Russia: U.S. controlling an "international terrorist alliance"

Source: CBS

Russian officials accused the U.S. on Thursday of siding with “terrorists” in Syria, in a sign of escalating tensions between Moscow and Washington amid the battle for the northern Syrian city of Aleppo.

U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby’s warning that the collapse of U.S.-Russian cooperation in Syria could lead to a rise in extremism and potential attacks against Russia drew Moscow’s anger.

The Russian Foreign and Defense Ministries both cast it as U.S. encouragement of terror attacks on Russia.

“We can’t assess those statements as anything else but a call, a directive for action,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a briefing.

Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said Kirby’s statement amounted to “the most frank confession by the U.S. side so far that the whole ‘opposition’ ostensibly fighting a ‘civil war’ in Syria is a U.S.-controlled international terrorist alliance.”

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Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-us-inviting-terror-attack-de-facto-support-for-terrorism-syria/

Passengers in Uber's self-driving cars waived right to sue for injury or death

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Democracy Now and Free Speech TV will have expanded live coverage of the debate

Democracy Now! 2016 Expanding the Debate Coverage

Source: Democracy Now!

Monday Night September 26: Tune into Democracy Now!’s live coverage of the first U.S. presidential debate from 8:30 pm –11:30 pm ET.

This broadcast will include the live debate between Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

Democracy Now!'s Amy Goodman will host a pre-debate roundtable discussion from 8:30–9:00 pm ET from our New York studio, followed by the live feed of the debate at Hofstra University, and a post-debate discussion from 10:30–11:30 pm ET with scholars, activists, and analysts you won't hear anywhere else.

How to Watch

Stream LIVE starting at 8:30pm ET at democracynow.org/debate or tune in live nationwide on Free Speech TV (Dish Network Ch. 9415 & DirecTV Ch. 348), KCET/Link TV (Dish Network 9410 & DirecTV Ch. 375) & MNN in Manhattan (Time Warner Cable 1993 and Verizon FiOS 38).

Tuesday Morning September 27: Democracy Now!’s Expanded 2-Hour Post Debate Coverage starting at 8:00 am ET.

Tune in on Tuesday, September 27th for a special 2-hour broadcast of Democracy Now! from 8:00 am–10:00 am ET. We’ve invited Green Party candidate Jill Stein and Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson to participate in a special expanded presidential debate.

As Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump square off in a series of debates in one of the most polarized U.S. elections to date, Democracy Now! has broken the sound barrier by expanding the debate—including major third party candidates shut out by the corporate-sponsored Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD).

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Read more: http://www.democracynow.org/live/democracy_now_2016_expanding_the_debate

South Korea, US to simulate attack on nuclear facility

Source: CNN

South Korea and the United States will conduct a mock attack on a nuclear facility next month, an official with the South Korean Defense Department told CNN.

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The US and South Korea will also simulate what to do in the event of a sudden missile attack.

North Korea's nuclear test prompted a strong rebuke from the international community, with South Korea saying it was "getting ready for the worst case scenario."

The simulation, dubbed joint exercise "Red Flag," will take place in Alaska from October 3 until October 21..

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The munitions

In its announcement, South Korea said the nuclear facility attack simulation will take place using a GBU-31 Joint Direct Attack Munition, a kit that converts bombs that normally just free-fall from planes into guided munitions.

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Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/20/asia/south-korea-us-nuclear-drills/

New Film Tells the Story of Edward Snowden; Here Are the Surveillance Programs He Helped Expose

Source: The Intercept

OLIVER STONE’S LATEST film, “Snowden,” bills itself as a dramatized version of the life of Edward Snowden, the NSA whistleblower who revealed the global extent of U.S. surveillance capabilities.

Stone’s rendering of Snowden’s life combines facts with Hollywood invention, covering Snowden being discharged from the military after an injury in basic training, meeting his girlfriend, and training in the CIA with fictitious mentors (including Nicolas Cage’s character, most likely a composite of whistleblowers like Thomas Drake and Bill Binney). Snowden then goes undercover, only to see an op turn ugly; becomes a contractor for the CIA and NSA; and finally chooses to leave the intelligence community and disclose its vast surveillance apparatus, some of which he helped develop.

