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Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

defundthensa.com

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Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#141

Post by ianstallings »

meepmorp wrote: post #127
LoganCale wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should be banning surveillance of anyone not under active investigation, not simply domestically.

Why? Persons who are not US citizens who are not on US territory aren't given protections under our constitution. What's the reasoning behind this? Surveillance serves a national interest for the US, and while there ought to be limitations for domestic surveillance, I don't see why those ought to exist for foreigners in other countries.

Because people, world-wide, have the right to their own privacy. I'm talking a fundamental human right. Not legalese.

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#142

Post by thomaslangston »

meepmorp wrote: post #127
LoganCale wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should be banning surveillance of anyone not under active investigation, not simply domestically.

Why? Persons who are not US citizens who are not on US territory aren't given protections under our constitution. What's the reasoning behind this? Surveillance serves a national interest for the US, and while there ought to be limitations for domestic surveillance, I don't see why those ought to exist for foreigners in other countries.

There is an ethical argument that the morality of a government's actions doesn't change because of the nationality of those actions' benefactors or victims. Therefore if it isn't moral to perform dragnet surveillance on the U.S. population, then it isn't moral to do so on foreign populations either.

There is another ethical argument that we should do unto others as we would have them do unto us (i.e. the Golden Rule). If the U.S. doesn't want foreign governments performing dragnet surveillance on them, then the U.S. shouldn't perform dragnet surveillance on other countries.

There is a policy argument that dragnet surveillance, when combined with foreign information sharing agreements, is effectively an unintended loophole. For example, assume British intelligence performs dragnet surveillance on the U.S. and vice versa. When these hypothetical findings are shared, it negates the perceived limitations on domestic surveillance.

There is an economic argument that if U.S. companies cannot be trusted to protect the privacy of their customers, foreign markets will become closed to them either via customer choice or even foreign government regulation.

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#143

Post by oleganza »

positr0n wrote: post #135
snitko wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone knows we need some kind of government I don't. Many people I know don't either. So what if we don't really need any kind of government?

I hear Somalia is nice this time of year.

So violence in Somalia is not acceptable to you, but allowing your government a lot of violence is acceptable? If people in Somalia cannot find out a way to avoid violence it does not mean it's not possible in principle, or that government is somehow "good".

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#144

Post by dllthomas »

LoganCale wrote: post #119
sneak wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, even if NSA stopped all domestic spying, the fact that they have programs like PRISM that silently turn any US company into a snitch for the US military means that the US internet industry has suffered an irreparable blow. Obama getting on national TV and saying "we only target foreign entities" is the worst possible thing that could have happened. Even if all of this stuff works, the spying on foreign…

It should be banning surveillance of anyone not under active investigation, not simply domestically.

Absent a declaration of war...

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#145

Post by dllthomas »

mwsherman wrote: post #118
mcherm wrote: post #88

Important point: (This point was made clear in the actual page, but some of the comments suggest that not everyone understood it.) The title to this posting (and the name of the website) are misleading. This is not a proposal to block funding for the NSA. And that's good, because such a proposal would have NO chance of passing, and would probably be a bad idea anyhow. Instead, this is a proposal to block funding for…

Also important: money is fungible. To block funding for a particular activity is to say that Congress appropriates money per activity. I don’t think that’s the case, but would happily be corrected. So a law that states ‘here’s your money, but you’re not allowed to use it for x’ seems toothless in the extreme. It’s words on a page. Keep in mind also that the NSA is close to lawless, so any room for interpretation will…

I don't know. If we say "Here is your money; you can't use it for X" and the next whistleblower shows that they are nonetheless using it for X means they're misappropriating government funds, and people can go to jail for that.

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#146

Post by pavanred »

meepmorp wrote: post #127
LoganCale wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should be banning surveillance of anyone not under active investigation, not simply domestically.

Why? Persons who are not US citizens who are not on US territory aren't given protections under our constitution. What's the reasoning behind this? Surveillance serves a national interest for the US, and while there ought to be limitations for domestic surveillance, I don't see why those ought to exist for foreigners in other countries.

Well, does that mean that every other country in the world is well within its rights to spy on every US citizen? I am sure no other country's constitution stipulates protections for US citizens either.

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#147

Post by MorningInfidel »

sinak wrote: post #31

Just a quick note to add that this was built over the course of 5 hours by four developers as part of http://taskforce.is , which was pretty much assembled here on Hacker News. Please take a few minutes to call. It's amazing how low conversion rates are on calling campaigns like this one - a factor of 100 lower than email asks - but this is really critical. We only have one day to make this happen. If you're interest…

Best of luck and god speed with this initiative. Were I a US citizen, I would be calling my representative.

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#148

Post by canvia »

meepmorp wrote: post #127
LoganCale wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should be banning surveillance of anyone not under active investigation, not simply domestically.

Why? Persons who are not US citizens who are not on US territory aren't given protections under our constitution. What's the reasoning behind this? Surveillance serves a national interest for the US, and while there ought to be limitations for domestic surveillance, I don't see why those ought to exist for foreigners in other countries.

Countries are just arbitrary divisions. Just because you are born in a certain geographic region doesn't mean you are the property of the government of that region. Every person is a human being with inherent rights and freedoms.

You think we are all equal, but Americans are just more equal than others?

Dividing people is counter productive and antiquated. We are all unified as citizens of Earth and denizens of the internet.

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#149

Post by ceejayoz »

oleganza wrote: post #24
nakedrobot2 wrote: post #2

This is something real, tangible, and valuable that we can all actually do. All of this month I have felt powerless. This is something within everyone's power to do, and it can definitely help start the ball rolling back the way it came. It is pretty unfortunate that there is such a short window of time in which this information can be disseminated. I can imagine if there were a bit more time, this could really sprea…

I disagree, it is not something real or tangible. I'm all for defunding NSA, but it's not like a regular business which you can boycott by not giving them money. You have to go and ask permission from the government to not give the money (which they previously extracted from you by force for the "good of society") to some of the government agencies. It's pretty much like going to NSA itself and ask them to defund the…

> Protect yourself against the police and the military who will try to extract them by force (possibly by having crowdfunded guards).

Yeah, that's not going to happen. "Protect yourself" in this case translates to "ensure your rapid death in a SWAT assault". Security guards aren't going to fight a warrant for your arrest, and mercenaries will just die in the assault.

Re: Block NSA funding for collecting the call records of all Americans

#150

Post by pavanred »

thomaslangston wrote: post #142
meepmorp wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? Persons who are not US citizens who are not on US territory aren't given protections under our constitution. What's the reasoning behind this? Surveillance serves a national interest for the US, and while there ought to be limitations for domestic surveillance, I don't see why those ought to exist for foreigners in other countries.

There is an ethical argument that the morality of a government's actions doesn't change because of the nationality of those actions' benefactors or victims. Therefore if it isn't moral to perform dragnet surveillance on the U.S. population, then it isn't moral to do so on foreign populations either. There is another ethical argument that we should do unto others as we would have them do unto us (i.e. the Golden Rule)…

Speaking of which, has anyone put together a list of potential non US alternatives for commonly used services?
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