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CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

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Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#81

I have a question for the HN audience. Many here have gone to top schools and studied crypto, ML, etc with the best. And are probably the best in their field. Do you currently work for any three letter agencies? Did your smartest colleagues go to work at three letter agencies? I am trying to gauge the quality of talent at CIA, NSA, FBI, etc. All of my best colleagues went to the private sector, usually tech or securi…

Do you realise that almost nobody working in this kind of job can disclose that?

Unless your an actual spy you could probably say you work at the NSA as an SE, linguist or something more mundane. I doubt you could talk about your actual work.

I’ve known people with clearances at Govt contractors. They could say what they do, EE/ME for X project but not many details beside that.

Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#82

I have a question for the HN audience. Many here have gone to top schools and studied crypto, ML, etc with the best. And are probably the best in their field. Do you currently work for any three letter agencies? Did your smartest colleagues go to work at three letter agencies? I am trying to gauge the quality of talent at CIA, NSA, FBI, etc. All of my best colleagues went to the private sector, usually tech or securi…

Do you realise that almost nobody working in this kind of job can disclose that?

The NSA has a number of open-source projects maintained by employees who are active on GitHub.

Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#83
post #60
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're well credentialed, tech-smart, greedy, and morally bankrupt, it's probably more lucrative to work for Google than the NSA.

It's probably more lucrative to work for the NSA then Google.

Its still a govt. organization and pay scales are capped.

Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I met with an NSA recruiter who was scoping out talent at a local hackerspace. It was one of the most awkward and out-of-touch experiences I ever had. He began trash talking Edward Snowden within 60 seconds, and complained that anyone under 25 (pretty much the sole demographic present at the event) were averse to paperwork and would never make it in the "real world". He also uncannily romanticized doing paperwork and…

>> I met with an NSA recruiter Ask them for the NSA Sudoku books. They also publish crosswords. These are the only NSA documents Wikileaks wouldn't touch.

These would be great mental exercises for me to complete while I fill out paperwork, unlike the other millennials who are too afraid to step up to the plate (printer?).

Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#85

I have a question for the HN audience. Many here have gone to top schools and studied crypto, ML, etc with the best. And are probably the best in their field. Do you currently work for any three letter agencies? Did your smartest colleagues go to work at three letter agencies? I am trying to gauge the quality of talent at CIA, NSA, FBI, etc. All of my best colleagues went to the private sector, usually tech or securi…

The agencies don't care about degrees as much as they care for raw talent. Many years ago I was in vacation and was just talking about video games with some random dude, then pirating, how to reverse engineer and crack em and from there into buffer overflows and exploit. After our conversation, he told me works for the NSA and asked if I'll like to work for them. I asked about pay, and it was more than double what I…

Have you written any blog posts about REing and cracking games.

Just looking for some good RE blog posts.

Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#86
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're well credentialed, tech-smart, greedy, and morally bankrupt, it's probably more lucrative to work for Google than the NSA.

Yep. GCHQ was recruiting on our CS course and the starting pay they offered was within £30-35k range. Working for literally any IT company in the region would pay more. (obviously there are perks working for the government that the private industry cannot match, so for some people lower pay is acceptable)

Don't forget the (massive) tax benefits as government employee. To get the same net amount at the end of the month, in Germany you would have to make several thousand € more per year in the private sector.

In the end, you are still right but it's still a factor.

Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#87
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US government created Tor for intelligence purposes. So it being embraced by the US intelligence community is unsurprising.

The US Navy created the concept of onion routing . Tor was not developed by the US government, it was developed in public (by Roger Dingledine and the rest of the Tor community).

Tor was developed at the Naval Research Laboratory and Roger Dingledine was under contract with and funded by the US Government.

https://pando.com/2014/07/16/tor-spooks/

Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I met with an NSA recruiter Ask them for the NSA Sudoku books. They also publish crosswords. These are the only NSA documents Wikileaks wouldn't touch.

These would be great mental exercises for me to complete while I fill out paperwork, unlike the other millennials who are too afraid to step up to the plate (printer?).

>> unlike the other millennials who are too afraid

A serious consideration for recruiters working for these agencies is that millennial truly fear the interview process. They believe that the NSA/CIA has their entire browsing history on file, that the interview process may see them confronted by some awful website they visited late one night in their teens. Or they fear any examination of their past may be shared with law enforcement. These are legitimate fears that recruiters must address. The reality is that such histories are not kept on file and/or are not part of the interview process.

(Similarly, many people don't realize themselves illegal immigrants/dreamers until they try to enlist in the army.)

Re: CIA’s Latest Layer: An Onion Site

#90
post #43

It's interesting that US government is embracing Tor, while Germany is cracking down on it[1]. [1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19399576

Department of State paid most of the Tor budget https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/10/05...

Without paywall: https://outline.com/TPr3uA
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