Richard Burr’s IP Dragnet Disappears into the Memory Hole

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As I noted yesterday, Richard Burr gave a planned colloquy on the Senate floor yesterday in which he said bulk collection included IP addresses.

Now what’s bulk data? Bulk data is storing telephone numbers and IP addresses — we have no idea who they belong to — that are domestic. And the whole basis behind this program is that as a cell phone is picked up in Syria, and you look at the phone numbers that phone talked to, if there’s some in the United States we’d like to know that — at least law enforcement would like to know it — so that we can understand if there’s a threat against us here in the homeland or somewhere else in the world. So Section 215 allows the NSA to collect in bulk telephone numbers and IP addresses with no identifier on it. We couldn’t tell you who that American might be. [my emphasis]

Here’s a CSPAN clip of that discussion.

Curiously, here’s how that passage looks in the Congressional Record. (h/t Steven Aftergood)

What is bulk data? Bulk data is storing telephone numbers–we have no idea to whom they belong–that are foreign and domestic. The whole basis behind this program is that as a cell phone is picked up in Syria and we look at the phone numbers that phone talked to, if it is someone in the United States, we would like to know that–at least law enforcement would like to know it–so we can understand if there is a threat against us here in the homeland or somewhere else in the world.

Section 215 allows the NSA to collect, in bulk, telephone numbers with no identifier on them. We couldn’t tell you who that American might be. [my emphasis]

Note, the Congressional record also added “foreign” on to the description of telephone numbers collected. We know NSA collects IP addresses overseas, so it may be that’s what Burr was thinking about (or it may be in this doctored Congressional record, he added foreign because that would be unsurprising).

I called Burr’s office yesterday to ask about this, but have thus far gotten no response.

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6 replies
  1. WB says:

    It’s extremely common for the Congressional Record to differ from the C-SPAN record. Both the House and Senate allow members to revise their floor statements in order to correct mistakes, remove colloquialisms, and add extensions, among other things. In fact, in the Senate, remarks can be added by members who weren’t even present for a debate.

    I’m not sure why Senator Burr modified his comments in this particular case–it could be for troubling or innocent reasons–but the modification, by itself, doesn’t indicate much.

    • P J Evans says:

      But if he points to his remarks, in the CR, they won’t be what he actually said. It’s like they have no clue that recordings don’t disappear or change when they ‘fix’ their ‘mistakes’.

    • Kitt says:

      it could be for troubling or innocent reasons–but the modification, by itself, doesn’t indicate much.

      The modification took out “bulk IP addresses.” That’s a lot more than not much.

  2. Giles Byles says:

    Yeah, these fiddled-with texts aren’t going to fly any more in the electronic age.  Your favorite word processor probably has a compare-write tool that can contrast a transcript with its “revised version” in seconds.  Insertions are red & deletions are blue & they stick out like sore thumbs.
    .
    Almost as interesting as “redacted” texts with blocks blacked out:  The most fascinating stuff about ’em is always what’s been purged & why.

  3. RCarter says:

    I’ve been waiting for the “Memory Hole: to start appearing, I surewe will see lots more of it.

    Great stuff, thank you.

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