Thursday, May 18, 2006

Bellsouth and Verizon; something is damn fishy

TAPPED:

"WHY DID VERIZON AND BELLSOUTH ISSUE DENIALS AFTER THE STORY BROKE? Here's another thing about the denials that doesn't quite add up. As we've seen, both Verizon and Bellsouth have more or less denied the USA Today story saying that the NSA has been secretly collecting their phone records. USA Today appears to be sticking to the story, though the paper's statement seems to carefully avoid a total commitment to it, instead saying that the paper's 'confident' in its reporting.

But something doesn't quite make sense. Why are Verizon and Bellsouth only denying these allegations after the story broke? The USA Today reporters who did the initial story contacted the companies before publishing it. We know this because it contains statements from both companies, each of which declined to comment.

So why didn't the companies deny the story then? I can already hear your answer: 'classification' issues. Classification issues do come into play -- though not how you'd expect. And they don't account for this initial failure to deny the story."

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