The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet • Hacker News Board

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#131

Post by sigkill » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:27 PM UTC

adaml_623 wrote: post #104

drivingmenuts wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great if you live outside the US, but if you're inside the US, would not the very act of connecting to a foreign secure service automatically make you suspect? There is a much deeper issue here: as Americans, we need to decide how much protection we actually want. One group says everyone is responsible for their own protection, another says everyone needs protecting from everyone else, yet another group says we'll pr…

Do you mind if the UK, Russian, or Chinese security agencies spy on you? After all that's their job? And by spy I do mean trojan your personal machine and keep you in a database?

Consider me the devils advocate, but wouldn't foreign spy-ing be better than local spying if they can't make use of that data to incriminate you in your daily life?

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#132

Post by wf » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:28 PM UTC

diminoten wrote: post #110

tekromancr wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is evidence of US citizens being blown off the streets by drones.

Do I just take your word for that?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdulrahman_al-Awlaki

The relevant parts:

In April 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama placed al-Awlaki on a list of people whom the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency was authorized to kill because of terrorist activities.[32][33][34] The "targeted killing" of an American citizen was unprecedented. Al-Awlaki's father and civil rights groups challenged the order in court.[32][34][35][36] Al-Awlaki was believed to be in hiding in Southeast Yemen in the last years of his life.[26] The U.S. deployed unmanned aircraft (drones) in Yemen to search for and kill him,[37] firing at and failing to kill him at least once,[38] before succeeding in a fatal American drone attack in Yemen on September 30, 2011.[39] Two weeks later, al-Awlaki's 16-year-old son, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, a U.S. citizen who was born in Denver, was killed by a CIA-led drone strike in Yemen.[40][41][42] Nasser al-Awlaki, Anwar's father, released an audio recording condemning the killings of his son and grandson as senseless murders.[43]

And US officials admitted the killing of the boy was mistake.

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#133

Post by humanspecies » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:31 PM UTC

smutticus wrote: post #2

It makes me happy to see Schneier get more mainstream press these days. As someone who has followed his blog for years it's about freaking time he got more attention.

Even if the only purpose is to propagate absurdly naive and ineffective ideas?

What, google and apple "fighting" the US Government they've gladly been cooperating with since forever???

Why doesn't Schneier call them out for what these corporations really are, government snitches? What makes Schneier think any of these companies want to do what's "moral"??

This article is one of the most naive pieces I've ever read. It parts on the principle that these companies want to do what's moral, but the government is keeping them from doing it. That is absurd.

Google, Apple and friends have been willingly cooperating with the government in exchange for perks, for immunity against FTC probes and so on. They're NOT gonna "fight" because they have nothing to fight against.

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#134

Post by diminoten » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:32 PM UTC

Sauer_Kraut wrote: post #74

diminoten wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're arguing that there is no evidence because the NSA is so good at what they do, they've successfully hidden all operational evidence from the public for their entire time of existence? Is Snowden the first mistake the NSA has ever made, in your eyes, then?

No, no. edit: Tried to respond below but have been "submitting too fast" while submitting nothing for far too long to care to wait more. I am not saying the NSA has flawless execution, you are the one repeating it for whatever reason. I'm saying the NSA/Administration when pushed had to put out something that showed the spying was 'working.' In response they said multiples of domestic plots were foiled. Given the lac…

So why, exactly, is there no evidence that US citizens on US soil are being "renditioned" or otherwise extrajudiciously held as a result of NSA data collection?

Because, if you'll recall, that's what we were talking about.

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#135

Post by diminoten » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:32 PM UTC

wf wrote: post #132

diminoten wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do I just take your word for that?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdulrahman_al-Awlaki The relevant parts: In April 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama placed al-Awlaki on a list of people whom the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency was authorized to kill because of terrorist activities.[32][33][34] The "targeted killing" of an American citizen was unprecedented. Al-Awlaki's father and civil rights groups challenged the order in court.[32][34][35][36] Al-A…

Ah, so not the streets of the US, which is what I said.

Got it.

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#136

Post by diminoten » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:35 PM UTC

TallGuyShort wrote: post #106

diminoten wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So we're ready to convict the government of thought-crimes? Just because they can, doesn't mean they will. Gun owners could all go out and harm innocent people, but they generally don't, do they? At least we don't convict them before they do.

Whoa, slow down there - where do I mention convicting the government of thought-crimes? My point is that granting the federal government powers (because, under the constitution, they have no power that isn't explicitly granted to them) under the umbrella of counter-terrorism initiatives is inevitably going to expand in scope and usage, and will still be labelled as "counter-terrorism".

Where do you mention convicting the government of thought-crimes? In the very next sentence! You are not capable of predicting the future, you don't know what is going to happen if we grant the federal government additional powers.

