from
All U.S. Intelligence Agencies,
Including CIA and NSA,
to Spy On Americans’ Finances
Reuters notes:
U.S. to let spy agencies scour Americans’ finances
The Obama administration is drawing up plans to give all U.S. spy agencies full access to a massive database that contains financial data on American citizens and others who bank in the country, according to a Treasury Department document seen by Reuters.
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Financial institutions that operate in the United States are required by law to file reports of “suspicious customer activity,” such as large money transfers or unusually structured bank accounts, to Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).
The Federal Bureau of Investigation already has full access to the database. However, intelligence agencies, such as the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency, currently have to make case-by-case requests for information to FinCEN.
The Treasury plan would give spy agencies the ability to analyze more raw financial data than they have ever had before…
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The planning document, dated March 4, shows that the proposal is still in its early stages of development, and it is not known when implementation might begin.
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The plan calls for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence – set up after 9/11 to foster greater collaboration among intelligence agencies – to work with Treasury. The Director of National Intelligence declined to comment.
The excuse given for this intrusion on privacy?
As with the destruction of all of our privacies and other liberties, the excuse given is terrorism.
Indeed, given that the government claims the right to assassinate or indefinitely detain Americans without any due process of law, do you think government employees will hesitate in seizing the assets of Americans labels as “enemies?”
The government has done it before, and President Obama authorized seizure of property again last year.
And the government’s take-down of Megaupload was an exercise of the power to seize all of the legal property held in a storage facility because a handful of crooks have illegal property in theirs.
- EXCLUSIVE -
March 13, 2013
from Reuters Website
|
Reporting by Emily Flitter in New York, Stella Dawson and Mark Hosenball in Washington; Editing by Tiffany Wu and Leslie Gevirtz. |
The
Obama administration is
drawing up plans to give all U.S. spy agencies full access to a massive
database that contains financial data on American citizens and others
who bank in the country, according to a Treasury Department document
seen by Reuters.
The proposed plan represents a major step by U.S. intelligence agencies
to spot and track down terrorist networks and crime syndicates by
bringing together financial databanks, criminal records and military
intelligence. The plan, which legal experts say is permissible under
U.S. law, is nonetheless likely to trigger intense criticism from
privacy advocates.
Financial institutions that operate in the United States are required by
law to file reports of "suspicious customer activity," such as large
money transfers or unusually structured bank accounts, to Treasury's
Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).
The Federal Bureau of Investigation already has full access to the
database.
However, intelligence agencies, such as the
Central
Intelligence Agency and the
National Security Agency, currently have to make case-by-case
requests for information to FinCEN.
The Treasury plan would give spy agencies the ability to analyze more
raw financial data than they have ever had before, helping them look for
patterns that could reveal attack plots or criminal schemes.
The planning document, dated March 4, shows that the proposal is still
in its early stages of development, and it is not known when
implementation might begin.
Financial institutions file more than 15 million "suspicious activity
reports" every year, according to Treasury.
Banks, for instance, are required to report all personal cash transactions exceeding $10,000, as well as suspected incidents of money laundering, loan fraud, computer hacking or counterfeiting.
"For these reports to be of value in detecting money laundering, they must be accessible to law enforcement, counter-terrorism agencies, financial regulators, and the intelligence community," said the Treasury planning document.
A Treasury spokesperson said U.S. law permits FinCEN to share information with intelligence agencies to help detect and thwart threats to national security, provided they adhere to safeguards outlined in the Bank Secrecy Act.
"Law enforcement and intelligence community members with access to this information are bound by these safeguards," the spokesperson said in a statement.
Some privacy watchdogs expressed concern
about the plan when Reuters outlined it to them.
A move like the FinCEN proposal,
"raises concerns as to whether people could find their information in a file as a potential terrorist suspect without having the appropriate predicate for that and find themselves potentially falsely accused," said Sharon Bradford Franklin, senior counsel for the Rule of Law Program at the Constitution Project, a non-profit watchdog group.
Despite these concerns, legal experts emphasize that this sharing of data is permissible under U.S. law.
Specifically, banks' suspicious activity
reporting requirements are dictated by a combination of the Bank Secrecy
Act and the USA PATRIOT Act, which offer some privacy safeguards.
National security experts also maintain that a robust system for sharing
criminal, financial and intelligence data among agencies will improve
their ability to identify those who plan attacks on the United
States.
"It's a war on money, war on corruption, on politically exposed persons, anti-money laundering, organized crime," said Amit Kumar, who advised the United Nations on Taliban sanctions and is a fellow at the Democratic think tank Center for National Policy.
SUSPICIOUS
ACTIVITY
The Treasury document outlines a proposal to link the FinCEN database
with a computer network used by U.S. defense and law enforcement
agencies to share classified information called the Joint Worldwide
Intelligence Communications System.
The plan calls for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence -
set up after 9/11 to foster greater collaboration among intelligence
agencies - to work with Treasury. The Director of National Intelligence
declined to comment.
More than 25,000 financial firms - including banks, securities dealers,
casinos, and money and wire transfer agencies - routinely file
"suspicious activity reports" to FinCEN. The requirements for filing are
so strict that banks often over-report, so they cannot be accused of
failing to disclose activity that later proves questionable.
This over-reporting raises the possibility
that the financial details of ordinary citizens could wind up in the
hands of spy agencies.
Stephen Vladeck, a professor at American University's Washington
College of Law, said privacy advocates have already been pushing back
against the increased data-sharing activities between government
agencies that followed the
September 11 attacks.
"One of the real pushes from the civil liberties community has been to move away from collection restrictions on the front end and put more limits on what the government can do once it has the information," he said.