General 1nc shell Uniqueness

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Uniqueness

NSA surveillance authority is likely to be restored

Slate, 6/1/2015 (Lily Hay Newman. “NSA Bulk Data Collection Expired Last Night. What’s Different Today?” http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2015/06/01/portions_of_the_patriot_act_expired_on_may_31_what_does_that_mean.html)

Yesterday bulk collection was in effect, but are we being surveilled today? For the first time in 14 years, there’s no automatic NSA mechanism for recording who you call and when you call them. But there are still ways for the NSA to use its network abroad to get information about your international calls and online browsing. The agency can even still get the content of your international communications through PRISM. Salon’s Marcy Wheeler writes, “Reports of the Patriot Act’s death are greatly exaggerated” The NSA still obtains records of calls—potentially all calls—you make with people overseas. It still tracks Americans’ Internet communications using metadata obtained overseas. The FBI can still access the content of any communications Americans have with foreigners targeted under PRISM without a warrant or even any evidence of wrongdoing. The FBI can still, and indeed does, obtain phone records of individuals in conjunction with national security investigations without any court review. In addition to the halt in bulk NSA communication surveillance, the act’s expiration means that the FBI can no longer use it to get sweeping wiretap orders to track a suspect when he or she changes phones. Each new device now requires a fresh warrant. Additionally, the agency can no longer use the act to justify wiretaps of “lone wolf” terrorism suspects—individuals who don’t have a known affiliation to a larger group. As the New York Times points out, though, it seems that the NSA is keeping its existing trove of data, since the Justice Department will have grandfathered ability to continue to access files for ongoing investigations. The Times also indicates that law enforcement agencies have other workarounds to continue to get the approvals they want. In the tension between the security need for surveillance and the desire to preserve individuals’ rights to privacy, it seems like eliminating bulk surveillance would be an obvious solution. So that would make today a better day than yesterday, right? But there is strong bipartisan agreement that some surveillance is necessary to maintain safety from international bad actors. Rep. Adam Schiff, a Democrat from California, called the expiration “a lose-lose.” The Senate will probably restore the expired portions of the act this week. And Congress has been mulling alternatives, like the USA Freedom Act, which would notably mandate that phone companies, not the government itself, store bulk collections. That way, agencies would have to go through the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court in order to pull individual records, instead of having full, broadly approved access.

Link Extension

Warrantless mass surveillance is critical to prevent terrorism --- casting a wide net and being able to act quickly is critical to identify networks

Yoo 2015. (John, Emanuel Heller professor of law at the University of California at Berkeley and a Visiting Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, former official in the Office of Legal Counsel in the U.S. Department of Justice. “Will Congress reject the dangerous NSA ruling by reauthorizing the Patriot Act?” American Enterprise Institute, 5/8/2015 https://www.aei.org/publication/will-congress-reject-todays-dangerous-nsa-ruling-by-reauthorizing-the-patriot-act/.

Finally, the Court displays a deep misunderstanding of the challenges of counterterrorism policy, which Congress understands far better. As Judge Richard Posner has recognized, an intelligence search “is a search for the needle in a haystack.” Rather than pursue suspects who have already committed a crime and whose identity is already known, intelligence agencies must search for clues among millions of potentially innocent connections, communications, and links. “The intelligence services,” Posner writes, “must cast a wide net with a fine mesh to catch the clues that may enable the next attack to be prevented.” Our government can detect terrorists by examining phone and e-mail communications, as well as evidence of joint travel, shared assets, common histories or families, meetings, and so on. If our intelligence agents locate a lead, they must quickly follow its many possible links to identify cells and the broader network of terrorists. A database of call data would allow a fast search for possible links in the most important place — the United States, where terrorists can inflict the most damage. Most of the calling records may well be innocent (just as most of the financial records of a suspected white-collar criminal may also be innocent), but the more complete the database, the better our intelligence agencies can pursue a lead into the U.S.

