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

Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence

news.trust.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 417 posts

Re: Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence

#81

Post by markpapadakis »

I imagine Yahoo! Mail engineers being royally pissed about this. Well, I suppose that includes all Yahoo! folks who are still putting real effort into improving Y!'s services. Every odd day something surfaces about Y!'s execs questionable practices and decisions, every even day problems, leaks, bad press. Moral must have hit rock bottom.

Maybe the Yahoo! Board should have surveyed the startups scene, looking for founders who bootstrapped successfully and proven their worth, and recruit the best they could get. I am not very familiar with management of people and aspects of running a business, but I believe there is a lot more to it than being a smart person with computers.

Re: Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence

#82

Post by mason240 »

Esau wrote: post #45

The lesson from this is to not trust corporations with out privacy. Sadly, it seems many of us are not learning it.

Yes, it's totally the fault of tech companies that the US Federal government forces them to give up access to any information they want, and a non-profit email org would immune US intelligence agencies. /s

Re: Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence

#83

Post by jpfed »

kafkaesq wrote: post #71
tptacek wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nacchio is no hero. He ran a $50MM pump-and-dump scam that personally netted him millions of dollars in profits at the expense of common shareholders, and he was indicted in a wave of similar prosecutions in the wake of the Enron fiasco. His offenses are there in black and white: with full knowledge that his company faced materially adverse changes unknown to his investors, he not only promoted the company but privat…

People like Nacchio are exploiting the good work real privacy advocates do, for their own personal enrichment. Or it's possible for people to be dual-natured: capable both of flagrant chicanery and abuse, as well as acts of conviction and principled defiance.

Psychologists have measured this! The capacity to stop yourself from doing bad things is different from the tendency to do good things (someone, go make an improved D&D alignment system out of that...).

Re: Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence

#84

Post by rdl »

DubiousPusher wrote: post #11

I think the attitude here that most tech companies are rolling over and just complying without a single ethical consideration is misplaced. The government has been doing an excellent job of basically extorting these companies into compliance. They threaten the full weight of the US government's wraith and then tie every order up with classifications and gag orders. You aren't legally allowed to talk to other companie…

I wonder what the actual personal consequences are for someone going public that there is an NSL requested. I seriously doubt they'd destroy a major public company with lots of employees/voters/users; fines, maybe, and going after execs, but the Government loses most of its power to threaten things once the act is done and everything is public.

I think you win in the court of public opinion if it's a broad program like this (and IMO clearly unconstitutional). If it's an NSL about, say, an order to specifically target UBL, you probably hang in public opinion. If it's an NSL about, say, finding Snowden, you might be ok. This is an interesting check and balance vs. government overreach.

I'd be a lot more comfortable with someone going public in a live press conference in DC (maybe releasing a key to a file which is pre-distributed), than someone running off to Russia or doing it anonymously, though.

Re: Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence

#85

Post by [deleted] »

DubiousPusher wrote: post #11

I think the attitude here that most tech companies are rolling over and just complying without a single ethical consideration is misplaced. The government has been doing an excellent job of basically extorting these companies into compliance. They threaten the full weight of the US government's wraith and then tie every order up with classifications and gag orders. You aren't legally allowed to talk to other companie…

[deleted]

Re: Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence

#86

Post by rdiddly »

peterkelly wrote: post #31
kefka wrote: post #15

Lets take it a different way: You're knowingly sending your data to a 3rd party. You're not encrypting. It's not through the USPS (special protections). It seems bloody evident that, of course, your email provider can read your emails! Unless you're encrypting with GPG, then they can (and they can still read the signing keys). Yahoo, Google, and friends all scan, dedup, and all sorts of tricks to determine marketing…

I've upvoted you, despite disagreeing with you, because I believe it's worth us all discussing the reasoning behind our opinions. What you've just said is the email equivalent to "she deserved to be raped, because she was dressed like a slut". Yes, we should take precautions to protect ourselves. But that in no way justifies the privacy intrusions that happened here.

I don't see how there's anything to agree or disagree with. Nowhere is the question of "deserving" or justice raised explicitly, for example. It's just a fact: your shit is being read and analyzed at all times and at all levels. If in doubt, the safer course of action is likely to be based on assuming this rather than assuming otherwise. Encryption is a way to make sure. Though even that won't stop somebody who has already pwned your system.

Re: Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence

#90

Post by morganvachon »

Redoubts wrote: post #41
peterkelly wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've upvoted you, despite disagreeing with you, because I believe it's worth us all discussing the reasoning behind our opinions. What you've just said is the email equivalent to "she deserved to be raped, because she was dressed like a slut". Yes, we should take precautions to protect ourselves. But that in no way justifies the privacy intrusions that happened here.

I think it's closer to "you deserved your message to be read, since you put it on the back of a postcard". But ok.

This. Email messages are digital postcards. When it leaves your computer (house) and goes to your ISP (local post office), anyone at that place can pick it up and read it before sending it on its way to the recipient's mail handler. While it's in transit, it's not sealed, it's not obscured or encrypted, it is plain text.

Now, that doesn't change the fact that Yahoo rolled over like a puppy when the government came calling, which is reprehensible for any tech company to do. They should have fought it and asked for a warrant for the specific persons of interest, rather than happily fucking over every single Yahoo email subscriber.

Post reply on HN