Johanna Faust, a mixed race Jew, prefers to publish pseudonymously. She is committed: first, to preventing war, ecological disaster, and nuclear apocalypse; last to not only fighting for personal privacy & the freedom of information, but, by representing herself as a soldier in that fight, to exhorting others to do the same. She is a poet, always. All these efforts find representation here: "ah, Mephistophelis" is so named after the last line of Christopher Marlowe's Dr. Faustus, whose heretical success flouted the censor for a time.

Defense Contractor Cubic's Roots Still Showing: Trapwire, Abraxas, Ntrepid



A paste reposted from Cryptome.






15 August 2012
Abraxas Denial of TrapWire Affiliation Is False
Thanks to jf @not_me
Paste ID 6810d9914a
Pasted at 17:15:07 EDT on 08/14/12, this paste will expire in 364 days.
On 13 August 2012, Cubic Corporation released a press statement entitled "Cubic Corporation Has No Affiliation with Trapwire, Inc.", indicating that "Erroneous reports have linked the company with Trapwire, Inc.".
They further state that "Cubic Corporation (NYSE: CUB) acquired Abraxas Corporation on December 20, 2010. Abraxas Corporation then and now has no affiliation with Abraxas Applications now known as Trapwire, Inc."
However, as the merger agreement and subsequent exhibits in Cubic Corporations SEC filings, available below, show, Cubic Corporation also acquired Abraxas Dauntless as part of their merger-acquisition of Abraxas Corporation. Abraxas Dauntless is a wholly owned subsidiary of Abraxas Corporation, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Cubic Corporation.
Furthermore, as part of the agreement, Ntrepid Corporation was assigned to the share-holders of Abraxas Corporation, which in turn received apparent ownership of Abraxas Applications now known as Trapwire, Inc.
Per the latest annual report filed in December of 2011, available below, to the Virginia State Corporation Commision, Abraxas Dauntless' registered business address is 12801 Worldgate Drive Suite 800, Herndon, VA 20170. The Abraxas Dauntless' board of directors is as follows:
Michael Martinka - President
Margaret A. Lee - Secretary
Richard H. Helms - Chief Executive Officer
Wesley Husted - Chief Financial Officer
Per the latest annual reporter of the executive board members to the Florida Department of State, Division of Corporations, the registered business address of Ntrepid Corporation as 12801 Worldgate Drive, Suite 800, Herndon, VA 20170. The Ntrepid board of directors is as follows:
Richard H. Helms - Director
Wesley R Husted, CFO
Margaret A. Lee - Secretary
Michael Martinka - President
Per the annual report filed in September of 2011, available below, to the Virginia State Corporation Commission, Trapwire, Inc., whose registered agent's & CEO's mailing address is 12801 Worldgate Drive, Suite 800, Herndon, VA 20170, the board of directors is as follows:
Jack Reis - President
R. Daniel Botsch - Vice President
Margaret A. Lee - Secretary
Wesley R. Husted - Chief Financial Officer
Richard H. Helms - Chief Executive Officer
As such, while it is true that Cubic Corporation does not officially own Trapwire, Inc, nor Ntrepid Corporation, the statement that Cubic Corporation is not affiliated is erroneous in itself as multiple board members of a wholly owned subsidiary are also board members of both companies.
Furthermore, Trademarks used to secure the loan of Anonymizer, Inc. by Abraxas Applications in May of 2008 from Allied Capital were repaid by Cubic Corporation with the trademarks being returned to Abraxas Applications now known as Trapwire Inc.
As of the time of this writing, initial attempts to reach Cubic Corporation for comment has received no reply.


Be seeing you.

Assange, US, Trading Words: State Department Credibility Deficit


This gorgeous portrait of Julian Assange by Abode of Chaos.
Do check his
photostream out.  It kicks ass.
Used with permission (
Creative Commons, some rights reserved)

So Julian says, from the balcony of the Ecuadorean Embassy, he says,




Assange Accuses U.S. of a ‘Witch Hunt’
By RAVI SOMAIYA: August 19, 2012
Since June, Mr. Assange has been confined to the embassy, a small office in a red-brick apartment block where he fled and was granted asylum from British efforts to extradite him to Sweden. He is wanted for questioning on accusations of rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion brought by two women in Stockholm in 2010, allegations he has denied.

