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

NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 182 posts

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#41

Post by dralley »

peteretep wrote: post #7

The Five Eyes have built a sufficiently valuable asset that the security services of other rich countries all want in. Denmark is in Nine Eyes, so they’ll happily sell out members of Fourteen Eyes (like Germany) to get closer into the circle.

Germany has no room to complain.

https://www.dw.com/en/parliamentary-report-finds-spying-by-b...

> German media later reported that the NSA had provided German intelligence services with spying software in exchange for data sharing. Consequently, the BND and it domestic intelligence couterpart, called the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), were accused of assisting the NSA in its global surveillance programs.

> ...

> More than two-thirds of all 3,300 targets monitored by the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) foreign intelligence service were on diplomatic representations of EU and NATO member states around the world, according to a parliamentary committee report seen by German news agency dpa.

> The report found a "low two-digit number of people" - including heads of state and government, ministers and members of their offices and military institutions - were spied on until October 2013. That same year, Chancellor Angela Merkel had complained to US President Barack Obama that spying on friends was "not done."

> The BND was also found to have spied on non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the aviation and space industries, as well as the arms trade, transport, media and consultancy.

The truth is that allies spy on each other all the time, it's not just normal but prudent to do so.

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#42

Post by justicezyx »

Permit wrote: post #38
justicezyx wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Selling to Iran as the motivation of sanctioning Huawei? How poorly you are informed about international politics? If selling to Iran was a problem, then you can just do whatever you want in the legal process to fix the issue. Force companies to not work with huawei, even against those companies' own interests. And detaining the Huwei founder's daughter and internationally to drag her into a legal marathon that has n…

> How poorly you are informed about international politics? > How naïve you are! Why the hostility? I've asked a handful of questions in good faith and another commenter politely corrected me on a few issues I was not aware of. It sounds like you have a better understanding of the issues at hand so I'd invite you to correct me rather than insult me.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/news/2019/05/21/huawei-w...

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#43

Post by unishark »

Permit wrote: post #11
quyleanh wrote: post #8

I still wonder, what happens if other countries like China, Russia spy on other governments and are disclosed? They will be embargoed by US. But why there is nothing happens when US spying other countries? Because US does it with good manner and good intention?

> I still wonder, what happens if other countries like China, Russia spy on other governments and are disclosed? They will be embargoed by US. Does this happen? Has China faced sanctions after spying on US citizens or stealing trade secrets? Has Russia?

I'm not clear what is illegal and where is the jurisdiction in this case. Apparently it is about Danish Intelligence allowing the tapping of Danish internet lines in Denmark. Is that a crime? Is it even something China would deny doing within their own country? I thought the US govt would just refused to allow services or something be sold to the US from China if they knew it went on. Or you know, try to, before the outrage and legal process overturned the ban.

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#44

Post by sneak »

rsj_hn wrote: post #32

This all boils down to the question of how to reign in the administrative state, and the problem here is that no one really wants to reign it in, they want to control it and point it in the direction they prefer, that is, they want an extra-judicial, extra-legislative source of power to exist, but just not do any of the things they don't like. But I don't think this is possible, once you have an administrative state,…

Do you think it would be fair to say that countries that operate in this way are no longer democracies?

I have my own thoughts on the matter but I'm curious based on this assessment of yours what other people think about the implications of the situation.

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#45

Post by baybal2 »

dralley wrote: post #40
maxden wrote: post #5

and in 2015 it was reported Germany was helping the NSA spy on European politicians. NSA doing what the NSA does really. https://www.theverge.com/2015/4/24/8489477/bnd-nsa-informati...

And not just the NSA. Despite their feigned outrage every time stuff like this hits the news, both Germany and France actively spy on US government and industry all the time. Every nation spies on every other nation, friend or foe, to look out for their own national interests. https://www.france24.com/en/20131024-nsa-france-spying-squar... > Bernard Squarcini, head of the Direction Centrale du Renseignement Intérieur…

These people are without honour

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#46

Post by kalleboo »

quyleanh wrote: post #8

I still wonder, what happens if other countries like China, Russia spy on other governments and are disclosed? They will be embargoed by US. But why there is nothing happens when US spying other countries? Because US does it with good manner and good intention?

Because ostensibly the US is an ally. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C7jdz-fXwAI8w-U?format=jpg&name=...

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#47

Post by fogihujy »

unishark wrote: post #43
Permit wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I still wonder, what happens if other countries like China, Russia spy on other governments and are disclosed? They will be embargoed by US. Does this happen? Has China faced sanctions after spying on US citizens or stealing trade secrets? Has Russia?

I'm not clear what is illegal and where is the jurisdiction in this case. Apparently it is about Danish Intelligence allowing the tapping of Danish internet lines in Denmark. Is that a crime? Is it even something China would deny doing within their own country? I thought the US govt would just refused to allow services or something be sold to the US from China if they knew it went on. Or you know, try to, before the…

Illegal? Possibly. It's being debated according to Danish news.

Controversial? Yes, to the extent that Denmark managed to piss off every single neighboring country. Also, Denmark is actively trying to avoid shutting down some illegal monitoring of its' own citizens, and this is pouring more fuel on that fire.

Spying on Germany caused a political shitstorm the last time it was im the Danish news and now it has been revealed Denmark spied on others too, I suspect that circus will be repeated.

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#48

Post by samcal »

sneak wrote: post #44
rsj_hn wrote: post #32

This all boils down to the question of how to reign in the administrative state, and the problem here is that no one really wants to reign it in, they want to control it and point it in the direction they prefer, that is, they want an extra-judicial, extra-legislative source of power to exist, but just not do any of the things they don't like. But I don't think this is possible, once you have an administrative state,…

Do you think it would be fair to say that countries that operate in this way are no longer democracies? I have my own thoughts on the matter but I'm curious based on this assessment of yours what other people think about the implications of the situation.

I think it's probably most accurate to say that there are democracies of different sizes. Your country is a more of democracy as more people have equal agency over their government. This obviously has never happened to a complete extent, and it's still an open question whether that should happen. But a discrete separation between "democracies" and "not democracies" will run into these sorts of problems in any case.

Re: NSA spying row: Denmark helped US gather data on European officials, says report

#49

Post by noja »

sneak wrote: post #44
rsj_hn wrote: post #32

This all boils down to the question of how to reign in the administrative state, and the problem here is that no one really wants to reign it in, they want to control it and point it in the direction they prefer, that is, they want an extra-judicial, extra-legislative source of power to exist, but just not do any of the things they don't like. But I don't think this is possible, once you have an administrative state,…

Do you think it would be fair to say that countries that operate in this way are no longer democracies? I have my own thoughts on the matter but I'm curious based on this assessment of yours what other people think about the implications of the situation.

> Do you think it would be fair to say that countries that operate in this way are no longer democracies?

Such an agency operating outside of the visibility of those voting is by definition not democratic. But that doesn't mean the rest of the democracy isn't there.

Post reply on HN