WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
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WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
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Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#2In news today, the SIGINT branch of the United States government collected signals intelligence on a key public official in another country; in particular, it did this at a moment of crisis, allowing the United States government to have an edge of knowledge in charting its policies.
Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#3In news today, the SIGINT branch of the United States government collected signals intelligence on a key public official in another country; in particular, it did this at a moment of crisis, allowing the United States government to have an edge of knowledge in charting its policies.
Yeah I sort of thought that's its legitimate purpose (as opposed to domestic surveillance).
Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#4Spying on other governments is the NSA's job. The problem is when it starts spying on ordinary citizens.
Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#5Spying on other governments is the NSA's job. The problem is when it starts spying on ordinary citizens.
> Spying on other governments is the NSA's job.
Nevertheless, specific instances of spying on allied governments is often irritating to the ally involved, and their citizenry.
US citizens are probably less upset about foreign surveillance by the NSA (even if it is directed at allies), OTOH, US citizens aren't the entire audience for news.
Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#6"One thing is certain: what happened in those difficult times was intercepted and transcribed by .. the National Security Agency (NSA), as this interception and other top-secret documents published today by WikiLeaks and our newspaper reveal.
"
Well it ain't no secret anymore and I wonder at the timing, who at the NSA leaked the documents and what their motivation is.
Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#7For me it will be interesting to see if any details come out about what pressure he was put under during the euro crisis behind closed doors. Not too bothered about the NSA spying part in this case. As others have said this is what they're supposed to be doing.
Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#8In news today, the SIGINT branch of the United States government collected signals intelligence on a key public official in another country; in particular, it did this at a moment of crisis, allowing the United States government to have an edge of knowledge in charting its policies.
Yeah I sort of thought that's its legitimate purpose (as opposed to domestic surveillance).
Yes, this is what it's chartered to do.
Now, there exists a group of people, of which Assange is one (as far as I can tell), who believe that spying is wrong, and governmental secrecy is wrong. Thus this particular Wikileaks release, and, afaict, a lot of the Wikileaks effort has gone into promulgating that ideological goal. I would note that governmental transparency is pursued by multiple political groups across the US spectrum: police transparency, foreign policy transparency, purchasing transparency, etc. It's not a simple bijective mapping between the thought-movement Assange is with and the goal of governmental transparency; there are profound nuances and deep variances of goal within the broader 'transparency' ideal.
As for me, I am perfectly content to have the spy game played against heads of state; especially if it keeps down total system instability and human suffering.
Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#9Spying on other governments is the NSA's job. The problem is when it starts spying on ordinary citizens.
> Spying on other governments is the NSA's job. Nevertheless, specific instances of spying on allied governments is often irritating to the ally involved, and their citizenry. US citizens are probably less upset about foreign surveillance by the NSA (even if it is directed at allies), OTOH, US citizens aren't the entire audience for news.
I guess I could be a little more sympathetic if I thought our allies weren't spying on us as well. After all the noise the Germans made about US intelligence services bugging Merkel's phone, it came out that the Germans were doing the same thing to Hillary Clinton when she visited as Secretary of State.
Re: WikiLeaks reveals the NSA spied on Berlusconi and his closest advisors
#10Snowden's strategy, or at least whoever managed information for the team, was super smart about the first 12 weeks.
They kept the government mostly in yhe dark about the depth of what they knew, and executed s perfect slow burn.
The agency went reeling from one disclosure to the next hastily making up lies and then having them disproved in subsequent releases.
Obviously there was more to it, however the main point is that the opposite seems to be true now. Even for receptive people, we just know and it is an effective strategy for the govt to habituate people.
Unless the facts surrounding an event gave relavent subdata and a narrative can be brought into focus with the new insight, this isn't news it is habituating the public to accept it.
I don't want to accept it, but simultaneously it is obvious that as noted in the thread, "SIGINT, is gathering signal intrlligience". So it ends up being a reminder that we have given up s lot, but not bad enough(on the per story basis) to ignite support.
Also, I am concerned about the risk we tale decentralizing our data. We may give up the opportunity to have amazing trend analytics and information that may never resurface in the inevitable balkanized system that is to be developed