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The NSA: An Inside View

lorensr.me

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Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#61

Post by pera »

lorendsr wrote: post #29
mtgentry wrote: post #19

No offense to OP, but this reads like propaganda to me. It feels like someone at the Pentagon realized they weren't winning the war of the minds of hackers, so they encouraged some of their own to blog about their experiences. I hate to sound like a tin hat wearing conspiracist. I really do. But I wouldn't be surprised if there was some sort of concerted effort by the NSA to encourage a dialogue with hackers on platf…

No offense taken. I was not asked to write this, nor guided in its contents by the government.

Really? why should anyone trust in anything coming from the NSA when you are systematically lying again and again? why should we listen to anything you say when historically, part of your strategy is to try to influence the PoV of society || specifics groups?

Specifically: how are you so sure about what the NSA is doing? in your article you say that the NSA does not do SI on US citizens without a warrant, but how can you really know that if you are just another worker? I don't think you can... but hey, you seem like a smart person so why are you making that kind of statement?

> I was not asked to write this, nor guided in its contents by the government.

I find this hard to believe, especially coming from someone in your area: if there is no way for us to verify this statement, then how relevant can this comment be for us?

Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#62

Post by ad80 »

Important voice in the whole discussion around NSA, but forgive me being suspicious - it comes around the time his Kickstarter campaign is to end...

Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#63

Post by alfiejohn_ »

lorendsr wrote: post #29
mtgentry wrote: post #19

No offense to OP, but this reads like propaganda to me. It feels like someone at the Pentagon realized they weren't winning the war of the minds of hackers, so they encouraged some of their own to blog about their experiences. I hate to sound like a tin hat wearing conspiracist. I really do. But I wouldn't be surprised if there was some sort of concerted effort by the NSA to encourage a dialogue with hackers on platf…

No offense taken. I was not asked to write this, nor guided in its contents by the government.

Did your post have to go through some sort of internal review before you were allowed to publish it? I find it weird that you're allowed to blog, let alone blog about the NSA.

Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#64

Post by intslack »

lorendsr wrote: post #27
andrewcooke wrote: post #6

The NSA is not a law enforcement agency. I am not one either. But I still have to obey the law. Maybe that's not what's implied by that statement? But if not, what on earth is meant (more exactly, what was the author's intent in saying something that seems obvious and irrelevant if taken at face value; what am I expected to infer?)?

I meant that the NSA is only looking at your information if a judge suspects that you are a foreign agent. It will not look at your information to determine whether you have done something else illegal, which is what it would do if it were part of a police state.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/05/us-dea-sod-idUSBRE...

>One current federal prosecutor learned how agents were using SOD tips after a drug agent misled him, the prosecutor told Reuters. In a Florida drug case he was handling, the prosecutor said, a DEA agent told him the investigation of a U.S. citizen began with a tip from an informant. When the prosecutor pressed for more information, he said, a DEA supervisor intervened and revealed that the tip had actually come through the SOD and from an NSA intercept.

Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#65

Post by mythealias »

dmfdmf wrote: post #13

Translation: Trust us, we are the good guys. This blog post does nothing to answer the fundamental questions that the Snowden leaks have raised. This man basically argues that, with few exceptions, everyone that works for the NSA is a true American and a patriot who only has your interests at heart and what is a little spying amongst friends anyway. Follow that with some scary hints about cyber war with nuclear respo…

I think that giving credit to the terrorist, and saying that they have won, is wrong. The kind of paranoia that defense forces have operated under has always been there since WWII. The only thing different now it that people are a lot aware of what could be/is happening.

Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#66

Post by javert »

jkrems wrote: post #45
javert wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a US citizen, I assume foreign countries (esp. China) spy on me. But I don't go around bitching about that. Why? Because the US will protect me. China cannot hurt me. On the other hand, when the US spies on me, I am much more threatened, because nobody can protect me from the US. If the US turns against me (for instance, for supporting the Tea Party), declaring me part of a "violent organization", I'm in real trou…

I think you are missing a point: US (cloud) companies do business with for example European companies/customers. The leaks suggest that all data a non-US customer stores with them is fair game for being snooped by NSA etc. without any judge or due process. This turns "complain about your own country spying on you!" into "Don't do business with an American company if you care for legal protection/are not stupid". But…

> The leaks suggest that all data a non-US customer stores with them is fair game for being snooped by NSA etc. without any judge or due process.

I agree.

> turns "complain about your own country spying on you!" into "Don't do business with an American company if you care for legal protection/are not stupid".

I agree. As a US citizen, I was quite upset when my employer started mandating Gmail use, and this was before the Snowden leaks.

Foreign companies are obliged not to use US cloud services, just as US companies are obliged not to use Chinese ones.

That is all water under the bridge now. There is no going back.

So you are not actually rebutting anything I said.

Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#67

Post by javert »

makomk wrote: post #59
javert wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a US citizen, I assume foreign countries (esp. China) spy on me. But I don't go around bitching about that. Why? Because the US will protect me. China cannot hurt me. On the other hand, when the US spies on me, I am much more threatened, because nobody can protect me from the US. If the US turns against me (for instance, for supporting the Tea Party), declaring me part of a "violent organization", I'm in real trou…

Except that unlike with China, the US is allied with some of the foreign countries spying on you and assisting them in their data collection, and quite likely even using the results of that spying themselves. Likewise, I'm in the UK which is allied with the US and assists them in spying on UK citizens.

And you should be fighting for the UK to break that off, because the UK is your defender.

It doesn't really matter if the US spies on you as long as the UK is your defender. The US doesn't have jurisdiction there.

This is all, really, a political issue. Ultimately, it is about political speech. Everything else you can simply encrypt and secure, and you should.

Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#68

Post by gesman »

So, if I'll meet someone who wanted to work more on personal coding projects and start a company and is making a mayonnaise as his first product - I'll know the guy must be from NSA!

:)

Re: The NSA: An Inside View

#70

Post by rst »

jonknee wrote: post #37

Interesting to get a look at what it's like to be inside the bubble. It's compartmentalized enough that the individual actors can justify their actions by the assumed competence and benevolence of the others. > I didn't test it, but I'm sure there was automated analysis that prevented or flagged use of US selectors. The mental leap here is subtle, but substantial. Since I have been told I can't use US selectors , I a…

What's particularly interesting is that some of the recent disclosures don't seem to be visible inside the bubble. Take this assertion, for instance:

"The NSA copy of my emails won't be viewed by police or FBI investigating me about marijuana use, for instance. Law enforcement might get a search warrant and retrieve a copy from Google, but not from the NSA."

In fact, it's been known for months that the DEA receives intercepts from the NSA in such volume that they have an office devoted to handling them (the DEA's "Special Operations Division"). And as for search warrants, the manuals for that office describe a practice of "parallel construction" which involves, not to put to fine a point on it, lying about the ultimate source of the information they're using, with the clear intent of evading judicial scrutiny.

Details here: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/07/us-dea-irs-idUSBRE...

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