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Edward Snowden at IETF 93

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Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#101

Post by [deleted] »

Lawtonfogle wrote: post #96
eli wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is something reasonable people can disagree about. The rule of law should apply to everyone equally. I get that Ed Snowden is a likable guy and the documents he released may even have been a force of positive change in the world, but that doesn't necessarily absolve him of having to face trial. You can't go easy on him just because you agree with his politics. Our whistleblowing laws are woefully inadequ…

>The rule of law should apply to everyone equally Then start with the little incident that happened around 2008 that did far more damage to the average American. Also, hasn't Obama admitted to smoking pot? He is currently in a far greater position to damage the US and should be thoroughly punished for his crimes. What about Clinton and her emails? And if I started listing the skeletons in the closet of Congress we wo…

[deleted]

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#102

Post by danenania »

eli wrote: post #75
thomasahle wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not just prison, the "Espionage Act of 1917", which is he charged with, has death penalty as a possible punishment. And it is pretty clear that he is guilty of this law. Not much room for whistleblowers in a wartime law.

The US has promised not to seek the death penalty if he returns to face trial.

Oh well if they promised then I'm sure there's absolutely nothing to worry about.

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#103

Post by enlightenedfool »

travjones wrote: post #53
thomasahle wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not just prison, the "Espionage Act of 1917", which is he charged with, has death penalty as a possible punishment. And it is pretty clear that he is guilty of this law. Not much room for whistleblowers in a wartime law.

Good point. I assumed prison was the most likely outcome if he came back, but you're right, it is possible that he could receive the death penalty. Granted, I doubt the government would use the death penalty to prevent him from going down as a "martyr."

People (in fact only a small section) quickly forget "martyr"s and the government could take a bet on that with confidence.

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#104

Post by enlightenedfool »

eli wrote: post #75
thomasahle wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not just prison, the "Espionage Act of 1917", which is he charged with, has death penalty as a possible punishment. And it is pretty clear that he is guilty of this law. Not much room for whistleblowers in a wartime law.

The US has promised not to seek the death penalty if he returns to face trial.

They could instead award him 300+ years in jail.

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#105

Post by danenania »

travjones wrote: post #26

I think it's a shame how mainstream media suggests that Snowden is a "coward" for not "coming home to face his charges." It's clear that he released confidential docs to reporters and this would be incredibly easy to prove in court, thereby landing him in prison for the rest of his life. I don't know any sane person that would surrender to this type of treatment, considering that he wouldn't be able to defend his act…

What I wonder is where the line is for people who automatically defer to government authority in these situations. How bad do the transgressions have to be before a whistleblower is justified in coming forward through any means necessary? For many, spying on billions of innocent people in direct violation of the country's constitution isn't sufficient, so what would be? What if Snowden had instead revealed proof of plans to carry out genocide or stage a military coup? Would he still be a traitor? Would he still be expected to "face the music" and go to jail? Where's the line?

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#106

Post by eli »

danenania wrote: post #102
eli wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US has promised not to seek the death penalty if he returns to face trial.

Oh well if they promised then I'm sure there's absolutely nothing to worry about.

The crimes he's charged with are actually not eligible for the death sentence and the Attorney General promised not to seek the death penalty even if future additional charges do make that possible. Not really sure what else you want.

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#107

Post by danenania »

eli wrote: post #73
travjones wrote: post #26

I think it's a shame how mainstream media suggests that Snowden is a "coward" for not "coming home to face his charges." It's clear that he released confidential docs to reporters and this would be incredibly easy to prove in court, thereby landing him in prison for the rest of his life. I don't know any sane person that would surrender to this type of treatment, considering that he wouldn't be able to defend his act…

I think this is something reasonable people can disagree about. The rule of law should apply to everyone equally. I get that Ed Snowden is a likable guy and the documents he released may even have been a force of positive change in the world, but that doesn't necessarily absolve him of having to face trial. You can't go easy on him just because you agree with his politics. Our whistleblowing laws are woefully inadequ…

Ok, many members of the Bush administration ordered torture and medical experimentation on human beings, a flat out war crime.

James Clapper lied under oath to Congress.