Terror threats are growing here and abroad – now key for mass surveillance more than ever

Zuckerman et al. 2013 (Jessica, Policy Analyst, Western Hemisphere @ Heritage; Steven P. Bucci, Director, Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign and National Security Policy @ Heritage; and James Carafano, Vice President for the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy, and the E. W. Richardson Fellow @ Heritage “60 Terrorist Plots Since 9/11: Continued Lessons in Domestic Counterterrorism,” 7/22/2013, Heritage Foundation, http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2013/07/60-terrorist-plots-since-911-continued-lessons-in-domestic-counterterrorism)

Three months after the attack at the Boston Marathon, the pendulum of awareness of the terrorist threat has already begun to swing back, just as it did after 9/11. Due to the resilience of the nation and its people, for most, life has returned to business as usual. The threat of terrorism against the United States, however, remains. Expecting to stop each and every threat that reaches a country’s borders is unreasonable, particularly in a free society committed to individual liberty. Nevertheless, there are important steps that America’s leaders can take to strengthen the U.S. domestic counterterrorism enterprise and continue to make the U.S. a harder target. Congress and the Administration should: Ensure a proactive approach to preventing terrorist attacks. Despite the persistent threat of terrorism, the Obama Administration continues to focus on reactive policies and prosecuting terrorists rather than on proactive efforts to enhance intelligence tools and thwart terrorist attempts. This strategy fails to recognize the pervasive nature of the threat posed by terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda and homegrown extremism. The Administration, and the nation as a whole, should continue to keep in place a robust, enduring, and proactive counterterrorism framework in order to identify and thwart terrorist threats long before the public is in danger. Maintain essential counterterrorism tools. Support for important investigative tools such as the PATRIOT Act is essential to maintaining the security of the U.S. and combating terrorist threats. Key provisions within the act, such as the roving surveillance authority and business records provision, have proved essential for thwarting terror plots, yet they require frequent reauthorization. In order to ensure that law enforcement and intelligence authorities have the essential counterterrorism tools they need, Congress should seek permanent authorization of the three sun setting provisions within the PATRIOT Act.[208] Furthermore, legitimate government surveillance programs are also a vital component of U.S. national security, and should be allowed to continue. Indeed, in testimony before the house, General Keith Alexander, the director of the National Security Agency (NSA), revealed that more than 50 incidents of potential terrorism at home and abroad were stopped by the set of NSA surveillance programs that have recently come under scrutiny. That said, the need for effective counterterrorism operations does not relieve the government of its obligation to follow the law and respect individual privacy and liberty. In the American system, the government must do both equally well. Break down the silos of information. Washington should emphasize continued cooperation and information sharing among federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies to prevent terrorists from slipping through the cracks between the various jurisdictions. In particular, the FBI should make a more concerted effort to share information more broadly with state and local law enforcement. State and local law enforcement agencies are the front lines of the U.S. national security strategy. As a result, local authorities are able to recognize potential danger and identify patterns that the federal authorities may miss. They also take the lead in community outreach, which is crucial to identifying and stopping “lone wolf” actors and other homegrown extremists. Federal law enforcement, on the other hand, is not designed to fight against this kind of threat; it is built to battle cells, groups, and organizations, not individuals. Streamline the domestic counterterrorism system. The domestic counterterrorism enterprise should base future improvements on the reality that governments at all levels are fiscally in crisis. Rather than add additional components to the system, law enforcement officials should streamline the domestic counterterrorism enterprise by improving current capabilities, leveraging state and local law enforcement resources and authorities, and, in some cases, reducing components where the terrorist threat is not high and the financial support is too thin or could be allocated more effectively. For example, the Department of Homeland Security should dramatically reduce the number of fusion centers, many of which exist in low-risk areas or areas where similar capabilities exist. An easy way to reduce the number of fusion centers is to eliminate funding to those that are located outside the 31 urban areas designated as the highest risk. Fully implement a strategy to counter violent extremism. Countering violent extremism is an important complementary effort to an effective counterterrorism strategy. In August 2011, the U.S. government released a strategic plan called “Empowering Local Partners to Prevent Violent Extremism in the United States.”[209] The plan focuses on outlining how federal agencies can assist local officials, groups, and private organizations in preventing violent extremism. It includes strengthening law enforcement cooperation and helping communities understand how to counter extremist propaganda (particularly online). Sadly, this plan is not a true strategy. It fails to assign responsibilities and does not direct action or resource investments. More direction and leadership must be applied to transform a laundry list of good ideas into an effective program to support communities in protecting and strengthening civil society. Vigilance Is Not Optional In a political environment of sequestration on the one hand and privacy concerns on the other, there are those on both sides of the aisle who argue that counterterrorism spending should be cut and U.S. intelligence agencies reigned in. As the above list indicates however, the long war on terrorism is far from over. Most disturbingly, an increasing number of Islamist-inspired terrorist attacks are originating within America’s borders. The rise of homegrown extremism is the next front in the fight against terrorism and should be taken seriously by the Administration. While there has not been another successful attack on the homeland on the scale of 9/11, the bombings in Boston reminded the country that the threat of terrorism is real and that continued vigilance is critical to keeping America safe. Congress and the Administration must continue to upgrade and improve the counterterrorism capabilities of law enforcement and intelligence agencies as well exercise proper oversight of these capabilities. The American people are resilient, but the lesson of Boston is that the government can and should do more to prevent future terror attacks.

