Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Pardon Snowden

pardonsnowden.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 814 posts

Re: Pardon Snowden

#341

Post by jordanlev »

eternalban wrote: post #312

How do you know this guy (and the whole set of characters and institutions that he legitimizes -- Greenwald, Omidyar & co, Washington Post, Guardian, the Intercept, the 'blessed' crypto, etc.) -- are on the up and up? Everything about this story, its central "hero", and the cast of characters of the show, smells imo.

What's your point? Regardless of the personalities involved, I don't think anyone has refuted the facts of the leaked documents. Yes, humans are human and nobody is a perfect angel or robot ... but what does that have to do with the facts of what was released?

Re: Pardon Snowden

#343

Post by pmarreck »

RRRA wrote: post #206

If you fear signing this, _and don't_, you really don't understand long risk mitigation and are just preparing yourself to be scared even more in the long run. Just like privacy doesn't exist without others, signing this will at least help by giving strength, and privacy, in numbers. Leaving this resistance alone, as if they were some heroes you respect but won't stand by, is really a cowardly way of being anti socie…

Good point. At some point in life you won't be able to run away from standing up for what you believe in (at perhaps small or medium risk to self) or else direr consequences may result.

If you believe he acted ethically, then sign the thing with me.

Re: Pardon Snowden

#344

Post by clarkmoody »

captainmuon wrote: post #60

Maybe a naive question, but what would the risk be for me to sign this? I wonder if I (a US citizen) might get trouble the next time at the border? Or get a higher score in some database, that combined with other things might get me into trouble? Increased scrutiny from the IRS (which should have nothing to do with this, but "they" might say hell why not?)? Inability to get security clearances in future? Being target…

> A mode of thought I would expect in socialist countries, not the US...

The United States government has done an excellent bit of propaganda to convince the bulk of the public that they are the most free people on earth. We salute the flag and sing the national anthem at games. We have the presidents' pictures on the walls of our classrooms. We chant "USA" at political rallies.

But the government of the United States has perpetrated terrible violence and destruction of liberty against its own citizens and many more abroad. Through endless military engagement abroad to harassment, detainment, and imprisonment at home, the government serves its own interests first, and enhancing and preserving your liberty is not among them.

I should be very concerned about coming to the attention of anyone within government -- at any level. Even the local code enforcement board can extract time, energy, and money from you should you come under scrutiny.

But as others have said, you're already on the lists. No need to be paranoid. Go ahead and sign the Snowden petition. It's just one more data point on your dossier. The government already has enough on you to put you away for life if you become inconvenient to the state. Three Felonies a Day[1] and all that.

[1]: https://www.amazon.com/Three-Felonies-Day-Target-Innocent/dp...

Re: Pardon Snowden

#345

Post by bisRepetita »

bisRepetita wrote: post #270

Who are these guys? Registrar is in Panama. The site says "partnership with ACLU and Amnesty International", but I cannot find any links from those sites to pardonsnowden.org Both ACLU and AI have their own petition forms with different letters. https://www.amnesty.org/en/get-involved/take-action/edward-s... https://action.aclu.org/secure/grant_snowden_immunity Wondering if ACLU and AI are a little late to confirm, o…

EDIT: Dan below + another source told me this is actually legit.

Re: Pardon Snowden

#346

Post by forgotpwtomain »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #340
forgotpwtomain wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is not correct. It is in fact correct. You have an outdated claim by Snowden which is not supported by any evidence, this year NSA released emails of his 'internal' communications with FOIA and it was discussed (here on HN [0]). As far as documented evidence his only attempt to raise an issue internally was emailing legal counsel regarding a 'test question' - this is laughable. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com…

Got to suggest, emails may not be the way he would communicate concerns. Especially knowing what he did about how email is not private.

> Got to suggest, emails may not be the way he would communicate concerns. Especially knowing what he did about how email is not private.

If you want whistle-blower protections, you need to go through official channels and document document document. I am not saying the US has good protections (obviously it doesn't) - but we have to admit that Snowden isn't the model of someone that tried to go through the proper channels.