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So here’s a retrospective of sorts for moviegoers and others interested in the journalism Edward Snowden made possible through his decision to become a whistleblower: In all, over 150 articles from 23 news organizations worldwide have incorporated documents provided by Snowden, and The Intercept and other outlets continue to mine the archive for stories of social and political significance.

In the hope that Stone’s movie will spark more widespread interest in the NSA programs Snowden helped bring to light, The Intercept has compiled its stories based on the archive of documents, which can be explored through the chart below.

Published Article Code Names
2/14/14 The NSA’s Secret Role in the U.S. Assassination Program GILGAMESH, SHENANIGANS, VICTORYDANCE
2/18/14 Snowden Documents Reveal Covert Surveillance and Pressure Tactics Aimed at WikiLeaks and Its Supporters ANTICRISIS GIRL, TEMPORA, XKEYSCORE
2/24/14 How Covert Agents Infiltrate the Internet to Manipulate, Deceive, and Destroy Reputations
3/7/14 The NSA Has an Advice Columnist. Seriously.
3/12/14 How the NSA Plans to Infect “Millions” of Computers With Malware CAPTIVATEDAUDIENCE, FOGGYBOTTOM, FOXACID, GROK, GUMFISH, HAMMERCHANT, HAMMERSTEIN, QUANTUM, QUANTUMCOPPER, QUANTUMHAND, QUANTUMSKY, SADDLEBACK, SECONDDATE, SOCIALIST, STELLARWIND, TURBINE, TURMOIL, UNITEDRAKE, VALIDATOR, WILLOWVIXEN
3/13/14 Foreign Officials in the Dark About Their Own Spy Agencies’ Cooperation With NSA PRISM, TEMPORA
3/15/14 Compare the NSA’s Facebook Malware Denial to Its Own Secret Documents QUANTUMHAND, QUANTUMTHEORY, TURBINE
3/20/14 Inside the NSA’s Secret Efforts to Hunt and Hack System Administrators QUANTUM
4/4/14 The “Cuban Twitter” Scam Is a Drop in the Internet Propaganda Bucket ROYAL CONCIERGE, SALAMANCA
4/30/14 British Spy Chiefs Secretly Begged to Play in NSA’s Data Pools BLARNEY, GHOSTMACHINE, PRISM, STORMBREW,
5/19/14 Data Pirates of the Caribbean: The NSA Is Recording Every Cellphone Call in the Bahamas MYSTIC, SOMALGET
7/9/14 Meet the Muslim-American Leaders the FBI and NSA Have Been Spying On
7/14/14 Hacking Online Polls and Other Ways British Spies Seek to Control the Internet ANGRY PIRATE, CHANGELING, ELATE, GATEWAY, GESTATOR, IMPERIAL BARGE, PREDATORS FACE, ROLLING THUNDER, SLIPSTREAM, SPRING BISHOP, UNDERPASS
7/23/14 The NSA’s New Partner in Spying: Saudi Arabia’s Brutal State Police
8/3/14 Cash, Weapons, and Surveillance: The U.S. Is a Key Party to Every Israeli Attack YESTERNIGHT
8/5/14 NPR Is Laundering CIA Talking Points to Make You Scared of NSA Reporting
8/25/14 ICREACH: How the NSA Built Its Own Secret Google CRISSCROSS, GLOBALREACH, ICREACH, PROTON,
9/14/14 The NSA and GCHQ Campaign Against German Satellite Companies TREASURE MAP
9/15/14 New Zealand Launched Mass Surveillance Project While Publicly Denying It SPEARGUN, XKEYSCORE
10/10/14 Core Secrets: NSA Saboteurs in China and Germany SENTRYCONDOR, SENTRYEAGLE, SENTRYHAWK, SENTRYOSPREY, SENTRYRAVEN
12/4/14 Operation AURORAGOLD: How the NSA Hacks Cellphone Networks Worldwide AURORAGOLD, OPULANT PUP, WOLFRAMITE
