Reply from Bell South to my email

[peaches2003]

Thank you for contacting BellSouth.

There has been much speculation in the last several days about the role that BellSouth may have played in efforts by the National Security Agency (NSA) and other governmental agencies to keep our nation safe.

As a result of media reports that BellSouth provided massive amounts of customer calling information under a contract with the NSA, the Company conducted an internal review to determine the facts. Based on our review to date, we have confirmed no such contract exists and we have not provided bulk customer calling records to the NSA.

BellSouth has built a successful business because of the trust that our customers have placed with us. We will continue to take our obligations to our customers seriously.

Should you need further assistance or have other questions, please reply back to this e-mail and the BellSouth Online Customer Care team will be happy to help you.

Thank you for doing business with BellSouth online.

Sincerely,

Ronetta Thompson

[papau]

1. have not provided bulk customer calling records" - "bulk" means what to

this telco?

If only for one week is that not "bulk" because it was "selective"?

[Nickster]

2. Now ask them if they are providing call records to a third party company

that then provides those records for review by the NSA. All they denied was that they don't have a contract to hand those records over directly to the NSA and that they haven't handed over those records to the NSA directly. What about third party vendors acting as agents of the NSA?

[Minnesota Libra]

3. This sounds great on the surface but on closer examination...............

.....something glares out as me. The statement of ".....have not provided bulk customer calling records to the NSA."

For me, that says one of two things.........

Their they have provided some records to NSA, but maybe not bulk records or may have even provided "bulk customer records" to some other agency.

I would have been much more impressed with something like "We have not and will not provide any government agency with the calling records of our customers unless that request is accompanied by a court ordered search warrant."

[habitual]

4. there seem to be a million ways to deny the USAToday story

so as long as they can come out and say
"we didn't hand over millions and millions of 10-digit telephone numbers on 8.5 X 11 paper, stapled and collated, on a saturday or any other weekend day."

ooooo so i guess the gov never got those numbers they approached qwest for and was rejected.....

WE DEMAND A GOVERNMENT THAT DOESN'T LIE TO US IN CLEVER WAYS

and they are not so clever after all....

[Lerkfish]

5. they all specify "NSA" which means they did it with a contractor of NSA

its the classic shell game.
and, they didn't deny until the lawsuits were filed, which leads me to believe the lawsuits name ONLY NSA.

They're hoping like hell for a loophole. Otherwise, they'll be staring billlions of dollars in fines in the face.

[gratuitous]

6. They had to conduct an internal review?

Boy, does that response looked over-lawyered to the nth degree. "Based on our review to date" means absolutely nothing. "Hey Herb! USA Today said we turned over all kinds of phone records to the government without a warrant. Have you ever heard of such a thing?" "No, Stan!" Well, there you have it.

"We have confirmed that no such contract exists." Well of course not. That was the point of the story, wasn't it? That Bell South and the other companies just sold out their customers without so much as an "Is this legal?" There was no paperwork, no subpoena, no warrant, no nothing. The government said "frog," and companies like Bell South jumped. They didn't stop to ask how high or how long, they just jumped.

[AnarchoFreeThinker]

7. if it wasn't in bulk, it's even scarier.

[drthais]

8. I got the same reply...

they give you a link to respond
I did that
and quoted their customer privacy policy to them
and asked to be shown proof
in the form of a warrant etc.
releasing customer information to govt agencies or others

of course, they did not respond to my repsonse

they also, remember, said they only received 26 negative emails about this
bull

there are hundreds probably from DU'ers alone

[seabeyond]

9. mine from at&t

AT&T has a long history of vigorously protecting customer privacy. Our customers expect, deserve and receive nothing less than our fullest commitment to their privacy.

We also have an obligation to assist law enforcement and other government agencies responsible for protecting the public welfare, whether it be an individual or the security interests of the entire nation.

We prize the trust our customers place in us. If and when AT&T is asked to help, we do so strictly within the law and under the most stringent conditions. Beyond that, we don’t comment on matters of national security.

Thank you