My previous comment was describing my best guess to what information is run up the flagpole and to what end. These people think that PRISM stops terrorists you think a couple extra hundred dollars is going to convince them its not worth the effort.
I do not mean to be critical of the poster, any involvement is better than none. However I do not think the best path forward is acting as if something is being done when it is not is not.
I think that someone who can build a website like this could make a much more useful one. Instead of preaching to the choir preach to the unconverted (Elected Officials, Mom, Dad, Grocery Clerk). Let people submit address/zip and then return a phone script and the name/numbers of your senators and your representative. Or populate a pdf file with all the information so that someone can put it in an envelope, copy the address given and add a stamp
I did a quick check for people submitting things like "FUCK YOU" and "YOUR MOM" in every field and deleted those before sending. A couple I let through had things like missing city but valid ZIP code, which I assume would actually be enough to get the letter to them. 95% of what was sent had a full address.
A couple I let through had things like missing city but valid ZIP code, which I assume would actually be enough to get the letter to them
Did you ever read their instructions for filing a FOIA request? "If you do not include a name and complete postal address, NSA will be unable to respond."[1]
While you are here I dont understand what you mean by:
"It seems that the NSA does not quite get that this is a protest, in addition to a request for information."
How did you expect them to act? And/or what behavior would constitute recognition that this is a "protest"? NSA is required by law to respond to FOIA requests. The civil servant that emailed you was doing what her employer told her to do so that she could continue to bring a paycheck home. Are all the "protest" FOIA requests supposed to get tossed in a burn bag at the end of the day?
Yes, civil servants who flout the oath they took should be just as respected as those who don't.
> I, [name], do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same...
It's not me that failed to include a full address. It is the people who submitted their information and failed to fill out the form properly. The form is dead simple, but no matter what, there will always be a small % of people who do not follow instructions.
Furthermore, the NSA does not get to make "rules" about the form of FOIA requests. If they have enough information to reply, by law, they must reply.
No you were not the person that failed to include a complete address. But you were the one that assumed there would be no problem with submitting incomplete addresses. Did you read 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(3)(A):
(3)
(A) Except with respect to the records made available under
paragraphs (1) and (2) of this subsection, and except as provided
in subparagraph (E), each agency, upon any request for records which
(i) reasonably describes such records and
(ii) is made in accordance with published rules stating the time,
place, fees (if any), and procedures to be followed, shall make
the records promptly available to any person. [1]
Or maybe you can point me to where it says that NSA is not allowed to specify the procedures for filing? It seems that NSA is not alone when it comes to requiring a complete address.[2]
You seem like an intelligent person who is genuinely interested in government. You may enjoy reading the DOJ's procedural requirements for foia[3]. It is an interesting exploration of all of the legal subtleties of FOIA.
I am still interested in hearing what behavior would constitute recognition that this is a "protest"?
I'm not "assuming" anything. I simply print and mail documents. I actually can't do more to review the forms, because it would be crossing the line into giving legal advice. If the form looked like it was filled out, I mailed it.
Actually... you can do more. You have a web form. Process the results with some error checking. I'm pretty sure Google (maybe someone else) has an API that lets you pass them an address and they will validate it. So you could pretty easily throw an error for forms that do not have a complete address. That is not legal advice... that is "Form Processing 101".
Having said that, I think it is rather comical you are using old school snail mail to request the NSA to provide people with their digital records. Plus I'm sure the paper form is a bit more work for someone to process. I like it. I'm all about using inconvenience as a middle finger.
Does it bother anyone else that the online FOIA Request form [1] is not protected by SSL?
Edit: I attempted to submit a request via the online form, but it responded "An error occurred while processing your request." This makes the paper request seem much more reasonable now.
What's the actual protest? That the paper FOIA requests don't include the required information to honor said request, allowing the NSA to throw out the requests entirely without having to spend time fulfilling them?
Sounds more like the ~~company~~ guy is trying to cover for ~~its~~ his fuckup filling out the forms. It's a much more effective protest to actually make the NSA follow through with the requests.
- Forms were generated via script, so no "fucking up filling out forms" (by me, anyway)
- A few people entered incomplete addresses, but I sent them anyway because I thought the address was sufficient to reach them (for example, missing city but valid ZIP)
- 95% of the forms I sent had full, valid addresses
- The NSA wasn't provided with my Web site, so in order to get the e-mail, they had to stalk that down first
What are you smoking? Go back through my comments and point to one where I suggested that the NSA's e-mail to me was a lie. At most, I suggested it was an exaggeration since they said "many" of the requests had invalid addresses, while I contend that it was less than 5%.
> This man is an idiot, please don't fill up HN with this drivel.
This personal insult is uncalled for. It's easy to sit around and complain about what the government is doing, but this man has actually gone out and done something - setting up infrastructure to make it easier for the average person to submit these requests, he is spreading the word, etc. He has also done great work protesting the TSA.
