National Security Archive – As the discovery of Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan, raises fresh questions about U.S.-Pakistan relations, newly released documents show that as early as 1998 U.S. officials concluded the Government of Pakistan „is not disposed to be especially helpful on the matter of terrorist Usama bin Ladin.“ According to previously secret U.S. documents, Pakistani officials repeatedly refused to act on the Bin Laden problem, despite mounting pressure from American authorities. Instead, in the words of a U.S. Embassy cable, Pakistani sources „all took the line that the issue of bin Ladin is a problem the U.S. has with the Taliban, not with Pakistan.“

1998 State Deparment talking points describe unsuccessful efforts, through Pakistan, to have Bin Laden expelled from Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.

The documents in this compilation – part of the National Security Archive’s developing Osama Bin Laden File – were obtained by the Archive through the Freedom of Information Act. They reveal a history of „disappointment that Pakistan … a good friend of the U.S., was not taking steps to help with Usama bin Ladin (UBL.)“

As an ally to both the Taliban and the United States, Pakistan was balancing conflicting policies towards the Bin Laden question. Islamabad continued to support the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, an organization protecting the al-Qaeda leader, while simultaneously promising U.S. leaders it was „taking the bin Laden matter very seriously,“ and would cooperate with U.S. counterterrorism efforts. Portending momentous events to come, U.S. officials in 1998 lamented that getting Pakistani help in apprehending bin Laden would be „an uphill slog.“

Read the Documents

John Stanton – According to the Army Special Operations Forces Unconventional Warfare, September 2008, “Information is a strategic resource vital to national security. Dominance of the information environment is a reality that extends to the armed forces of the United States at all levels.

Military operations, in particular, are dependent upon many simultaneous and integrated activities that, in turn, depend upon information and information systems, which the United States must protect…With the free flow of information present in all theaters, such as TV, phone, and Internet, conflicting messages can quickly emerge to defeat the intended effects.

As a result, continuous synchronization and coordination between Information Operations, Public Affairs, Public Diplomacy, and U.S. allies is imperative. It also helps to ensure that information themes employed during operations involving neutral or friendly populations remain consistent.”

In short, the media in all its forms—mass, blog, social, print, electronic, spoken word—is a physical element to be accounted for in national security operations just like the weather or inhospitable geographic terrain. And that means citizen consumers of information are absorbing content from providers who are accounted for and manipulated by national security commanders (civilian and military) in planning and executing operations.

Shaping the information environment means targeting the media not with violence but with logrolling techniques, trial balloons, trades/leaks, etc. The main stream media (MSM) is the focus of these efforts as the population/culture largely looks to the MSM for guidance on how to dress, think, travel, eat, listen, watch and speak. The Combatant Commands and the US Department of Defense News Services assist in shaping the consciousness of the nation as well.

I Shot Bin Laden, But I Didn’t Shoot the Deputy
The National Security Operation approved by US President Barak Obama that ended Osama Bin Laden’s was a gem in terms of Military Information Support Operations (though it should be renamed National Security Information Operations). Planning included meeting with editors of US publications like The New York Times, Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal. CNN and FOX, and select allies, were likely briefed as well. These outlets transmit the voices and thoughts of those who take the country to war, set economic policy, and decide whether a Broadway play succeeds or fails.

Even though the original version of the Bin Laden story continues to crumble/change, it was wildly successful in stimulating US nationalism through the media’s constant repetition of the matter. Even Hezbollah’s website Al Manar carried wires stories from AP on Bin Laden’s ignominious demise.

But it is far too early for anyone to speculate what the fallout will be from the targeted killing of Bin Laden and the use of the media to exploit his death and humiliate Pakistan. Kristen Eichensehr’s Assassination Policy Under International Law–in the May 2006 issue of Harvard International Review– cautions against the celebratory madness seen in the USA after Bin Laden’s death. It reminds that retribution against US leaders should not be unexpected.

