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UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

privacyinternational.org

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Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#21

Post by prof_hobart »

Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

>And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either.

I think that may be the effect rather than the cause. Public opinion is shaped to a pretty large degree by what the media tells people to be interested in.

And with the media mostly telling us that it's happening but that's it's not important, it's for our own good and that anyone publishing details about it (like the Guardian) is threatening national security, that's what a lot of people accept as fact.

It makes me angry because this is the exact reason why freedom of the press needs to exist - not to allow papers to publish details of some celeb's romantic life. But it's only the latter that 95% of the press in the UK seem to be prepared to battle to defend.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#22

Post by _k »

Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

Indifference always gets us in trouble.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#23

Post by frameworkHeavy »

7952 wrote: post #12
janthinidae wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We all talk about using SSL everywhere protects people from NSA/GCHQ/... It may prevent script kiddies to use Firesheep but as far as I understand if the NSA/GCHQ has access to any key from any Root CA (which I highly assume) then it doesn't matter at all to the NSA/GCHQ what kind of encryption we use as they can do easily MITM attacks (anyone checking SHA1 from the certificates from a reliable source, whatever this…

Corporate IT departments tend to rely far too much on network level security like this. But if the users machine is compromised in some way network security is completely useless. Even if TLS was completely perfect there would still be vulnerabilities in software that could be attacked on-mass.

Quick tip: En masse, pronounced with an "awww". It's French.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#24

Post by peterlawest »

Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

I consider myself an educated, well-informed person, and I have no problem whatsoever with government surveillance. Like anything, it can be abused, but I don't think that outweighs the benefits.

I think it's sad that it makes you 'angry' that some people simply disagree with you. We have a democracy, and obviously only a minority consider this to be an issue of concern.

If you have a problem with it, stand for election.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#25

Post by spingsprong »

madaxe_again wrote: post #20
Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

Don't forget about "the muslim problem" and the "international islamic conspiracy". I'm sorry to Godwin the thread, but it's pertinent. The push on "british values" (nationalism) and "preventing non-violent extremism" (such doublespeak) and "combatting islam" is fucking terrifying to anyone even vaguely familiar with the events that preceded the holocaust and the second world war. The surveillance state we find ourse…

I suspect something much more mundane.

Politicians love to shout about their successes. Only, this government hasn't really got any to shout about, so they're falling back to the old standby that all governments do in situations like this. Wave the flag and be proud to be British.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#26

Post by duairc »

peterlawest wrote: post #24
Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

I consider myself an educated, well-informed person, and I have no problem whatsoever with government surveillance. Like anything, it can be abused, but I don't think that outweighs the benefits. I think it's sad that it makes you 'angry' that some people simply disagree with you. We have a democracy, and obviously only a minority consider this to be an issue of concern. If you have a problem with it, stand for elect…

> We have a democracy, and obviously only a minority consider this to be an issue of concern. > > If you have a problem with it, stand for election.

There must be a name for this kind of fallacy.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#27

Post by pling »

madaxe_again wrote: post #20
Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

Don't forget about "the muslim problem" and the "international islamic conspiracy". I'm sorry to Godwin the thread, but it's pertinent. The push on "british values" (nationalism) and "preventing non-violent extremism" (such doublespeak) and "combatting islam" is fucking terrifying to anyone even vaguely familiar with the events that preceded the holocaust and the second world war. The surveillance state we find ourse…

This.

I'm a UK resident and I note that the propaganda machine is running on overdrive. The batshit sheep majority (sorry but it's true at least where I live) of the country is almost calling out for anyone with a beard and a turban to be hung and the armed forces are constantly in focus in the media and in public word. If you look around facebook it's terrifying some of the rants you hear yet at the same time these people are slating the Nazis for their prejudice. It's literally:

"Kill all the muslims", "support our boys", "Nazi's bad m'kay".

I will say that none of these people were alive when the Nazis had their gig. Those who were are suspicious and aware of the consequences of thinking and acting like this.

I too am suspicious of anyone who holds a noose.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#28

Post by digitalengineer »

prof_hobart wrote: post #21
Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

>And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. I think that may be the effect rather than the cause. Public opinion is shaped to a pretty large degree by what the media tells people to be interested in. And with the media mostly telling us that it's happening but that's it's not important, it's for our own good and that anyone publishing details about it (like the Guardian) is threatening national…

I just now realized the double-speak of their name, the Guardian. I thought they guarded the public. Silly me.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#29

Post by noir_lord »

peterlawest wrote: post #24
Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

I consider myself an educated, well-informed person, and I have no problem whatsoever with government surveillance. Like anything, it can be abused, but I don't think that outweighs the benefits. I think it's sad that it makes you 'angry' that some people simply disagree with you. We have a democracy, and obviously only a minority consider this to be an issue of concern. If you have a problem with it, stand for elect…

Created 9 minutes ago (as of this post) and has one post.

Doffs tin foil hat.

I see this a lot on a variety of forums whenever topics like this come up.

It would be interesting to do an analysis of the age of the average commenter’s account by topic across popular comment type sites.

Re: UK intelligence forced to reveal secret policy for mass surveillance

#30

Post by aluhut »

peterlawest wrote: post #24
Nursie wrote: post #7

The political silence on this issue is indeed deafening. As was the press silence (other than the Guardian). The press in this country are far more interested in reality tv, political infighting, fanning flames about 'immigrants' and what the royals are up to. And I suspect it's because most of the public don't care either. There are people who would like privacy, who think that GCHQ should be accountable and then th…

I consider myself an educated, well-informed person, and I have no problem whatsoever with government surveillance. Like anything, it can be abused, but I don't think that outweighs the benefits. I think it's sad that it makes you 'angry' that some people simply disagree with you. We have a democracy, and obviously only a minority consider this to be an issue of concern. If you have a problem with it, stand for elect…

What are these benefits?
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