Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM • Hacker News Board

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#271

Post by jfoster » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 8:17 AM UTC

nostrademons wrote: post #141

dkulchenko wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Realistically though, can you imagine there being so many CEOs knowing that this thing is going on and being forced to lie about it, and not one of them spilling the beans? Even if the gov tries to arrest them for leaking classified information, they'd be near-impossible to convict following the inevitable massive public outcry.

You don't get to be CEO unless you can learn to lie & keep secrets. OTOH, I'm more skeptical about the implementation side. Have you ever set up a feed between two different organizations that needs to transmit a massive amount of data in real-time? It's an immensely complicated undertaking requiring a whole team on both sides, with managers, engineers, techwriters, QA, and support staff. It seems a little unbelievab…

Yeah, there is very little chance of CEOs leaking. The obligation they feel most is their obligation to the interests of their company. It definitely wouldn't be in a company's interests to rebel against the government of the country in which the company is headquartered.

Implementation side would definitely be very difficult, but you could screen the candidates for those who are sympathetic toward it. Ensure they understand how important it is that the program stays secret. Keep retention high, and perhaps even have some ongoing benefits for any employees who do churn but were part of the program. It definitely wouldn't be easy, but I think it is doable.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#272

Post by jfoster » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 8:31 AM UTC

joonix wrote: post #241

jonny_eh wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. There's no point in being a billionaire high-tech visionary if you're stuck behind bars on treason charges. To us he'd be a hero, to the rest of America he's just helped out terrorists by coming clean.

I don't think it would happen. It would be a disaster and a scandal for any administration to pursue such charges against someone so high profile.

Julian Assange is pretty high profile, considered a journalist by many, has run an organisation that exposed many legitimate scandals, etc. Celebrities also go to prison quite often.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#273

Post by ryanac » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 8:40 AM UTC

vecter wrote: post #243

wheels wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't Occam's Razor instead suggest that since the Page statement was much earlier that Zuckerberg or whoever wrote this (probably not Mark) just copied the style of Page's statement semi-intentionally? They'd have almost certainly have read it.

Precisely this. It's really sad to see the sheer volume of conspiracy-theorizing going on around HN.

It's also sad to see the immediate dismissal of alternate story lines even after this discovery.

A conspiracy was just uncovered... and we're concerned about conspiracy-theorizing? The word itself has been dragged through the mud to the point of becoming a dismissing scare tactic, it basically translates to "crazy person, crazy ideas".

Basically, if your story doesn't match the official conspiracy theory given by the government and the companies that work for it, then you must be a conspiracy theorist...

Life is comedy.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#274

Post by jfoster » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 8:46 AM UTC

Domenic_S wrote: post #211

dkulchenko wrote: post #23

Look at the two writeups (Zuckerberg's and Page's) side by side. Each has 4 paragraphs. Each of the pairs of paragraphs addresses the same thing. 1st paragraph: we wanted to respond to these claims. 2nd paragraph: never heard of PRISM, don't give direct access. 3rd paragraph: each request goes through legal channels. 4th paragraph: encourage governments to be more transparent. Terrifying. EDIT: It gets worse. Here's…

You're getting a lot of flak, but I immediately noticed the same thing. Google: "we have not joined any program that would give the U.S. government—or any other government—direct access to our servers" FB: "Facebook is not and has never been part of any program to give the US or any other government direct access to our servers." Google: "We had not heard of a program called PRISM until yesterday." FB: "We hadn't eve…

It's definitely not coincidence, but it's important to keep an open mind about all the possibilities.

Participating with government requests doesn't make these companies any money. It must be a major drag, actually. It involves lawyers, tech people, and trying to strike an uncomfortable balance between user trust and trying to persuade a court that a request should be denied.

This might be because they've been given a script, but it might also be because they chose to copy each other. They could copy each other out of not wanting to be "the odd one out." Any company that puts out a statement much different from the others risks being trusted less than the others. They could copy each other because they want people to jump to the conclusion that the government gave them a script (even if they didn't) so that people get more pissed than they already are.

As others have pointed out, the similarity could also be because the PR/lawyer response to this is so cookie cutter. I think the "not wanting to be the odd one out" would be the #1 mundane reason, though.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#275

Post by smsm42 » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 9:02 AM UTC

jonny_eh wrote: post #233

joonix wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So imagine Larry Page or Mark Zuckerberg comes out and admits it. Do you think they end up in federal prison?

Yes. There's no point in being a billionaire high-tech visionary if you're stuck behind bars on treason charges. To us he'd be a hero, to the rest of America he's just helped out terrorists by coming clean.