“Publicized US employment of targeted killings in the war on terror made a return to the previous era of credible moral superiority in rhetoric impossible. The preferable alternative to targeted killing of enemies should always be arrest and trial, but in cases where those alternative measures are not available, targeted killing may be the next best alternative. However, careful calculation of the risks and benefits of employing the policy must be weighed before it is implemented. The threat of reciprocity and repercussions for society are serious considerations that are often not given enough weight, and the policy should be re-examined continually to evaluate its effectiveness in decreasing the threat to the employing state’s citizens. In some instances, targeted killings are both legal and effective, but for societies founded on principles of human rights, they should never be the first choice.”

Higher on the list of tasks for the Navy Seals, than terminating Bin Laden, was to gather information/intelligence from Bin Laden’s hideout that would allow further exploitation and shaping of the domestic and global information terrain; and, hence, public consciousness on matters of national security. Indeed, much appears to have been collected by the pickers on the Navy Seal Teams (designated shooters and pickers of information) in the form of hard drives and other electronic/print media.

This has provided the National Security System, led by President Obama, to “do a Wikileaks.” Over the coming months (and years?) bits and bytes of Bin Laden’s operation will be given to, or leaked to, favored media outlets. The Hollywood liaison offices at the Pentagon and elsewhere will be busy working with script writers for the Bin Laden story to further shape the information environment via the movie screen.

Cry Havoc! Let Loose the Electrons and Photons of War
Like their US counterparts in the national security machinery, The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has similar views on the importance of media exploitation. They are savvy too.

“Wars today cannot be won without media. Media is directed to the heart rather than the body. The weapon is directed to the body. If the heart is defeated the battle is won and the body is defeated. In the beginning, with the fall of the Islamic Emirate, the enemy thought that the field was completely open before them, and they spread their lies and falsehoods that they had destroyed the Islamic Emirate and its Mujahideen and that their victory in the land of Afghanistan was complete.

All of their resources, especially their media were directed towards changing the ideas of Afghans and injecting defeatist thought into them and instilling in them a petrifying fear of the new occupiers. First through the grace of Allah, subhanahu wa ta’ala, then through the victories of the Mujahideen and their rightly guided leadership; and after defeats were inflicted on the enemy on the field of battle, a media committee was established to contest with the enemy in the (media) field.

Among other committees, the Islamic Emirates established a special Media Committee to spread news about Jihadist activities in different fields and chase away the voice of the unjust enemy who, before the entire world, was distorting the image of the Jihad in Afghanistan and was claiming false victories here and there over the Mujahideen. Need called for the existence of a media agency to take responsibility for the Mujahideen in Afghanistan; speaking on behalf of the Islamic Emirate; delivering news of its victories on the battlefield to its friends and to the world; exposing the falsehood of its enemies and their media; responding to the claims and its daily changing deceptions; and delivering to the world the voice of truth and jihad and its point of view about current Jihadist events in the land of Afghanistan.

Our website specializes in conveying field reports from the combat zones and publishing the statements of the Ameer ul-Momineen and the statements of the Command Shura Council about different issues pertaining to Jihad, in addition to articles and official analysis. They have many sections: for example there’s an Islam page, a magazines page, and a page for films produced by official studios. We also print magazines and statements and distribute them in popular circles at home and abroad. Additionally, we produce different publications and regulations and distribute them among the Mujahideen. There is also a “Voice of Shari’ah” that broadcasts news and official statements day and night.”

Civil and Military Become One, Media a Tool
It now seems ridiculous to use the term “military operations” since the lines differentiating civilian and military practice have long since ceased to exist. The only notable difference between civilian and the military is in the clothing; one sports a Brooks Brothers business suit, the other military gear adorned with awards.

At any rate, President Barak Obama implied as much in his National Security Strategy of the USA. As a matter of policy, America has gone “beyond traditional distinctions” indicating that America’s homeland defense, commercial activities and military operations have all fused together to defeat terrorists, drug lords, the black market, et al. The moniker selected for this is “Whole of Government, Whole of Nation” effort which the world will hear more of in the coming months and years.

Better now to think of the USA as a National Security System. National Security Operations are conducted on either the strategic or tactical level using any one or all of the USA’s instruments of national power as excellently defined by the US Army’s Unconventional Warfare manual cited above. Those elements of power are diplomatic, information, military, economic, intelligence, law enforcement, and financial.

