they killed dozens of soldiers in iraq not with bullets but with poison the u.s. military is largest contractor has been found guilty of negligence for using a deadly anti corrosion chemical in its water purification plant now they want taxpayers to pay the military families who lost their loved ones. and they promised they'd be back in two thousand and thirteen now the hacktivist group anonymous is making digital waves again this time they're petitioning the white house to consider d.d. o. s. attacks as a form of protest. and swimming against the current al gore is selling his news network to al jazeera for a pool five hundred million and alternative energy lovers of his himself can do

a lot of good with that money only the cash wasn't home from taare oil profits we'll explain. it's thursday january tenth five pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching r t well starting off today with a defense contractor that wants taxpayers to foot the bill for its toxic mistakes k.b.r. was tasked with rebuilding iraq's oil infrastructure after the u.s. invasion the car modally water treatment center ran by the contractor was laced with a substance called sodium diet chromate k.b.r. told u.s. soldiers guarding the place that it was a mild irritant. well turns out it's not mild but deadly substance is an extreme carcinogen one of the soldiers stationed there died of cancer a few years ago and in november a jury found k.b.r.

guilty of poisoning a dozen soldiers the jury ordered the company to pay eighty five million dollars in damages but now k.b.r. is saying it's not responsible for paying the bill taxpayers are why k.b.r. says it entered into an indemnification agreement with the government which protects it from being sued and it's not just the eighty five million dollars k.b.r. says taxpayers should cough up the company once fifteen the fifteen million dollars it's spent on legal fees to be covered too this isn't the first time the private military contractor has been in hot water some things you should know about the houston based company it's a former subsidiary of how of how the burren it avoided paying hundreds of millions in taxes by hiring workers to other companies in the cayman islands and in two thousand and nine it was charged with bribing nigerian officials to win government contracts that's not all it was charged with installing faulty wiring that electrocuted u.s.

soldiers in iraq for more on the possibility that taxpayers will foot the foot the bill for this company's mistakes i'm joined now by neil gordon an investigator with the project on government oversight neil good to have you here so this sounds like a taxpayer bailout for k.b.r. is that what it is that's the way it's been characterized. yeah i mean that's were essentially were going to taxpayers they're asking for taxpayers to pay the eighty five million plus the fifteen million that they have been found liable for that's right and k.b.r. essentially is saying no matter what they're guilty of that they are not held responsible as that is that true right because of a clause in their contracts with the with the army that would be done to fire them in for a legal liability arising from the contract ok so kind of makes them immune from

from getting sued it's really no matter what they do it kind of sounds like a silly thing to agree agree to agree to kind of like an extreme thing to agree to why would anybody enter into such an agreement. well i think the government specifically the well is there in the early years early months of the iraq war. there was a lot of work to be done and a lot of hazardous work and keep you are which has expertise in this sort of work. they were going to restore a water treatment plant. so the government chose them for their expertise. and felt the needs needed to sweep the deal as it were with this in the vacation agreement rights way in the deal it doesn't look like it really worked to the government's benefit because now they're saying that they that they are not responsible k.b.r. spokesperson said spoke to this and this is what this this person said they said it

was necessary to enter into this agreement because the conditions in iraq are dangerous and it's no secret even though it's been declared mission accomplished in iraq that it's a situation they're very volatile very unstable so it's not a valid argument. well i don't think there's any question really that there was it was a very unstable situation in the country at the time that's true. but the government leader. actually in two thousand and eleven the first turned down k.b.r. for this indemnification and their argument was that well yeah there was. an unstable situation with regards to the military situation but in regard to the specific water treatment plant that was an unusually hazardous and that's why they thought that indemnification would not apply. interesting. you know that you deal

a lot with your very you know about k.b.r. but other government contractors and in terms of this indemnification agreement how common are they will a couple years ago the pentagon turned over to senator ron wyden. all the documents from the past decade. in regards to these agreements and i believe there were about one hundred such agreements over the ten year period. so they're not they're not as uncommon as you would think they do want to into these agreements once in a while for a special tasks. what's interesting is that most agencies that i read up on it a little bit most agencies are not allowed to have agreements like this the pentagon though is exempt why. i don't really know about this i'm not really certain why that why that was. done that way. the pentagon it should be noted is

the government's largest contractor they account for about two thirds three quarters of all contract dollars spent every year interesting you know when you look at k.b.r. as actions we kind of went over some of their past history earlier. it looks like their big motivation is profit i mean as a lot of that's the motivation for a lot of companies. and that the health and well being of the of those tasked with protecting that they've been tasked with protecting seems secondary to say the least and there's been a lot of things questionable things that have come up in their past that makes you kind of begs this question.

