Civil Liberties Groups and Internet Companies Demand an End to NSA Spying
eff.org
eff.org
> "reports based on information provided by a career intelligence officer"
That's clearly factually incorrect. Snowden wasn't a career man, and also wasn't an officer. He was an IT infrastructure analyst. He's a support guy.
Reading posts like this make the distinction (even w/in the intel world) very clear: http://qz.com/92509/edward-snowdens-lesson-to-both-businesse...
I agree they were probably contacted, but still I'd like to know, in any case, what was the procedure behind selecting those (and not other) companies.
Bottom line - snooping is part and parcel of the business plan, they won't go against it, nor will they give it up.
But before jumping to conclusions, we'd have to be sure they were contacted for this? Maybe the authors of the letter assumed these companies wouldn't sign?
It would be telling if they refused to participate.
But you're right, I would've thought Google and the others would be the first to start a major lobbying campaign against NSA's surveillance powers. So maybe they don't really care about user privacy that much, or don't think this story will damage them too much in US or abroad, and that they don't really need to do anything to fix the broken trust relationship they have with their users now.
This plays out as: The NSA etc. claim "Okay, we've stopped spying!" right up until they get caught again.
Then the cycle starts over.
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There is no technically feasible way of ensuring that you're not being snooped on. Thus: you will always be snooped on.
There will be brief outcry, some half-hearted claims by a few in charge that they will look into it, and after the next shooting or terrorist attack it will be on the second page, soon to drop off the radar completely.
At least that's what I'd put my money on. They won't even be bothered to lie about it.
Now is the time for Silicon Valley to step up.
but it seems like a good opportunity to really send a message.
But most people do care about Freedom and civil liberties, on a less "abstract" level. They just don't quite see the connection yet.
And then it's our responsibility to inform those who don't care of the reality of what's happening and what is at stake --freedom of speech, democracy. Before it's to late to do it.
It is not that people fear, or care more about the governmental power to intercept our electronic communications than the reality that citizenry might be killed without right to trial - they feel the loss of civil liberty in one instance is more likely to affect them personally, that is why it is important to remember "injustice anywhere is threat to justice everywhere." - MLK Jr.
As we move further into the 21st century and the world government's seek to expand their power, this strategy is seeing even greater success. This complements Orwell's 1984 very well, specifically because it matches Alduous Huxley's 'Brave New World' quite well.
They have been turned into sheep over the last 6 decades by the media.
if HN isnt looking after the internet... who is ?
Maybe its up to us to do our part [ along with reddit, 4chan, Anons, RMS/EFF ] so normal people can feel like the internet is their space ?
"you need to attack corporations bottom line for political reasons and make it very clear that's what you are doing"
For example: I wonder how much of their secrecy is really about protecting American citizens. After the Boston bombings (and 9/11 for that matter) there seemed to be no secrecy about the bombers. All types of information came out: that Russian intelligence had warned them about these guys, that one of them had already been investigated by the FBI for something else. All the information coming out had this open, non-secret feel. Same for 9/11: we suddenly knew about the movements and actions of the terrorists for months prior to the World Trade acts. How they trained, how they hijacked the planes, how Bin Laden had engineering insight and knew that hitting the towers at a certain height would make them collapse.
PRISM seems murky as shit compared to that. It's almost like it's dealing in a completely different type of information altogether. This is what makes me wonder about what percentage of PRISM-type surveillance is really about locating some band of terrorists training in some desert camp. The secrecy around it seems much more likely to protect the spies than the American people.
I do refuse to believe that the NSA employees are merciless warmongers looking to secretly destabilize nations and install puppet regimes while somehow profiting off of the anarchy that ensues (although a lot of US history is precisely that). I think most of them genuinely believe that they are doing good work that makes the world a safer place. But the personality of the organization they work for doesn't fit the rest of the picture and I just wonder what it is they are told in order to feel that the secrecy is justified.
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For instance NSA is tasked with producing (and now reviewing for approval) cryptographic schemes to protect government and national secrets, and in general devising new ways to conduct electronic intelligence so that they can devise countermeasures for the U.S. to use. If you've ever heard of TEMPEST fonts, that's just one example.
The difference between the CIA and NSA is that the CIA primarily does HUMINT (human intelligence), while the NSA does SIGINT (signal intelligence). HUMINT includes spies directly living in the target countries, mingling with the people they are spying on. SIGINT involves intercepting communications and decrypting them. There is some crossover; in particular, HUMINT can frequently be used to place bugs, keyloggers, rootkits, and the like which can be used for SIGINT, and SIGINT can fill in information that HUMINT is not privy to.
