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

Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

circa.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 60 posts

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#51

Post by tehwebguy »

narrowrail wrote: post #45
Mendenhall wrote: post #38

Whats interesting and very telling is the medias coverage of this.

Or lack there of. They're busy getting hysterical over the highly damning allegations of the day that is our current 'NightmareTV' political situation. Because the Obama admin was implicated in it, the coverage seems to be broad in Republican circles (i.e. Fox News). I wish us non-tribal people could form some common-sense, bipartisan group. Edit: added less ambiguous descriptors.

No one outside HN and reddit ever seemed to give a shit about this stuff, even in the Bush years.

All the noise I've tried to make about this and no one ever cares. The South Park episode about this was painfully dead on.

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#52

Post by killin_dan »

narrowrail wrote: post #43
killin_dan wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not even close to the actual intelligence structure. The nsa doesn't have to answer to dod at ALL. Hurr durr the military is the state, you have no clue what you're talking about. I served for 6 years doing naval intelligence, sigint, and we never once heard from nsa, cia, fbi, etc. All our orders came from one of two generals in charge of our task force. Nuclear subs night have to work with intel agencies for techni…

I don't have the experience you do, but all of the big violent acts we have had over the last 20 years that I remember were perpetrated by US citizens (except 9/11). I agree that we should not shape our laws based on edge-case criteria (e.g comic book villains), but their has to be some cross-state law enforcement.

Then it should be a job for public servants and law enforcement, not a bunch of cowboys with unlimited xkeyscore power with nobody to answer to.

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#53

Post by PKop »

nstj wrote: post #44

I'd never heard of Circa (circa.com, the publisher of the story) before, so did a little digging. Apparently it's owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group [0]. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclair_Broadcast_Group

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/national/articl...

(Yes they are citing the circa article... but hey, they think it's legit enough to cover)

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#54

Post by gozur88 »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #23
CWuestefeld wrote: post #13

One wonders: is there ANY point at which the Congress or even the Courts will step in and say that the abuse has been excessive? Is there really any threshold, and they're just waiting to see if we reach it? I'm really starting to believe that there's no limit at all. It's the proverbial frog in hot water.

One wonders: is there ANY point at which the Congress or even the Courts will step in and say that the abuse has been excessive? Yes, and it's happened before: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Committee The LE and intelligence agencies just go back to doing exactly what they were doing, with zero accountability as usual, and nothing really changes. Except they get a little bit better at covering their tracks.

The Church Committee really didn't have any effect beyond forcing the CIA to rely on electronic surveillance, putting them at a disadvantage vs the Soviets.

That agency leaked sensitive information to embarrass Bush when he crossed them, and then did the same thing to Obama (for the same reason). This is what people are talking about when they mention the "deep state". The best thing that could happen is for the CIA to be defunded and disbanded completely, with a new agency staffed by entirely new people created in its place.

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#55

Post by mercer »

tehwebguy wrote: post #51
narrowrail wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or lack there of. They're busy getting hysterical over the highly damning allegations of the day that is our current 'NightmareTV' political situation. Because the Obama admin was implicated in it, the coverage seems to be broad in Republican circles (i.e. Fox News). I wish us non-tribal people could form some common-sense, bipartisan group. Edit: added less ambiguous descriptors.

No one outside HN and reddit ever seemed to give a shit about this stuff, even in the Bush years. All the noise I've tried to make about this and no one ever cares. The South Park episode about this was painfully dead on.

Which episode was that? I don't generally follow South Park but occasionally watch particular episodes.

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#56

Post by ue_ »

mindcrime wrote: post #48
djjdiud wrote: post #5

52 points 2 hours and this is on page two. Not a big surprise given how pro Government HN commenters can be.

FWIW, there are 2 or 3 libertarians / voluntaryists / anarcho-capitalists / whatever left hanging around... so not everybody is pro-government here.

Don't forget anarcho-Communists like me, I think there's a couple of us (or at least Socialists here).

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#57

Post by tehwebguy »

mercer wrote: post #55
tehwebguy wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one outside HN and reddit ever seemed to give a shit about this stuff, even in the Bush years. All the noise I've tried to make about this and no one ever cares. The South Park episode about this was painfully dead on.

Which episode was that? I don't generally follow South Park but occasionally watch particular episodes.

"Let Go, Let Gov" - S17E1 on Hulu (Plus?) here https://www.hulu.com/watch/538488

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#58

Post by killin_dan »

MrZongle2 wrote: post #15
killin_dan wrote: post #3

Oh lord, this is so shocking! /s Why is state intelligence even a thing? The military is capable of gathering all of the defensive intelligence that we need to protect ourselves. These state cowboys are out there making deals and cracking my WiFi to see what porn I'm watching in the name of counter-terror. Nonviolent threats do not necessitate or validate state intelligence imo.