Read more.

and so what does the Obama Administration reply?

U.S. says WikiLeaks' Assange trying to deflect rape allegations
(Reuters) WASHINGTON | Tue Aug 21, 2012 12:41am

The United States on Monday accused WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange of making "wild assertions" about an alleged U.S. vendetta against him to deflect attention from rape allegations he faces in Sweden.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland dismissed Assange's latest broadside, which he delivered on Sunday from the balcony of the Ecuadorean Embassy in London where he has sought refuge from arrest.

(continued below)



"So let me get this straight: 
The US is complaining... 
about Britain not being able to extradite... 
an Australian citizen... 
to Sweden... 
because he is in the Ecuadorean embassy."

 (h/t Corporanon)

May I add: 
The US is 'worried' 
Assange might not face justice... In Sweden...  
For not using a condom. 

(Reuters, continued from above)

"He is making all kinds of wild assertions about us," Nuland told a news briefing, saying Assange's current legal problems stemmed from allegations of sexual misconduct and were unrelated to the WikiLeaks case.

"He is clearly trying to deflect attention away from the real issue, which is whether he's going to face justice in Sweden, which is the immediate issue. So that case has nothing to do with us. It's a matter between the UK, Sweden, and now Ecuador has inserted itself," Nuland said.

Read more

 "Inserted itself. " 
Where would that be?
Had the US thought Ecuador took its place in line?  
Will that be mutually consensual?
Will that insertion have had safety first in mind?

Sheesh.

Good luck, Julian.  Try not to call attention to yourself.  



Be seeing you.

Is It Me Or Does Anyone Else Think This Is Weird:
Not Only Is The Nurse Who Treated The 'Batman' Shooting Victims Dead Suddenly,
US Media Does Not Find This Fact Newsworthy


Bahia Santa Maria, Costa Rica


In fact, since, although my search brought up all of seven (in one version -- forty, in another) different entries, or 'hits," there were in fact actually only two distinctly different sources (both of them Irish). I'd say that makes the media silence international.

From Irish Central we learn that she had received recognition for her tireless work in the aftermath of the Aurora, Colorado incident less than one month ago.

Can we infer from this that she makes good decisions, with a body that does not physically give out in stressful situations? I think so.


Jennifer Gallagher-Pinson, 46, the Denver based Irish woman who cared for the Aurora Batman shooting victims in the aftermath of the horrific attack has drowned. She was a critical care emergency room nurse.
President Obama and his wife Michelle had earlier paid tribute to Jenny and to her hospital colleagues, who were credited with saving the lives of many injured in the senseless massacre.
But now her family has a tragedy of their own to contend with. Meath native Jenny was reportedly swimming in a lake near her home when she she got into difficulties and drowned
Read more:

But check this out (emphasis mine):

'Jenny was excited to be back playing football this year and was enjoying the Friday night games at Infinity Park and also played on the Denver Gaels ladies football team at the recent Irish festival, beating teams from San Francisco and Dallas to win the tournament. She so loved to be with the Ladies that were her team mates and so many who were her very close friends. Memories of trips with the Gaels whether it was for tournaments, camping in Moab, or surfing in Costa Rica would never have been so fond had Jenny not been there. We will always remember her wonderful smile, her loving and sharing nature.'

Read more:

So she was not only a nurse who did not crack under pressure, she was an experienced camper and surfer as well.  One would think this would make her a resourceful woman -- as well as one who knew how to swim, even after getting "into difficulties."


Costga Rica Surf, Image Search, not under copyright


To quote Mr. Corporanon, "If you know how to swim,  I don't really see what difficulties you can get into swimming alone in a lake.  Lets say that old adage is true, and you shouldn't go swimming after dinner.  So she eats, goes swimming, gets cramps.  You can float, you can dog paddle, tread water.  Act like its the ocean without any waves... You can yell for help.... Really odd.... Really odd.  Difficulties, huh."