"No, that's the CIA."
Talking about movies, I think I'm going to propose a "movie night" sometime soon at Splatspace (the hackerspace in Durham, NC) to watch Sneakers and Nineteen Eighty Four.
Yet I have never been clear on why we need a domestic spy agency given we have the FBI, DEA, Secret Service, DHS, and DOJ who are all actively engaged in monitoring internally. At what point to people start to realize that all of these groups will exist to serve themselves at our own expense?
In fact I would probably fall out of my chair in shock if a single politician, fbi/cia/nsa/doj agent, or military official could name the terrorist organizations we are at war with.
Traditionally the Freedom of Assembly is a Right guaranteed to US citizens by the Bill of Rights, on par with Freedom of Speech. I recognize in modern history (post WWII) people were tried for their association to Communism, but even then people were "tried" by courts of law not subject to extra judicial killings as enemy combatants.
Later in the century Congress has authorized the use of military force against Lebanese internal unrest that threatened to topple the government in 1958 (Operation Blue Bat).
Later use of force would be authorized in Lebanon again, with UN backing. Though to maintain the peace and not aggressive warfare per se, it did result in U.S. fatalities and other casualties, and the U.S. did fire live rounds.
"Shay's Rebellion" (the Whiskey Rebellion) would also technically count I suppose, as President Washington did raise an army and march it to Pennsylvania, though the rebels dispersed without much bloodshed.
Also easily overlooked, but the U.S. often fought against pirates on the high seas, who are non-state actors by definition. Sometimes Congress made specific authorizations for them, sometimes not, but the U.S. did fight.
An interesting example is the "Utah War" where the Federal government and Mormon settlers feuded over land (of all things). Though no actual battles took place bases were attacked on both sides before the government won. The conflict itself extended over a year though, so it was not just some flash-in-the-pan.
I would not disagree with your examples, but certainly the post WWII (UN era) examples are the most useful for purpose of legal precedent. Aside from Lebanon there are similar instances of the US intervening on behalf of democratically elected governments, especially in Africa, but as you noted the US role is on a sliding scale when generally the use of force is not authorized.
The pirates is very interesting too, I know there are other instances such as Greek pirates (pre UN era) but assuming your referencing "Somali pirates", Somalia is unusual in that it is a recognized State with no recognized government, but here I would not say this is a declared war rather the authorized use of force to protect vessals on the high seas, but I have to concede it is fairly certain some missions were more target specific.
I still think the US "War on Terror" is setting all kinds of precedent as to US authorized use of force against non-state actors, but I am far from saying your position is wrong and the burden is on me to express myself more clearly and not put something in its most simple terms out of convenience, and I am happy to enjoy a spirited exchange of ideas on HN.
http://www.lawfareblog.com/2011/11/extraterritorial-use-of-f...
I haven't read the book myself but it does look interesting.
As far as the pirates I was mentioning, it wasn't actually about the Somali pirates but the ones in the age of sail. Back then pirates operating under the authority of a nation-state were "privateers" and carried a letter of marque. Non-state pirates were reviled internationally and hunted down and destroyed wherever they were seen.
I do agree to uneasiness about the "war on terror" (going on 12 years now) but at the same time I think it's inevitable that the U.S. will have to set the precedent; no other nation is such a lightning rod as the U.S. is now, with the possible exception of Israel.
But who knows, maybe we as grouping of nations will cooperate to revise the Geneva Conventions in response to the requirements for counter-terrorism?
Many of them will be cringing at Abu Graib ... its about real oversight and balance of power and correct policy.
More probable is renaming PRISM and (if the political heat [sorry] warrants it) splitting it into smaller entities, and then re-mount [ok, I'll stop now] the business-as-usual bike, as though nothing had ever happened.
I know what you mean though. My point is that you need the political will, and politicians are way too scared of a bomb going off, and the people forgetting that they demanded privacy, asking why the NSA didn't magically know of it in advance.
I do think the people need to once and for all decide on what they want, and once decided, be reminded of it every year or so.
My opinion is that Im happy to take more risk of being killed in a terror attack and keeping freedoms. Since one is about 1000 times more likely to be killed in a car crash, I reckon we can have some freedom back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qwest#Refusal_for_NSA_spying
It has also been suggested that the insider trading charge were trumped up as retribution, in that the CEO was accused of purchasing shares with 'insider' knowledge of government contacts, but that he was prohibited by law from publicly disclosing those contracts.