Re: Pardon Snowden

#347

Post by peterkelly »

captainmuon wrote: post #60

Maybe a naive question, but what would the risk be for me to sign this? I wonder if I (a US citizen) might get trouble the next time at the border? Or get a higher score in some database, that combined with other things might get me into trouble? Increased scrutiny from the IRS (which should have nothing to do with this, but "they" might say hell why not?)? Inability to get security clearances in future? Being target…

This is the so-called "chilling effect" that's one of the most worrying implications of mass surveillance on a society... people feel afraid to speak out due to a concern they may be added to a list of some sort, and face negative real-life repercussions due to expressing their free speech.

There were a couple of times where I actually called the public contact numbers for NSA & GCHQ regarding particular stories about which I was especially upset, identifying myself by name and politely but firmly expressing my views. NSA told me to go away, but surprisingly the woman at GCHQ heard me out for several minutes and let me finish my rant. That's the British establishment for you I guess - they can be assholes, but polite assholes.

Snowden risked everything to inform us all of the crimes of the FVEY governments and the least we can all do is take inspiration from his actions and stand up and publicly make our views known, whatever they may be. The day people stop being willing to express their political views publicly is the day we lose something very important.

NSA - my name and XKEYSCORE selectors are in my profile. Feel free to add me to whatever lists I'm not already on.

Re: Pardon Snowden

#348

Post by M_Grey »

captainmuon wrote: post #60

Maybe a naive question, but what would the risk be for me to sign this? I wonder if I (a US citizen) might get trouble the next time at the border? Or get a higher score in some database, that combined with other things might get me into trouble? Increased scrutiny from the IRS (which should have nothing to do with this, but "they" might say hell why not?)? Inability to get security clearances in future? Being target…

North Koreans see themselves as 'The Cleanest People'. We see ourselves as the freest. We're both wrong.

Re: Pardon Snowden

#349

Post by forgottenpass »

mc32 wrote: post #329
forgottenpass wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "funny" thing is, our governments are probably doing very similar things No, they're provably doing similar things. A "citizen score" only has cosmetic differences to the data crunching done by machine learning predictive policing. The differences are just as large enough to avoid fitting into any of the identifiers for bad governance that the American collective conscience is already keyed into.

The main difference is you're not getting fired or ostracized or jailed for run of the mill political views or dissidence. Look at today's Turkey for what it would be if this were true in western democracies (of which Turkey withdrew itself recently).

The main difference is you're not getting fired or ostracized or jailed for run of the mill political views or dissidence.

There are two different aspects.

The difference you're focusing on seems to be setting what positions are acceptable, and what gets done to people who hold them them.

The similarity I was focusing on was that they're being tracked at all. And in the cases that they're not not immediately actionable, I don't draw much distinction between a bureaucrat with actuarial tables and machine learning.

Re: Pardon Snowden

#350

Post by eternalban »

jordanlev wrote: post #341
eternalban wrote: post #312

How do you know this guy (and the whole set of characters and institutions that he legitimizes -- Greenwald, Omidyar & co, Washington Post, Guardian, the Intercept, the 'blessed' crypto, etc.) -- are on the up and up? Everything about this story, its central "hero", and the cast of characters of the show, smells imo.

What's your point? Regardless of the personalities involved, I don't think anyone has refuted the facts of the leaked documents. Yes, humans are human and nobody is a perfect angel or robot ... but what does that have to do with the facts of what was released?

Let's review the leak:

* NSA spies on foreign governments. Isn't that their job?

* NSA spies on Americans, & has compromised infrastructure. Your first assumption here is that the ruling elite won't want you to know that. Have you ever considered they wanted you to know without official acknowledgement? Go find an oldhand AT&T geek and ask them about the telephony and NSA.

> Regardless of the personalities involved

You would have a point if Snowden had released the material to non-corporate actors (how about UN's human rights commission) and wasn't on the talking head [1] road show pontificating on various matters. If the actor is false then the road show is a cause for concern, don't you agree?

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_... I want to see a pic of our hero in Moscow, holding today's edition of whatever passes for journalism in Russia, posted to twitter, to start with.

Post reply on HN