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Larry Page addresses PRISM

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Re: Larry Page addresses PRISM

#361

Post by ricardobeat »

Dove wrote: post #34
chrisacky wrote: post #4

I can't understand the repeated use of "direct access". It's the kind of language a lawyer would use to qualify a patent clause. - We do not provide direct access to our servers. - We do not provide direct access nor is there a backdoor. - O, but we do still pipe all of your data to external NSA servers. Every company named (I'm not just picking on Google here) has come out with the same overarching statement. "We do…

Until this week’s reports, we had never heard of the broad type of order that Verizon received—an order that appears to have required them to hand over millions of users’ call records. We were very surprised to learn that such broad orders exist. Any suggestion that Google is disclosing information about our users’ Internet activity on such a scale is completely false. I'm not sure how much more strongly you'd like t…

What about the date where "PRISM collection began" for Google, given as 1/14/09? What is that about?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/prism-...;

Re: Larry Page addresses PRISM

#362

Post by adestefan »

rayiner wrote: post #282
Nelson69 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's become very clear is that there is a lot of careful parsing going on. Careful parsing of the constitution, careful parsing of various laws, very very careful interpretation of the words on the page. Does Google give anyone, any company, any entity, anyone at all direct access to their data? They've specifically excluded NSA. Does NSA subcontract that to Booz Allen Hamilton? Google claims that no government has…

> Careful parsing of the constitution, careful parsing of various laws, very very careful interpretation of the words on the page. There is no "careful parsing" of the Constitution going on. Just people who never read the document very carefully other than what they thought the teacher said in 8th grade. This is the entirety of the 4th amendment: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers,…

To follow up even the Supreme Court ruled in 1928 that a wiretap did not constitute a search under the 4th Amendment so there was no need for a warrant.

Wiretaps themselves became illegal and the information from them inadmissible under the 1934 Communications Act. This didn't really stop wiretaps. Instead they were used as a method of intelligence gathering to go and find stuff that was admissible. Note that this was not a reflection on the Constitutionality of wiretaps, but instead the sense that they just weren't needed to convict criminals.

By the 1960's wiretaps were again brought to the Supreme Court and they outlined how a wiretap statue could pass Constitutional muster. The Katz case is where the "expectation of privacy" language was introduced. This resulted in wiretap statues passing in late the late 60s and that's basically what we had until the PATRIOT Act of 2001.

http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/li...

Re: Larry Page addresses PRISM

#363

Post by [deleted] »

xenophanes wrote: post #330
Dove wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy it. What I quoted above doesn't say anything about US persons or non-US persons, about content or metadata, about this law or that one. It just says, Any suggestion that Google is disclosing information about our users’ Internet activity on such a scale is completely false. Now, Page may well be lying , but he definitely isn't weaseling. I'm pretty sure that denial covers both of the possibilities you're…

Of course it's weaseling. Maybe they disclosed such information on a slightly lesser scale. That passage doesn't say. They all said stuff about "direct access", without discussing what would and wouldn't qualify as "indirect". They didn't deny doing all kinds of different access that could be called indirect in some way.

[deleted]

Re: Larry Page addresses PRISM

#366

Post by VladRussian2 »

macchina wrote: post #346
gibsonf1 wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The key issue here is that Google and the other companies may have no idea this is going on. My read is that the NSA has managed to gain access to the data centers either through inside help, spy craft, hardware/router back doors, or some other means we have no idea about.

It's hard for me to believe they could access to the data centers without Google's knowledge. Isn't it more plausible that they're intercepting data flowing in and out of Google servers?

an old time option - a few employees "compelled" to provide access and keep mouth shout.

a new time option - Larry is lying because of the gag order.

in between - Larry said "on such scale". Well, Google probably is of a bigger scale than Verizon.

Anyway, once the data is out there, it is only a matter of time and determination for a government (or any financially well backed up player) to get to it.

This scandal will be a great boost for any services involving "crypto", and probably would spring a new ones like an encrypted phone exchange/switch service, where one can see incoming and outcoming phone numbers, yet not which one connected to which :)

Re: Larry Page addresses PRISM

#367

Post by adventured »

Dove wrote: post #34
chrisacky wrote: post #4

I can't understand the repeated use of "direct access". It's the kind of language a lawyer would use to qualify a patent clause. - We do not provide direct access to our servers. - We do not provide direct access nor is there a backdoor. - O, but we do still pipe all of your data to external NSA servers. Every company named (I'm not just picking on Google here) has come out with the same overarching statement. "We do…

Until this week’s reports, we had never heard of the broad type of order that Verizon received—an order that appears to have required them to hand over millions of users’ call records. We were very surprised to learn that such broad orders exist. Any suggestion that Google is disclosing information about our users’ Internet activity on such a scale is completely false. I'm not sure how much more strongly you'd like t…

Prism has been admitted by the government to exist.

The notion that it exists, and Google isn't involved in it, is pretty absurd. That'd be like talking about tapping the telecom companies, but leaving out Verizon and AT&T.

See:

"The top intelligence official in the United States condemned as “reprehensible” leaks revealing a secret program to collect information from leading Internet companies and said a separate disclosure about an effort to sweep up records of telephone calls threatens “irreversible harm” to the nation’s national security."

Mr. Clapper said in a statement that the classified program to collect information from Internet providers is used to “protect our nation from a wide variety of threats” and he condemned the leaks of documents describing its existence.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/08/us/intelligence-chief-call...

Re: Larry Page addresses PRISM

#368

Post by Udo »

I think they are probably replicating their content in realtime onto government servers, so technically Google et al don't give the NSA any "direct" server access. In practice it's way more convenient to house all that data directly under the NSA/DHS/whatever umbrella than to connect to Google every time they need something.

Using piecemeal "direct access" would also hurt the government's data mining ambitions, so there are a lot of factors that suggest internet companies are simply obligated to stream all their data into a gov black box. This way, everybody wins: the government gets warrant-less, hassle-free access to absolutely everything, the internet companies get freedom from search warrants and NSLs, and they get to use the canned "direct access" denial line which is technically true but is still actually a huge lie.

Re: Larry Page addresses PRISM

#369

Post by lifeguard »

rayiner wrote: post #359
lifeguard wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you understand there is more to our rights that just a document. They have to exist in a framework of judges and the executive branch.

I'm not saying otherwise. But flaming the government for acting Unconstitutionally for activity that is not contrary to the text of the document is lame and misleading. If you think there should be a right to privacy of electronic communications, then convince people of it. Get an amendment passe. Don't twist the Constitution to say what you wish it said.

I disagree with your definition of papers. And that is why we have Judges.

Re: Larry Page addresses PRISM

#370

Post by adventured »

gibsonf1 wrote: post #329
Dove wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy it. What I quoted above doesn't say anything about US persons or non-US persons, about content or metadata, about this law or that one. It just says, Any suggestion that Google is disclosing information about our users’ Internet activity on such a scale is completely false. Now, Page may well be lying , but he definitely isn't weaseling. I'm pretty sure that denial covers both of the possibilities you're…

The key issue here is that Google and the other companies may have no idea this is going on. My read is that the NSA has managed to gain access to the data centers either through inside help, spy craft, hardware/router back doors, or some other means we have no idea about.

AT&T and Verizon are two of the most powerful companies in the US, and have massive lobbying power. The notion that those companies were compelled to sign on to huge espionage programs, with their chiefs being fully aware of it - but yet somehow Facebook / Google / Microsoft / Apple etc. did not have to sign on to anything related to Prism (which has been openly admitted to exist by the Feds), nor were they aware of anything, is just about impossible.
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