So, where to turn to for the news? How to differentiate between news content of Al Manar (Hezbollah) and the New York Times? How to know whether the Washington Post or Press TV (Iran) has the right angle on the story? The “bad guys” at those publications are carrying items off the AP, Reuters’ wires. They report on floods in the US Midwest like their US counterparts. Al Manar is a huge fan of NBA basketball and LeBron James. And what to make of the reporting style of Xinhua (China) or the Daily Star (Lebanon)?

The US Army Special Forces document cited above outlines the dangers of a centralized media. The hazards are real, the battlefield is everywhere now, and the mind, or heart, is the target.

Conspiracy Theorists: Take a Hike!
Understanding the operation of the National Security System is not hard if one is an educated information consumer, a student of the information terrain cognizant of the doctrines used by those who manipulate and attempt to shape individual and collective thought. Marketers selling soda and beer use techniques that are similar.

Before forming opinions based on information provided by the media be it Fox News, Press TV, Al Manar, the Wall Street Journal or the Washington Post, beware the hazards of National Security Operations.

Hazards of centralized mass media include the following: 1.) A disproportion of power occurs and disproportionate informational power accrues to those who control centralized mass media; arguably, it is inherently undemocratic. 2.) An inability to transmit tacit knowledge; the context of content presented must either be explicitly explained or is assumed to be understood by the receiver. 3.) An inclination to focus on the unusual and sensational to capture the receivers’ attention, leading to a distortion and trivialization of reality. 4.) The deliberate promotion of emotions such as anxiety, fear, or greed can be used to sell a particular agenda. 5.) An inability to deal with complex issues because of time and economic constraints leads to simplification, further distorting and trivializing reality.

John Stanton is a Virginia based writer specializing in national security and political matters.

Lahore, Pakistan– A research on the existing criminal justice system (CJS) recently carried out by a group of Punjab police officers as a part of their ongoing promotional course at the National Institute of Management Lahore has pointed out severe weaknesses in the police investigation wing.

According to the research paper, weaknesses in investigation, structural flaws in the whole system and lack of coordination among its stakeholders at grass-roots level have been causing an increase in litigation in society, dismally low conviction rate and overcrowding factors in prisons.

It observes that the existing system is not fully exhausted at operational level and there is an ample space within the system for effective service delivery.

The paper pinpoints several weaknesses in the process from evidence collection in a criminal case to the conviction and from jail term to corrections, recommending few actions on urgent basis, especially merger of prosecution wing with the police, least interference in police affairs, decentralisation of administrative and financial autonomy, strengthening of investigation wing by injecting more manpower and funds and grass-roots level coordination among officials of police, prosecution, court and jail.

A majority of suggestions have been recommended with additional input by Capital City Police Officer Muhammad Aslam Tareen recently while few of those have been disagreed.

The paper, a copy of which is available to Dawn, was prepared by the officers of 11th Mid-Career Management Course in Lahore. They visited two Lahore police stations-Kot Lakhpat and Defence A- as well as district camp jail. The paper focuses on the capacity and training of the investigators (who are not capable of conducting investigation keeping forensic issue in mind as most of them are incapable of deciphering a medico-legal certificate which is in English), suggesting the setting up of an independent investigation cadre with declaring 80 per cent newly-recruited trainee ASIs of Lahore police (which comes to 160) as investigators.

It says the investigation cadre initially can be done by the provincial police chief in form of a standing order and later if the integration between other cadres and investigation cadre is smooth an attempt can be made to make the initiative permanent by amending Police Rules through provincial government’s concurrence.

By imparting training on scientific lines and teaching courses underlined in the Punjab Police Rules 1934, the objective of making them proficient in investigations with specialisation in criminal investigations like kidnapping for ransom, homicide, robbery/dacoity, financial crime etc could be achieved.

The paper says in five years Lahore police will have 800 professionally trained investigating officers with sub-specialisations. Roughly it will be 11 investigators per police station in Lahore.

All dead wood in the investigation branch of Lahore police may be removed only to be replaced by the specifically trained police investigators and those officers may be employed on relatively mundane job of maintenance of public order and patrolling.

