The CIA snake oil salesmen who sold US lies about Iraqi WMDs that resulted in the deaths of thousands of US soldiers and Iraqis are back in the business of peddling lies to cover their incompetence.
The CIA's former acting director, Michael Morell, blamed the Paris attack on Internet companies "building encryption without keys," which, he said, was caused by the debate over surveillance prompted by Edward Snowden's disclosures. Former CIA chief James Woolsey said Snowden "has blood on his hands" because, he asserted, the Paris attackers learned from his disclosures how to hide their communications behind encryption. Woolsey said Snowden should be "hanged by the neck until he's dead, rather than merely electrocuted." (Interestingly. this is the same feeling many people have about the snake oil salesmen who sold US lies about Iraqi WMDs.)
Of course, there is no evidence the perpetrators in Paris used the Internet to plot their attacks, let alone used encryption technology. CIA officials simply made that up. It is at least equally likely that the attackers formulated their plans in face-to-face meetings.
There is evidence from a Belgian ISIS raid in January that suggests that the ISIS terror networks involved were communicating in the clear, and that the data on their smartphones was not encrypted. European media outlets are reporting that the location of a raid conducted on a suspected safe house Wednesday morning was extracted from a cellphone, apparently belonging to one of the attackers, found in the trash outside the Bataclan concert hall massacre. Le Monde reported that investigators were able to access the data on the phone, including a detailed map of the concert hall and an SMS messaging saying “we’re off; we’re starting.” Police were also able to trace the phone’s movements. Belgian investigators concluded that Abaaoud directed the foiled operation there by cellphone from Greece — and that despite his attempts to avoid surveillance, his communications were in fact intercepted. Just a few days after the raid, Belgian news website RTL Info ran a whole article titled “What the Terrorist Suspects under Surveillance Were Saying.” It described surveillance over several months, through wiretaps and listening devices placed in the suspects’ car and their apartment.
No mystery here. The big mystery is Why does anyone buy anything these snake oil salesmen are selling US?
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