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Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

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Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iran has their terrorist group proxies throughout the region. I think there's some truth to this, although the actions of some truly rogue terrorist groups probably get blamed on Iran because it's been the zeitgeist for a few decades to find reasons to attack Iran. Whatever the case, the current Iran regime hasn't given nuclear material, chemical weapons, or biological weapons to these terror groups. If the current I…

America and Friends. And by that i include russia and china, because even they care about other countries not having nukes. If/when the regime falls nobody will be able to stop them. Just look at Syria.

How will America and Friends secure the nuclear material? Boots on the ground?

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#442

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like saying that russia is worse off after the collapse of communism and attributing that to capitalism.

It's true, because that system worked for a few generations of people. A sudden change, even for a theoretically better system, can't make things better for people. Now we can see how much worse things became. Russia is completely deranged state at the moment, much much worse than Iran.

Communism never worked. People just survived it for a few generations. Who can say what europe would look like today if the Soviet union hadn't collapsed in 1991?

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#443
post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i don't get that. Saddam Hussain was a genocidal, fascist lunatic. The world is certainly a better place with him gone. Even if America didn't handle the subsequent occupation too well, i would argue (and you are free to disagree) that Iraq was still better off. But an American occupation isn't even on the table. Nobody is interested in that. The most anyone wants at the moment is for the US to drop a MOAB on fordo a…

opinion like this can only come from someone who have lived a life of privilege, thousands mils away from systematic violence or hunger someone in a war torn country constantly have to face. For an average individual going about their day, lack of political freedom is a 100x better option than lack of food or security that Iraq (or Libya or Afghanistan) went through.

>For an average individual going about their day, lack of political freedom is a 100x better option than lack of food or security

I couldn't agree with you more. I can think of at least one excellent example of this.

But in the case of Iraq there is no question in my mind that deposing saddam was the right thing to do.

If anything the person i was replying to was lecturing op, apparently an actual Iranian, about why American involvement is bad for him.

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

America and Friends. And by that i include russia and china, because even they care about other countries not having nukes. If/when the regime falls nobody will be able to stop them. Just look at Syria.

How will America and Friends secure the nuclear material? Boots on the ground?

just a quick raid. The first thing to collapse would be the armed forces. It would be like stealing candy from a child.

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#445
post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is quite different than Iraq. We know Iran has many sites were they are developing nuclear technology, sites that they not only do they not let inspections happen, but that are literally buried deep in the ground. We also know they are acquiring or have acquired the technology to enrich to weapons grade, and they themselves have said they will continue to enrich beyond what a civilian program needs. In o…

So the intelligence community doesn't know as much as what you heard on TV?

I watch TV for entertainment, not news I read from different and often conflicting sources for information, for whatever that is worth I draw my own conclusions, for whatever they are worth, which sometimes change over time

I believe that Iran is and has been trying very hard to produce enough enriched uranium to make a bomb. I do not know how close they are to an actual bomb, but I also do not believe the technical know how is beyond them, they have smart people, funding, and a technology infrastructure to make it happen. The hard part is the enriched uranium.

I also do not believe that Iran getting close to a bomb is the real reason for Israel's current offensive. Neither do I believe that Israel "acted alone", the US is complicit. Neither do I believe that Hamas and Hezbollah acted alone, Iran is complicit. The past 20 months has always been about Israel/Iran and US/Russia/China.

You may believe differently.

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#446

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just a lie. I personally know somebody who worked at meta and they had a whole set of teams dedicated to building tools for governments to mass-export data based on their queries Now I don't know the exact details of which governments had which access (was it just for warrants, which nations, what was the line between actual terrorist versus persecuting journalists), but there was absolutely bulk export and t…

Isn't it more likely that Meta has been infiltrated by Mossad, just as they no doubt have by other intelligence services and they use these insiders to exfiltrate location data on specific targets?

Sandberg herself does teary, falsehood ridden war propaganda videos for Israel, these days.

Microsoft shared data early on with IDF to help target their users (would have to check their ToS to see if there's a clause for that there).

I doubt there's any need to hide anything inside these kinds of companies. Leaders there likely believe they're doing the right thing helping "the good cause" by supporting extrajudicial executions of people. At worst they'll have to kick out employees who'll raise their voices, like they already did many times. No biggie.

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#447
post #49
post #44

I'm surprised reading that the Iranian's regime concerns are centered on WhatsApp sharing information with Israel. It is much more likely that WhatsApp have 0-day vulnerabilities used by the Mossad to gain the info than WhatsApp actively sharing it.

> Iran banned WhatsApp and Google Play in 2022 during mass protests against the government So more than fearing Israel, they actually fear the public that has an encrypted communication channel that can't be tapped by their police. Explains a lot.

Or it's an issue for multiple reasons at once.

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#448

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gaza and West Bank as Palestinian territory. That means that Israel would have to retreat to its 1967 borders.

There was no "Palestinian territory" in the 1967 map. Gaza was part of Egypt, the West Bank was part of Jordan. But neither Egypt nor Jordan want anything to do with them now because of the internal instability it would inevitably result in.

Regardless of other borders, Israel would retreat back to its 1967 borders. That is what they are saying.

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#449

Why isn't this flagged? Surely this is politics.

Politics, yes, but:

1. Politics has been getting more freedom here lately, especially if it's the first story about something new. This is, as far as I can see, the first story about this.

2. The story has an interesting technical component, about encryption, privacy, and tracking - things that a lot of HN users care about.

3. It mostly hasn't deteriorated into a flamefest.

Re: Iran asks its people to delete WhatsApp from their devices

#450
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you read around their points, it sounds like they track general location, log group messages, and provide specific information on request to a government.

Meta can also just lie about it. If they were secretly granting backdoor root access to some NSA spooks, like Microsoft did with PRISM or AT&T did with 641A, most likely no one would find out, so, there'd be zero actual downside to simply lying.

Palantir, Meta and OpenAI just had executives commissioned as lieutenant colonels in the US armed forces. They are defacto extensions of the US government now.

It is rather shocking seeing how rapidly the US is shifting from all of its historic norms. Trump sees the US as a "store" where he dictates the terms, he directly has control over US Steel after the Nippon Steel "takeover" -- straight out of the communist central control dictums -- and now US major corporations are embedded in the US military.

It is insane. This is stuff people accused China of for time eternal but apparently it was taken as a good lesson to learn from.

But absolutely no one outside the US -- whether enemies or allies -- should trust anything from US corporations now. The country has fallen.

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