As part of the investigation cadre as support staff, the concept of investigating constables (the most neglected), which will multiply to 1,500 in five years and support investigating officers in all investigation work except sensitive raids, may be introduced with one-year rigorous training in support role to the IOs.

The paper, realising that the resources provided to the police are humongous and trickle down has problems (for example Rs195 cost of investigation per case if total allocated CoI worth Rs14.6m of Lahore police is divided on average 75,000 cases annually), suggests that there is a strong case to rethink the budgeting process or else to order the district police officers to delegate financial powers under intimation to the regional police officers to their SPs while other operational expenses earmarked for police stations in the consolidated budget of the Lahore police like POL, repair, stationery may be devolved to the police stations in the shape of an automated ‘Budget Document’ supervised by the SP operations.

The paper further suggests that all 25 registers and other relevant office jobs like case diaries in a police station are required to be automated in an interactive fashion for which the software and its applications must be uniform throughout the province. PROMIS (prosecutors’ management information system), a project of the ADB’s Access to Justice Programme, is a useful option which is designed to integrate investigation, prosecution and judicial components of the CJS. The paper further says that the hardware is already installed in the police stations and allied offices of Lahore police but what is required is necessary capacity building to start the automation process in three months for change in police culture.

The paper also highlights non-access of police to the data of Nadra, excise, PROMIS and subscriber data, lack of human resource management, poor coordination of police investigators with the prosecution department, absence of surveys and crime analysis and poor functioning of internal accountability system.

It recommends the establishment of central data bank in integrated form and its access to the police station. It further recommends introducing shift system to enhance the productivity and quality.

It is opined that prosecutors most of the time try to become IOs and press directions on investigative issues and if they are not obliged the cases are not forwarded while in the previous system the prosecution was a policing function. It is suggested that meeting of divisional SPs investigation with the concerned prosecutors may be formalised to monitor and supervise the cases.

Similarly monthly meeting between the head of the investigation branch of Lahore police and district public prosecutor should also be formalised to monitor overall performance, specifically to check corrupt practices at various stages from investigation to prosecution of a criminal case.

In order to improve the police image, third-party validation mechanism by inviting students of different prestigious universities be taken up in the form of independent surveys and crime analysis through them.

The paper in the last suggests that a dedicated unit (which should work on the lines of NYPD Internal Affairs Unit) of internal accountability of junior officers may be set up at the SSP (discipline and inspections) office to ruthlessly check corruption and highhandedness in the Lahore police. And the best way to make it effective is to mandate it with assignments which must be monitored periodically by senior police officers.

Promisgate: World’s longest spy scandal still glossed over / Part I
Promisgate: World’s longest spy scandal still glossed over /Part II
Promisgate: World’s longest spy scandal still glossed over /Part III

onlineredaktion – The recent Osama bin Laden operation needed to model, and understand the internal structure of Osama’s compound before the kill operation began. The Whitehouse has already said that the seal team practiced on a mock up of the compound before the actual mission began.

Three Special Operations sites have training mock-ups with helicopter support for killing. One mock-up of the bin Laden compound was constructed for training at a US east coast facility. See US Training Bases for Special Operations Killing

How did they know the internal lay out of the compound to build the practice model before the team went in? It’s not likely that US operatives were invited in to take pre-mission planning photos.

This stray bit of information says that it is likely that the DARPA VisiBuilding program or some variant of it, is now both operational and field-tested. It is a high-resolution ultra wideband “radar” in the 1.85–6 GHz range and includes the necessary processing software application for thru the wall imaging and surveillance.

One such DARPA program is VisiBuilding – an urban sensing and planning tool capable to determe building layouts, find anomalous quantities of materials and locate people within the building. To achieve these goals, VisiBuilding could exploit phenomenology of signal penetration into buildings, measuring propagation and backscatter off urban structures. The system will utilize various means to position and monitor sensors in the vicinity of the objective, gaining an insight about the building, developing hypothesized ‚best guess‘ model of theinternal layout of rooms, walls and utility infrastructure that best fits the available sensor data.

