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Comment by hallway_monitor | Hacker News Reader

This comment feels like it's coming from communist Russia. You'd better not make the KGB your enemy. Be careful not to do anything they would take an interest in, even if it's not illegal. Is that the USA we're living in? Sure feels like it sometimes.

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The user you are replying to doesn’t live in the USA. And for non-US citizens, not doing anything a US three-letter agency might take an interest in is certainly a consideration, because US law doesn’t protect them. (I’m not sure how much better the situation is for US citizens in actual practice.)

If I would try to do something against American interests, US law would be the last thing I would care about. I have more faith in German or Swiss law regarding privacy and if that’s not enough, keeping data in Russian or Chinese jurisdiction in that specific case would make more sense.

It didn’t work out very well for people like Julian Assange.

He‘s unlucky to have a passport of a country with zero influence in this part of the world. I doubt that if he was in Australia he would be extradited.

Your interpretation of my comment is wrong. I didn’t say you shouldn’t make certain powers your enemies. I said you need to prepare adequately. Your country isn’t famous for protecting citizens privacy, on the contrary.

The US has been like this since sometime in the 1950s, possibly even before. You had to watch what you said or you'd be labelled a communist sympathizer and the FBI'd take interest in you.

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