What's the Moab, I asked him.  

"Utah.  Wilderness.  Look it up.  If I remember right, popular with mountain bikers."



Moab is a city in Grand County, in eastern Utah, in the western United States. ... Moab hosts a large number of tourists every year ...The town is a popular base for mountain bikers who ride the extensive network of trails including the famed Slickrock Trail, and off-roaders who come for the annual Moab Jeep Safari..... During the 1800s the area around what is now Moab served as the Colorado River crossing along the Old Spanish Trail.

Read more



"She camped there?" I nod, encouragingly.  He was just hearing about this new weird-ass development in a story the ass of which was already most weird, what with such weird-ass details as: 
  • The seemingly different James Holmeses
  • The exceedingly well stocked collection of paramilitary gear.  
  • His not even knowing how to shoot a rifle 
  • The truly amazing bargains he must have run into 'on the internet,' to afford all that hardware and tech on a student budget
  • The efficiency with which he must have managed his schedule to leave himself the time to learn about all those explosives and military tech
  • The efficiency with which he must have managed his schedule in order to plan and booby-trap his apartment, having just learned it, without blowing himself up
  • then again I suppose your grades are  the first things to go when you become convinced that not only does "this town --" (and we won't quibble over the name of the town, that would be needlessly picking nits) "-- need an enema," but, despite your ability to rent and view Batman videos (videos that obviously do not feature you, or any of the people around and with whom you have ever spent time),  you also become equally convinced that it is in fact you from whom this town needs it.

, " -- and, still not having learned, his ability to shoot so well and for so long, and still almost escape.  Not to mention the rather advanced skill at setting incendiary mousetraps.  Not to mention how dazed he looks, but that doesn't count -- .  "She sounds like an outdoors person.  Really rugged.  Maybe she ran into a bear?  Ain't no bear going to go out on the water.  A croc?  No way.  Not out west."

Difficulties.  Like unexpected people maybe?  You know, from the government.  There to help her.

Maybe we could stand a few more details about the circumstances of this death, no?  

That is, if everyone wants to avoid looking, shall we say, "shady."



Be seeing you.

UK Gov't To Seize Assange From Ecuadorean Embassy In Violation Of Geneva Conventions



A repost of a pastebin mirror of a site to which it may be difficult to connect.


Taken from http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2012/08/americas-vassal-acts-decisively-and-illegally/ which is currently down.

America’s Vassal Acts Decisively and Illegally
by craig on August 16, 2012 11:30 am in Uncategorized
I returned to the UK today to be astonished by private confirmation from within the FCO that the UK government has indeed decided – after immense pressure from the Obama administration – to enter the Ecuadorean Embassy and seize Julian Assange.

This will be, beyond any argument, a blatant breach of the Vienna Convention of 1961, to which the UK is one of the original parties and which encodes the centuries – arguably millennia – of practice which have enabled diplomatic relations to function. The Vienna Convention is the most subscribed single international treaty in the world.

The provisions of the Vienna Convention on the status of diplomatic premises are expressed in deliberately absolute terms. There is no modification or qualification elsewhere in the treaty.

Article 22

1.The premises of the mission shall be inviolable. The agents of the receiving State may not enter
them, except with the consent of the head of the mission.
2.The receiving State is under a special duty to take all appropriate steps to protect the premises
of the mission against any intrusion or damage and to prevent any disturbance of the peace of the
mission or impairment of its dignity.
3.The premises of the mission, their furnishings and other property thereon and the means of
transport of the mission shall be immune from search, requisition, attachment or execution.

Not even the Chinese government tried to enter the US Embassy to arrest the Chinese dissident Chen Guangchen. Even during the decades of the Cold War, defectors or dissidents were never seized from each other’s embassies. Murder in Samarkand relates in detail my attempts in the British Embassy to help Uzbek dissidents. This terrible breach of international law will result in British Embassies being subject to raids and harassment worldwide.