Another program recently launched at DARPA is ‚Harnessing Infrastructure for Building Reconnaissance‘ (HIBR), a capability that translates VisiBuilding into practical terms: DARPA believes that ‚opportunistic sensing‘ could be a practical approach to ‚guess‘ such interior structure, using exterior observations. Information could be gathered from geometrical and stimulus response (for example, seismic or acoustic vibrations performing a sonar effect). Such stimulus could uncover minute details that, when processed, could provdie tactically useful information, for example, ad-hoc mapping of structural, electrical, plumbing, and ventilation systems.

Stephan Fuchs – Gleich zweimal flogen Business Jets mit den Schweizer Registrationskennzeichen HB heikle Missionen die im Zusammenhang mit dem Krieg in Libyen stehen. Einer der Flüge brachte Mousa Kousa, den ehemaligen libyschen Top Geheimdienstchef nach England.

Die Gulfstream 200 mit der Schweizer Registration HB-JGL hob um 11:45 auf der tunesischen Ferieninsel Djerba ab. An Bord; CIA Agenten und eine besonders wertvolle Fracht: der ehemalige Geheimdienstchef Mousa Kousa. Um 15:00 landete die Maschine auf dem militärisch / zivilen Flugplatz Farnborough in England, nahe London. Seither wird Mousa Kousa offiziell verhört. Wie kommen Schweizer Flugzeuge in den Genuss solcher Aufträge?

Der „Main Owner“ der Maschine ist die G200 Aviation in Georg Town auf den Grand Cayman Inseln. Dubios? Der „Main Operator“ ist die TAG Aviation SA in Genf.

Steve Ragan – Given his treatment while in confinement, as well as the list of new charges against him, Bradley Manning has gained another set of champions to his dilemma. Anonymous has promised to avenge Manning, and wage a media war with the U.S. military.

The Tech Herald has spoken to one of those involved for a rundown of current events.

„Manning is an absolute hero. If this means me going to fucking prison, then that’s fine,“ said Barrett Brown earlier today in an interview.

Brown, best described as a self-styled spokesperson for Anonymous, who enjoys some support from the loosely associative group, but some detraction as well, is well-known to us in the media.

He comes from a military family, and has a deep respect for the fighting troops he said. Yet, Mannings treatment while in custody at the Quantico Brig has Brown and others working with him outraged.

Earlier today, Brown said that Manning must be given clothes, sheets, blankets, and access to books within the week, adding that Anonymous plans for those responsible for his conditions will play out in the public soon.

On the evenings of March 2 and March 3, Bradley Manning was forced to strip naked, remaining under observation in this condition within his cell for seven hours each night. The following mornings, still without any clothing, Manning was forced to stand at attention outside his cell as the Duty Brig Supervisor (DBS) arrived. Manning was later given his clothes.

This type of degrading treatment is inexcusable and without justification. It is an embarrassment to our military justice system and should not be tolerated No other detainee at the Brig is forced to endure this type of isolation and humiliation, commented David Coombs, the lawyer representing Manning, who was once a Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army.

The type of treatment given Manning is something that is a bit of an open secret. Its used to break the will of the detainee and make them dependent on the interrogator, or the persons holding them. While an effective means of non-lethal coercion, it is frowned upon due to the damaging impact on a detainees mental health.

Such acts of isolation and embarrassment, or personal humiliation, have led to suicide attempts and extreme depression. Examples of this type of treatment were well established, as events at Guantanamo Bay prison were made public.

Anonymous outrage started after it was learned that Manning was to be charged with 22 additional counts, one of which could carry the death penalty. However, the military has said that the death penalty is off the table.

Manning was initially charged with 12 counts of illegally downloading and sharing a military operations video, as well as diplomatic documents and cables.

The new charges against him, added this week, include aiding the enemy, theft of public property or records, computer fraud, transmitting defense information in violation of the Espionage Act, and wrongfully causing intelligence to be published on the internet knowing it would be accessible to the enemy.

Read all @ The Tech Harald

Adrian Gatton – The tale of a modern-day Svengali. Nineteen-year-old Oxford jewellery shop assistant Leanne McCarthy found herself trapped in a modern nightmare of kidnap, fear and mind control when she met 23-year-old Wayne Gouveia, a sophisticated conman with a track record of duping young women.