or whether or not k.b.r. will in fact be held responsible what do you think is the likely outcome here. i'm not sure i really don't know. i know that in these indemnification arrangement still. that there's a kind of a two step process the first step is to determine whether the clause applies at all and if it does then the government will go through the the list of charges that q.b. has incurred and decide whether there are reasonable right because if they decide they're not fair and reasonable then they could turn them down for. you would reimburse them and more recently the n.d.a. passed and one of the provisions of that is to make these indemnification

agreements more transparent do you think that's a good step and could that prevent something like this from happening again in the future well sure i think it's a very good step towards greater transparency in the situation so i'm glad to see that was inserted in this year's bill. neil thanks for coming on that was neil gordon investigator with the project on government oversight. also out here on our t.v. it's not exactly hacking but d.d. o. s. attack sure can be annoying for web site creators like the. protests that story next. since.

i am. just so. let me let me respond or not let me ask you a question from. here on this morning is what we have in the bank we have our knives out from the from. me if you can see this right with the space thing there again here in the situation where the united nations talk about surveillance me.

here's mitt romney trying to figure out the name of that thing that the americans call. a dog. i'm sorry but it does appear there are a lot of. uses are. you know what that is my other terrorists if you want to wish to defeat terrorism be on the liberal and the courage. to go to. you know support you to distract us from what you and i should care about because there are profit driven industry that's over from facials that garbage because that breaking news i'm out to martin and we're going to break this but.

i did as a group anonymous has carried out some high profile cyber attacks but now the group wants an online action called distributed denial of service or d.d. o. s. to be considered a legal form of protest and they are taking this request all the way to the white house in the form of a petition here it is they compare the action to an occupy protest and say quote instead of a group of people standing outside a building to occupy the area they are having their computer occupy a website to slow or deny service of that particular website for a short time. but titian ers are also calling for those jailed for conducting d.d. o. s. attacks to be released and their records cleared so far there's over a thousand signatures on the petition so it needs many more in order to require a response from the white house so can this really be considered

a new form of protesting joining us now is international human rights lawyer stanley cohen and attorney for the defense in the so-called anonymous pay-pal fourteen hacking case in california mr cohen great to have you on so go to me we hear a lot about these kinds of attacks d.d. o. s. attacks what exactly are they. i don't like using the phrase attack it's more of an action it's alleged to be a process by which large numbers of people essentially hit a website with tremendous numbers of e-mails of cyberspace communications to slow it down or in certain circumstances to shut it down which really if ever happens. as we saw in that petition there it's being compared to the occupy protests how can you make that comparison or would you make that comparison i make it a better comparison i think it's very much the twenty first century sittin

countersuit in that occurred in the south down in the sixty's in the fifty's where people would literally sit in counters to challenge segregation to slow down business as usual when barack obama gets on the television and begs his followers and when politicians implore their followers to get on the switchboard to shut him down to send a message to support a position it's considered free speech the da says essentially nothing different than what obama is doing what politicians are doing and what corporations are doing to lobbying firms all right one could say that there are kind of some notable differences for example if you're picketing more traditionally the march additional way of protesting is your kind of a group of people gather outside they chant they hold signs a lot of times that could be very inconvenient for the company but it doesn't necessarily shut them down at least for the most part we haven't come across for example the case that i'm dealing with northern california right now which is sort