Intel Key

Mass surveillance is key to preventing WMD terrorism --- compromising secrecy risks attacks

Yoo 2004 (John, Professor of Law @ UC-Berkeley, visiting scholar @ the American Enterprise Institute, served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Council at the U.S. Department of Justice between 2001 and 2003. “War, Responsibility, and the Age of Terrorism,” UC-Berkeley Public Law and Legal Theory Research Paper Series, http://works.bepress.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1015&context=johnyoo)

Third, the nature of warfare against such unconventional enemies may well be different from the set-piece battlefield matches between nation-states. Gathering intelligence, from both electronic and human sources, about the future plans of terrorist groups may be the only way to prevent September 11-style attacks from occurring again. Covert action by the Central Intelligence Agency or unconventional measures by special forces may prove to be the most effective tool for acting on that intelligence. Similarly, the least dangerous means for preventing rogue nations from acquiring WMD may depend on secret intelligence gathering and covert action, rather than open military intervention. A public revelation of the means of gathering intelligence, or the discussion of the nature of covert actions taken to forestall the threat by terrorist organizations or rogue nations, could render the use of force ineffectual or sources of information useless. Suppose, for example, that American intelligence agencies detected through intercepted phone calls that a terrorist group had built headquarters and training facilities in Yemen. A public discussion in Congress about a resolution to use force against Yemeni territory and how Yemen was identified could tip-off the group, allowing terrorists to disperse and to prevent further interception of their communications.

Perception I/L

Expiration of NSA authority is a massive signal of weakness --- terrorist groups are looking to exploit any further vulnerability

Daily Mail, 5/31/2015. (“Head of CIA warns that US is at risk of lone wolf terror attack after NSA powers to monitor all phone calls expired – as Isis ‘watch carefully’ for security gaps,” http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3105089/Senate-makes-ditch-bid-extend-NSA-s-bulk-collection-phone-records-Rand-Paul-swears-block-legislation-let-Patriot-Act-expire.html)

