Tag: surveillance

Biden Admin to Investigate Chinese-Made ‘Smart Cars’ Posing Potential National Security Risks

Virginia Star Staff
Gina Raimondo

The Biden administration announced Thursday it will investigate Chinese-made “smart cars,” citing national security risks and surveillance concerns.

The investigation will center around concerns that Beijing could use Chinese smart cars inside the U.S. to collect information on the driver and the area surrounding the vehicle, according to the White House. U.S. intelligence agencies have warned that China has capabilities allowing it access to a score of key infrastructure systems, which could potentially be exploited in the event of a global emergency.

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Commentary: The Biden Big Government and Big Banks Surveillance Collusion

Virginia Star Staff
Bass Pro Shops

Uh oh.

I’m in trouble now.

Last December, I walked into a Cabela’s on my way to Christmas vacation. I needed, you see, a gift card for my cousins. A Christmas present. They love the outdoors. Hikers and nature lovers, they have grown fond of Cabela’s. So what else to give them but, of course, a Cabela’s gift card?

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House Judiciary Introduces FISA Reform Bill

Just the News

A group of lawmakers on the House Judiciary Committee has unveiled legislation Monday to restrict the intelligence community’s warrantless surveillance authority and impose stiffer punishments for violations.

Spearheaded by Arizona GOP Rep. Andy Biggs, the plan boasts Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, Ranking member Jerold Nadler, D-N.Y., and Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., as cosponsors, The Hill reported.

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Commentary: FBI Chief Replies with Less-than-Inspiring ‘Not to My Knowledge’ When Asked About Tricky FISA Warrants, Criminal Investigations

Virginia Star Staff

“Not to my knowledge.”

That was FBI Director Christopher Wray’s response to questioning from U.S. Rep. Tom McClintock (R-Calif.) at the House Judiciary Committee on July 13 about whether the Justice Department and FBI utilize parallel construction — where law enforcement agencies are handed information obtained from Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants or via warrantless surveillance by intelligence agencies, not unlike the FISA surveillance of the Trump campaign in 2016 that became the Russiagate counterintelligence and eventually criminal investigation — and then act on it.

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Chinese Intelligence Arm Quietly Operates ‘Service Centers’ in Seven U.S. Cities

Admin

by Philip Lenczycki   A Chinese intelligence agency quietly operates “service centers” in seven American cities, all of which have had contact with Beijing’s national police authority, according to state media reports and government records reviewed by the Daily Caller News Foundation. The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) United Front Work…

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China Has Operated Spy Facilities in Cuba Since at Least 2019, White House Says

Admin

The White House clarified Saturday that China has operated a spy base in Cuba since at least 2019, according to The Wall Street Journal, following reporting that Beijing reached a tentative agreement to set up a new operation somewhere on the island country.

The White House on Friday had characterized as “inaccurate” the WSJ’s first report of a planned Chinese surveillance outpost in Cuba focused on intercepting electronic communications, including emails and radio transmissions, in the southeast U.S. However, White House officials told the outlet Saturday that the Biden administration has worked to tamp down on China’s repeated attempts to spy on the U.S. since Biden took office, and said China has had a surveillance operation in Cuba since at least 2019.

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House Speaker Releases Thousands of Hours of January 6 Surveillance Video to Tucker Carlson: Report

Admin

According to an exclusive posted on Axios today, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has turned over the full trove of surveillance video captured by Capitol police security cameras on January 6 to Fox News host Tucker Carlson.

“Carlson TV producers were on Capitol Hill last week to begin digging through the trove, which includes multiple camera angles from all over Capitol grounds,” Mike Allen reported. “Excerpts will begin airing in the coming weeks.”

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China Chreatens U.S. for Popping Balloon as American Military Begins Recovery Operation

Just the News

China on Sunday threatened to respond after the United States shot down a suspected spy balloon that flew over sensitive military sites while U.S. armed forces are currently recovering the aircraft.

“China will resolutely safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of the company concerned, and reserves the right to make further responses if necessary,” China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which has insisted the balloon was a civilian research airship that went off course, said.

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Commentary: The Administrative State Can Put a Bug in Your Phone

Admin

n the age of cellphones and the internet, consumers often face a simple choice: convenience or privacy? Do we let Big Tech have access to our private communications and free email accounts because it’s so easy?

Once you’ve said yes — and who among us has not? — it’s not a stretch to think that Big Data already has almost all your information, so why get picky at the next juncture?

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NSA Inspector General ‘Concerned’ About Surveillance of Americans’ Communication Devices

Virginia Star Staff

On Monday, the office of the Inspector General at the National Security Agency (NSA) released a report showing that the agency failed to follow basic internal guidelines and court-ordered procedures in its surveillance of American citizens’ communications.

According to CNN, the report showed that the agency abused a loophole in Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). While Section 702 allows the government to collect such communications of foreign citizens on foreign soil without a warrant, it prohibits the government from doing so with American citizens. The loophole allows the NSA and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to use this section to collect American communications without a warrant if they believe “a query is reasonably likely to return foreign intelligence information.”

The inspector general’s report “revealed a number of concerns involving [U.S. person] identifiers used as query terms against FISA Section 702 data.” Furthermore, some of these NSA queries “did not always follow NSA procedural and policy requirements.” Among other discrepancies, information gathered on “selectors,” or particular search terms in an investigation, were not properly documented; in addition, the NSA’s internal query tools designed to automatically prevent the processing of queries involving any Americans associated with the selectors ultimately failed to do so, thus allowing Americans to be investigated and monitored.

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Commentary: The Everlasting COVID Crisis

Admin

In 1972, three black men, Melvin Cale, Louis Moore, and Henry D. Jackson, Jr., hijacked Southern Airways Flight 49, demanding $10 million and safe passage to Cuba. The hijacking lasted nearly 30 hours and involved multiple stops throughout the United States, Canada, and eventually, Cuba. In the process of negotiating with the FBI, the hijackers threatened to ram their aircraft, a Douglas DC-9, into the High Flux Isotope Reactor in Oak Ridge, Tennessee if their demands weren’t met.

Until that point, American airlines had resisted installing metal detectors in airports, worried that treating Americans like common criminals to board a plane would wreck their burgeoning industry. But that threat of nuclear attack, and the 130 other hijackings between 1968 and 1972, convinced the government to take a stand at last. In 1973, the FAA used its bureaucratic and administrative powers to make passenger screening mandatory. In 1974, Congress validated the requirement, ignoring passenger rights’ groups that protested the intrusive screening of luggage and persons in order to board aircraft. 

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Commentary: $28 Per Day Triggers IRS Surveillance Program

Virginia Star Staff

The entire Democrat multi-trillion dollar socialist spending scam is bad for Americans, and bad for our economy. One particular provision that is especially terrible is their “IRS Surveillance” program, which would grant the government access to spy on nearly every Americans’ bank accounts. Their bill wants to use $80 billion of taxpayer funds to hire 85,000 more bureaucrats, nearly doubling the size of the IRS, to go through individuals’ personal banking information.

President Biden, and his colleagues in Congress, must have realized how unpopular this policy was with the American people, so they decided to make some “changes.” They created the impression they were raising the threshold in transactions individuals would need to hit before triggering the IRS to spy on their personal banking accounts.

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JC Bowman Commentary: Exposed in a Technological Age

JC Bowman
classroom

An old and wise saying challenges us to: “Believe nothing you hear, half of what you read, and some of what you see.”  It is critical to examine issues from all angles, rejecting gossip, mistruths, bias or information not supported or misinterpreted.  Put what you see or read into proper context to make sure what you think you are seeing is factual. 

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