Wayne, who worked in a whisky shop in the same street, swept Leanne off her feet on several lavish dates and they started a relationship. He then set out to cleverly and meticulously convince Leanne he was an MI5 agent, assigned to protect her shop from a ruthless gang of jewel thieves.

The couple embarked on a year of madness involving late-night stake-outs, car chases, safe-houses, narrow escapes from the gang and, in between, going to flashy hotels and on glamorous trips abroad.

Read all @ Adrian Gatton

IT – Works – Hacker group Anonymous (aka OperationLeaks on Twitter) just released what they say is a trove of damning documents on Bank of America.

 

You can find them here: bankofamericasuck.com

Remember, at this point, we can’t verify whether they are legitimate or not, but Gawker’s Adrien Chen, who has sources within Anonymous, suggest there’s something real to the leaks.

Anonymous says the emails deal with BofA’s mortgage practices, but the source is not an employee of Bank of America proper — the source is a former employee from Balboa Insurance, a firm which used to be owned by BofA.

As you will see below, we believe that the evidence that is supposed to be so damning is a series of emails showing that employees of Balboa asked for certain loan identifying numbers to be deleted, and they were.

Anonymous said late Sunday evening, however, “this is part 1 of the Emails.” So perhaps more incriminating correspondence is to come. And to be honest, these messages could be incredibly damaging, but we’re not mortgage specialists and don’t know if this is or isn’t common in the field. The beauty is, you can see and decide for yourself at bankofamericasuck.com.

But for those who want a simple explanation, here’s a summary of the content.

The Source

The ex-Balboa employee tells Anonymous that what he/she sends will be enough to,

crack [BofA’s] armor, and put a bad light on a $700 mil cash deal they need to pay back the government while ruining their already strained relationship with GMAC, one of their largest clients. Trust me… it’ll piss them off plenty.

The source then sends over a paystub, an unemployment form, a letter from HR upon dismissal and his/her last paystub and an ID badge.

He/she also describes his/herself:

My name is (Anonymous). For the last 7 years, I worked in the Insurance/Mortgage industry for a company called Balboa Insurance. Many of you do not know who Balboa Insurance Group is, but if you’ve ever had a loan for an automobile, farm equipment, mobile home, or residential or commercial property, we knew you. In fact, we probably charged you money…a lot of money…for insurance you didn’t even need.

Balboa Insurance Group, and it’s largest competitor, the market leader Assurant, is in the business of insurance tracking and Force Placed Insurance…  What this means is that when you sign your name on the dotted line for your loan, the lienholder has certain insurance requirements that must be met for the life of the lien. Your lender (including, amongst others, GMAC… IndyMac… HSBC… Wells Fargo/Wachovia… Bank of America) then outsources the tracking of your loan with them to a company like Balboa Insurance.

The Emails

Next comes the emails that are supposed to be so damaging. The set of emails just released shows conversational exchanges between Balboa employees.

The following codes pertain to the emails, so use as reference:

1. SOR = System of Record
2. Rembrandt/Tracksource = Insurance tracking systems
3. DTN = Document Tracking Number. A number assigned to all incoming/outgoing documents (letters, insurance documents, etc)

The first email asks for a group of GMAC DTN’s to have their “images removed from Tracksource/Rembrandt.” The relevant DTNs are included in the email — there’s between 50-100 of them.

In reply, a Balboa employee says that the DTN’s cannot be removed from the Rembrandt, but that the loan numbers can be removed so “the documents will not show as matched to those loans.” But she adds that she needs upper management approval before she moves forward, since it’s an unusual request.

Then it gets approved. And then, one of the Balboa employees voices their concern. He says,

“I’m just a little concerned about the impact this has on the department and the company. Why are we removing all record of this error? We have told Denise Cahen, and there is always going to be the paper trail when one of these sent documents come back. this to me seems to be a huge red flag for the auditors… when the auditor sees the erroneous letter but no SOR trail or scanned doc on the corrected letter… What am I missing? This just doesn’t seem right to me.

