31 January 2012

Adrian Lamo Comments on NSA

Adrian Lamo sends 31 January 2012:

Hello,

I realize I'm late to the party, but I'm putting this on the public record just the same.

In the [January 7, 2011] story at http://cnet.co/ziTPdF, Declan McCullagh writes:

One of the NSA's missions is, of course, information assurance.

But its normally lustrous star in the political firmament has dimmed a bit due to Wikileaks-related revelations.

Bradley Manning, the U.S. Army private who is accused of liberating hundreds of thousands of confidential government documents from military networks and sending them to Wikileaks, apparently joked about the NSA's incompetence in an online chat last spring.

"I even asked the NSA guy if he could find any suspicious activity coming out of local networks," Manning reportedly said in a chat transcript provided by ex-hacker Adrian Lamo. "He shrugged and said, 'It's not a priority.' "

I reject and repudiate the implication that the snippet of conversation between myself and Bradley Manning is representative of any attitude on the part of the NSA beyond that of the particular individual assigned to FOB Hammer outside Baghdad.

Specifically, it should not be taken as representative of the posture of the agency as a whole. It was clearly intended (by PFC. Manning) to disparage the skills or attentiveness of one particular agent or technician (who, by now, is probably seeking new employment) rather than define the capabilities of the NSA as a whole.

To be clear, I am in no way privy to any special knowledge or insight as to the NSA's capabilities, technology, tactics, or training. No aspect of my unavoidable past, present or immediate future involvement with the .gov or the .nsa.smil.mil/nsa.ic.gov influences this opinion. For purposes of this note, I am relying on open-source intelligence.

My sole purpose in proffering this note is to clear the air in re. a part of a conversation to which I was a party being used to paint a picture that is not representative of its context.

Neither is this reply intended to impugn Declan McCullagh's skills or ethics as a journalist, both of which are beyond reproach and are routinely described positively by sources considering approaching him. It is my good-faith belief that he may have overestimated the understanding that PFC. Manning held in re. the capabilities of the National Security Agency, among other benign possibilities.

Thank you for reading.

Cheers,

/s/

Adrian Lamo

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