Nobody has started a thread about the NSA/domestic spying?

[Pinky]

I'm fine with spying on each and every nation other than the U.S. It's turning our capabilities inward that I have a problem with.

Problem is, the bits don't care whether they go from one house directly to the other next door, or circle the globe 5 times before getting there. Costs the same and only adds milliseconds. So if you're a terrorist and you don't want us listening to you, oddly enough the best way to hide is to make sure your data gets moved around on servers in the US of A. We (used to?) have rules and restrictions against domestic monitoring. Hard to separate that stuff out and not accidentally track crusty's pron habits if you do look.

That's fine. The benefit of catching terrorists by snooping on their Gmail account is not worth the costs of invading everyone's privacy. There simply aren't enough terrorists killing enough Americans to justify the loss of our rights.

[Pinky]

A nice blog post from The Economist

If it weren't for the monumental credulity of America's spy-loving public, the NSA might find itself in a bit of bind. Acts of terror against Americans are by all known accounts exceedingly rare and, as we have seen, they pose relatively little real danger to public safety. If the NSA actually has foiled more than a few serious, terrorist plots against Americans in the past decade or so, saving more lives than are lost through bathtub falls, then we must ask why terrorist plots have become so much more common since the inception of the "war on terror"?

[nafod]

I'm fine with spying on each and every nation other than the U.S. It's turning our capabilities inward that I have a problem with.

Problem is, the bits don't care whether they go from one house directly to the other next door, or circle the globe 5 times before getting there. Costs the same and only adds milliseconds. So if you're a terrorist and you don't want us listening to you, oddly enough the best way to hide is to make sure your data gets moved around on servers in the US of A. We (used to?) have rules and restrictions against domestic monitoring. Hard to separate that stuff out and not accidentally track crusty's pron habits if you do look.

That's fine. The benefit of catching terrorists by snooping on their Gmail account is not worth the costs of invading everyone's privacy. There simply aren't enough terrorists killing enough Americans to justify the loss of our rights.

So only Google or Yahoo should have unfettered access to our privacy? Wonder if a google employee ever gets to urge to make some side coin? Or maybe the Chinese hack into Google? Like this...

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/0 ... on-aurora/

It is probably smart to assume that if you pass info unencrypted, someone who does not have your best interests in mind can or is reading it. We currently depend on them not caring about you to safeguard their not using that information for anything other than targeting you for smart marketing and stuff.

[Blaidd Drwg]

Every phone conversation, every email, in the grasp of the government, whenever they want without probable cause. If that doesn't immediately strike you as obscene, there is seriously something wrong.

[nafod]

Every phone conversation, every email, in the grasp of the government, whenever they want without probable cause. If that doesn't immediately strike you as obscene, there is seriously something wrong.

My point is two-fold
1. Our government is just one of many entities feeding off the flow of information. It is safe to bet that other foreign governments are wired in almost as deeply (since we catch them trying regularly) and we know FOR A FACT that companies are harvesting the comms, since they are the ones hosting the comms. I'm speaking of gmails and yahoos, etc.
2. The technology exists, works, is legal, and is free to make your communications opaque. It is painful to use compared to just zipping into gmail, but it give you the privacy you feel you have a right to. Exercise your right to privacy and use cryptography. Anything else is communicating via megaphone.

http://www.pgpi.org/

[Blaidd Drwg]

Every phone conversation, every email, in the grasp of the government, whenever they want without probable cause. If that doesn't immediately strike you as obscene, there is seriously something wrong.

My point is two-fold
1. Our government is just one of many entities feeding off the flow of information. It is safe to bet that other foreign governments are wired in almost as deeply (since we catch them trying regularly) and we know FOR A FACT that companies are harvesting the comms, since they are the ones hosting the comms. I'm speaking of gmails and yahoos, etc.
2. The technology exists, works, and is free to make your communications opaque. It is painful to use compared to just zipping into gmail, but it give you the privacy you feel you have a right to. Exercise your right to privacy and use cryptography. Anything else is communicating via megaphone.

http://www.pgpi.org/

That's akin to arguing it's just good practice to wear a bulletproof vest in case you get pulled over and accidentally lit up by Johnny Law. It's certainly true but it's not a good basis for public policy.

[Turdacious]

That's akin to arguing it's just good practice to wear a bulletproof vest in case you get pulled over and accidentally lit up by Johnny Law. It's certainly true but it's not a good basis for public policy.

We should advocate that the UN pass a resolution that nobody will adhere to.

[Blaidd Drwg]

That's akin to arguing it's just good practice to wear a bulletproof vest in case you get pulled over and accidentally lit up by Johnny Law. It's certainly true but it's not a good basis for public policy.

We should advocate that the UN pass a resolution that nobody will adhere to.

We should see about relocating the UN to less expensive real estate if you ask me.