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#137

Post by pdonis » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:40 PM UTC

diminoten wrote: post #126

pdonis wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there's just no reason to believe such a thing to be true No reason to believe what to be true? The US government's placing of backdoors in the long-distance telephone network is historical fact. That historical fact is a reason to believe that what the US government has done once, it could do again. It may not be a reason you want to accept, but it's still a reason.

The NSA can't stop you from visiting Hacker News. That's what control means, the ability to alter your behavior or the course of events. The NSA does not have the ability to do this. So no, this is not historical fact.

That's what control means, the ability to alter your behavior or the course of events.

When it became public knowledge that the US government had backdoors in the long distance telephone network, that did alter people's behavior and the course of events. Similarly, the public knowledge that the NSA is spying on the Internet is altering people's behavior and the course of events.

I agree the NSA can't stop people from visiting HN, but they can certainly change the incentives faced by people using the Internet. Perhaps this doesn't meet your definition of the word "control", but you still seem to find it significant.

this is not historical fact

What isn't? Are you saying that you don't believe the US government put backdoors into the long distance telephone network? Or that you don't believe the NSA is spying on the Internet? Or are you just saying you don't care, because you can still visit HN? That doesn't change the historical fact; it just means you don't care about that particular historical fact.

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#138

Post by eliasmacpherson » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:41 PM UTC

diminoten wrote: post #121

eliasmacpherson wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hardly wild speculation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction Use of NSA info in the manner described above is scope creep because they aren't terrorists, or foreign.

What's wrong with this?

They are using data from 'national security' databases for ordinary investigations against Americans as opposed to foreigners. And obscuring that fact. If this is allowed to continue fourth amendment rights will mean very little. Ubiquitous surveillance not for international terrorism, but every little misdemeanor. You may argue they are criminals, but they have been subjected to e.g. an illegal search to get evidence. In cases where they are not actually criminals, the illegal search and coverup is indefensible.

Here's the article linked from the wikipedia page. http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/05/us-dea-sod-idUSBRE...

"A similar set of instructions was included in an IRS manual in 2005 and 2006, Reuters reported." [2]

Basically they use "evidence" obtained illegally, tip off the DEA and it seems the IRS.

Choice quote[1]: "Nancy Gertner, a Harvard Law School professor who served as a federal judge from 1994 to 2011, described the practice of "parallel construction" as "a fancy word for phonying up the course of the investigation". It was one thing, she said, to create special rules for national security, but creating rules for ordinary crime threatened to undermine the bill of rights, set up as a check against the power of the executive."

Ezekiel Edwards, the director of the American Civil Liberties Union's criminal law reform project[1]: He said that the concealing of information about the source of an investigation was unconstitutional because it did not allow defendants their right to confront and examine the evidence the government has against them.

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/06/justice-departm...

[2] http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/08/us-dea-irs-idUSBRE...

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#139

Post by rst » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:47 PM UTC

ge0rg wrote: post #27

S_A_P wrote: post #14

While I understand that Lavabit and others have taken a stand, Im not sure that I would call going out of business fighting. I see this as an NSA victory. If they could shut down all of these niche secure email businesses, what option will people have but to use less private alternatives? I would argue that a shut down is exactly what the NSA wanted from lavabit. Of course the flip side is that you don't want to be c…

If they could shut down all of these niche secure email businesses, what option will people have but to use less private alternatives? I think Ladar Levison answered that question, implicitly, in his shutdown announcement: "I would _strongly_ recommend against anyone trusting their private data to a company with physical ties to the United States." It is high time to provide secure services hosted in countries withou…

Which countries would these be, and how could you be sure? Remember that exceptions to normal judicial procedures might take some form other than a secret court, and can be a whole lot less overt. (And that the governments may be motivated to lie about what they're doing, and whether they exist.)

Re: The NSA Is Commandeering the Internet

#140

Post by dreamfactory » Mon, Aug 12, 2013, 7:52 PM UTC

diminoten wrote: post #105

dreamfactory wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine many would say recent events demonstrate that it shouldn't continue in its current incarnation as it's doing more harm than good to national interests. Like the TSA, it doesn't need to exist, certainly not in its current form. In the UK for example, the equivalent hasn't always existed, (and going by Adam Curtis recently, may as well not have). That didn't prevent them from building an empire and dominating…

I'd like to see what you've read that makes you think the majority of US citizens think the NSA shouldn't continue in its current incarnation. Furthermore, I'd like to see what you've read that shows the TSA doesn't need to exist. Also, what makes you think the UK hasn't had a global intelligence network since its inception?

They call it the second oldest profession but intelligence can take different shapes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melville#Secret_Service... post-dates the British empire for example.

I didn't say anything about the majority US opinion (which is volatile of course), but it's plausible that a sufficiently large number of powerful Americans could call time out for a restructure as they see their international business interests heading rapidly towards the plughole. That could well be taking the shine off being the gatekeepers of the gov info economy for example.

As for the TSA, you may disagree but I'm sure Bruce Schneier has more intelligent things to say about it than me - http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/military/news/tsa...