with only government lawyers present. The orders that result are all highly classified. "We're

going to have to find ways where the public has an assurance that there are checks and balances in place ... that their phone calls aren't being listened into; their text messages aren't being monitored, their emails are not being read by

some big brother somewhere," the president said. A senior administration official said Obama had asked Director of National Intelligence James Clapper to determine what more information about the two programs could be made public, to help better explain them.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to speak publicly. Snowden accused members of Congress and administration officials Monday of exaggerating their claims about the success of the data gathering programs, including pointing to the

arrest of the would-be New York subway bomber, Najibullah Zazi, in 2009. In an online interview with The Guardian in which he posted answers to questions Monday, Snowden said that Zazi could have been caught with narrower, targeted surveillance programs – a point Obama

conceded in his interview without mentioning Snowden. "We might have caught him some other way," Obama said. "We might have disrupted it because a New York cop saw he was suspicious. Maybe he turned out to be incompetent and the bomb didn't go off. But, at the margins,

we are increasing our chances of preventing a catastroph e like that through these programs ," he said.

Obama repeated earlier assertions that the NSA programs were a legitimate counterterror tool and that they were

completely noninvasive to people with no terror ties – something