The Security of Our Election Systems • Hacker News Board

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#71

Post by jonathankoren » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 5:31 PM UTC

thaumasiotes wrote: post #28

jonathankoren wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Accurate or not, foreign influence is something to worry about. Let's be honest here. Governments don't release intelligence on foreign leaders in some sort of magnanimous and innocent gesture to help inform the foreign populace. No. They do it for influence. They choose what to release and when. For the sake of argument, let's say that your had evidence that a major candidate for office in a strategically important…

So what? You appear to be defending the idea I originally mocked, that this is a good thing when the New York Times does it and a bad thing when Pravda does it. You won't ever be able to make that argument coherently; all information releases serve the goals (or are intended to) of the person releasing the information, and those goals are never your goals. Why are Russia's US federal policy goals more nefarious than…

I am defending the idea you mocked.

Why does it matter who's releasing the information? Because they're not us. It's that simple. It's same reason why you can talk shit about your proverbial sister, but no one else gets to.

If you don't understand the concepts of national sovereignty and self-determination, I can't help you.

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#72

Post by jonathankoren » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 5:32 PM UTC

wwwdonohue wrote: post #36

jonathankoren wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is about the leaks, is that there's isn't anything there that anyone paying attention didn't already know. Of course DWS was putting the thumb on the scales for Hillary, who schedules something you want people to see on a Saturday night? [0] As far as "corrupted" and "preventing" democratic process where's the evidence? Seriously. What votes were not counted?Where's the voter fraud? I'll tell you. Nowhere.…

"Putting the thumb on the scales" is itself a violation of the DNC's own charter, under which they are obligated to treat every Democratic candidate for president with impartiality and evenhandedness. There was a massive amount of coordination with the Hillary campaign, anti-Bernie stories were crafted and distributed from inside the DNC, and planting audience questions designed to undermine him was floated as an ide…

I'm not saying that DWS and the rest weren't biased. They were. I'm saying that it didn't matter, because of both the strengths and weaknesses of candidates' campaigns, and the fact that biases were pretty minor league.

The reason why I said the Saturday debates were obvious, because they were reported that way at the time.[0] They were opposite NFL playoff games for crying out loud.

[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/12/19/ho...

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#73

Post by krapp » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 5:32 PM UTC

elgabogringo wrote: post #68

Dowwie wrote: post #4

There's a strong moral argument in favor of the DNC leaks: the American people ought to know that its political process was corrupted by powerful actors within its own institutions. Schneier said, "This kind of cyberattack targets the very core of our democratic process. " In this case, though, the attack targeted actors who prevented democratic process. Were we exposed to fictitious narratives intended to advance pr…

If we care about foreign influence, shouldn't we be concerned about all the foreign money the Clinton's have taken? Millions to their foundation (just while she was SoS): https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/foreign-governments-... Millions in speaking fees outside the US (just while she was Sos): http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/bill-doubled-speaking-fees... And it's doubly-ironic how much the left suddenly care…

The subject of this thread is the vulnerability of the networks and IT infrastructure involved with our democratic process, but fair enough.

We should be concerned about all the foreign money the Clintons have taken, and all the foreign money Trump has taken. We should be concerned about foreign influence in our elections in general, regardless of which party it benefits.

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#74

Post by jonathankoren » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 6:05 PM UTC

chillwaves wrote: post #57

jonathankoren wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is about the leaks, is that there's isn't anything there that anyone paying attention didn't already know. Of course DWS was putting the thumb on the scales for Hillary, who schedules something you want people to see on a Saturday night? [0] As far as "corrupted" and "preventing" democratic process where's the evidence? Seriously. What votes were not counted?Where's the voter fraud? I'll tell you. Nowhere.…

You comment sounds a lot like the reaction to Snowden. There is a difference between allegations and evidence. I hope you can understand that difference. By the way, controlling the media is a form of corruption.

There's a difference between mountains and molehills. I hope you can understand that difference.

By the way, controlling the media has been intrinsic to politics since drum signals.

