NOVANEWS
Tentacles of Israeli “security” firms stretch across U.S., globe
By Keith Johnson for American Free Press Newspaper
While the National Security Agency (NSA) spying scandal continues to grab national headlines, the equally egregious intelligence gathering on United States citizens by Israeli security firms has virtually flown under the radar.
A recent article in Rolling Stone magazine, entitled “Meet the Private Companies Helping Cops Spy on Protesters,” comes close to scratching the surface by identifying the four major security contractors that have been aggressively hawking their invasive surveillance products at various trade shows and police conferences throughout the nation. However, they fail to mention that at least two of those companies are owned and operated by members of a foreign nation with a long and notorious history of spying on theU.S. government and its citizens.
Among them is NICE Systems, Ltd., an Israel-based company founded in 1986 by seven “Israeli ex-army colleagues.” NICE’s current CEO is Zeevi Bregman, who formerly helmed Comverse Technology, Inc., an Israeli-run private telecommunications firm that provides wiretapping equipment to U.S. law enforcement.
In 2001, Comverse was the subject of a Fox News investigation into Israeli spying, where it was alleged “that the wiretap computer programs made by Comverse have, in effect, a back door through which wiretaps themselves can be intercepted by unauthorized parties. Adding to the suspicions is the fact that in Israel, Comverse works closely with the Israeli government, and under special programs, gets reimbursed for up to 50% of its research and development costs.”
More recently, Comverse subsidiary Verint Systems, Inc. has been linked to the current NSA spy scandal. AMERICAN FREE PRESS has previously reported on how the company was hired by the feds to wiretap U.S. telecommunications networks and even offered back-door access to major U.S. technology companies like Facebook, Microsoft and Google.
Bregman now oversees NICE Systems projects that are just as intrusive. One product marketed to law enforcement is “NiceTrack Target 360°,” an intelligence gathering tool that collects and monitors the activities of persons targeted in surveillance operations. According to their brochure, “The solutions retrieve target location, relations and conversation content from any type of communication including telephony, IP and satellite, resulting in a multi-dimensional intelligence picture.”
Nice Systems also provides a suite of video surveillance products that monitors street activity 24/7 and alerts law enforcement of potential disruptions. In a promotional videofor the “NICE Security Portfolio,” a group of protestors are depicted as posing a “security risk” by demonstrating in a city center. The fictitious activists are shown chanting slogans and hoisting signs that read “No More” and “Stop It Now” as the narrator explains how a variety of NICE Systems products can be used to help mitigate the “situation.” The narrator concludes by saying, “The entire event is then reconstructed on a chronological timeline, based on all multimedia sources,” to help “managers evaluate and understand trends and prepare for, predict and even prevent the next event.”
According to foreign trade portal Israel Gateway, NICE Systems products are already being used at the Statue of Liberty and the New Jersey Transit System.
A spokeswoman for NICE declined to provide Rolling Stone with specific clients, but said “Thousands of customers worldwide” use their products, including “law enforcement and other government agencies.”
A quick review of NICE’s website however, reveals some high-profile “leading customers” the Jewish firm has accumulated, including:
- Air France
- Beijing Metro
- Bank of Tokyo
- American Airlines
- Dallas-Ft. Worth Int’l Airport
- Mitsubishi UFJ
- American Express
- Eiffel Tower
- India Parliament House
- HSBC
- T-Mobile
- Miami-Dade Police Department
- NJ Transit
- New York Police Department
- Port of Miami
- Belgian Railways
- UBS
- Shanghai Pudong Int’l Airport
- Washington Mutual
- Statue of Liberty
The other Israeli-owned security firm referenced in Rolling Stone is 3i-MIND, which is profiled in the below article. 3i-MIND’s founder and CEO is Israeli-born billionaire Mati Kochavi, who also owns AGT International, a security firm managed by a team of retired Israeli generals and Mossad agents, according to an article in Le Figaro.
Though AGT has only been in business since 2007, it has already secured $8B in contracts and has become a leading supplier of surveillance technologies to the governments of India, the Netherlands, Brazil, China, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates and others.
In 2010, AGT entered into a strategic partnership with Microsoft as an initial foray into the U.S. security market. According to a press release, the two companies plan to “provide government homeland security and corporate customers with complete solutions” in a shared “belief that the benefits of globalization for the world economy need to be accompanied by in-built sophisticated security technology.”
More recently, AGT’s Kochavi has ventured into the realm of journalism by launching a digital news website called Vocativ, which produces pro-Israel news content targeted at the young adult demographic. According to a recent article in Forbes magazine, Kochavi “has organized his newsroom along the lines of an intelligence agency in the belief that journalism needs to undergo the same transformation that’s already swept the field of spycraft.”
Although Kochavi wants his staff and clients to enjoy full-spectrum intelligence gathering capabilities, he doesn’t believe the general public should be afforded the same. In 2011, Kochavi and former President Bill Clinton appeared together in a CNBC interview to push for the creation of a regulatory agency that would prevent “misinformation and rumors” from being spread over the Internet.
“Why can’t we have a credibility bar near every resultive search,” Kochavi asked. “When we buy food we have ingredients on the food. When we go to see a movie we have ratings.”
It’s certain that if Kochavi had his way, real news organizations like AMERICAN FREE PRESS would be given a “zero” credibility rating.
Israeli security companies like AGT and NICE Systems can only survive if their sordid pasts are concealed from public scrutiny. And that’s precisely why AFP will continue to expose them at every opportunity.