> It's easy to sit around and complain about what the government is doing, but this man has actually gone out and done something - setting up infrastructure to make it easier for the average person to submit these requests
His infrastructure does not make it easier to submit these requests. It is harder to submit them with his stuff than to use the NSA's own form:
As far as I am concerned that email is the work product of a dedicated civil servant. I wish more companies I interact with would do something like google my name in order to learn about my needs and then email me advice on how to better utilize their service.
> It seems that the NSA does not quite get that this is a protest
I don't get it. What's it achieving?
> Imagine the NSA ending up with a desk full of a million records requests, and what a statement that would make, even if they refuse to process every one of them.
Well, they've got at least 500 so far. Only nine hundred and ninety nine thousand to go.
I wonder how many of those 500 have any records with NSA?
Still don't see the point. You're not going to find anything like phone transcripts or what tags might be applied to your person. I'm guessing 99% of the requests will be sent back with "we don't have a folder specifically for you". Because there isn't one...specifically. We're probably all in their database as some random character string, only actually linked to our identity if needed. Unless they have an actual investigation on anyone requesting information, I doubt anyone's going to get anything more that a boilerplate response.
Also, the site sending out mail that will just be thrown out because it's not correctly filled out is a complete waste. I just don't see what the goal of this is. Just to spam snail mail? If the goal is to just clog up their office and be a general nuisance as a protest of some sort...at least the forms would not be sent if they don't have all mailing information. Otherwise it looks like really childish trolling. To me that is. You providing a phone number does nothing.
In order for a record to be releasable under FOIA, it need not be in a file attached to your name. If I ask the NSA for every document that has the word "purple" in it, they are required to provide that document or claim a valid statutory exemption. Likewise, if I ask them for any record that contains 8005551212, they are required to provide it regardless of the labeling on its container.
It is now clear that you have not done any research about what constitutes a valid FOIA request. If you would like to do some research the DOJ Procedures guide that I have previously recommended is extremely detailed and thorough. I was serious when I said you might enjoy reading it if you are interested in FOIA. Please note, I have only included footnotes 107 and 108 because they seem to be the most relevant to this comment.
Courts have recognized that the legislative history of the 1974 FOIA
amendments indicates that a description of a requested record is
sufficient if it enables a professional agency employee familiar with
the subject area to locate the record with a "reasonable amount of
effort."[105] Courts have also found that requests that are so broad and
sweeping that they lack specificity are not reasonably described.[106]
Courts have explained that "[t]he rationale for this rule is that
FOIA was not intended to reduce government agencies to full-time
investigators on behalf of requesters,"[107] or to allow requesters
to conduct "fishing expeditions" through agencyfiles.108 Courts have
recognized that an agency's FOIA staff is neither required to have
"clairvoyant capabilities" to discern the requester's needs,[109] nor
must they spend "countless numbers of personnel hours seeking needles in
bureaucratic haystacks."[110]
[107] Assassination Archives & Research Ctr. v. CIA, 720 F. Supp. 217,
219 (D.D.C. 1989), aff'd in pertinent part, No. 89-5414, 1990 WL
123924 (D.C. Cir. Aug. 13, 1990) (per curiam); accord Nurse v. Sec'y
of the Air Force, 231 F. Supp. 2d 323, 329 (D.D.C. 2002) (quoting
Assassination Archives & Research Ctr., 720 F. Supp. at 219); see,
e.g., Bloeser v. DOJ, 811 F. Supp. 2d 316, 321 (D.D.C. 2011) (reasoning
that "[b]ecause 'FOIA' was not intended to reduce government agencies
to full-time investigators on behalf of requesters, . . . [t]o the
extent that plaintiff can identify documents which he believes exist in
a particular office within [DOJ], such identifying information should
have been included as part of his original FOIA request"); Satterlee
v. IRS, No. 05-3181, 2006 WL 3160963, at *3 (W.D. Mo. Oct. 30, 2006)
(finding that request was improper where it would require agency to
"conduct legal research" and answer questions "disguised as . . . FOIA
request"); Frank v. DOJ, 941 F. Supp. 4, 5 (D.D.C. 1996) (stating that
agency is not required to "dig out all the information that might
exist, in whatever form or place it might be found, and to create
a document that answers plaintiff's questions"); Lamb v. IRS, 871
F. Supp. 301, 304 (E.D. Mich. 1994) (finding requests outside scope of
FOIA when they require legal research, are unspecific, or seek answers
to interrogatories); Trenerry v. Dep't of the Treasury, No. 92-5053,
1993 WL 26813, at *3 (10th Cir. Feb. 5, 1993) (holding that agency not
required to provide personal services such as legal research).
[108] Immanuel v. Sec'y of the Treasury, No. 94-884, 1995 WL 464141,
at *1 (D. Md. Apr. 4, 1995), aff'd, 81 F.3d 150 (4th Cir. 1996)
(unpublished table decision); see also Dale v. IRS, 238 F. Supp. 2d 99,
104-05 (D.D.C. 2002) (concluding that request seeking "'any and all
documents . . . that refer or relate in any way'" to requester failed to
reasonably describe records sought and "amounted to an all-encompassing
fishing expedition of files at [agency's] offices across the country, at
taxpayer expense").
59 comments
[ 0.18 ms ] story [ 117 ms ] threadIf I have your name, which is: Jonathan Corbett.
