Echelon, Diana, Wassenaar

[John Young <jya@pipeline.com>]

The Wash Post today has picked up the hot European
story of NSA's file on Princess Diana and linked it to
the NSA's Echelon program.

   http://jya.com/nsa-diana.htm

This is the first US major media story on Echelon, and its
connection to privacy invasion of a global celebrity icon 
may do more to get public attention for the vile program
than any previous investigation and report.

NSA claims Diana was not a "target" and that the 1,000 pages
of data on her were gathered "incidental" to other activities. 
But, as with all the TLA snooping, it is this incidental 
surveillance of the innocent that all the calls for loosening of
encrypton controls  is about.

After all the near-futile efforts of investigators to bring 
Echelon out into the open, and counterefforts of pols
and spooks cloak it, the Diana hook may the "Gone
With The Wind" popularizer that finally energizes
a genuine borad-based opposition, and, may very well 
be the kickoff to global demand for encryption to protect 
privacy worldwide and maybe even in the US.

What wonderful cloubreak to let sunshine into the dark
halls of Wassenaar and FT Meade spookdoms.