Earlier quoted context omitted.
Gotta love this site.
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I think they were being serious. In the sense that it’s cool that there’s always someone with personal experience chiming in here.
Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
291–300 of 393 posts
Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#292The NSA’s Upstream program primarily targeted foreign communications under the authority of Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act. However, it also incidentally collected data from U.S. citizens, particularly when their communications were intercepted while in contact with foreign targets.
The court cases were thrown out because of congressional action, as they should be, because the entire purpose of the NSA is to spy on foreigners. Thus these programs were legal and this whistleblowing was not, in fact, whistleblowing at all, just leaks of classified information.
Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#293This is the sentence I was looking for: > While we were able to use his evidence to make some change, both EFF and Mark were ultimately let down by Congress and the Courts, which have refused to take the steps necessary to end the mass spying even after Edward Snowden provided even more evidence of it in 2013. Do you have to be a cynic to pretty much have expected this?
No, you're not a cynic. The EFF takes exquisite pains to hide from you the fact that these programs spied on foreigners, which is the job of the NSA. Thus, they are necessary and proper, and perfectly legal.
The EFF is a propaganda platform. You shouldn't take its claims at face value.
Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#294This is the sentence I was looking for: > While we were able to use his evidence to make some change, both EFF and Mark were ultimately let down by Congress and the Courts, which have refused to take the steps necessary to end the mass spying even after Edward Snowden provided even more evidence of it in 2013. Do you have to be a cynic to pretty much have expected this?
No, you're not a cynic. The EFF takes exquisite pains to hide from you the fact that these programs spied on foreigners, which is the job of the NSA. Thus, they are necessary and proper, and perfectly legal. The EFF is a propaganda platform. You shouldn't take its claims at face value.
Foriegners like the US citizen spouses and (ex)girlfriends of NSA employees?
https://www.reuters.com/article/world/uk/nsa-staff-used-spy-...
Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#295This is the sentence I was looking for: > While we were able to use his evidence to make some change, both EFF and Mark were ultimately let down by Congress and the Courts, which have refused to take the steps necessary to end the mass spying even after Edward Snowden provided even more evidence of it in 2013. Do you have to be a cynic to pretty much have expected this?
No, you're not a cynic. The EFF takes exquisite pains to hide from you the fact that these programs spied on foreigners, which is the job of the NSA. Thus, they are necessary and proper, and perfectly legal. The EFF is a propaganda platform. You shouldn't take its claims at face value.
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Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#296Earlier quoted context omitted.
Upthread, we have: > Thank goodness he [was more willing to betray his position for moral reasons] than the "I was just following orders" crowd. We know from WW2 that "I was just following orders" is not a legitimate excuse to help facilitate grave atrocities, Which dilutes to this when challenged: > he didn't oppose [the invation of Ukraine] for the same reason very few other Russians opposed it. Those perspectives…
> Those perspectives both can't be correct! Uh, sure they can: he saw an opportunity where he could make a difference and bring a program to light where the NSA was otherwise blatantly lying to Congress and the American people, and he took it. There is nothing he can or could do to stop the invasion of Ukraine. Which is to say, he didn't merely oppose US crimes. He brought them to light. Everyone already knows about…
Exactly this. His original revelations were shocking to his audience; the Ukrainian invasion is already almost-universally condemned among the same. His “speaking out” against it would be pure virtue signalling, not a single mind would be changed or informed by it.
Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#297Damn. I don't know if this started the whole movement or whatever you'd call it for this push towards privacy and the general public knowing about it, but it helped a lot. Before him releasing info about room 641A and whatever else, there really wasn't definitive evidence of any government spying and tampering, and either with the intention of starting this movement or simply letting people know, he was a big push in…
> started the whole movement or whatever you'd call it for this push towards privacy I don't really like this framing because it makes it sound like if you care for privacy you are some form of fringe advocate. We should always try to reframe: Would you be ok with government employees or law enforcement indiscriminately opening your letters? Ask any senior and the answer is a clear no. So why are we discussing this a…
You can make this work in the other direction:
"Would you be ok with government employees or law enforcement indiscriminately opening the letters of illegal immigrants?"
You'd immediately get the answer yes. Of course, in order to find the illegal immigrant letters they have to open _all_ of the letters.
People will give law enforcement huge amounts of power because they think it will be used against groups they don't like.
Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#298Earlier quoted context omitted.
I do not want my data included in the dataset. "We're not looking at it, pinky swear!" rings hollow.
Why would an analyst at the NSA be looking at your communications data? It's a bit like the police getting a search warrant to look around your home. If there's no legitimate reason to do it, like having reasonable suspicion of a crime that requires investigation, then they're not going to.
Setting aside the legality/morality/whatever of the data collection itself, you seem to place a lot of faith in the NSA’s ability to keep that data private.
Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#299Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died
#300This is the sentence I was looking for: > While we were able to use his evidence to make some change, both EFF and Mark were ultimately let down by Congress and the Courts, which have refused to take the steps necessary to end the mass spying even after Edward Snowden provided even more evidence of it in 2013. Do you have to be a cynic to pretty much have expected this?
No, you're not a cynic. The EFF takes exquisite pains to hide from you the fact that these programs spied on foreigners, which is the job of the NSA. Thus, they are necessary and proper, and perfectly legal. The EFF is a propaganda platform. You shouldn't take its claims at face value.
Let’s not confuse the fact that they are only legally allowed to spy on foreigners, with what they actually do.
I have no idea how you effectively filter mass wiretaps in fibre raw data and exclude americans. It’s impossible to not catch some/lots of domestic data as well..