The government’s calculation is that, unlike Ecuador, Britain is a strong enough power to deter such intrusions. This is yet another symptom of the “might is right” principle in international relations, in the era of the neo-conservative abandonment of the idea of the rule of international law.

The British Government bases its argument on domestic British legislation. But the domestic legislation of a country cannot counter its obligations in international law, unless it chooses to withdraw from them. If the government does not wish to follow the obligations imposed on it by the Vienna Convention, it has the right to resile from it – which would leave British diplomats with no protection worldwide.

I hope to have more information soon on the threats used by the US administration. William Hague had been supporting the move against the concerted advice of his own officials; Ken Clarke has been opposing the move against the advice of his. I gather the decision to act has been taken in Number 10.

There appears to have been no input of any kind from the Liberal Democrats. That opens a wider question – there appears to be no “liberal” impact now in any question of coalition policy. It is amazing how government salaries and privileges and ministerial limousines are worth far more than any belief to these people. I cannot now conceive how I was a member of that party for over thirty years, deluded into a genuine belief that they had principles.



Be seeing you.

MUST READ: TrapWire: The Bottom Line With No BS

Alternate title:
Why Is Level Headed Analysis Like This Scarce Of Late?


Trapwire and data mining: What we know
Submitted by sosadmin on Sat, 08/11/2012 - 18:21  -  ACLU sosadmin's blog


These days every news cycle brings us more thoroughly disturbing reasons to be concerned about pervasive digital monitoring in the United States. This week things got extra interesting with the revelation of an enormous, shadowy surveillance company with deep ties to the CIA: Trapwire exploded on the surveillance scene like a bat out of hell. And people are justifiably freaked out about it.

But people are also publishing a lot of information that seems to have appeared out of the ether, grounded in no documentation whatsoever. There is no need to speculate or conjure surveillance bogeymen where they do not exist. The documented facts speak loudly enough.
Furthermore, we don’t even have to look to pre-crime, globally networked spook software like Trapwire to be concerned about where we stand vis a vis privacy rights and government powers. Take the following stories from just the past month as just a small sample of our problems to illustrate the seriousness of our current predicament:
On NSA dreams: “NSA Boss Wants More Control Over the Net: The Internet should be adapted to allow for oversight by the National Security Agency, the organization’s boss says” (Technology Review, MIT, July 27, 2012)
On NSA vacuum style digital surveillance: “HOPE 9: Whistleblower Binney says the NSA has dossiers on nearly every US citizen” (NetworkWorld, July 15, 2012)
On the feds using our cellphones as bugs: “Ninth Circuit OKs Feds Use of Cellphones as Roving Bugs” (The New American, July 28, 2012)
On impunity and secrecy in spying: “The Feds Violated the Constitution but the Administration Won’t Say How” (The Atlantic, July 24, 2012)
On the National Counter Terrorism Center (NCTC) collecting unimaginably large amounts of data about every single person and storing it for a very long time: “The Biggest New Spying Program You’ve Probably Never Heard Of” (ACLU, July 30, 2012)
On impunity for warrantless spying on a mass scale: “Appeals Court OKs Warrantless Wiretapping” (Wired, August 7, 2012)
On face recognition: “FBI’s Facial Recognition is Coming to a State Near You” (EFF, August 8, 2012)
On the Microsoft and NYPD attempt to recreate “Total Information Awareness”: “The NYPD’s Domain Awareness System Is Watching You” (New York Magazine, August 9, 2012)
And for those worried that the government will use its vast, unaccountable surveillance powers to intimidate and harass political activists or religious minorities, there’s some news for you, too:
On the targeting of political anarchists: “Political Convictions? Federal Prosecutors in Seattle Are Dragging Activists into Grand Juries, Citing Their Social Circles and Anarchist Reading Materials” (The Stranger, August 7, 2012)
On JTTF raids of activist homes: “FBI and JTTF Raid Multiple Homes, Grand Jury Subpoenas in Portland, Olympia, Seattle” (Green is the New Red, July 25, 2012)
On the NYPD’s relentless and remorseless targeting of Muslims: “Gov jabs at NYPD again over spying on Muslims” (Wall Street Journal, August 8, 2012)

In other words, we are in a rough spot, Trapwire or no Trapwire. Having established that, let's move on to what we can prove Trapwire is, and what we cannot.

