Ahead of election, Snowden reveals mass spying in NZ 17 Sep 2014
Related articles
- NZ More Interested in All Whites than All Blacks Sport
- Australia Jumping on the Boy Bandwagon Living
- NZ hosts nuclear non-proliferation meeting News
- Minister looks at court systems in Europe and UK News
- Brownlee Leads Aviation Mission To Shanghai News
- Environmental edge to Auckland’s RWC 2011 prep Sport
- Sludge Report #192: The Naked Budget Columns
- Budget provides $321m for RS&T activities News
- Navy takes delivery of HMNZS Wellington News
- Licensing To Cut Out Cowboy Advisers Migration
Ahead of election, Snowden reveals mass spying
on New Zealanders
By Tom
Peters16 September 2014
On Monday evening 1,700 people crowded into Auckland’s Town Hall to hear speeches by journalist Glenn Greenwald and, via video-link from Russia, whistleblower Edward Snowden. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange also made a video appearance from the Ecuadorean embassy in London.
According to the Internet Party, which organised the meeting, dubbed “The Moment of Truth,” 800 more people had to be turned away due to lack of space. The event, held just five days before New Zealand’s national election, was watched online by tens of thousands of people.
The speeches, along with articles published the same day by Snowden and Greenwald on the Intercept website, further exposed the mass surveillance of NZ citizens and residents by the spy agency, the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB).
Greenwald released documents revealing that “at some point in 2012 or early 2013” the US National Security Agency (NSA) and GCSB carried out an operation, code-named Speargun, which plugged into the undersea Southern Cross cable, which “carries the vast majority of Internet traffic between New Zealand and the rest of the world.” This would also allow access to data from Australia, and via Australia to large parts of Asia.
Tapping into the cable gives the spy agencies access to enormous volumes of communications metadata and content, which can be viewed using the XKEYSCORE tool by all the agencies in the Five Eyes network (the US, NZ, Australia, Britain and Canada).
Snowden wrote that from his desk in Hawaii, where he worked as a NSA contractor until mid-2013, “I routinely came across the communications of New Zealanders.” He stated that the GCSB agents “do not merely useXKEYSCORE, but also actively and directly develop mass surveillance algorithms for it.” He told the Auckland meeting that using the tool, “I can see everything. I can see what book you looked at on Amazon.com, I can see who you talked to, I can see who your friends on Facebook are, I can see the text messages you sent, I can read the emails you wrote.”
Snowden also revealed that there are two NSA facilities in New Zealand, including one in Auckland. This is in addition to the secretive Waihopai spy base operated by the GCSB, which also gathers data on behalf of the US. Prime Minister John Key has denied the claim.
In an interview with TV3 on Saturday, Greenwald said he is preparing a further report showing that the GCSB spies “on a variety of countries on behalf of the United States,” including “hostile” countries and “Western democracies.”
The revelations from Snowden and Greenwald directly contradict repeated assurances by Key over the past year that the GCSB does not engage in mass surveillance. Last year, the National Party government admitted that the GCSB had illegally spied on at least 88 NZ residents and citizens, including multi-millionaire entrepreneur and Internet Party (IP) founder Kim Dotcom. Dotcom’s mansion was raided by armed police in 2012 and he has since been fighting extradition to the US on charges of copyright infringement relating to his former website Megaupload.
In August 2013, the government passed laws to legalise spying on New Zealanders by the GCSB and increase its ability to access Internet communications. Thousands of people protested across the country against the laws.
Greenwald refuted Key’s claims that the new laws were “harmless.” He wrote that the NSA documents showed that “in high-level discussions between the Key government and the NSA, the new law was clearly viewed as the crucial means to empower the GCSB to engage in metadata surveillance.”
Key has attempted to dismiss the allegations of mass spying and has hurled abuse at Greenwald, describing him as a “loser” and a “henchman” for Dotcom. Key said the documents released by Greenwald merely showed a proposal for metadata gathering by the GCSB, which was never implemented. But Key has repeatedly refused to comment on Snowden’s evidence of the GCSB’s involvement with XKEYSCORE, which is nothing other than a mass surveillance tool.
Greenwald, Snowden and Assange have all performed valuable services by exposing the machinations and crimes of US imperialism and the establishment of the scaffolding for a police state in the US and other countries, including New Zealand. They have also shown considerable personal courage in the face of persecution by Washington and its allies.
However their attendance and speeches at last night’s meeting also revealed significant political limitations. For the IP and its ally, the Maori nationalist Mana Party, the purpose of the event was to boost their support in the election this Saturday. Snowden and Greenwald joined Dotcom and IP leader Laila Harre in calling for a vote to change the government—that is, to install the Labour Party supported by the Greens, the right-wing NZ First, the IP and Mana.
Greenwald admitted he had “spent very little time” studying NZ’s domestic political disputes, but said he was “thrilled that [Dotcom] ... is willing to support and fund a party ... devoted to defending Internet freedom and individual privacy and opposing mass surveillance.”
However the IP’s policy, like that of the Greens and Labour, merely calls for a “review” of the GCSB and other spy agencies—not their abolition. It calls for New Zealand to exit the Five Eyes network in order to exercise “sovereign control” over the intelligence agencies, so as to defend the country’s “national security” and “future interests.”
The IP is a pro-business party whose main objective is to reform copyright laws and establish other incentives for online businesses like Dotcom’s. It has no interest in dismantling the state’s repressive apparatus.