of the penultimate quote unquote hacking case which by the way doesn't involve a dent in the theft or theft of services or stealing or anything criminal like that it's a straight slow down attack it caused no harm and caused no injury and cause no financial loss pay-pal admits that it caused a minor inconvenience no different than the person blocking a street. no different than the president suggesting that people bombard the switchboard to send a message we live in a century we live in a time where by design our political infrastructure our economic infrastructure is directed toward cyberspace we have changed the field and in order to level the playing field we've got to recognize first amendment protections. all right i had read i was reading up a little bit on last attacks and i don't like teams that weren't attack. i read that what it does is that it infects computers with viruses is that true and in that case i mean that's kind of makes people weary of saying that it should be

illegal when you can charge people with criminal mischief we have statutes that when you break a window when you're standing in front of the building it's legal picketing when you break the window it's now a crime so if you infect a computer you can charge someone not with some sort of conspiracy but with a criminal mischief offense we have traditional laws which are designed when people cross the line it's that we with all first amendment activities and it should be no different here we're talking about classic first amendment free speech activities keep in mind in this day and age corporations are considered to be purposes persons for purposes of free speech their money is recognized as free speech how much more true is it wouldn't people want to express through a system designed by the government in country right now their opposition to a policy by action without criminal mischief without damage without injury without that all right so what do you think is the likelihood of this being recognized as

a form of simple civil disobedience is what this petition is calling for i think it's less likely at this show that president obama will recognize that because he has a history of trying to repress free speech he's he's or he's afraid of the light of day i think it's more likely that down the road some of the courts may may look at some of these actions and find that there's first amendment protection and free speech implicated that's not to say that an effort to change the president's mind shouldn't be undertaken again we're not talking about hacking we're not talking about theft we're not talking about injuring property in any sense of the word. all right and you had mentioned how you know this changed playing field and we're seeing that in a lot of facets of our life a lot of it is more of being conducted by virtue or digitally and in the cyber world so would you say that this is going to be the future of protesting da i think to some degree the future is here i think that more and more numbers of people

people of conscience and principle determination recognize you can't pick up a phone or write a letter or even put petition in front of this anonymous cyberspace corporate entity that's all over the world the way that has to be done i think people are going to determine increasingly is through water otherwise describe those actions it's not the time where the pamphleteer could stand in the corner where someone could necessarily blockade a street the playing field is change them means a protest will evolve as well right the playing field has changed but it doesn't seem like the government has updated many of the laws regarding technology has the time come what you know separate but equal was lawful in this country as was slavery denying the right to vote for one hundred fifty years i think the time has come i think that congress will increasingly understand that the patriot act and nine eleven has been used as a sub to fuse in a pretext to to pass these incredibly oppressive laws would seek to suppress free

speech which seek to control the discussion of the dialogue and would seek to keep people out of the debate that's what the first amendment stands for and that i would suggest as would be the us actions as covered by right lastly i do want to mention the last attack is considered illegal and this is under the computer fraud and abuse act and currently there is fourteen people that have been charged under it for carrying out this very act this petition calls for these people to be released and that is the kind of wiped off of their records what do you think is the likelihood. that happening well there's fourteen people facing trial in northern california i'm representing you member state is safe was one of those defendants is probably several dozen persons throughout the united states who have been charged and i think prosecutors are hoping that some of these cases are going to go away i think they're trying to sort of fold over cases involving allegations of best with pure free speech i think the pure free speech cases will evolve and

eventually go away one way or another because it's difficult to convince a jury that our best and our brightest our children of broken any law when they're simply registering their opposition to a policy by deed of action and not stealing or diverting or causing any damage to the computer system. really interesting mr cullen thanks so much for coming on the show that was stanley cohen international human rights lawyer thank you so much for inviting me. all the cable network al jazeera has closed a deal with liberal leaning current t.v. and the deal is a lucrative one for al gore with reports he'll be getting one hundred twenty five million dollars from the sale al jazeera of course is financed by the government of qatar and has been criticised for biased reporting which reflects the foreign policy of the qatari government a former employee is now speaking out about such selective reporting longtime