If you want to see how it is really done, look at Russia - people that have money get charged with money things. You have tax audits, labor laws audits, financial compliance audits, whatever. With 2000-page laws and over 50 new federal crimes added to the statutes every year, I'm sure if you need it you can find it. I'm not saying Obama is there yet - I really hope not - but the technology is there. Nixon was impeached in part for using it, and Obama could use it too and there's some evidence it is being used here and there, even though no evidence yet it is used systematically by the highest branches of government. But it is there, and it works.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#276

Post by smsm42 » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 9:05 AM UTC

rustydoorknobs wrote: post #265

louthy wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you think it matters, I'm afraid, you give the American public too much credit. Not just the American public. This is blanket spying on the people of the world. Now that might sound less problematic for Americans who want to see those pesky terrorists brought to justice, but it also allows the NSA to build up profiles on everyone. US border security is already a nightmare, god knows what they can do with this ki…

Give me a break. Every other country is spying on every other country. Nobody gives a shit if your torrented a movie.

Nobody gives a shit until the government has some beef with you. Then it becomes the crime of the century.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#277

Post by taktix » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 9:45 AM UTC

joonix wrote: post #231

arange wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

or all these companies are intentionally making similar press releases in hopes people will catch on that theyre being coerced into denying involvement. this way they're (assuming they have one) fulfilling their denial obligation with the NSA, yet still are protesting what they dont actually want to be doing

So imagine Larry Page or Mark Zuckerberg comes out and admits it. Do you think they end up in federal prison?

About whistleblowers, The Guardian[1] warned:

...the tactic of the US government has been to attack and demonize whistleblowers as a means of distracting attention from their own exposed wrongdoing and destroying the credibility of the messenger so that everyone tunes out the message.

According to the same article:

...Obama prosecutes whistlelblowers at double the number of all previous presidents COMBINED

The US government could easily and expertly discredit any whistleblower CEO with trumped-up tax evasion charges.

[1] http://m.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/07/whistleblo...

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#278

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 10:55 AM UTC

wheels wrote: post #190

dkulchenko wrote: post #23

Look at the two writeups (Zuckerberg's and Page's) side by side. Each has 4 paragraphs. Each of the pairs of paragraphs addresses the same thing. 1st paragraph: we wanted to respond to these claims. 2nd paragraph: never heard of PRISM, don't give direct access. 3rd paragraph: each request goes through legal channels. 4th paragraph: encourage governments to be more transparent. Terrifying. EDIT: It gets worse. Here's…

Wouldn't Occam's Razor instead suggest that since the Page statement was much earlier that Zuckerberg or whoever wrote this (probably not Mark) just copied the style of Page's statement semi-intentionally? They'd have almost certainly have read it.

I'm pretty sure that's it, especially given the call for 'greater transparency'.

That one is definitely optional and would not be part of any scripted response, the fact that a large number of the statements have this exact same optional closing paragraph suggests they are inspired by a common source.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#279

Post by _pmf_ » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 11:05 AM UTC

beedogs wrote: post #264

vecter wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precisely this. It's really sad to see the sheer volume of conspiracy-theorizing going on around HN.

Even though this is an actual conspiracy between the government and several large Internet companies?

> Even though this is an actual conspiracy between the government and several large Internet companies?

If it's a conspiracy, what's the common goal? There's nothing in in for the companies involved. You might just as well say rape is a conspiracy between the rapist and the victim.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg addresses PRISM

#280

Post by belorn » Sat, Jun 08, 2013, 11:30 AM UTC

dkulchenko wrote: post #23

Look at the two writeups (Zuckerberg's and Page's) side by side. Each has 4 paragraphs. Each of the pairs of paragraphs addresses the same thing. 1st paragraph: we wanted to respond to these claims. 2nd paragraph: never heard of PRISM, don't give direct access. 3rd paragraph: each request goes through legal channels. 4th paragraph: encourage governments to be more transparent. Terrifying. EDIT: It gets worse. Here's…

Those responses are eery close, and both Zuckerberg's and Page responses do not address a key question: Do their companies run queries over users data to answer questions that the state are willing to pay/force to get?

The value of the data inside Facebook would actually go down if it was transfer out of Facebook. Its much better if Facebook themselves would run the query (like they normally do with advertisement), and provide the NSA with either a summery or webbugs/custom code in form of targeted images (advertisement) sent to those NSA is interested about.

Copying massive data would not just be logistically hard, it would need to be constantly updated. The simplest answer is that "direct access" simply mean NSA provided queries that google/facebook run at "request". No need for backdoors.