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New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

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Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#221

Post by TeMPOraL »

rhizome wrote: post #138
krapp wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, I doubt many people (including myself) with an opinion either way actually know what they're talking about. The expert pool for knowledge about high-level classified government hacking is probably pretty small, even on Hacker News. It's politics, and politics hits people in the lizard brain and short-circuits their ability to think rationally.

That's pretty condescending. How many sports fans know how to be a pro athlete or manage a team? How many critics of government, "know what they're talking about," by your standard?

It only reinforces OP's point. I don't see sports fans discussions productive in any way.

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#222

Post by new299 »

koonsolo wrote: post #196
alextgordon wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What the US is doing is extraordinary, mainly because it is the only country with the resources to run the operation that it's running, but also because everybody seems to be infected with fear. If we were talking about Georgia, or Israel, or Ukraine, or Japan, I would understand the fear. But the USA has no enemies, there are no threats. It's a tragic case of paranoia.

> there are no threats. It's a tragic case of paranoia. Unless, of course, you have a non-US company competing with a US company, then you are targeted. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON#Concerns "In the early 1990s, the U.S. National Security Agency intercepted the communications between the European aerospace company Airbus and the Saudi Arabian national airline. In 1994, Airbus lost a $6 billion contract with S…

Fascinating. Here's the Economist reference (one of the sources cited in the Wikipedia article):

"According to a European Parliament report, published in 2001, America's National Security Agency (NSA) intercepted faxes and phone calls between Airbus, Saudi Arabian Airlines and the Saudi government in early 1994. The NSA found that Airbus agents were offering bribes to a Saudi official to secure a lion's share for Airbus in modernising Saudi Arabian Airlines' fleet."

It would be interesting to see the European Parliament report, if anyone has a reference.

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#223

Post by alecco »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #219
alecco wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, Obama and US congress made it clear we foreign people are just fair game for targeting. At least I'm lucky not to live in a country where targeted assassinations are going on. Also, it's pretty obvious terrorism is an excuse. The main reason is power and control. Corporate espionage and controlling US-unfriendly political movements is very likely the main goal.

> Also, it's pretty obvious terrorism is an excuse. Terrorism is indeed very real, and is happening all the time. Hundreds of acts of terror have been committed in the years since 9/11, resulting in deaths of thousands of civilians, including hundreds of children. They those acts have pretty much 0 media coverage, and no one is doing anything to stop them. The US is free to keep on terrorizing civilian populations ar…

[Edit: I misread your comment]

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#224

Post by ramrunner800 »

thefreeman wrote: post #172

The NSA should just leak documents showing all of the other governments doing this stuff so we can move on from the Anti US/UK circle jerk. Seriously if you think your government hasn't invested serious time and money in digital subterfuge you are living in a dream world and need to wake up.

This.

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#225

Post by TeMPOraL »

alecco wrote: post #223
TeMPOraL wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, it's pretty obvious terrorism is an excuse. Terrorism is indeed very real, and is happening all the time. Hundreds of acts of terror have been committed in the years since 9/11, resulting in deaths of thousands of civilians, including hundreds of children. They those acts have pretty much 0 media coverage, and no one is doing anything to stop them. The US is free to keep on terrorizing civilian populations ar…

[Edit: I misread your comment]

They're deaths nonetheless. In case my previous comment wasn't clear, let me say it directly - the USGOV is terrorizing the world and then uses fear of retaliation to push for more domestic security measures.

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#226

Post by TeMPOraL »

happyscrappy wrote: post #220
TeMPOraL wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, it's pretty obvious terrorism is an excuse. Terrorism is indeed very real, and is happening all the time. Hundreds of acts of terror have been committed in the years since 9/11, resulting in deaths of thousands of civilians, including hundreds of children. They those acts have pretty much 0 media coverage, and no one is doing anything to stop them. The US is free to keep on terrorizing civilian populations ar…

Who do you think is going to stop them? The US can do what ever they want because Europe permanently has its head up its ass.

I don't know. The EU seems to be more concerned about not falling apart right now. But then again, I was hoping the people of US would notice and maybe tell their government that they don't want to be citizens of the biggest terrorist state on the planet?

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#227

Post by ramrunner800 »

iamedward wrote: post #72
tosser002 wrote: post #19

I can understand the support of Snowden for blowing the whistle on domestic spying, but how is this defensible?

I am glad for any document that has been leaked. Although we might not be able to see the whole picture yet it made one thing clear: the US government is at the same moral level as countries like Russia, North Korea or the Iran to me. They do neither respect the privacy of their citizens nor the privacy of any other person in the world. They might have some moral concepts that are a little bit more close to mine as a…

Good to know you see reading your mail as equivalent to executing people for their sexuality, interning hundreds of thousands in labor camps, and jailing all who dare oppose you. That definitely doesn't devalue the lives of all those people or reveal you as hysterically self-important.

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#228

Post by junto »

I'm pretty late to the party here but there are some fascinating parallels between the USG's actions in the physical world, as in the digital one.

First to USG has made a concerted and successful attempts to place secret digital strongholds and black sites across the globe, including some 'behind the enemy lines' so to speak. In the physical world these are the equivalent to CIA black sites and safe houses, from which you can attack and spy on the enemy, feed in extra weaponry to partisans and rebels (similar to the CIA Benghazi compound, sorry 'consulate', sorry 'embassy'.

The NSA has all these smart dangerous and arguably immoral minds employed to defend the digital borders of the US. But in truth these minds are busier establishing secret pathways through the digital trenchlines in order to have a definive and effective advantage when the cyberwar comes (which of course they are actively encouraging to validate their position, historical actions and future funding).

At the same time they are making a concerted effort to make sure that the security protocols everyone uses are undermined and backdoored. In effect they are making sure that the digital nuclear weapons held by their enemies aren't going to get in the air when the time comes.

Through strong encryption we could make sure that we have the digital equivalent of mutually assured security, but as ever the US isn't interested in this, because the reality is that the military industrial compound aims to make billions of dollars from the industry.

In a world where all communications and hardware devices were secure, they wouldn't make any money. A secure, stable and safe world just isn't profitable.

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#229

Post by [deleted] »

pa7ch wrote: post #30

Looking at the comments in support of the NSA here makes me suspect an astroturfing campaign is happening. Edit: I should add that my suspicion came from noticing that the vast majority of the comments when this was first posted seemed aligned in favor of the NSA's mission. It wasn't the presence of pro-NSA comments that was interesting but rather that these opinions were the overwhelming majority. This is, of course…

[deleted]

Re: New Snowden Docs Indicate Scope of NSA Preparations for Cyber Battle

#230

Post by happyscrappy »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #226
happyscrappy wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who do you think is going to stop them? The US can do what ever they want because Europe permanently has its head up its ass.

I don't know. The EU seems to be more concerned about not falling apart right now. But then again, I was hoping the people of US would notice and maybe tell their government that they don't want to be citizens of the biggest terrorist state on the planet?

I am sure ISIS and al Qaeda feel they are being terrorized and Americans fully support these operations. Pakistan and Yemen help with these missions because they want them eradicated. Europeans criticize while not realizing these operation are run in large part from Europe. As long as the governments of Europe do what the U.S. says the opinion of their citizens can be ignored.
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