The head of the CIA has warned that Americans are now at risk after the Senate was unable to extend laws giving authorities special powers to fight terrorists. Politicians in the upper house were unable to come to an agreement to extend key parts of the Patriot Act - that legalize controversial methods of surveillance by the National Security Agency (NSA) - which expired on Sunday. Attempts were frustrated by Presidential candidate Rand Paul, who has taken a firm stance against the extension of powers allowing the mass collection of phone records, wire taps and warrants without evidence. But the Head of the CIA John Brennan claims ordinary Americans, who expect the NSA to do their jobs, have been put at risk by 'political grandstanding and crusading for ideological causes' that fueled the debate. Speaking on CBS show Face The Nation, he warned that the US - and Europe - is now in danger from technologically 'sophisticated' terrorists who are watching developments carefully and 'looking for the seams to operate' within. He claimed that the authorities do not abuse the powers, extended in 2011 to help fight lone wolf terror suspects not connected to a specific group, and that without them, it's difficult for the NSA to protect America. Mr Brennan said: 'I think terrorist elements have watched very carefully what has happened here in the United States, whether or not it's disclosures of classified information or whether it's changes in the law and policies. They are looking for the seams to operate within. 'And this is something that we can't afford to do right now, because if you look at the horrific terrorist attacks and violence that is being perpetrated around the globe, we need to keep our country safe. And our oceans are not keeping us safe the way they did a century ago.' The Patriot Act was passed in 2001 in the wake of the 9/11 terror attacks. Now that the provisions have expired, government agents will need to subpoena phone companies for the records. The White House previously justified collecting the records because of the Patriot Act's Section 215, which expired on Sunday. Two other provisions, added in 2011, also expired with it. The first is a 'roving wiretap' provision which allows government agencies to keep tracking suspects as they switch devices. The second is a 'lone wolf' clause which allows warrants to be granted without any evidence linking a suspect to a foreign power or terrorist group. Political struggles over the NSA and its data collection have become a national issue since whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed the extent of government programs in 2013. The senate's efforts to pass a replacement bill were frustrated by Kentucky's junior senator Rand Paul, who has spoken at length against the NSA's activities, which he has excoriated as illegal and unconstitutional. Paul, a Republican who is running for president, came up against members of his own party, as well as the Obama administration. With his presidential campaign waning, he has been accused of irresponsible political opportunism by opponents, by fighting a bill on ideological grounds that may put ordinary people at risk. He was criticized by the White House Sunday night, which called the Patriot Act expiration an 'irresponsible lapse'. While Brennan didn't mention Paul by name, he said on Face The Nation: 'Unfortunately I think there is a little too much political grandstanding and crusading for ideological causes that have really fuelled the debate on this issue. He added: 'These are authorities that have been used by the government to make sure that we're able to safeguard Americans. And the sad irony is that most Americans expect the government to protect them. And so although there's a lot of debate that goes on, on the Congress and the Hill on this issue, I think, when you go out to Boise or Tampa or Louisville, Americans are expecting their law enforcement and homeland security and intelligence professionals to do their work. And these authorities are important.' Paul argued 'there must be another way' but even he agrees that the lapse in these powers are likely to be temporary as politicians work on the USA Freedom Act, which is expected to pass within the next week. Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell called a rare Sunday session to try to pass the replacement law, but was unable to push it through in time. And although the replacement is set to pass this week, Paul said the expiration was 'a victory no matter how you look at it'. In a statement, he said: 'It might be short lived, but I hope that it provides a road for a robust debate, which will strengthen our intelligence community, while also respecting our Constitution. He added: 'The expiration of the NSA's sweeping, all-encompassing and ineffectual powers will not relinquish functions necessary for protecting national security. The expiration will instead do what we should have done all along - rely on the Constitution for these powers.' According to a top lawmaker, as of 8pm Sunday no NSA employee could access their enormous phone records database, which holds metadata on millions of phone conversations handed over by telecoms companies like Verizon and AT&T. Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Richard Burr said on Sunday: 'There is no way to get any type of agreement tonight -- either an extension or passage of a bill. So at 8pm tonight, NSA employees can not query the database'. In a statement issued Sunday night, Obama's press secretary Josh Earnest, urged action to pass the USA Freedom Act as quickly as possible. He said: 'The Senate took an important - if late - step forward tonight. We call on the Senate to ensure this irresponsible lapse in authorities is as short-lived as possible. 'On a matter as critical as our national security, individual Senators must put aside their partisan motivations and act swiftly. The American people deserve nothing less.' Some lawmakers have said the lapse raises alarming questions about how US authorities can keep the homeland safe with a diminished security toolbox. 'I think it's very very unfortunate that we're in this position,' said Senator Mike Lee, a conservative Republican who supports the reform bill. 'We've known this date was coming for four years. Four years. And I think it's inexcusable that we adjourned' for a weeklong break last week without resolving the issue. Lee, too, conceded that the reform bill would most likely pass in the coming week. With the clock ticking, CIA chief John Brennan warned Sunday that allowing vital surveillance programs to lapse could increase terror threats, and argued that the phone metadata dragnet has not abused civil liberties and only serves to safeguard citizens. 'This is something that we can't afford to do right now,' Brennan said of allowing the counterterrorism provisions to expire. 'Because if you look at the horrific terrorist attacks and violence being perpetrated around the globe, we need to keep our country safe, and our oceans are not keeping us safe the way they did century ago,' he said on CBS talk show Face the Nation. Brennan added that online threats from groups like Isis would continue to grow over the next five to ten years. He said: 'Isis has been very sophisticated and adept at using the Internet to propagate its message and reach out to individuals. We see what is happening as far as thousands upon thousands of individuals, including many thousands from the West, that have traveled into Syria and Iraq. And a number of these individuals are traveling back. 'And what we see, they're also using the Internet as a way to incite and encourage individuals to carry out acts of violence. 'So as the director of FBI says, you know, this use of these websites and their Internet capabilities is something of great concern. So yes, I think ISIS is a threat not just in the Middle East and South Asia and African regions but also to Europe as well as to the United States.'

