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Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

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Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#91

Post by [deleted] »

throwaway71958 wrote: post #79
ooqr wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure that was GP's point. The text is intentionally garbled with no identifiable first-language bias.

Well, there's no Russian first-language bias in that text for sure. Another argument in favor of the opinion that this was written by an American: the author seems to be well versed in the memes of the US political discourse. Someone from outside the US is unlikely to even know or care about Trump's "movement", or who "Bannon" is, or "drain the swamp", or "white privilege" etc. They're also unlikely to abbreviate "Ne…

[deleted]

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#92

Post by Pyxl101 »

mootothemax wrote: post #64
doktrin wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just seems like general obfuscation to me. It would be very weird for anyone to make assumptions about their identity based on broken english.

While I get your wider point, I find the different types of mistakes that ESL'ers with different mother tongues make absolutely fascinating. I've noticed, say, that in Poland, where the native tongue lacks articles, people regularly mess up "the" and "a," or miss them altogether. I've never met a French person with the same issue, for obvious reasons. When I started looking into people's mistakes with tenses in Engli…

> I like cars red

Interestingly, that word order is also valid English, though it has a slightly different meaning than "I like red cars".

Example: "I like [my] soup warm".

"I like soup warm, but you can eat it cold and left over if you want."

"I like having soup warm"

"I like my cookies freshly baked"

"I like men muscular and toned"

"I like my women blonde, so you can go for the brunette"

"I like cars red" doesn't quite work as well but doesn't seem wrong. Add a little context and it seems more normal. "As a buyer of many sports cars, I like my cars red, even despite the speeding tickets I get".

Perhaps a linguist could explain how this phrasing works.

(That said, of course I advocate teaching her to speak fluently and to use that word order only when she intends its subtlety of meaning.)

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#93

Post by throwaway71958 »

kafkaesq wrote: post #51
throwaway71958 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Russian myself, I can tell you with certainty that there are mistakes in that text that a Russian ESL speaker would never make, and verb tenses are a bit too good for an unskilled speaker. Due to the combination of these two factors, I bet this was written by a native English speaker who thinks he/she knows the mistakes a Russian would make. They're wrong.

I'd be curious as to which particular "anti-mistakes" you had in mind (that you believe a non-native speaker wouldn't be likely to make). I have some hunches (like the over-use of linking verbs, and certain overly-idiomatic colocations), but I'd be curious as to what stands out in your view.

"The peoples" is unlikely. "-ing" after most verbs is unlikely. "the" is unlikely before "Freedom Caucus" and "NSC". There's no "the" in Russian, and ESL speakers often omit it, or put it where it doesn't really belong. The word "caucus" in itself is unlikely: I've never even heard of it before I moved to the US, it's not in common use abroad. "Whose" is unlikely. "To destroying" is very unlikely. "Will be happening" is unlikely ("will happen" is far more likely). "Be remembering" is very unlikely. "Do you be thinking" is very unlikely. And so on.

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#94

Post by atemerev »

throwaway71958 wrote: post #79
ooqr wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure that was GP's point. The text is intentionally garbled with no identifiable first-language bias.

Well, there's no Russian first-language bias in that text for sure. Another argument in favor of the opinion that this was written by an American: the author seems to be well versed in the memes of the US political discourse. Someone from outside the US is unlikely to even know or care about Trump's "movement", or who "Bannon" is, or "drain the swamp", or "white privilege" etc. They're also unlikely to abbreviate "Ne…

Yes, exactly. While those are still somewhat plausible (I am Russian, and I might have occasionally used all of these ironically), it was "POTUS" and "SCOTUS" that made me 99% sure that this text was written by an American (or at least a US insider). You guys love your acronyms.

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#95

Post by aub3bhat »

mavdi wrote: post #85

Given the latest world events, I've personally come to realise that security agencies play an important role in keeping us safe, from external entities or from ourselves. This is disaster in my (current) opinion. We tend to dismiss the work the likes of NSA do, not thinking much about what would happen if they didn't do it. Snowden categorically dismissing anything that NSA does, just means he's a deluded idealist, m…

I agree, to quote Mike from breaking bad.

"Just because you shot Jesse James, don’t make you Jesse James.”

Snowden is skilled at data theft and not a source of wisdom when it comes to surveillance.

The liberal media (hate to use that term) is equally complicit. They have trotted him around as source of wisdom. The leaker of Pentagon Papers had a position that allowed him to asses the subject matter. Snowden on the other hand was a sysadmin.

