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

Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

theguardian.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 237 posts

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#21

Post by pdkl95 »

toyg wrote: post #7
itsallbs wrote: post #4

We are at an interesting juncture of history. It seems like Snowden has accomplished what he set out do to: raise awareness of government abuse and bring about positive change. Initial fears after the NSA leaks seemed to be that the public would become outraged and then forget about it. Clearly, this is not happening. A more secure Internet is needed, and instances like this highlight that necessity.

weirdly enough, I think the public would have forgotten about it, but establishment leaders seem bent on doing everything they can to keep the story alive (lying to Congress, grounding Morales' plane, forcing Snowden to defect to Russia, harassing journalists, now even attacking their families...).

The Streisand Effect is a concept that some people apparently do not understand until they have experienced the full force of the Effect first-hand.

Edit: grammar

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#22

Post by derefr »

itsallbs wrote: post #4

We are at an interesting juncture of history. It seems like Snowden has accomplished what he set out do to: raise awareness of government abuse and bring about positive change. Initial fears after the NSA leaks seemed to be that the public would become outraged and then forget about it. Clearly, this is not happening. A more secure Internet is needed, and instances like this highlight that necessity.

> It seems like Snowden has accomplished what he set out do to: raise awareness of government abuse and bring about positive change.

On a tangent--I have to say, this has been a weird era.

It was started by a small group of people who decided to kick Americans into a state of fear and panic--Bin Laden et al--and they succeeded, wildly. And it might be ended by one man, who decided to kick Americans into a state of suspicion that their fear and panic has been used against them.

It feels a bit mythical, individual heroes and villains swaying the fates of nations like this. Politics isn't supposed to be this neat and tidy, is it? Things like this are only supposed to exist when you revise history to make the lines less muddy. And yet, here we are.

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#23

Post by ballard »

random42 wrote: post #9
toyg wrote: post #6

This is a tragedy. We need to reboot email. Encrypt everything, including metadata -- given current hardware, the client can easily bruteforce it from a list of known keys. Build some sort of easy key distribution tool (connecting via p2p, dns, whatever, just build a goddamn UI). Ask existing transports to relax their restrictions enough to let fully-encrypted mail through, and build some intelligent webmail interfac…

I disagree. This is a political fight. Technical means can drag the resistance longer, which is helpful, but the political system needs to be put in checks and balances against becoming a police state. There is no substitute of "taking roads and doing peaceful protests" as out of comfort zone they might be. We sometimes fall in love with our methods because that is what _we_ are good at, not what is necessarily the b…

The two are not mutually exclusive and there is overlap.

Personally, I don't care whom is in office or how ostensibly benign they portray themselves to be during campaign cycles. Governments are large, uncoordinated, stupid animals capable of arbitrarily ruining people's lives when it's politically convenient.

PHK is wrong; You don't leave your doors unlocked because the mayor seems nice.

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#24

Post by luscious »

random42 wrote: post #9
toyg wrote: post #6

This is a tragedy. We need to reboot email. Encrypt everything, including metadata -- given current hardware, the client can easily bruteforce it from a list of known keys. Build some sort of easy key distribution tool (connecting via p2p, dns, whatever, just build a goddamn UI). Ask existing transports to relax their restrictions enough to let fully-encrypted mail through, and build some intelligent webmail interfac…

I disagree. This is a political fight. Technical means can drag the resistance longer, which is helpful, but the political system needs to be put in checks and balances against becoming a police state. There is no substitute of "taking roads and doing peaceful protests" as out of comfort zone they might be. We sometimes fall in love with our methods because that is what _we_ are good at, not what is necessarily the b…

This, this, this.

You can't let yourselves lose a power war by wasting all your time losing tactical battles. It's a tragedy if we all spend any time trying to protect our LOLs and OMGs to-from each other. If you are working on means for tracking behavior and extracting value (monetary, political, etc.) you are doing something less good than you could be.

Don't get caught by rope-a-dope when you could just cut funding for all this. We don't need protection from 20 terrorists who can kill 3,000 people. We can deal with them together. Somehow (fear, greed, stupidity?) we've lost our collective front. We need a 'We' now.

When Bush and some war-nat-resource-industry profiteers stack the deck, it's awful, but expected. At least the actions are rational. At this point, it's pretty obvious (not that it hasn't been for 50+ years) that we have a problem. The organizations at the heart of this are willing to act outside the spirit, if not the letter, of US law. The political factions riding power act outside the spirit, if not the letter, of our law and founding documents.

