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Comment by hansjorg | Hacker News Reader

> According to local media, the Defence Intelligence Service is accused of failing to investigate allegations of espionage in the armed services. It has also been accused of obtaining and passing on information about Danish citizens.

The secret intelligence services in your country are not working for you or your safety, and this is not a secret. If you believe so you have not been following the news the last thirty years (before that they had a scape goat for their behaviour).

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I think it would be possible for intelligence services to obtain and pass on information about a citizen while still trying to work for the overall safety of the country.

Nope, it is not their job. If a citizen is accused in a crime, there are other institutions tasked with the investigation. Sometimes this is the counterintelligence, sometimes this is the police. However, breaking the law and actively avoiding legal supervision is a crime which makes them criminals.

I'd imagine intelligence would be about crimes yet to take place, ie people planning a terrorist attack (is that a crime in itself?)

Generally, for every crime x, the act of planning x is a crime known as "conspiracy to commit x"

Not for a crime planned by one person alone.

Well, they are accused of not investigating possible espionage in their own army. Lacking details, it is really hard to say what is the exact situation, but obviously they are not interested in preventing crimes.

The community here is understandably very anti-surveillance, but you're right about the purpose of intelligence.

When we talk about intelligence and counter-terrorism, it's more about preventing terrorist attacks than reacting to them.

The UK is more open with statistics than the US — their most senior counter-terrorism officer claims that they foiled 22 terrorist attacks from March 2017 to September 2019 [1].

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/sep/09/foiled-terro...

This would generally be the function of a counter-intelligence or internal (criminal) investigation group.

In the US that would be handled by the FBI -- they're legally the only ones that can spy on citizens in in the US. They work hand-in-glove with other agencies, but they own domestic.

A non-US example would be Russia, where the FSB (which Putin used to be the head of) handles internal investigations and counterintelligence like the FBI, while the SVR handles foreign intelligence. Or MI5 vs MI6 in the UK, etc.

Ok so we have to play by the rules to the absolute T. But our adversaries like China/Russia can play dirty and anyway they want, because you say justice is absolute and black and white. Great.

Have you ever thought that maybe there was a reason for those rules to be imposed? It is really easy to put on the kindergarten act and to say that if the other side did it first, then it is okay. However, what is the difference between you and the other side then? The state has rather enormous power as it is and it is quite able to use it without letting the power trips of random individuals.

If you understand these programs they have... they do a meta-analysis of huge amounts of data. So while they use your data, there isn’t somebody personally looking at your data.

Whereas China/Russia has people tracking dissidents etc.

Not even in the same realm.

Im saying give a more nuanced legal approach so we can defend ourselves.

If it was just about meta data, maybe. However, the US (I accept that we are talking them now) have the lovely habit of imprisoning and torturing people on the bases of suspicion, without a due process, and without oversight or consequences for the fuckups. You see, the rules are exactly for the situations when some innocent bastard gets between the teeth of the machine and some middle manager orders for the body to be buried because murders look bad in the quarterly performance review.

> Whereas China/Russia has people tracking dissidents etc.

If you think the USA doesn't track dissidents you've been walking around with your eyes and ears shut.

It depends on who is doing the tracking and who the dissidents are. I think most will agree it’s in the interest of the country to track “dissidents” who are bent on inciting “race” wars and so on. Violent anarchists probably also get in that list. Basically any seriously credible threat to the state and its citizens.

Do you believe it is reasonable to draw a distinction between dissident and criminal?

In many aspects yes but you also don’t want surprises. Most members of those groups haven’t been caught doing criminal activity; does that mean you ignore them because they haven’t struck.

If you hear rumblings about a heist it makes sense to monitor the conspirators even if they have not yet done the heist.

Conspiracy to commit crime is already a crime.

Being a dissident, not so much.

Comparing what the US does to citizens to what Russia/China do is laughable and childish.

Are you asserting that that’s a bad thing?

What, like, tear gas people for a photo op in front of a church the cunt ain't never even been in?

If these rules are not followed, then what is the difference between us, Russia, and others? The amount of propaganda coming from Washington?

The rules are too strict. Have reasonable rules. Otherwise enemies exploit your Achilles heel.

If you want to die on the hill of a subjective concept of morality, fine. But I don’t and I don’t think most do.

The US point of view is more concerned about making enemies than solving problems. This is the Achilles heel of this country. For all its problems, the Chinese are engaged in the right approach: make alliances instead of war and improve their economy.

It seems that you’re implying that allowing intelligence agencies unlimited discretion in spying on their own populations is necessary in order to “win” against hostile foreign powers.

This seems like a fairly extraordinary claim that you haven’t backed with either evidence or logic.

I never said unlimited. Limited would be fine, enough to even the field.

How does spying on your own citizens “even the field”?

There’s a fair argument to be made here, but I think you’re missing the parent’s point. It’s not that it’s impossible for someone to obtain and pass on information while working for the overall safety of the nation, but rather they’re arguing that secret intelligence agencies inherently do not serve the overall safety of their own countries.

Your rhetoric is simplistic and unhelpful. Isn't it funny how little attention is paid to terrorist attacks that don't happen?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_thwarted_Islamic_terro...

https://www.google.com/search?q=ring+wing+terror+plot+foiled...

There's a balance here. To be free, we have to protect ourselves from plots like these, otherwise we would live in fear. At the same time, this protection itself threatens other kinds of freedom, like the freedom from surveillance and interference by our own governments. We have to be cognizant of this balance. We need whistle-blowers, watchdogs, and so on. But we also need state intelligence.

Wow, that's a pretty irresponsible list for an encyclopedia. I'd expect a certain standard of evidence for assertions of thwarted plots, but there seems to be little if any presented.

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