Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

amazon.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 459 posts

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#81

Post by frittig »

wil421 wrote: post #37
gwd wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He never had to pay a single bit of tax. I know a few people in Europe with higher salaries and they have never paid a cent either. He didn't say pay taxes; he said file taxes. Every year I have to tell the US government how much I made, and then explain why I don't owe them any money (i.e., already paid tax on it to the UK). It's a stressful hassle even if you don't end up owing anything.

I fully understand. I’m asking if you ever had to pay taxes? Plenty of people complain about filing paper work but I’ve never met anyone who owed anything.

I had to pay. I have lived abroad for several decades and when I decided to do some independent contracting I realized that now I have to pay social security. Also, while I generally pay more taxes than an American, every once in a while there is a tax break that I get that Americans don't. In that case I have to pay that amount to the US.

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#82

Post by davidw »

wil421 wrote: post #37
gwd wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He never had to pay a single bit of tax. I know a few people in Europe with higher salaries and they have never paid a cent either. He didn't say pay taxes; he said file taxes. Every year I have to tell the US government how much I made, and then explain why I don't owe them any money (i.e., already paid tax on it to the UK). It's a stressful hassle even if you don't end up owing anything.

I fully understand. I’m asking if you ever had to pay taxes? Plenty of people complain about filing paper work but I’ve never met anyone who owed anything.

You end up paying quite a bit to owe 0, because it's not easy to find a competent accountant who can, say, understand your Italian tax returns, and then file in the US based on those.

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#83

Post by roasm »

Noxmiles wrote: post #9

Does anyone know how much money he gets from every book / ebook? I think buying it is, at least for some people, very much a support Snowden thought.

The publisher Metropolitan Books looks like it's part of Macmillan so they're likely a traditional publisher, which suggests he got a pretty healthy advance on the book because of his fame.

I would also guess that even if he sold enough books to earn out the advance, his take on each incremental book is really small as the publisher took most of the financial risk with the advance itself.

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#84

Post by olegious »

jonahbenton wrote: post #6

I really only want read the story told by Snowden's bank accounts and use of cash. Pretty sure this isn't that.

Not sure why you're being downvoted. Even if I don't believe that Snowden is a Russian agent, I think that is a fair question. The point you make about the sources and uses of cash telling the truth about someone is a great one not only within the context of Snowden.

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#85

Post by davidw »

stef25 wrote: post #69
typenil wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other countries that tax worldwide income: Libya, North Korea, Eritrea and the Philippines. Great company to be in. You could call it ridiculous because it’s so unusual. But the reason most countries don’t do it is that taxes are a supposed to be a deal - the government forces you to hand over money and pays for services you use in return. Expats - they aren’t using those services. And your point about tax evader…

> The other countries that tax worldwide income When I declare my taxes here in Belgium the form always asks me if I have any income / assets abroad (I don't). I guess "tax worldwide income" refers to "if you also live abroad" ?

If you're a Belgian citizen, and move to, say, Canada, you'd file taxes in Canada and that'd be the end of it. If I, as a US citizen,move to Canada, I'd have to file and pay Canadian taxes, and file - and maybe pay - US taxes in addition.

What you're talking about is if, living in Belgium, you have income from other countries that needs to be reported, which seems fair enough - after all, you live and pay taxes in Belgium, not those other countries.

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#86

Post by mises »

Saus wrote: post #10
csunbird wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Offtopic: You were faster than my comment! I understand the Yubikey is popular but I do not understand the why the Wi-Fi dongle is popular. Any ideas?

I've bought an Alfa adapter 10+ years ago because you can use them in promiscuous mode. So you can snoop wifi traffic, listen for handshakes and doing so crack WEP/WPA (wifi) encryption. Things probably haven't changed..

They have a little. 5ghz is more common, so you won't get any thing there. WPA2 is significantly harder to crack, and I usually do it on GPU with pyrit or hashcat-ocl and a wordlist. WPA3 is out now, too, and I'm there aren't really any well-established procedures for it yet.

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#88

Post by davidw »

thelittleone wrote: post #66
wrkronmiller wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Devils-advocate: The U.S. government still provides expats services such as the State Department, potentially U.S. government intervention to help evacuate citizens from troubled areas etc...

So does Australia whilst not taxing on worldwide income.

And Canada, Italy, Germany, Norway, New Zealand, France, UK, etc... etc.... do as well without the silly system the US has in place.

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#89

Post by eeZah7Ux »

We were called "paranoid lunatics" even when we started speaking about ECHELON in the '90ies.

Same with the clipper chip. Same with TPM/DRM/ME. Same with Internet centralization.

It's worth asking why the general public keeps trusting authorities and distrusts techies, even those among us with a career in security.

Re: Edward Snowden: Permanent Record

#90

Post by mises »

Noxmiles wrote: post #15
csunbird wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Offtopic: You were faster than my comment! I understand the Yubikey is popular but I do not understand the why the Wi-Fi dongle is popular. Any ideas?

Someone know a good 2.4/5.0 GHz wifi adapter for these kind of things?

The Alfa AWUS1900 is a nice model, but if you want something cheaper (and will put up with 2.4ghz-only), the TP-Link TL-WN722N is cheap, but get the v1 chipset! It's the best-supported with drivers on linux. Oh yeah, and you will probably need to do monitor mode on linux.
Post reply on HN