berlin correspondent act some solomon recently resigned and said in an interview with d.w. quote the problem is that the organization lacks internal structures that would immunize it against what was presumably an attempt by the owner or by the editors to interfere politically and things that should have been handled in a journalistic manner. well as we mentioned al jazeera is fueled by qatar an oil rich country interesting now that they're paying off gore whose legacy is his dedication to fight global warming one of his notable accomplishments in this mission is his nobel peace prize winning movie entitled an inconvenient truth. lead up to. this level. of ability to live is what use its day. but perhaps the

real inconvenient truth is how much gore has profited from his anti oil agenda he's made six figures from various speeches about global warming but he's been criticized for not practicing what he preaches the multimillionaire has multiple homes that guzzle mega amounts of electricity so it looks like for gore big oil isn't so bad when he's making big money. are going to take a quick break but coming up good news for an teen your own advocates a german defense firm says it's invented a laser that can stop you and it's tracks back in a minute. here's

mitt romney trying to figure out the name of that thing that we americans call a dollar. i'm sorry i missed the guy who cares an awful lot of money for you sir are you know what that is my other terrorist cells in your neighborhood i want you to listen to feature isn't the only poll the christian. can see really sort of. going to school for you to distract us from what you and i should care about because they're profit driven industry that sells a sensationalistic garbage he calls it breaking news i'm having martin and we're going to break this but.

we just put a picture of me when i was like nine years old so she told the truth. mccain says and i am

a total ghetto friends that i love traveling to posses interesting. letters kind of yesterday. i'm very proud of the role that the place.

and that is some welcome news for people concerned by the growing number of drones flying in the skies above normally we view these drones as the top of the technology food chain but not anymore german defense firm ryan metal has developed a new laser weapon system that can shoot fast moving drones from afar the two laser weapons used at radar in optical systems to detect dro to detect and track drones excuse me the laser is then shot to drones at a far distance from right out of the sky during the tests ryan metal plans to integrate an automatic can into the laser system and try to mount it on various vehicles to make the whole thing mobile. but let's say you fear a drone that can afford a laser system with the power to cut through a steel girder is there anything out there for you you can probably afford

a new hoodie new york artist our new york artist adam harvey is unveiling a clothing line designed to make the wearer close to invisible to surveillance drone the line is called stealth where harvey created it in collaboration with fashion designer joanna bloomfield the clothes and food in and drone hoodie in matching scarf that confuse thermal imaging that's the way that drone see so to speak a t. shirt protects the wearers organs from x. rays and pocket and a pocket blocker stop cell phones from sending or receiving signals harvey told a magazine rhizome that he sees the clothes of the way for people wearing them to feel protected kind of like armor only on the twenty first century would wearing a sweater protect you more from a potential enemy than a knight's armor perhaps a sweatshirt though wouldn't be your best bet when it comes to that laser based we

talked about earlier on we are going to leave it off there but stay tuned because breaking the set is coming up in thirty minutes here on r.s.b. let's check in with abby martin to see what is on today's agenda abbi what's going on drones drones. strobe going off of what you just covered live or talk into a missile bonneted from epic about the new event they have coming up just trying to create awareness about the domestic drones are to be flying overhead this years starting without any real privacy safeguards here i mean in the year two thousand and twenty we're going to have a word for thirty thousand of these unmanned robots of all shapes and sizes flying over us so it's really important we stand down kind of demand these secrets for privacy otherwise it may be too late was roles when talking about how gwar the buyout current t.v. from al-jazeera and also kind of al gore's really. feelings here does he really practice what he preaches were to go back in time and kind of see his his investment was some of the very green companies that he has profited from he

mentally in fact he may be the first carbon billionaire as some have claimed really interesting stuff there and also going to end the show with talking about a pac biggest israel lobby in the country some say that it dictates u.s. foreign policy and really kind of pave the way he leaves the show here in the u.s. are we talking about really breaking it down is it really is powerful some people say what influence do they really have what's really going on there all that and more definitely stay tuned bring a lot of interesting stuff coming up thanks abbi for that update that's coming up in just a half hour but that is going to do it for the news right now for more on the stories we covered you can also head on over to our youtube channel that's youtube dot com slash our team america we post everything there and fall also check out our web site that is our teeth dot com slash usa will find a bunch of.