12/13/14 Operation Socialist: How GCHQ Spies Hacked Belgium’s Largest Telco HACIENDA, HOPSCOTCH, LEGSPIN, NOCTURNAL SURGE, STELLARWIND, SOCIALIST
2/4/15 Western Spy Agencies Secretly Rely on Hackers for Intel and Expertise INTOLERANT, LOVELY HORSE
2/10/15 NSA Claims Iran Learned From Western Cyberattacks
2/19/15 The Great SIM Heist: How Spies Stole the Keys to the Encryption Castle DAPINO GAMMA, HIGHLAND FLING, XKEYSCORE
3/10/15 iSpy: The CIA Campaign to Steal Apple’s Secrets DREAMY SMURF, NOSEY SMURF, PARANOID SMURF, TRACKER SMURF, WARRIORPRIDE
4/2/15 Britain Used Spy Team to Shape Latin American Public Opinion on Falklands QUITO
5/5/15 The Computers Are Listening: How the NSA Converts Spoken Words Into Searchable Text RHINEHART
5/11/15 The Computers Are Listening: Speech Recognition Is NSA’s Best-Kept Open Secret
6/8/15 The Computers Are Listening: NSA Won’t Say If It Automatically Transcribes American Phone Calls In Bulk PRISM, UPSTREAM
5/8/15 U.S. Government Labeled Al Jazeera Journalist as Al Qaeda SKYNET
5/18/15 Snowden Files Give New Details on Osama Bin Laden Raid
5/21/15 The NSA Plan to Find Bin Laden by Hiding Tracking Devices in Medical Supplies
5/28/15 Inside NSA, Officials Privately Criticize “Collect It All” Surveillance
6/22/15 Controversial GCHQ Unit Engaged in Domestic Law Enforcement, Online Propaganda, Psychology Research
6/22/15 Popular Security Software Came Under Relentless NSA and GCHQ Attacks CAMBERDADA, PRISM
6/22/15 Spies Hacked Computers Thanks to Sweeping Secret Warrants, Aggressively Stretching U.K. Law
6/26/15 How the NSA Started Investigating the New York Times’s Warrantless Wiretapping Story
7/1/15 XKEYSCORE: NSA’s Google for the World’s Private Communications BADASS, NUCLEON, XKEYSCORE
7/15/15 Israeli Special Forces Assassinated Senior Syrian Official
8/3/15 GCHQ and Me: My Life Unmasking British Eavesdroppers CARBOY, FROSTING, ECHELON, SHAMROCK, SOUNDER, TRANSIENT
8/11/15 The Philosopher of Surveillance: What Happens When a Failed Writer Becomes a Loyal Spy?
9/25/15 From Radio to Porn, British Spies Track Web Users’ Online Identities BLACKHOLE, INFINITE MONKEYS, KARMA POLICE, MARBLED GECKO, MEMORY HOLE, MUTANT BROTH, SAMUEL PEPYS, SOCIAL ANTHROPOID, TEMPORA, XKEYSCORE
9/28/15 Did a Rogue NSA Operation Cause the Death of a Greek Telecom Employee? SENTRYOWL
11/18/15 Overwhelmed NSA Surprised to Discover Its Own Surveillance “Goldmine” on Venezuela’s Oil Executives CADENCE, PINWALE
1/28/16 Israeli Drone Feeds Hacked by British and American Intelligence ANARCHIST
5/16/16 NSA Closely Involved in Guantánamo Interrogations, Documents Show
6/7/16 Facing Data Deluge, Secret U.K. Spying Report Warned of Intelligence Failure MILKWHITE, PRESTON
6/28/16 The Hunter: He Was a Hacker for the NSA and He Was Willing to Talk. I Was Willing to Listen
8/15/16 In Bungled Spying Operation, NSA Targeted Pro-Democracy Campaigner PRISM
8/19/16 The NSA Leak Is Real, Snowden Documents Confirm BADDECISION, BLINDDATE, ELIGIBLE BOMBSHELL, FOXACID, MAGICBEAN, MAGIC SQUIRREL, NIGHTSTAND, POLARSNEEZE, SECONDDATE, TURBINE
9/6/16 Inside Menwith Hill: The NSA’s British Base at the Heart of U.S. Targeted Killing GHOSTHUNTER, GHOSTWOLF

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