351–360 of 459 posts
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Snowden also leaked everything he had. It certainly was not targeted.
Everything was 100% vetted through two respected journalist. They decided what to leak and when and what to protect. Very well done by any standard.
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I was a system administrator with similar responsibilities for several years, and it was quite clear who the system architects were and who the maintainers were. It's a minor point, but speaks to Mr. Snowden's reportedly inflated self-importance. It's up to all of us to take this report, and news reports and autobiographies, as seriously as you think they deserve. This provides background information not commonly kno…
>I was a system administrator with similar responsibilities for several years, and it was quite clear who the system architects were and who the maintainers were Both groups would have been necessary to build the a long term system. Beyond that, I don't see how his status while working for the intelligence sector is very important, and I've never gotten the impression Snowden was trying to boast about how achievement…
Even during the initial revelations, people who wanted to downplay the topic regularly pointed out that Snowden was "just a system administrator, not an intelligence agent" and attempted to debate whether he worked directly for the government or only for a contractor. It baffled me, because that doesn't even seem relevant to his claims.
The "government employee" issue would only matter if the authenticity of the leaks was disputed; the various PRISM and XKEYSCORE slideshows were never even challenged, so who cares? And "only a system administrator" sounds backwards to anyone who actually knows what sysadmins do. Dismissing him as a maintainer instead of an architect is a weird sideshow, since his role was mostly important as an answer to the question "how did he get undetected access to so many different files?"
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The key difference is that you can decide not to buy corporate products you do not want, but have to comply with the laws. I am a lot less concerned about stupid things done by a majority for convenience (and I can choose whether to do participate or not) than about the law that forces the same stupidity down my throat. My 2c.
you can decide not to buy corporate products That's a fallacy by both choice and externality. There are cases in which there is no choice but to use specific corporate products, or in which choices are made without an individual's consent or involvement. Karen Sandler, co-host (with former FSF directory Bradley Kuhn) of the "Free as in Freedom" podcast has an implanted, closed-source proprietary medical device. She c…
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Correct, this is what I meant.
The whole thread was about the NSA's budget and mission, so I misunderstood your point. It appears you have no specific qualms with the NSA other than the fact they exist under the same government as the FBI/CIA?
I haven't mentioned my qualms about the NSA up to this point, but since you asked: I object to spending $10.8 billion in 2013[1]. I object to the fact that they have so little oversight, the public had to find out what their funding is from a leak[1]. I object to the fact that this spending resulted in only 4 arrests they will tell us about over a period of years[2] which are all fairly questionable[3]. I object to their continued violation of the constitutional right to privacy of almost every American.[4] I object to them undermining encryption standards[5] which weakens the security of people and companies everywhere.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/30/us/politics/leaked-docume...
[2] https://www.ibtimes.com/four-times-nsa-surveillance-programs...
[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20944055
[4] https://www.eff.org/702-spying
[5] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/nsa-nist-encrypti...
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>I was a system administrator with similar responsibilities for several years, and it was quite clear who the system architects were and who the maintainers were Both groups would have been necessary to build the a long term system. Beyond that, I don't see how his status while working for the intelligence sector is very important, and I've never gotten the impression Snowden was trying to boast about how achievement…
Amazon page blurb aside, I don't understand why this question comes up so often. Even during the initial revelations, people who wanted to downplay the topic regularly pointed out that Snowden was "just a system administrator, not an intelligence agent" and attempted to debate whether he worked directly for the government or only for a contractor. It baffled me, because that doesn't even seem relevant to his claims.…
It coming up again of again when Snowden is discussed is part of either controlled or natural occurring propaganda, a talking point of the regime. The one bringing it into this thread is a new throwaway account, go figure. One way or another, directly or indirectly, you are seeing the "controlling public discussions" part of what intelligence agencies do in action here :)
I can't speak for the US but this man has shifted so much of the political debate in my country and I think also in the EU in general. If you talked about the massive surveillance from governments people tossed you aside as a paranoid lunatic. After Snowden no one could ignore you anymore and privacy is an aspect in any public debate.
> If you talked about the massive surveillance from governments people tossed you aside as a paranoid lunatic. I wonder how much that was any given person, or just that the availability of such surveillance has increased dramatically.
Since then, combined with the ability to use AI patterns against video streams and even deep fake capability. My trust in most things is pretty much broken at this point.
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The key difference is that you can decide not to buy corporate products you do not want, but have to comply with the laws. I am a lot less concerned about stupid things done by a majority for convenience (and I can choose whether to do participate or not) than about the law that forces the same stupidity down my throat. My 2c.
you can decide not to buy corporate products That's a fallacy by both choice and externality. There are cases in which there is no choice but to use specific corporate products, or in which choices are made without an individual's consent or involvement. Karen Sandler, co-host (with former FSF directory Bradley Kuhn) of the "Free as in Freedom" podcast has an implanted, closed-source proprietary medical device. She c…
"No choice" in the sense that you lose business, lose touch with your high school classmates, or are forced to go out and pick up your own food from the restaurant down the street?
Or "no choice" in the sense that people show up at your door with guns?
What a privilege it is to be able to casually use the same language to describe such disparate outcomes.
Before his story broke there was an AMA on Reddit about govt surveillance, I'm 90% this was Snowden. Does anyone else remember this? The person spoke of these things happening in ways we "couldn't imagine". People were guessing at what he meant and his responses were mostly "it's much worse". One redditor posted some highly technical speculations to which the author responded "you're getting close". Reddit's search i…
This was in 2012, 2013 was when Snowden did what he did.
I always wondered if he saw this talk and was motivated by it.
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Simply asserting that you're somehow impervious to corporate power is not an argument. Individuals only have the absolute power to not transact in an ideal market where there is vibrant competition for your business, and our real market is far from ideal. 1. Persistent psychological manipulation (advertising), including political manipulation, based on knowing your weaknesses better than you know yourself. 2. Punitiv…
> Punitive insurance rates based on unreasonable inferences, especially for mandatory insurances. Like say doubling your auto insurance rate for buying more than a few beers per week. Or your health insurance going up from buying a power tools. Is it just supposed to be self-evident that those inferences are unreasonable? I've always thought that this was an interesting argument. If there is some form of correlation…
Directing focus at "people who drink a lot of beer" means considering people who who drink a lot of beer at home as guilty by association, ultimately due to the subjective priorities of whomever pushed for that model.
Obviously in the expected value sense, charging on correlations is lucrative for the company (as is any justification for raising prices on a set of customers if your competitors do it too). But in the exact same way as saying certain zip codes are more likely to default on a loan, which we rightfully reject.