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#75

Post by thaumasiotes » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 6:15 PM UTC

jonathankoren wrote: post #71

thaumasiotes wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what? You appear to be defending the idea I originally mocked, that this is a good thing when the New York Times does it and a bad thing when Pravda does it. You won't ever be able to make that argument coherently; all information releases serve the goals (or are intended to) of the person releasing the information, and those goals are never your goals. Why are Russia's US federal policy goals more nefarious than…

I am defending the idea you mocked. Why does it matter who's releasing the information? Because they're not us. It's that simple. It's same reason why you can talk shit about your proverbial sister, but no one else gets to. If you don't understand the concepts of national sovereignty and self-determination, I can't help you.

Your argument here is not compatible with your argument two levels up. You've retreated from the idea that foreigners talking to us is bad by any metric, and gone to the more defensible (?) idea that it makes you personally indignant.

Good luck.

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#76

Post by rpgmaker » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 8:07 PM UTC

brudgers wrote: post #48

A political party's computers are not part of the "critical election infrastructure" unless the party [or parties] has become the state. Exceptionalism is political crack. States seek to influence elections in other states. Always have, always will. Having a candidate aligned explicitly aligned with the interests of a foreign state is quite common in Americas. As is having a foreign state explicitly align themselves…

Not to mention that the US has a particularly awful history of subverting other countries' elections.

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#77

Post by rpgmaker » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 8:16 PM UTC

mtbcoder wrote: post #27

chvid wrote: post #14

Why is this not flag killed like all the other (politically biased) articles on the DNC hack?

Where is the political bias on Schneier's part here? Perhaps you simply just disagree with his position?

Are we supposed to ignore that the media is 100% unified in stopping Trump from becoming president? I'm against Trump (who I believe to be a fascist and psychologically unstable) but I'm not going to pretend that it is honest to say that Trump literally asked Russia to hack Hillary's emails. I watched the entire press conference btw. If the election pitted Sanders against Bush the media would not hesitate to be this dishonest when attacking Sanders, it just so happens that by far the biggest outsider this year happens to be the biggest asshole too.

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#78

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 8:19 PM UTC

elgabogringo wrote: post #68

Dowwie wrote: post #4

There's a strong moral argument in favor of the DNC leaks: the American people ought to know that its political process was corrupted by powerful actors within its own institutions. Schneier said, "This kind of cyberattack targets the very core of our democratic process. " In this case, though, the attack targeted actors who prevented democratic process. Were we exposed to fictitious narratives intended to advance pr…

If we care about foreign influence, shouldn't we be concerned about all the foreign money the Clinton's have taken? Millions to their foundation (just while she was SoS): https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/foreign-governments-... Millions in speaking fees outside the US (just while she was Sos): http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/bill-doubled-speaking-fees... And it's doubly-ironic how much the left suddenly care…

[deleted]

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#79

Post by rpgmaker » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 8:22 PM UTC

troiter wrote: post #32

What influence? It's called exposing lies and corruption within the DNC. If anything, I praise Putin for it. Let's not lose perspective of reality thinking about tech security.

There's no reason why you can't do both: worry that another country could influence the electoral process via hacking and see the value in having this information exposed. The media and the Democrats only want people to focus on the former.

Re: The Security of Our Election Systems

#80

Post by xj9 » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 8:35 PM UTC

elgabogringo wrote: post #66

Dowwie wrote: post #4

There's a strong moral argument in favor of the DNC leaks: the American people ought to know that its political process was corrupted by powerful actors within its own institutions. Schneier said, "This kind of cyberattack targets the very core of our democratic process. " In this case, though, the attack targeted actors who prevented democratic process. Were we exposed to fictitious narratives intended to advance pr…

Funny that the left all of a sudden cares about security in our elections. Try to implement the most basic security that is common even in poor foreign countries, such as an ID requirement and the left is up in arms. The truth is, the left doesn't care about election security, it just cares about the left.

What left? DNC is to the left of GOP, at best, but not left in any real sense.