U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#31

Post by temp453463343 » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:15 AM UTC

beloch wrote: post #18

After SOPA, it became clear that the U.S. info sector could no longer neglect its lobbying efforts in Washington. The MPAA and RIAA represent comparatively tiny (in terms of revenue) interests but were only thwarted by the unpredictable (and unreliable) intervention of the public. Now this. The info sector has become big industry and is going to play a correspondingly big role in U.S. politics going forward. They're…

Is the EFF really strapped for cash? If their budget was 2 or 3 times bigger, would they really be able to do a lot more?

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#32

Post by untog » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:16 AM UTC

jrockway wrote: post #22

flyt wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Hard working, innovative technology companies are losing out to foreign companies due to this unaccountable, big government program. It's time to reign in this anticompetitive NSA behavior and let American business compete on a level playing field." *formatted for a talking head to use on FOX News/MSNBC/CNN

Can't the NSA spy on foreign operations without any legal oversight, as opposed to spying on domestic operations with "oversight" from a secret court? Both are bad.

Oh, sure. But they can't legally compel foreign companies to give them data.

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#33

Post by bigiain » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:20 AM UTC

deegles wrote: post #19

computer wrote: post #15

I too have switched my personal things and most of our company away from the US. I have helped my friends move to non-US chat services and/or use OTR. I will spend my money on secure (from snooping and the operator) encrypted services outside the US instead. Seeing that we have no rights in the US whatsoever, it is ridiculous to store anything in the United States that could be used in any way at any point in the fut…

Honest question, what makes you think that you will have more rights/privacy by hosting somewhere else? It's been my impression that there has been (comparatively) little backlash within the US regarding foreign data acquisition. Maybe all this attention on the NSA's activities will be the trigger for other countries to create or ramp-up their own data snooping efforts.

I'm not the OP, but I'll add my two bits here anyway…

I'm moving things off US hosted services - but at the same time I'm also ramping up my privacy protections as well.

For example, I'm changing from using Dropbox to using EncFS encrypted data stored on JottaCloud. I'm not _relying_ on Norwegian based storage to be any less at risk from the Norwegian state security service than Dropbox(/Amazon) data stored in the US - but while it's possible that the NSA might have crypto attacks or hardware/software backdoors that work against my OS and/or EncFS/GPG - there's a _much_ lower chance that the Norwegians have that (or that the US shares those attacks with Norway).

(I'm also using BTSync to get "cloud-like" multi-device file sync without needing to rely an _any_ cloud provider. The closed source nature of BTSync doesn't fill me with joy though - I'm experimenting with Tahoe/LAFS, but I'm not prepared to put in the amount of work required to give me access to data stored that way on my phone/iPad…)

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#34

Post by thaumaturgy » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:20 AM UTC

Incidentally, I just had a new customer call to ask about hosting services, because he needs a new mail account and, in his words, "can't trust Google after all the recent news." This guy is an attorney and very far from the tech echo-chamber.

I've got a pretty small business in a small town, so when I start hearing about stuff like this from customers, it's usually a pretty good indication that it's gone mainstream.

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#35

Post by j-g-faustus » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:27 AM UTC

deegles wrote: post #19

computer wrote: post #15

I too have switched my personal things and most of our company away from the US. I have helped my friends move to non-US chat services and/or use OTR. I will spend my money on secure (from snooping and the operator) encrypted services outside the US instead. Seeing that we have no rights in the US whatsoever, it is ridiculous to store anything in the United States that could be used in any way at any point in the fut…

Honest question, what makes you think that you will have more rights/privacy by hosting somewhere else? It's been my impression that there has been (comparatively) little backlash within the US regarding foreign data acquisition. Maybe all this attention on the NSA's activities will be the trigger for other countries to create or ramp-up their own data snooping efforts.

Two reasons for non-Americans:

- the snooping is explicitly targeting foreigners. In USA I'm a foreigner, by hosting in my own country I have at least the protection of being a citizen.

- if I don't like the snooping my own government does, I can call my representatives, vote for "less snooping" political candidates, start lobbying etc. In a foreign country like USA I have no rights or leverage whatsoever.