I google searched "Jonathan Corbett NSA"
The first link is your twitter account: https://twitter.com/tsaoutourpants
Which mentions: http://www.mynsarecords.com/
I do a whois on the site: (public information)
I am assuming he emailed you either there or got your email from your website which has it in the contact section...Not very difficult really.
You can use your argument to anything. E.g. what is your previous comment accomplishing?
I do not mean to be critical of the poster, any involvement is better than none. However I do not think the best path forward is acting as if something is being done when it is not is not.
I think that someone who can build a website like this could make a much more useful one. Instead of preaching to the choir preach to the unconverted (Elected Officials, Mom, Dad, Grocery Clerk). Let people submit address/zip and then return a phone script and the name/numbers of your senators and your representative. Or populate a pdf file with all the information so that someone can put it in an envelope, copy the address given and add a stamp
That seems.. helpful?
I did a quick check for people submitting things like "FUCK YOU" and "YOUR MOM" in every field and deleted those before sending. A couple I let through had things like missing city but valid ZIP code, which I assume would actually be enough to get the letter to them. 95% of what was sent had a full address.
Did you ever read their instructions for filing a FOIA request? "If you do not include a name and complete postal address, NSA will be unable to respond."[1]
While you are here I dont understand what you mean by:
"It seems that the NSA does not quite get that this is a protest, in addition to a request for information."
How did you expect them to act? And/or what behavior would constitute recognition that this is a "protest"? NSA is required by law to respond to FOIA requests. The civil servant that emailed you was doing what her employer told her to do so that she could continue to bring a paycheck home. Are all the "protest" FOIA requests supposed to get tossed in a burn bag at the end of the day?
[1] http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/foia/submit_foia_request/foia...
So she was just following orders, huh?
> I, [name], do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same...
Furthermore, the NSA does not get to make "rules" about the form of FOIA requests. If they have enough information to reply, by law, they must reply.
You seem like an intelligent person who is genuinely interested in government. You may enjoy reading the DOJ's procedural requirements for foia[3]. It is an interesting exploration of all of the legal subtleties of FOIA.
I am still interested in hearing what behavior would constitute recognition that this is a "protest"?
[1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/5/552
[2] http://www.justice.gov/oip/foia-guide13/procedural-requireme...
[3] https://www.google.com/search?q=foia+%22complete+address%22+...
Don't forget; I am still interested in hearing what behavior would constitute recognition that this is a "protest"?
Having said that, I think it is rather comical you are using old school snail mail to request the NSA to provide people with their digital records. Plus I'm sure the paper form is a bit more work for someone to process. I like it. I'm all about using inconvenience as a middle finger.
Edit: I attempted to submit a request via the online form, but it responded "An error occurred while processing your request." This makes the paper request seem much more reasonable now.
[1] http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/foia/submit_foia_request/foia...
Sounds more like the ~~company~~ guy is trying to cover for ~~its~~ his fuckup filling out the forms. It's a much more effective protest to actually make the NSA follow through with the requests.
Edit: Also, from http://www.mynsarecords.com/contact/
Yes, how did they get your email, indeed. Probably some kind of spy technology.This man is an idiot, please don't fill up HN with this drivel.
- Forms were generated via script, so no "fucking up filling out forms" (by me, anyway)
- A few people entered incomplete addresses, but I sent them anyway because I thought the address was sufficient to reach them (for example, missing city but valid ZIP)
- 95% of the forms I sent had full, valid addresses
- The NSA wasn't provided with my Web site, so in order to get the e-mail, they had to stalk that down first
Turns out, you were being misleading, not them.
Your blog links to the mynsarecords website.
Took me 2 minutes.
Edit: I'm not as quick as pavs though, it only took him 30s:
This personal insult is uncalled for. It's easy to sit around and complain about what the government is doing, but this man has actually gone out and done something - setting up infrastructure to make it easier for the average person to submit these requests, he is spreading the word, etc. He has also done great work protesting the TSA.
Idiot may have been harsh as a judgement of character, but this post is idiotic.
His infrastructure does not make it easier to submit these requests. It is harder to submit them with his stuff than to use the NSA's own form:
http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/foia/submit_foia_request/foia...
I don't get it. What's it achieving?
> Imagine the NSA ending up with a desk full of a million records requests, and what a statement that would make, even if they refuse to process every one of them.
Well, they've got at least 500 so far. Only nine hundred and ninety nine thousand to go.
I wonder how many of those 500 have any records with NSA?
Probably all of them, since the NSA collects phone records on every American.
The NSA is capturing all internet and telephone traffic for every individual on this planet with a phone or email account.
But perhaps they don't index it by person name, and so 500 becomes 0 because of that.
Also, the site sending out mail that will just be thrown out because it's not correctly filled out is a complete waste. I just don't see what the goal of this is. Just to spam snail mail? If the goal is to just clog up their office and be a general nuisance as a protest of some sort...at least the forms would not be sent if they don't have all mailing information. Otherwise it looks like really childish trolling. To me that is. You providing a phone number does nothing.
Guess not.