Labour, for its part, is absolutely committed to the military-intelligence alliance with the US, including the GCSB’s relationship with the NSA. The 1999–2008 Labour government passed the GCSB Act in 2003, establishing the agency as a separate department. According to investigative journalist Nicky Hager, the agency’s funding increased by 150 percent in the decade following the September 11 attacks in 2001, mostly under the Labour government.
Labour was responsible for strengthening the alliance with the US by sending NZ troops to Afghanistan and Iraq. This included sending GCSB agents to work with the US spy agencies in Afghanistan, where they helped identify targets for airstrikes, according to Hager’s book Other People ’ s Wars .
In a deliberately vague statement, Labour leader David Cunliffe told TVNZ on Sunday that he would replace the current GCSB legislation with something “more protective of New Zealanders’ personal privacy.” Today Cunliffe stressed that he “would not” withdraw NZ from Five Eyes. He told the media that Labour’s “review” of the GCSB would be designed to “build public confidence” in the spy agency. Asked if he believed Snowden was a credible source, Cunliffe refused to comment.
Labour’s record was not mentioned by Harre, Dotcom or any of the speakers at the “Moment of Truth” event. Nor did the meeting discuss the purpose of the surveillance of the world’s population by the NSA and its partners: namely, as a pre-emptive measure to suppress opposition to imperialist war and deepening social inequality.
News
Hilary Timmins' Award-Winning UK Documentary Series To Inspire NZ Students
29 Jun 2020 Education
Dream Catchers, produced and directed by Hilary Timmins, celebrates the success stories of more than thirty inspirational New... more
New Zealand reaffirms support for Flight MH17 judicial process
7 Mar 2020 News
Ahead of the start of the criminal trial in the Netherlands on 9 March, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has reaffirmed the need to... more
Business
NZ Government's Economic package to fight COVID-19
17 Mar 2020 Business News
The Coalition Government has launched the most significant peace-time economic plan in modern New Zealand history to cushion the... more
NZ Government announces aviation relief package
19 Mar 2020 Business News
Transport Minister Phil Twyford today outlined the first tranche of the $600 million aviation sector relief package announced earlier... more
Living
Diversity was Key at New Zealand Trade Tasting in London
6 Jun 2022 Food & Wine
New Zealand Winegrowers Annual Trade Tasting was recently held in London, on Wednesday 4 May, in Lindley Hall.
It was the first... more
Kiwi author stuns Behind the Butterfly Gate
12 Jan 2022 Arts
Hidden behind the Butterfly Gate is where the secret has been kept for 76 years...
New Zealand writer Merryn Corcoran’s... more
Property
Fairer rules for tenants and landlords
17 Nov 2019 Property
17 NOVEMBER 2019
The Government has delivered on its promise to the over one million New Zealanders who now rent to make it fairer... more
New Zealand Government will not implement a Capital Gains Tax
17 Apr 2019 Property
The Coalition Government will not proceed with the Tax Working Group’s recommendation for a capital gains tax, Jacinda Ardern... more
Migration
Boosting border security with electronic travel authority – now over 500,000 issued
19 Nov 2019 Migration
19 NOVEMBER 2019
We’ve improved border security with the NZeTA, New Zealand Electronic Travel Authority, which helps us to... more
Christchurch reinstated as refugee settlement location
18 Aug 2018 Migration
18 AUGUST 2018
HON IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY
The announcement that Christchurch can once again be a settlement location for refugees... more
Travel
Gallipoli Anzac Day services cancelled
19 Mar 2020 Travel & Tourism
The New Zealand and Australian Governments have announced this year’s joint Anzac Day services at Gallipoli will be cancelled... more
New Zealanders advised not to travel overseas
19 Mar 2020 Travel & Tourism
New Zealanders advised not to travel overseas
more
Sport
The Skipper's Diary: Sir Richard Hadlee honouring his father and NZ's Forty-Niners
27 Oct 2019 Cricket
NZNewsUK London Editor Charlotte Everett spoke to Sir Richard Hadlee about why he’s chosen to publish his father’s... more
PREVIEW: All Blacks v England semi-final
26 Oct 2019 Rugby
The two most convincing quarterfinals winners are set to square off in a semifinal showdown for the ages when the All Blacks meet old... more
Columns
Gordon Campbell on the Gareth Morgan crusade
11 Nov 2016 Opinion
Gordon Campbell on the Gareth Morgan crusade
First published on Werewolf
The ghastly likes of Marine Le Pen in France and Geert ... more
Gordon Campbell on the US election outcome
10 Nov 2016 Opinion
Column - Gordon Campbell
Gordon Campbell on the US election outcome
Well um.. on the bright side, there (probably)... more
Kiwi Success
Congratulations to Loder Cup winner
26 Sep 2018 People
25 SEPTEMBER 2018
The Loder Cup, one of New Zealand’s oldest conservation awards, has been awarded to Robert McGowan for 2018... more
Appointments to New Zealand National Commission for UNESCO
16 Aug 2018 Appointments
16 AUGUST 2018Appointments to New Zealand National Commission for UNESCO
HON JENNY SALESA
Associate Education Minister Jenny Salesa is... more
Recruitment
Historic pay equity settlement for education support workers
14 Aug 2018 Recruitment
14 AUGUST 2018Historic pay equity settlement for education support workers
RT HON JACINDA ARDERN
HON CHRIS HIPKINS
Prime Minister
The... more
Historic pay equity settlement for education support workers
22 Aug 2018 Recruitment
14 AUGUST 2018Historic pay equity settlement for education support workers
RT HON JACINDA ARDERN
HON CHRIS HIPKINS
Prime Minister
The... more