Deterrence I/L

Deterrence works against terrorism --- terrorists will wait for weakness

Woo 2002. (Gordon, was trained in mathematical physics at Cambridge, MIT and Harvard, and has made his career as a calculator of catastrophes. His diverse experience includes consulting for IAEA on the seismic safety of nuclear plants and for BP on offshore oil well drilling. As a catastrophist at Risk Management Solutions, he has advanced the insurance modelling of catastrophes, including designing a model for terrorism risk. “Quantitative Terrorism Risk Assessment,” http://isc.temple.edu/economics/wkpapers/Homeland/Quantitative_Terrorism_Risk_Assessment.pdf)

The term macroterrorism has been coined to describe a spectacular act of terrorism, (which may be a multiple strike at several locations), which causes more than $1 billion of loss, or 500 deaths. Minor (micro) terrorist acts, such as house bombing, may occur haphazardly, but not signify a change in the terrorism environment. However, this is not the case with macroterrorism. Following an act of macroterrorism, security and border controls are inevitably strengthened, and emergency government funding made available for improving protective measures. Civil liberties may be temporarily curtailed as suspects are detained without trial, and minority communities potentially supporting sleeper cells are placed under tight surveillance. Although copycat attacks may be attempted in the aftermath of a successful strike, they are likely to fail due to the heightened security. In the harsher security regime soon after a successful strike, terrorists may rationally decide to lie low, and delay any further action until security is relaxed, border controls are eased, civil liberties lawyers intervene, and public risk awareness fades: circumstances which would give a later attack a higher chance of success. There are other reasons favoring a delay. Logistically, resources may need to be replenished after a macroterror attack. Furthermore, once a terrorist’s message has been delivered across the media through a spectacular macroterrorism event, (perhaps after a series of failures), a publicity reminder may not be needed for a while. The change in system state following a sucessful macroterrorism event implies that, rather like great earthquakes, such events do not satisfy the prerequisites of a Poisson process. Although it would require an elaborate Monte Carlo simulation to realize the temporal pattern of successful al-Qaeda macroterror attacks, the simplest representation is a two-state Markov process. In the first state, security is comparatively relaxed, and conducive to a successful macroterror attack. In the second state, security is comparatively strict, and not conducive to a successful macroterror attack. With the almost infinite payoff of paradise promised to martyrs, patience in waiting for security weaknesses is an optimal strategy. Indeed, it is known that Osama bin Laden has expected very high reliability levels for martyrdom operations. As a didactic illustration, consider the binary situation where successful macroterror attacks only take place during the relaxed security state. If the rate of successful macroterror attacks in this first state is U, and the erosion rate of security in the second state is V, then, assuming a successful macroterror attack causes a state transition from 1 to 2, the limiting proportion of time spent in state 1 is V/(U+V), and the limiting frequency of successful macroterror attacks is UV/(U+V). The effect of maintaining security measures is to keep V low, and hence suppress the limiting frequency of successful macroterror attacks.

