I wonder if that's why Germany is the most spied upon in EU. Does Germany have the same deal with US? You spy on us, we spy on you?
It can either be that, or US spies on Germany because they want all sort of information from their politicians, businesses, and so on. I doubt most terrorists reside in Germany. So those can be the only 2 explanations.
Would the US allow the Dutch, the Germans, the Belgians and the French to have military bases on US soil?
If you intend to imply that I agree with the NSA that Germany is a US possession, then you're wrong. In the 80's I protested American occupation personally.
However, it's useful to understand the mindset of the people in power in Washington. They really do regard everything as American soil.
Finally, from a logical perspective, the Germans didn't allow US military bases; it was part of the post-war occupation accord. The French and the UK got their sectors, too, as did the Soviet Union.
There is at least one U.K. facility home-based here in the U.S. in fact.
Edit: I can't say what I am talking about, but I will say that we (the U.S.) ended up having to lease usage of the U.K. facility even though it was physically located here in the U.S. and protected by U.S. forces.
You're not inspiring the average American's confidence in the US Government.
In fact if Americans weren't in general wary of the government I'd be wondering who kidnapped all of America and replaced them sleeper cell aliens. There's no finer American pasttime than distrusting the government, it's right up there with chopping cherry trees and baseball.
The way the US regularly gets various major countries to dance upon command, probably just helps reinforce that view (eg the US directly threatening Britain in regards to leaving the EU).
Can you clarify this, I haven't heard of it?
(A bargain was also struck with the UK: they got bombs from the USA in exchange for data - Anthony Neil Wedgwood "Tony" Benn was Postmaster General)
But following 9/11 there would be no way the UK could keep up with the US's new intelligence quantity/demands, so the US started spying on themselves and new laws had to quickly get penned to make that retrospectively legal.
If I sign up to Yahoo France, while in France, and give my French address, I assume the NSA (or Dutch AVID, in this case) would assume I'm French and could spy on me. But this may be incorrect, I could be an American... Yahoo never asked me nor verified my identity, let alone my nationality...
Even if they did, some people are dual nationals, and some people are nationals of the US and the US doesn't know about it (Children of Americans born and raised abroad, who have a foreign nationality as well, have no US birth certificate, never lived in the US, have no SSN, and have not yet asked for a passport). These unregistered people are Americans, too, the law says they cannot be spied on without a warrant...
The NSA would have to be able to prove that accounts do not belong to Americans (impossible, for many reasons).
Immigration and nationality are exclusively "guilty until proven innocent." The burden on proof is on YOU to prove that you are a US citizen, whether you're stopped by some police department or the border patrol. This is why you're supposed to always have your Green Card on your person.
In most states it is not required to have ID on you. Most US citizens do not carry proof of citizenship (passport or birth certificate), and a Drivers License is not proof of citizenship.
US citizens travel abroad, and it would be illegal for the government to intercept communications between a US citizen and someone else, regardless of location of either party, regardless of the location of the communications intercept.
Furthermore, based on your logic, the government could intercept all emails where someone's passport was not scanned and attached...
Just another example of how the program is a complete failure and unnecessary.
All that personal and confidential information available to virtually any half decent intelligence agency.
By contrast, if NSA were doing what I have theorized above, they would have unfettered access to all PRISM data with no oversight, and it would be entirely legal.
If they can't get their way in the courts, who takes the fall for "letting a terrorist go free"?
The NSA could then tell their overseers that they have never used PRISM to spy on Americans, which would be technically true, while they would enjoy unfettered access to intelligence on US persons with absolutely no oversight or authorization from anyone. This seems to be one of only a few logical explanations for giving other countries access to the system.