We suspect this is the type of email that Anonymous believes shows BofA fraud

Wikileaks, Anonymous and Bank of America

Up until now, everyone assumed that whatever secret document drop, dropped on BofA, would come from Wikileaks. But that threat seems to have fizzled, at least temporarily.

This hacker group, which is unconnected but sympathetic to Wikileaks, want to expose “corruption and fraud” at BofA with its document drop, and says emails from this former employee of the bank will prove mortgage fraud.

OperationLeaks has been teasing followers for days now with tweets that it received documents about BofA from a disgruntled employee, like this one:

He Just told me he have GMAC emails showing BoA order to mix loan numbers to not match it’s Documents.. to foreclose on Americans.. Shame

Then on Sunday, Anonymous said, in a series of tweets:

I Got a email from a person claiming he worked at BoA and was demoted then fired after telling a SVP he seen something wrong in the system.

Cryptome – When we stormed State Security Police headquarters in Nasr City, which hosted one of Mubarak’s largest torture facilities, on Saturday I found two DVDs in one of the offices, both titled [Arabic text omitted] The Agency Officers’ Archive. The DVDs included profile pictures of State Security officers, organized in folders. Each folder had the officers’ name. Some however did not have the names. There were also sub folders that included pictures of those officers in social events like weddings.

I don’t know what was the purpose of these two DVDs, but I sincerely thank the State Security officials who gave us this present on a golden plate. I’ve uploaded the profile pictures to this flickr set and added them to the Piggipedia. I urge you all to circulate them. And if you have any more information about those officers please come forward.

Each member of SS has to be brought to justice. This was an agency devoted to spying, surveillance, torture and murder. Every member of this organization from the informer all the way up to the generals should be prosecuted. SS has to be dissolved. It cannot be “restructured” like what the current PM is calling for.

Although those torturers violated our private lives on a daily basis, bugging our phones, offices, and even our bedrooms, I will respect the privacy of their families and will not publish the photos of their social events that included family members.

Dear SS, yes you had every right to be worried from the Piggipedia. We will expose you, bring shame on you. You forced millions of Egyptians to live in fear and terror. Now you have to answer for your crimes.

The names of the 30 officials shown in the photos below were derived from names of the Zipped files provided by the source indicated in the article. The photos are reduced to about half-size of the originals in the Zipped files.

Visit Cyptome

Cryptome – Video obtained by an FOIA request from a person to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST.gov) who directed NIST to send it to Cryptome.org. NIST investigated the WTC tower collapses and collected large amounts of evidence from officials and individuals. While much of this evidence has been released to the public, more is still withheld.

Excerpt of the March 3, 2011 NIST letter to the FOIA requester who used the mail address of Cryptome.

These electronic files image were provided to NIST by the New York Police Department. The City of New York has provided NIST with the following notice:

„Please take notice that the City of New York („City“) has asserted that the contents of the enclosed DVD-ROM is protected under tbe Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. sections 101 et seq. Tbe City expressly reserves its rights in these materials, and requires that you obtain the City’s permission prior to any reproduction, modification, adaptation, recompilation, or other derivative use of each DVD-ROM or portion thereof, including any still image extracted or derived therefrom, and that the City’s permission be obtained prior to the commercial distribution of any video footage and of still or moving images extracted or derived therefrom in any medium, by sale, rental, lease, lending or other means.

The City requires that the instant notice accompany any moving or still images that you disseminate for any reason, including dissemination that complies with the fair use authorized by section 107 of the Copyright Act, and requires that each recipient of these materials comply with the instant Notice.

Moreover, the City requires that a summary statement of its copyright be embedded in any moving or still images extracted from the enclosed DVD-ROM that are broadcast in any medium for any purpose. This summary statement shall read as follows: „Copyright (c) NYPD.“ Please write to the New York City Police Department, Legal Bureau, 1 Police Plaza, Room 1406, New York, N. Y. 10038, for information about obtaining an appropriate license.“

The video has been uploaded as provided by NIST without modification. Original in VOB format, 700MB.

A related collection of 153 still photos from another NYPD helicopter:

http://cryptome.org/0001/wtc-nist-gjs/wtc-nist-gjs.zip (64MB)