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#96

Post by apeace »

mavdi wrote: post #85

Given the latest world events, I've personally come to realise that security agencies play an important role in keeping us safe, from external entities or from ourselves. This is disaster in my (current) opinion. We tend to dismiss the work the likes of NSA do, not thinking much about what would happen if they didn't do it. Snowden categorically dismissing anything that NSA does, just means he's a deluded idealist, m…

> Snowden categorically dismissing anything that NSA does

That's not representative of Snowden's opinion at all. From the beginning he's always stated he believes in the mission of the intelligence agencies. Heck, he used to work for one.

"I am not trying to bring down the NSA, I am working to improve the NSA" [0]

[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/edwar...

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#97

Post by waitwait »

jacquesm wrote: post #29
tekkk wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the article pointed out by Snowden: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/17/us/shadow-brokers-leak-ra... they state that the stolen code is from 2013 and Snowden was quoted in Wikipedia saying "circumstantial evidence and conventional wisdom indicates Russian responsibility". To me it seems impossible that non-state-sponsored hackers would have gotten their hands into top secret NSA hacking tools. If I'd have guess it…

> To me it seems impossible that non-state-sponsored hackers would have gotten their hands into top secret NSA hacking tools. About as impossible as the Snowden exfiltration, so that makes it entirely believable. All it takes is one rogue employee or plant. And if you don't want to burn an inside asset it would pay off to release files that are several years old.

Releasing several year old files is signalling. "Next time it may include your zero-days". Remember the previous threats?

> What this have do with fun Cyber Weapons Auction? We want make sure Wealthy Elite recognizes the danger cyber weapons, this message, our auction, poses to their wealth and control. Let us spell out for Elites. Your wealth and control depends on electronic data. You see what "Equation Group" can do. You see what cryptolockers and stuxnet can do. You see free files we give for free. You see attacks on banks and SWIFT in news. Maybe there is Equation Group version of cryptolocker+stuxnet for banks and financial systems? If Equation Group lose control of cyber weapons, who else lose or find cyber weapons? If electronic data go bye bye where leave Wealthy Elites? Maybe with dumb cattle? "Do you feel in charge?"

https://web.archive.org/web/20160815152123/https://github.co...

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#98

Post by [deleted] »

apeace wrote: post #96
mavdi wrote: post #85

Given the latest world events, I've personally come to realise that security agencies play an important role in keeping us safe, from external entities or from ourselves. This is disaster in my (current) opinion. We tend to dismiss the work the likes of NSA do, not thinking much about what would happen if they didn't do it. Snowden categorically dismissing anything that NSA does, just means he's a deluded idealist, m…

> Snowden categorically dismissing anything that NSA does That's not representative of Snowden's opinion at all. From the beginning he's always stated he believes in the mission of the intelligence agencies. Heck, he used to work for one. "I am not trying to bring down the NSA, I am working to improve the NSA" [0] [0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/edwar...

[deleted]

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#99

Post by doktrin »

rev wrote: post #70
DanBC wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia uses online trolling as a tool. It's widely documented. This use of trolling leaves Russia open to accusations even when they're not involved. For a well documented case: http://www.stratcomcoe.org/internet-trolling-hybrid-warfare-...

Well documented analysis of a corpus of comments on some Latvian sites, yes. Anything in 100+ pages serving as a proof of Kremlin connections with the "hybrid trolls" (gotta love the newspeak)? Not so much. I don't know whether Russians are xenophobic aggressive bastards or knights in shining armor exposing the wrongdoings of others, it's just that claims along the lines like "Russia uses online trolling" seem exagge…

> claims along the lines like "Russia uses online trolling" seem exaggerated.

What?

gamergate, /pol, /b, alt-right, the_donald, antifa use online trolling. In context, saying a state actor uses online trolling is an extremely conservative claim. I'm sure there's online trolling in favor of and sponsored by US, Chinese and Macedonian interests (to name a few) too - but Russia's actions are much better documented.

Re: Snowden: NSA just lost control of its Top Secret arsenal of digital weapons

#100

Post by samstave »

throwaway71958 wrote: post #40
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #26

It's pretty fascinating to read the Shadow Broker's posts. They have to write something, since they can't just say "I work for Russia and we're reminding America that they're not invulnerable." So they have to come up with all sorts of contrived reasons about why they're doing this, complete with broken english to fool stylometry detection that walks the fine line between being believable and preposterous. Someone sp…

As a Russian myself, I can tell you with certainty that there are mistakes in that text that a Russian ESL speaker would never make, and verb tenses are a bit too good for an unskilled speaker. Due to the combination of these two factors, I bet this was written by a native English speaker who thinks he/she knows the mistakes a Russian would make. They're wrong.

CIA got it...
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