Hillary Clinton kept classified material on a personal server at her house.

These are all serious crimes with plenty of publicly available evidence that they were committed. The people who committed them are all inside the country and easy to find, so charging and arresting them wouldn't be difficult.

So where's the outrage from all the "rule of law" folks? Why aren't these well known fugitives ever mentioned alongside Snowden?

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#108

Post by danenania »

eli wrote: post #106
danenania wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh well if they promised then I'm sure there's absolutely nothing to worry about.

The crimes he's charged with are actually not eligible for the death sentence and the Attorney General promised not to seek the death penalty even if future additional charges do make that possible. Not really sure what else you want.

US government officials have been caught lying countless times when it comes to "national security" issues. What gives this particular promise any credibility?

Is this "promise" legally binding? What about the next Attorney General? Or the next one?

Even if he isn't executed, he could be physically and psychologically tortured. I'm not sure if you know much about the US prison system, but this is a common and officially sanctioned practice. Many people would consider a lifetime of torture to be a worse punishment than execution.

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#109

Post by grey-area »

NullCharacter wrote: post #39
agd wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bulk collection of phone metadata (which he exposed) was subsequently ruled unlawful: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/07/nsa-phone-rec...

That's great and all, but what about the other one million+ documents he absconded with not related to the phone metadata record collection? At what point does he cease being a whistle blower?

The phone metadata is just a small part of the lawless behaviour of intelligence services he released proof of to journalists. For example he also released proof of industrial espionage (Petrobras), political spying during negotiations (Belgacom), of tapping internet traffic indiscriminately (Tempora), of undermining encryption standards(Bullrun), installing malware on routers, of personnel misusing selectors to target their loved ones with impunity.

Perhaps you believe in your country right or wrong, but many don't nowadays, many feel little allegiance to national boundaries or national agencies which actively undermine our society.

What I find most interesting here is that this attempt by security agencies to collect it all actually means that their operation can be compromised by the smallest cogs in their machine whom they foolishly gave full access to. You can be absolutely sure that if Snowden walked out with this data, Chinese, Russian and other spies have the whole trove as well dating back years, because their security around private contractors was awful - GCHQ shared all this with the US without restraint, and of course all their data is now open to the world. So the ambition to collect it all and the entire collection of data (including data on western judges, politicans etc etc) is actually highly damaging to national security, even if you believe that flimsy excuse.

At some point if you're exposed to all this you might feel you have to take sides with humanity and take a stand, before these tools are used for widespread repression. At that point you start being a whistleblower, and your life will probably be destroyed by the powers that be (as his has been, or as Binney's was), because they now have that power.

http://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000001733041/the-pro...

I think the biggest lesson from Snowden is not technical, but the simple argument that the power of state and citizen must be in balance for society to function, and we must constantly guard against the state aggrandising power, because that is in its nature.

Re: Edward Snowden at IETF 93

#110

Post by mjevans »

NullCharacter wrote: post #91
pfg wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying that he shouldn't be held responsible if all of those documents were to leak. He did, however, specifically select journalists who already experienced heavy surveillance from state actors and had at least some knowledge of proper OpSec and encryption to mitigate this risk to some degree. He acknowledged that it could leak, but still thought it's a risk worth taking (I can't remember his exact words, I…

Why should he be the one to decide if the leaking of over a million highly classified documents is a "risk worth taking" to inform Americans of the phone metadata program? Doesn't that seem just odd to you? If I wanted to blow the whistle on a program I thought was illegal, I'd gather supporting documents and evidence of that one program (to include supposed emails I had sent in an attempt to follow the proper "chann…

First, the reason is because this whistle blowing was /necessary/ due to a /lack of oversight/ and to a lack of eventual release for that oversight to the public.

Second, we don't know the number of potential documents, nor how they may have been divided among those to whom they were disseminated.

Addressing the first point, it should take work and review, on an ongoing basis, to re-affirm the classification of that material. By default there should be a /reasonable/ and /short/ expiration time. If it costs too much to keep those secrets than that in and of it's self is a reason for not HAVING so many secrets to keep!

The cost, otherwise, is to our freedoms; to the very liberty for which our government is supposed to be protecting.

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