"The military is capable of gathering all of the defensive intelligence that we need to protect ourselves." In theory, yes. In practice, no. Military intelligence focuses on identifying and tracking threats to military forces. During the Cold War, for instance, this meant having a decent understanding of Soviet doctrine, equipment, and tactics. Civilian intelligence agencies focused on government operations, infrastr…

I was in military intelligence. I am qualified to make the evaluation I made.

Violent citizens can be dealt with through police channels and public servants, not lawless shadows in the dark in a giant data center somewhere.

How many civilian whistleblowers have there been compared to how many enlisted whistleblowers there have been? I myself once spoke up about an unscrupulous sailor, but I went to an E-8 and asked him for his advice (hey, a friend of a friend is doing something wrong, blah blah) and he pointed me in the right direction to handle it without fucking this guy over, and the behavior was corrected and we all went happily about our missions, no harm, no foul. It's easy to do.

Civilians don't have as much of a moral obligation to the rest of the country, they aren't ready to die to serve it.

Your argument is basically, "well, private sector is going to do this shit anyways" but that's ridiculous to say that we should continue to be complicit in letting the NSA exist just because if we don't let them do it, someone else will.

Citizen's hands are dirty for being complicit, and more people need to realize that a unified effort of enough magnitude could make HUGE cuts to state intel sector a reality, and we could pump that money into better police training, better resources for investigators and people who are invested in their communities rather than some asshole with an xkeyscore login and a name on a screen.

I'm not saying state intel agencies don't contribute to ethical sources like infrastructure and civ eng stuff, of course they do, but it doesn't excuse all the other terrible things they do, and it'd be possible to redirect that talent and those resources into those areas through other agencies.

DOT could offer special hire credits for intel workers with infra design experience, for example. That could be made possible by NOT running $10-digit datacenters full of civilian facebook messages with tax payer money.

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#59

Post by moomin »

matt4077 wrote: post #36
ypeterholmes wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what a broken system looks like- the people are no longer represented, and corruption has no check or balance. Question is, what do we do about it? Side note: it would be foolish to think that these two things are not related. The motivations for removing our civil rights dovetail with the goals for keeping us under control.

I really don't see how anybody is actually being kept under control, so far. Not disputing the overreach of many of these transgressions that have become public over the last years. But to suggest that they are actively used to influence US domestic politics and elections just doesn't seem plausible. Even if the theory is that the two parties act as a duopoly and protect their shared interests, which seems unlikely g…

I don't think you actually need a conspiracy for this behaviour to hold true. As different as the parties are, there's huge amounts they both agree on. (It's positively ridiculous how much time is spent presenting everyone's minor differences in approach on Terrorism and Syria, for instance)

It's pretty ridiculous that America's idea of an anti-establishment candidate is pro-foreign intervention, pro-big business, anti-drugs and favours mass incarceration. I mean, seriously, how is this different from Bill Clinton's policies.

TL;DR; Whilst there are genuine and important differences between the two parties and specific candidates, American policy in general is pretty damn stable.

Re: Declassified memos show FBI illegally shared spy data with private parties

#60

Post by MrZongle2 »

killin_dan wrote: post #58
MrZongle2 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The military is capable of gathering all of the defensive intelligence that we need to protect ourselves." In theory, yes. In practice, no. Military intelligence focuses on identifying and tracking threats to military forces. During the Cold War, for instance, this meant having a decent understanding of Soviet doctrine, equipment, and tactics. Civilian intelligence agencies focused on government operations, infrastr…

I was in military intelligence. I am qualified to make the evaluation I made. Violent citizens can be dealt with through police channels and public servants, not lawless shadows in the dark in a giant data center somewhere. How many civilian whistleblowers have there been compared to how many enlisted whistleblowers there have been? I myself once spoke up about an unscrupulous sailor, but I went to an E-8 and asked h…

Thanks for responding.

I was also in military intelligence (Army SIGINT, 89-93) and worked in DoD and the intelligence community as a contractor for more than a decade afterward. I don't think I'm completely unqualified from making an evaluation, either.

I agree that issues involving the citizenry should be handled by civilian police organizations and the justice system. In the open and transparent, as much as existing privacy laws permit.

Your argument is basically, "well, private sector is going to do this shit anyways" but that's ridiculous to say that we should continue to be complicit in letting the NSA exist just because if we don't let them do it, someone else will.

No, my argument is that if you turn all of this over to the military, you're going to add a whole new set of problems and you're not guaranteed to solve the existing ones. I am certainly not fine with what appears to be an increasingly lackadaisical approach to collection against previously off-limits targets and an inability to properly protect citizens against online threats.

You're still going to have corruption. You're still going to have waste, fraud and abuse. But if you're turning your workforce from civilian to military, you're now introducing additional issues of training and retention. Think about the E-1s through E-3s in any unit you've served with: they're a mixed bag, some of them may not even really be qualified to be there, they generally lack much of the actual training they need to be effective in their job, and a good number are just counting the days until they can be out.

Post reply on HN