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#36

Post by bigiain » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:28 AM UTC

vmarsy wrote: post #13

whyme wrote: post #8

What's surprising is the lack of alternative services (even outside the US) that clearly state any service they provide will in fact shut down before not being transparent. I have cancelled quite a few services over the last few months, but struggle to find real alternatives. Also, I doubt even transparency in the aggregate would be enough to make me go back into US based offerings.

Take a look at http://www.ovh.co.uk/cloud/public-cloud.xml EC2-like instances are supposed to be released at the end of august.

I notice they've now got a US based datacenter. With my overly-paranoid hat on, I wonder how much that places their entire business under risk of NSA pressure?

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#37

Post by stfu » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:30 AM UTC

deegles wrote: post #19

computer wrote: post #15

I too have switched my personal things and most of our company away from the US. I have helped my friends move to non-US chat services and/or use OTR. I will spend my money on secure (from snooping and the operator) encrypted services outside the US instead. Seeing that we have no rights in the US whatsoever, it is ridiculous to store anything in the United States that could be used in any way at any point in the fut…

Honest question, what makes you think that you will have more rights/privacy by hosting somewhere else? It's been my impression that there has been (comparatively) little backlash within the US regarding foreign data acquisition. Maybe all this attention on the NSA's activities will be the trigger for other countries to create or ramp-up their own data snooping efforts.

Just by the way bureaucracy works you can make it a lot more inconvenient for them by using services of a bunch of different countries just to put your profile together.

By rotating free email providers such as mail.ru, free.fr, and so on you can pretty much create a bureaucrat's nightmare - assuming of cause the unlikely cause that this is the weakest link in the chain.

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#38

Post by josh2600 » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:31 AM UTC

beloch wrote: post #18

After SOPA, it became clear that the U.S. info sector could no longer neglect its lobbying efforts in Washington. The MPAA and RIAA represent comparatively tiny (in terms of revenue) interests but were only thwarted by the unpredictable (and unreliable) intervention of the public. Now this. The info sector has become big industry and is going to play a correspondingly big role in U.S. politics going forward. They're…

Just pointing this out, Telecom is part of the info sector and they've been lobbying forever.

I would say that google, Facebook, Microsoft and apple (prop 8) all lobby in some form. I mean Marissa Mayer had Obama over for dinner during the height of the campaign (she was hosting a fundraiser with her husband).

My point is this: we don't need more lobbyists so much as we need leadership. Zuck tried and has likely failed. In recent years I've started to think Ron Conway might be an interesting candidate to consider; he certainly holds enough sway in the valley.

Food for thought.

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#39

Post by rodgerd » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:35 AM UTC

s_q_b wrote: post #29

beloch wrote: post #18

After SOPA, it became clear that the U.S. info sector could no longer neglect its lobbying efforts in Washington. The MPAA and RIAA represent comparatively tiny (in terms of revenue) interests but were only thwarted by the unpredictable (and unreliable) intervention of the public. Now this. The info sector has become big industry and is going to play a correspondingly big role in U.S. politics going forward. They're…

We need a well-organized lobbying effort to support the interests of United States internet companies. Those survey numbers are actually astounding. The most surprising thing about lobbying and donation efforts is that they aren't really all that expensive. All it takes is a few hundred thousand to a million to swing a tight election. The amounts aren't that large. Maybe a crowdfunding campaign for a Free Internet PA…

From my perspective outside the States, there is already government support, which is the full-court press US ambassadorial staff have been running in Australia and New Zealand to categorise privacy and data sovereignty laws as unfair and illegitimate anti-competition laws whose sole purpose is to prevent companies like Amazon gutting the local IT markets.

I imagine they are running the same line in Europe.

I wonder what Amazon's relationship with the US government is like?

Re: U.S. cloud firms face backlash from NSA spy programs

#40

Post by tteam » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 2:49 AM UTC

At Tonido, we got a following mail from a customer a week back.

" We are sorry but recent developments and news in regard to the NSA PRISM program and the Patriot Act have made us decide no longer to use any cloud solution developed or hosted by a US company. You can remove our information from your database."

Even though, Our Tonido software is a self hosted one and totally orthogonal to Google Drive or dropbox in principle and in operation, we do get the shaft unfairly.