Unproven claims about Trapwire
Given what we know about other, active surveillance programs, there’s no need to speculate that we are living in dangerous times. But unfortunately that’s precisely what’s happening on the internet this week.
This article, for example, called “Confirmed: New Nationwide “Trapwire” Surveillance System is Actively Recording, Monitoring Everything,” makes a series of extremely disturbing allegations that it supports with absolutely no documentation, beginning with its headline. 
Among other unproven and somewhat hysterical allegations, the article claims that “The Trapwire system is actively monitoring every major city in the country.” Really? The documents I’ve been able to locate show that the company's "TrapWire Community Member" program -- which importantly is not the same as its critical infrastructure monitoring program or its law enforcement program -- is operative in a number of major cities, including Washington DC, Las Vegas, New York and Los Angeles.

But I can't find any evidence to support the claim that it is operating where I live, for example, in Boston -- or in Providence, RI, or Portland, OR, or Seattle, WA, etc.. It very well might be operating in every US city, but there is no evidence to back up such a claim.
The article further states that Trapwire’s software integrates its license plate and CCTV data with “what you bought on your credit card today and who you interacted with via text message or your favorite social network” without providing a shred of evidence for the latter. Trapwire’s website and its patent filings confirm that its software attempts to integrate license plate and CCTV data, but makes zero mention of credit card information or SMS metadata. That's not to say the company's database doesn't have this information, but it is a fact that there's no documentation or other proof to give credence to these claims.
Salon.com is the most high profile outlet to publish a claim I've seen batted about the internet for a few days -- that Trapwire's system is more advanced than face recognition. Again, there's been zero evidence presented to back up this claim. 
Speculating about Trapwire's prowess and reach is dangerous and unnecessary. After all, the facts the company laid out for us through its limited but nonetheless revealing digital trail are enough to raise the alarm.
Let’s turn to what we know about Trapwire.

Known knowns
Trapwire's early history
The first documentation of Trapwire’s existence comes from filing papers to the US patent office dated September 7, 2004. The papers ask for a patent on Goods: "computer software for use in detecting terrorist surveillance of a facility and other pre-attack preparations on a facility or on persons associated with a facility". The patent application was filed by a company called Abraxas Corporation, represented by a Danielle O. Saunders of McLean, Virginia -- the heart of CIA country. 
On April 5, 2005 the US patent office responded by denying the trademark application because of "likelihood of confusion" with two other companies' trademarks: "The applicant’s mark, TRAPWIRE, is similar to the registered marks, TRIPWIRE and TRAPWARE. The marks are compared for similarities in sound, appearance, meaning or connotation."
On October 4, 2005 the patent office received a response from Abraxas Corporation, arguing that the products the three companies produce are different enough to warrant granting Abraxas the Trapwire trademark. Furthermore, it argues, its product will only be sold to an elite batch of discriminating clients who would engage in extensive research and consultation with the firm before buying it. This isn't "food snacks" you grab at the market without thinking twice, it says. It's a big, costly computer surveillance network made for the "discriminating purchaser." Indeed.
Somewhat hilariously, Abraxas points out that the two other companies -- Tripwire and Trapware -- make computer software products that allow individual computer users and large networks to detect unwanted attacks on their systems. Trapwire doesn't do that, the lawyers wrote. You can say that again.
The US patent office overturned its initial rejection on November 14, 2005, about a month after Abraxas' appeal. Four days before Christmas, on December 21, 2005, the patent office mailed an official notice of publication for the Trapwire mark to attorney Danielle O. Saunders. The company had its trademark, and likely a very Merry Christmas.
The next document in the Trapwire file at the patent office is a notice to revoke power of attorney from Danielle O. Saunders, filed January 5, 2006. The company's power of attorney would change again multiple times over the next five years.
Finally, on September 26, 2005 the patent office received some more substantive information from the company, describing what it set out to do with its patent. That document is titled "TrapWireTM: Pre-Attack Terrorist Detection System for Protecting Critical Infrastructure". You can read it yourself here.

