Former Intelligence Agent Says Google In Bed With CIA : Ignorance Is Futile!
ignoranceisfutile.wordpress.com | Dec 6th 2006An ex-CIA agent has gone further than ever before in detailing Google’s relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency, claiming sources told him that CIA seed money helped get the company off the ground and naming for the first time Google’s CIA point man.
Robert David Steele, a 20-year Marine Corps infantry and intelligence officer and a former clandestine services case officer with the Central Intelligence Agency, is the CEO of OSS.net.
Speaking to the Alex Jones Show, Steele elaborated on his previous revelations by making it known that the CIA helped bankroll Google at its very inception.
“I think Google took money from the CIA when it was poor and it was starting up and unfortunately our system right now floods money into spying and other illegal and largely unethical activities, and it doesn’t fund what I call the open source world,” said Steele, citing “trusted individuals” as his sources for the claim.
“They’ve been together for quite a while,” added Steele.
Asked to impart to what level Google is “in bed” with the CIA, Steele described the bond as a “small but significant relationship,” adding, “it is by no means dominating Google in fact Google has been embarrassed because everything the CIA asked it to do they couldn’t do.”
“I also think it’s very very wrong of Google to have this relationship,” cautioned Steele.
The former agent went further than before in identifying by name Google’s liaison at the CIA.
“Let me say very explicitly – their contact at the CIA is named Dr. Rick Steinheiser, he’s in the Office of Research and Development,” said Steele.
Steele highlighted Google’s blatant censorship policies whereby press releases put out by credible organizations that are critical of Dick Cheney and other administration members don’t make it to Google News even though they are carried by PR Newswire.
We have repeatedly highlighted past examples of censorship on behalf of Google, including their blacklisting of a mainstream news website that was mildly critical of China, and also the deliberate stifling and manipulation of Alex Jones’ Terror Storm film ranking on Google Video. Google was also caught red-handed attempting to bury the Charlie Sheen 9/11 story at the height of its notoriety.
Saying Google had become “too big for itself,” Steele opined that Google was “long overdue for a public audit.”
“One of the problems with privatized power is that it’s not subject to public audit,” said Steele, arguing that groups should rally to “put Google out of business unless they’re willing to go the open source software route.”
We regularly highlight Google’s damaging role in aiding the march towards a big brother society, but the admission that Google were planning on teaming up with the U.S. government to use microphones in the computers of an estimated 150 million-plus Internet active Americans to spy on their lifestyle choices and build psychological profiles which will be used for surveillance and minority report style invasive advertising and data mining, astounded even us.
Steele said that our previous story about Google’s ties to the CIA, which was picked up by dozens of top technology websites, concerned Google enough to lie to the public about it and deny its validity.
It remains to be seen how Google will react to these latest revelations.
Listen to the interview with Robert David Steele, in which he also questions the official version of 9/11, by clicking here.
Google actively aiding intelligence agencies?
Nate Anderson / ARS Technica | October 31 2006
Former intelligence officer Robert David Steele recently appeared on the Alex Jones show to make the provocative claim that Google is currently cooperating with secret elements in the US government, including the CIA.
Steele, who now runs OSS.net and is a proponent of open source intelligence, said that “Google has made a very important strategic mistake in dealing with the secret elements of the U.S. government—that is a huge mistake and I’m hoping they’ll work their way out of it and basically cut that relationship off.” In his view, Google’s attempt earlier this year to avoid turning over information to the Department of Justice was little more than a hypocritical charade.
Steele has made these claims for some time; back in January, he said the same things at a conference organized by his company at which several sources came forward and spoke about the alleged cooperation. According to security site HSToday.us, which had a reporter in attendance at the conference, one unnamed security contractor “said three employees of an intelligence agency he declined to identify are in Mountain View, Calif. where Google is based, working with the company to leverage the search engine company’s user data monitoring capability in the interests of national security.”
No hard evidence for these claims was presented, and those in a position to have direct knowledge of such an arrangement have been unwilling to speak about it on the record. Google traditionally prefers not to comment on such allegations, and did not respond to our requests for comment by press time.
It’s clear that the company is not opposed to working with the intelligence and defense communities in principle. Products such as Google Earth are explicitly marketed to such industries, with Google claiming that its products allow “analysts and operatives to get the job done effectively and in record time.”
Whether the famously idealistic company is actively assisting the CIA and NSA is a different question, though, and one that remains unanswered. If the allegations have any merit, then it’s no great stretch to imagine that other leading search engines have attracted the government’s interest. Will major Internet companies like Microsoft, Yahoo, and Google turn out to be as involved in surveillance as the telecommunications companies? Or did all these shadowy sources get the story wrong?
Original Page: http://ignoranceisfutile.wordpress.com/2008/08/08/former-intelligence-agent-says-google-in-bed-with-cia/
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