From Courthouse News Service: A federal judge may shine a light on foreign dictatorships that have imported illegal surveillance and jamming technology from the United States.
Events from the so-called Arab Spring show that Middle Eastern dictators have used Western technology to quash uprisings, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a nonprofit digital watchdog group, has said.
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Read More… from FOIA requests may illustrate foreign despots’ access to U.S. surveillance devices
From ExecutiveGov: The White House wants public input on its proposal to create a second action plan that will work to further encourage openness and civic participation in government activities, according to a Wednesday blog post.
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Read More… from White House seeks feedback on second opengov action plan
From Twin Cities Daily Planet: Since its earliest days, the Obama administration has been circumspect about officially confirming the existence of its drone-centric counter-terrorism operations. Despite extensive press coverage of the subject (as well as apparently sanctioned leaks and carefully crafted public statements) the administration avoided officially acknowledging its drone program for over four years.
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Read More… from Obama speech impacts California drone lawsuit
From Reuters: WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama's administration is likely to open a criminal investigation into the leaking of highly classified documents that revealed the secret surveillance of Americans' telephone and email traffic, U.S. officials said on Friday.
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Read More… from Government likely to open criminal probe into NSA leaks: officials
From The Guardian: The National Security Agency has obtained direct access to the systems of Google, Facebook, Apple and other US internet giants, according to a top secret document obtained by the Guardian.
The NSA access is part of a previously undisclosed program called PRISM, which allows officials to collect material including search history, the content of emails, file transfers and live chats, the document says.
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Read More… from NSA taps in to user data of Google, Skype and others, secret files reveal
In the following statement issued today, NFOIC and its allies in the OpenTheGovernment.org coalition expressed outrage and demanded more answers regarding the FISA-court authorized data mining of Verizon customers' phone records.
Please see the full statement and additional links below.
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Read More… from Open government groups demand answers on domestic spying program
From The Columbus Dispatch: Some of President Barack Obama’s political appointees are using secret government email accounts to conduct official business, a practice that complicates agencies’ legal responsibilities to find and turn over emails under public-records requests and congressional inquiries.
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Read More… from Some Obama appointees using nonpublic email accounts
From Watchdog.org: HONOLULU — Aloha, U.S. Secret Service? You’ve been served. About those vacations to Hawaii, we want to know how much they’re costing taxpayers.
Judicial Watch Inc., a nonpartisan Washington, D.C.-based organization that focuses on transparency and accountability in government, filed the lawsuit May 6 to obtain from the U.S. Secret Service financial records related to the first family’s Hawaiian vacations.
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From Politico:
A federal appeals court issued a major ruling Tuesday preserving the rights of Freedom of Information Act requesters to proceed to court quickly when agencies don't comply with the legally required timelines to respond to demands for government records.
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Read More… from FOIA requesters score major win over Obama Administration
