AT&T whistle-blower interview

Today's Wired News carries a frank interview with Mark Klein, the AT&T whistle-blower who heroically outed his employer for helping the National Security Agency to illegally wiretap every Internet connection in America. The Electronic Frontier Foundation is suing AT&T using his information, and the court procedure is a lever for discovering what the NSA was up to. Klein literally got fed up with the illegal activity in his workplace and walked into the EFF offices one day and told them what he knew.

What got me back interested was The New York Times' story in December 2005. (Editor's note: The Times reported that the government had been secretly monitoring Americans' phone calls and e-mails that crossed the nation's border since shortly after 9/11 without getting approval from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, or FISA.)

The president admitted the program existed, but only admitted that part which had been exposed — and he avoided talking about the part that wasn't, which was the internet.

The administration sent officials out to defend the program, including (Vice President) Dick Cheney, and they said they didn't think they had to obey FISA…. This was the defense of the indefensible. So I decided if they are going to perpetuate this fraud then I'm going to blow their cover.

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