The basics: what does Trapwire do?
The whitepaper sketches out the contours of a pre-crime surveillance system that the former CIA agents who run Trapwire Inc. hoped would work to "intercept a terrorist strike before it begins." 
TrapWire dramatically increases the ability to detect pre-attack preparations and to take appropriate action to detect, deter and intercept terrorist attacks. A visual monitor of the entire system -- a map with dynamic status indicators for each entity connected to the TrapWire network -- facilitates the ability of decision-makers to absorb vast quantities of information quickly and efficiently. The dynamic status indicators show the threat level at each facility and highlight those that have moved to a higher threat level over the preceding 24 hours. Security officials can thus focus on the highest priorities first, taking a proactive and collaborative approach to defense against attacks. The information collected by TrapWire can also be shared with law enforcement agencies to assist in their counterterrorism efforts.

The company says "the basic premise behind" the technology "is as follows: Through the systematic reporting of suspicious events and the correlation of those events with other event reports for that facility and for related facilities across the network, terrorist surveillance operations can be identified..."
The services Trapwire offers to major corporations and governments can be broken down into three categories: critical infrastructure "hardening", suspicious activity report management, and data mining. 
Using open-source information it is very difficult to determine what kinds data-inputs the system accesses. The only confirmed sources of data to the system are CCTV cameras, license plate readers and open source databases. (The latter contain a wealth of information about each and every one of us, so the combination of these three data sets alone is troubling.) 
The Wikileaked Stratfor emails that revealed the existence of this shadowy surveillance network to the world contain at least 189 references to Trapwire. They reveal much more about what the program is used for than does the Trapwire public website. 
Among the most disturbing emails in the Wikileaks GIF files is this one, written by a Stratfor analyst to the head of the firm. It gives us a troubling taste of how these private security companies view their role as intermediary between the government and the people:
Regarding SF landmarks of interest--they need something like Trapwire more for threats from activists than from terror threats. Both are useful, but the activists are ever present around here.

Look out for more on Trapwire in this space over the coming weeks. There's lots more to dig up on this sprawling security infrastructure and much more to say about its implications for our privacy and democracy, so stay tuned.

Read More: 
sosadmin's blog

    © Copyright 2012 ACLU of Massachusetts | 211 Congress St, Boston, MA 02110 | 617-482-3170
    Reprinted with permission of the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts
    http://www.aclum.org
    ACLU of Massachusetts: Because the rights you save may be your own.




    Be seeing you.

    TrapWire's ABRAXAS Alleged Involvement In Bush-Era War Crimes, Spying


    Follow the links.  Post more if you have them.  Each link is represented by one standard link, one iframe and one html link; the iframe and latter link to a base 64 encoded archive of the page which, although it may not be viewable in ie, will still be here even if Constant's wonderful blog ever disappears (knock on wood).  The second link is url-shortened, so right-click the iframe if it is not working for you.





    Abraxas Corp Allegedly Engaged in War Crimes





    Here's the unshortened data-encoded html of the above post.

    Other of Constant's work mentioning ABRAXAS, secon links all url encoded:


    How To Find The Names of the CIA Agents, Contractors Involved in American War Crimes (encoded link)




    Abraxas Corp. Assumptions (encoded link)

    War Crimes Prosecutors Have Worldwide CIA E-mail, Identifying Info (encoded link)

    Alleged War Criminal Viet D. Dinh Fatal Admissions, Errors (encoded link)


    NARUS STA 6400 & Allegation: Clandestince, Domestic Intelligence Gathering Outside FISA To Support War Crimes (encoded link)



    CONSTANT, WE MISS YOU.

    Be seeing you.