AT: Intel Coop Turn

Intelligence cooperation is high now, despite NSA surveillance

Defense One 2015. Patrick Tucker. “‘Dramatic Improvement’ in US and European Intel Sharing Because of ISIS,”2/11/2015 http://www.defenseone.com/technology/2015/02/dramatic-improvement-us-and-european-intel-sharing-because-isis/105120/.

More than ever, European countries are voluntarily providing the United States with large amounts of information about their citizens, particularly as those citizens attempt to travel, the nation’s top counterterrorism official said. Compared to the summer of 2013, U.S.intelligence professionals have seen a “pendulum swing” in the willingness of European law enforcement to share information with the U.S. on European citizens, said Nicholas J. Rasmussen, director
 of the National Counterterrorism Center, or NCTC, on Wednesday. Things have turned around since summer 2013, when NSA contractor Edward Snowden first disclosed some of the nation’s most closely kept secrets on surveillance capabilities. Rasmussen said that “the politics are difficult for some of our European partners” but tracking Islamic State fighters, or ISIS, has become a priority. Rasmussen, before the House Committee on Homeland Security, said that European partners continue to differ from U.S. counterparts on the issue of bulk metadata collection. But European reservations about data sharing in more targeted investigations had “seen a dramatic improvement,” particularly in populating the NCTC’s database, called the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment, or TIDE. It is one of the key person-of-interest watch lists that the U.S. and other countries use to track potential or suspected terrorists.

Intelligence cooperation is inevitable despite any political disputes over surveillance

PBS 2013 (Ray Suarez, PBS; P.J.*Crowley, former assistant secretary of state for public affairs, now a professor at George Washington University; and Philip Mudd, senior research fellow at the New America foundation, and held senior positions at the CIA, FBI and the National Security Council. “What are the diplomatic costs of the NSA surveillance revelations for the U.S.?”10/25/2013 http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/government_programs-july-dec13-snowden2_10-25/)

RAY SUAREZ: What impact have the revelations had on U.S. interests abroad and intelligence operations? P.J. Crowley is a former assistant secretary of state for public affairs, now a professor at George Washington University. And Philip Mudd is a senior research fellow at the New America foundation, and held senior positions at the CIA, FBI and the National Security Council. P.J. Crowley, these latest revelations of the surveillance of the communication of heads of state and heads of government, is that a serious breach, serious diplomatic problem for the United States now? P.J. CROWLEY, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs: It is a serious and awkward diplomatic problem for the United States. You know, that said, at the end of the day, interests drive relationship. Politics matters. It animates those relationships and the willingness of leaders to stand together in common cause and do whatever needs to be done to keep their respective countries safe, you know, those relationships also matter. We have been through these stresses and strains before. We went through them with WikiLeaks. Remember that Iraq wasn’t very popular during the Bush administration. So I’m confident that because the relationship between the United States and Europe is so deep, is so broad, is so meaningful, we will get through this. But it will take some time. RAY SUAREZ: Philip Mudd, how seriously should we take the fury coming from Europe today? PHILIP MUDD, New America Foundation: I think this is a short-term problem. As P.J. suggested, I’m not sure it is a long-term issue. The issue here though really is not just these revelations in isolation. It is this cascade through the summer and into the fall about spying on Americans, spying on citizens in Europe, spying on foreign leaders. This cascade is going to, I think, lead to months, maybe a little longer of tension. These political leaders have to respond. But when security services feel a threat, for example, a threat from terror cells, they will continue to cooperate, regardless of what we’re seeing at the political level.