This is from the Observer (Sunday Paper), not the Guardian as the headline states, though I think they published it on the Guardian website - the two papers have separate editorial teams though they share the same online space. You can see the printed edition of the Observer article reproduced here:<p><a href="http://guardian.newspaperdirect.com/epaper/viewer.aspx" rel="nofollow">http://guardian.newspaperdirect.com/epaper/viewer.aspx</a><p>It'd be nice to see some verification of the claims, so I'd be interested to see the article if it is ever republished after checking (I think they took it down as the source - Madsen - is seen as particularly unreliable).
The source, Wayne Madsen, apparently has a history of unsubstantiated claims, including that Obama is secretly a homosexual[1].<p>[1]: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/the-guardian-wayne-madsen-nsa-scoop-2013-6" rel="nofollow">http://www.businessinsider.com/the-guardian-wayne-madsen-nsa...</a>
Can't see much value in posting this. If they deleted it it's probably factually incorrect or inaccurate and will probably return with corrections.
I don't know about what has happened here, but this story does ring true with what has historically happened after 9/11. We know that EU countries bent over backwards to accommodate US demands with respect to information sharing with regards to travel. This is just what I would expect to be a sort of secret extension of that rational. Don't up set the "Yanks", and betray the citizens, then complain like hell when it turns out the US spies on EU governments and institutions.<p>UK wise, we are just turn all we have over to the US with out question. I would assume that this has always been the case. Dunno why we dont change our name to USK, and adopt the dollar.
Yes, PRISM is probably an extension of the existing ECHELON program. It's weird that the correlation hasn't been made already. Fun fact, I remember Australia stepping out of ECHELON because they hadn't the capabilities to keep up with US surveillance meaning the spying was essentially one-sided [ref needed].
<a href="http://whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/POLITICS/ECHELON/echelon.html" rel="nofollow">http://whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/POLITICS/ECHELON/echelo...</a>
Here's the link to archive.org version:
<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20130630002034/http://www.guardian.co.uk/info/2013/jun/30/taken-down" rel="nofollow">http://web.archive.org/web/20130630002034/http://www.guardia...</a><p>It states "This article has been taken down pending an investigation."<p>Here's the 404 from the next day:
<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20130629225229/http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/29/european-private-data-america" rel="nofollow">http://web.archive.org/web/20130629225229/http://www.guardia...</a>
The deleted article is almost entirely sourced to Wayne Madsen, who has made disclosures and claims far more shocking than these in the OP:<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayne_Madsen" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayne_Madsen</a><p>So are these disclosures new? Whether they're a scoop or not doesnt have much to do with their actual validity, but if he's made these claims well before Snowden, then it's likely they've been debated in the past, too.
Here are the diffs between the various versions:<p><a href="http://www.newssniffer.co.uk/articles/658994/diff/0/1" rel="nofollow">http://www.newssniffer.co.uk/articles/658994/diff/0/1</a><p>Here's Wayne Madsen's comments:<p><a href="http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/articles/20130630" rel="nofollow">http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/articles/20130630</a>
This seems to be the original story (HT Fefes Blog):<p><a href="http://www.privacysurgeon.org/blog/incision/former-nsa-contractor-warns-of-murky-interception-arrangements/" rel="nofollow">http://www.privacysurgeon.org/blog/incision/former-nsa-contr...</a>
Worth mentioning that the author smeared WikiLeaks in the past:<p><a href="https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/351121777742716928" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/351121777742716928</a>