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Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

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Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#81

Post by motohagiography »

A lot of influential people were quietly radicalized by Klein's disclosures and they took that forward in their ventures, careers, and lives. Change takes time, and almost two decades later, I think we are seeing the results of what those early voices in the wilderness were calling out.

I hope on the other side of current bureaucratic reforms we can make a monument that includes Klein and the other surveillance whistleblowers whose disclosures, and specifically whose courage, turned the popular tide against government overreach.

Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#82

Post by genewitch »

Bluecobra wrote: post #37
tptacek wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's almost definitely just a sewer inspection van; I found videos that company has of "multi-sensor pipeline inspections" with the same van, open, with the same equipment visible, and a bunch of people following a bunch of equipment down into a manhole.

As an aside, if you are purchasing an older home make sure you pay for a sewer line inspection. I had no idea this was a thing until a few years later when I had to replace mine and it cost ~$25,000.

how far is that sewer line run, 6 miles? they usually just bore it out and put a PVC sleeve inside. This is done with the cast iron sewer lines, because if they're not properly taken care of, they will rust into nothing and then you just have a suggestion of a hole through the dirt to the sewer line.

my lines are 4" PVC, if we somehow clog those, someone call me an ambulance.

Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#83

Post by tptacek »

themcaffee wrote: post #79
kstrauser wrote: post #5

Nooooooo! He was my next door neighbor a few years ago, and I knew him as a person before I realized that I knew him as a hero. His dogs were fiercely protective of his house, which is perfectly understandable. One day I saw a "sewer cleaning" van behind his house, and I have a hard time believing that's what it really was: https://honeypot.net/2025/03/12/rip-mark-klein.html

That certainly is just a Sewer TV inspection van! I have a hand in writing some of the software that is run on these and processes the videos that come out of them. They all have rack mounted PCs and a monitor with a joystick to control the crawler that goes in the pipe.

Gotta love this site.

Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#84

Post by adastra22 »

ajross wrote: post #65
CamperBob2 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Snowden was such a hero, why did he take Russian citizenship What choice did he have? Do you think he'd receive a fair trial if he came back to the US? and not oppose the invasion of Ukraine? Did he actively support it? I hadn't heard that. Major bummer, if so. Otherwise, he didn't oppose it for the same reason very few other Russians opposed it. I'm sure the reason will occur to you if you think hard enough.

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…

He has never expressed himself to be anything other than a patriotic American. Why would he be putting his life on the line for a country that he does not identify with?

People who do that ti support just cause like Ukraine have my respect. But I wouldn’t expect if of anyone.

Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#86

Post by ziddoap »

trescenzi wrote: post #57

I’m watching Person of Interest for the first time. It’s interesting watching it today now that the premise, minus 100% accurate crime prediction, is largely a forgone conclusion. It was produced after Klein but before Snowden and does a good job exploring the expansion of surveillance and just how motivated the government is to have a system that tracks everyone. Of course it’s fiction but it’s a fun watch that asks…

I really enjoyed that show. Such a shame it was cancelled! Despite critical acclaim (in later seasons, at least), it apparently wasn't profitable enough.

I actually tried to find a legal way to rewatch it the other day, but all of my current subscriptions list it with "rights expired" or some such.

Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#87

Post by genewitch »

aio2 wrote: post #2

Damn. 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…

not only was there not "definitive evidence"; if you said that the companies did that sort of thing you were called a conspiracy theorist whackaloon. oddly 85% of the general public suddenly was like "well of course they spy on email" after all this came out.

Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#88

Post by ryanisnan »

themcaffee wrote: post #79
kstrauser wrote: post #5

Nooooooo! He was my next door neighbor a few years ago, and I knew him as a person before I realized that I knew him as a hero. His dogs were fiercely protective of his house, which is perfectly understandable. One day I saw a "sewer cleaning" van behind his house, and I have a hard time believing that's what it really was: https://honeypot.net/2025/03/12/rip-mark-klein.html

That certainly is just a Sewer TV inspection van! I have a hand in writing some of the software that is run on these and processes the videos that come out of them. They all have rack mounted PCs and a monitor with a joystick to control the crawler that goes in the pipe.

I mean, if a sufficiently capable entity is interested in snooping on an individual like this, mimicking a sewer tv inspection van is a trivial endeavour. You don’t know at all what that van was doing.

Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#89

Post by ziddoap »

taosx wrote: post #46
kstrauser wrote: post #5

Nooooooo! He was my next door neighbor a few years ago, and I knew him as a person before I realized that I knew him as a hero. His dogs were fiercely protective of his house, which is perfectly understandable. One day I saw a "sewer cleaning" van behind his house, and I have a hard time believing that's what it really was: https://honeypot.net/2025/03/12/rip-mark-klein.html

This is crazy.. you guys are focused on vans and mini stories when all his sacrifice and that of thousand if not more americans was snuffed. `Congress intervened by passing the FISA Amendments Act which, in part, granted “retroactive immunity” to the telecommunications carriers for their involvement in the NSA spying programs. This massive grant of immunity for past violations of multiple state and federal laws prote…

Mark Klein was not some mythical hero, but a real person who did heroic things. It's nice to be reminded of that. If anything, I find it inspiring.

Re: Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed NSA mass spying, has died

#90

Post by tptacek »

ryanisnan wrote: post #88
themcaffee wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That certainly is just a Sewer TV inspection van! I have a hand in writing some of the software that is run on these and processes the videos that come out of them. They all have rack mounted PCs and a monitor with a joystick to control the crawler that goes in the pipe.

I mean, if a sufficiently capable entity is interested in snooping on an individual like this, mimicking a sewer tv inspection van is a trivial endeavour. You don’t know at all what that van was doing.

Yes we do. It was a sewer inspection van. If it was the NSA, their van wouldn't look so goofy that people took one look at the photo and assumed it had to be an NSA van, which is what happened here. This is a bad movie plot trope: the bad guys can't simultaneously be omniscient and so dumb they're trivially outed like this, just like the real supervillain isn't going to monologue while you free yourself from the chains lowering you into the shark tank.
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