Bayan's Renato Reyes
The Aquino government must protest the collection of cellphone metadata and text messages by the United States National Security Agency, the leftist organization Bayan said Wednesday.
In a statement, Bayan’s Renato Reyes was reacting to news reports that the US spy agency through the computer program Mystic embedded in Philippine telecommunications networks is able to collect metadata (information that reveals the time, source, and destination of calls) and text (SMS, or short messaging services) messages.
The Philippine government must protest “that is, if (it) is not yet in cahoots with the US spy agency. This program of the NSA is totally unacceptable and must be stopped. The US has committed a grave violation of Philippine laws. This is another affront to our sovereignty,” he said.
Reyes also said the National Telecommunications Commission, along with the different telecoms companies, should explain how their networks have been used.
“The leaks by whistleblower Edward Snowden on the activities of the NSA point to a very disturbing pattern of impunity, of the total disregard by the US government of the domestic laws and sovereignty of countries like the Philippines,” he said.
According to the Philippine Star story, Bahamas and another unnamed country are where the US is able to collect and store all phone calls. The Philippines, Mexico, and Kenya are the three countries where Mystic is able to collect metadata.
‘Senate must investigate ‘
The spy system is apparently hiding in plain sight, as it is a program whose overt objective is “legitimate commercial services for telcos” while its covert objective is signal intelligence, according to the leaked documents.
According to the website The Intercept which ran the story on the NSA spying, “Mystic was established in 2009 by the NSA’s Special Source Operations division, which works with corporate partners to conduct surveillance.”
Documents in the Snowden archive describe it as a “program for embedded collection systems overtly installed on target networks, predominantly for the collection and processing of wireless/mobile communications networks.”
Bayan called on the Philippine Senate to investigate the widespread NSA spying operations in the Philippines.
“We would like to know how such an arrangement was made possible, if the Philippine government knew of this program, if the NTC allowed it, and if the telcos allowed it,” Reyes said.
“This spying is taking place even before the implementation of the cybercrime law and even without the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement. Just imagine what kind of spying can happen once the US sets up its own military communications facilities all over the country under the EDCA,” he added.
http://www.interaksyon.com/article/87312/aquino-govt-must-protest-united-states-nsa-spying-on-filipinos---bayan
The Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN-New Patriotic Alliance) is the main Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) umbrella front organization and Renato Reyes is a long-time CPP activist. The commies are just attempting to sow a little dissension and discord in RP-US relationship.
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