Our government is not behaving towards the world or our own citizens in the way that inspired generations to come here to build a better life for themselves.

The baby boomers frittered everything away. Lazy asses. Now, it's time to make amends. It's time to FORK THE USs REPO!!!

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#25

Post by walshemj »

rlpb wrote: post #11
random42 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. This is a political fight. Technical means can drag the resistance longer, which is helpful, but the political system needs to be put in checks and balances against becoming a police state. There is no substitute of "taking roads and doing peaceful protests" as out of comfort zone they might be. We sometimes fall in love with our methods because that is what _we_ are good at, not what is necessarily the b…

I agree, but I'd also like to add a more specific cause to this idea. Like you say, technical measures aren't a bad idea either, but only drag things on. My political view is this: both the right to communicate and the privacy of communications need to be treated as a fundamental human rights, just as freedom of speech is currently treated. Then there are subjective measures. Breaching these rights may be warranted i…

but in the us freedom of speech is not universally applied ie you employer can sack you for what you say for example

"oh maybe we should organize a union" or maybe "the NHS model is a good idea"

Any changes need to apply universally and not just to the government.

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#26

Post by alan_cx »

001sky wrote: post #15
devx wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree it's primarily a political fight, but I think we should work on both. But it's true that with absolute government power where they can justify anything, and with so many partner countries willing to play along with them - encryption won't get you very far, no matter how good it is and where you are in the world. They'll find a way to put a backdoor into the systems somehow with or without the service provider…

One needs to organize to fight politically. if you cant speak, you cant organize. that's why they are going after e-mail...they are desperate to keep themselves in power...

Blimey, what did we do before email?

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#27

Post by adjwilli »

ascendantlogic wrote: post #19

Now more than ever is when we need sites like this. This all plays right into the government's hands. They may as well keep it up because people are self-censoring and that makes their jobs easier.

If one person does it, it's self-censorship. If a group of people do it's a non-violent collective action protest.

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#28

Post by DennisP »

random42 wrote: post #9
toyg wrote: post #6

This is a tragedy. We need to reboot email. Encrypt everything, including metadata -- given current hardware, the client can easily bruteforce it from a list of known keys. Build some sort of easy key distribution tool (connecting via p2p, dns, whatever, just build a goddamn UI). Ask existing transports to relax their restrictions enough to let fully-encrypted mail through, and build some intelligent webmail interfac…

I disagree. This is a political fight. Technical means can drag the resistance longer, which is helpful, but the political system needs to be put in checks and balances against becoming a police state. There is no substitute of "taking roads and doing peaceful protests" as out of comfort zone they might be. We sometimes fall in love with our methods because that is what _we_ are good at, not what is necessarily the b…

The two fights don't conflict. In fact, they complement each other.

When all email is getting stored in plaintext on NSA computers, it's going to be hard to get the government to give up all that juicy data. Reduce the value of the data they're getting, and it's easier to reach a point where the political heat just isn't worth it to them.

At the same time, the political effort helps prevent new laws that make the technical solutions more difficult. And it helps encourage people to actually use our fancy technical solutions. If ever there were a time when we can get people on board with using crypto, it's now.

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#29

Post by 001sky »

alan_cx wrote: post #26
001sky wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One needs to organize to fight politically. if you cant speak, you cant organize. that's why they are going after e-mail...they are desperate to keep themselves in power...

Blimey, what did we do before email?

Printing press: now digital files, copiers make copies, record metadata of files Telephone: GPS, trackable, recordable, micropohone, imaging system. wirelines rarely used. Snail Mail: every parcel is imaged digitally Cafe, walks, parks: CCTV on every streetcorner, remote acees to all wireless devices Driving: Licenseplate scans (passive) of interstate traffic

MOSAIC.

Re: Groklaw legal site shuts over fears of NSA email snooping

#30

Post by alan_cx »

I hope those who treated me with scorn for suggesting the politicians and business people are effectively blackmailed by the mere existence of NSA type spying can now see it for real.

No direct threat, not conversation, no deals. Just the fear of the knowledge that one is being comprehensively watched, and what "they" might have. This fear is enough to alter behavior, to conform.

Again, at what stage can we describe the US and UK, and their co-conspirators as fascist, police state, oppressive, and so on?

Or, do we have micro targeted oppression? Is that the modern way?

Post reply on HN