[nafod]

Every phone conversation, every email, in the grasp of the government, whenever they want without probable cause. If that doesn't immediately strike you as obscene, there is seriously something wrong.

My point is two-fold
1. Our government is just one of many entities feeding off the flow of information. It is safe to bet that other foreign governments are wired in almost as deeply (since we catch them trying regularly) and we know FOR A FACT that companies are harvesting the comms, since they are the ones hosting the comms. I'm speaking of gmails and yahoos, etc.
2. The technology exists, works, and is free to make your communications opaque. It is painful to use compared to just zipping into gmail, but it give you the privacy you feel you have a right to. Exercise your right to privacy and use cryptography. Anything else is communicating via megaphone.

http://www.pgpi.org/

That's akin to arguing it's just good practice to wear a bulletproof vest in case you get pulled over and accidentally lit up by Johnny Law.

It's akin to arguing that you should use opaque sealed envelopes for mailing letters instead of writing critical privacy info on the back of postcards or yelling really loudly between houses. In this case the opaque sealed envelopes are free.

[Blaidd Drwg]

Your argument that the cat is already out of the bag does nothing to address the fact your government is busy collecting every fucking cat they can for later use against whomever they want, including you.

[buckethead]

I'm lost. Is a cat typing an encrypted email in this thread? Is its bag from China?

[Blaidd Drwg]

I'm lost. Is a cat typing an encrypted email in this thread? Is its bag from China?

It came in a box

[buckethead]

I'm lost. Is a cat typing an encrypted email in this thread? Is its bag from China?

It came in a box

Must be an intelligent cat

[Pinky]

So only Google or Yahoo should have unfettered access to our privacy?

Yes, because I voluntarily use their services knowing that they will mine the contents of my email. When the information in my email is read by any other party without my consent, my privacy has been invaded. The difference between a Chinese hacker and a DoD employee reading our email is that the DoD employee is trusted with protecting our interests.

It is probably smart to assume that if you pass info unencrypted, someone who does not have your best interests in mind can or is reading it. We currently depend on them not caring about you to safeguard their not using that information for anything other than targeting you for smart marketing and stuff.

Granted. But this also isn't relevant to a discussion of whether our government ought to be monitoring our phone calls and email. The question is whether "someone who does not have your best interests in mind" should include government employees as a matter of policy.

[DrDonkeyLove]

I'm lost. Is a cat typing an encrypted email in this thread? Is its bag from China?

It came in a box

Must be an intelligent cat

If that's Schrodinger's cat, I'm ready to place my bet now.

[Protobuilder]

So only Google or Yahoo should have unfettered access to our privacy?

Yes, because I voluntarily use their services knowing that they will mine the contents of my email. When the information in my email is read by any other party without my consent, my privacy has been invaded. The difference between a Chinese hacker and a DoD employee reading our email is that the DoD employee is trusted with protecting our interests.

Thank you. The argument of "so what if the government collects info, Google/Facebook do the same" argument is idiotic.

Even if you draw direct parallels between the Constitution of the United States and Facebook's Terms of Service, I don't know of anybody who is forced to use the latter's service nor am I aware of any instances where Zuckerberg uses check-in information to target zone strikes or lock people up because he feels like it. Of course, when Facebook changes their layout, there is more of a shit storm in the US media than what is happening now from the NSA story.

[Turdacious]

http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders ... 1-2s9.html

Because this discussion lacks substance.

[Bram]

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petiti ... n/Dp03vGYD

You can sign if you think Snowden deserves to be pardoned.

I have no idea if these things are effective, but I think talking without action is less effective.

If some of you learned men and women have a better idea on how to voice my opinion, protest or whatever effectively let me know. I've always thought complaining alone is kind of worthless.

[TerryB]

Your argument that the cat is already out of the bag does nothing to address the fact your government is busy collecting every fucking cat they can for later use against whomever they want, including you.

The cat is not the issue here, Dude. It's about a line in the sand. Across this line, you. do. not. cross!

[Testiclaw]

He was fucking right all along.

[nafod]

Something I'd like to see the government do, which is related to all this, is to develop the technology for personal identification. The idea that someone can get my SSN and know my birthday and then "steal my identity" pisses me off, and is bullshit. The banks then try to sell insurance to me, to protect me from their fuckup. If the banks give my money to someone who is not me, then I have a hard time seeing why it is my problem, but it currently is. This is the sort of thing the government should tackle, because it falls in the seams of what the commercial world gives a shit about.

Once you have the technology for unambiguously proving you are who you say you are, then the next step is to make cryptography more ubiquitous and easy to use, so when you send a message to your mistress setting up a meet time at the local motel, or Bats sends out an agenda for the next meeting to plan the violent overthrow of our constitutional form of government, encrypting it is no harder typing in the author addresses and hitting the "go" button. Same for voice comms.

[Turdacious]

Something I'd like to see the government do, which is related to all this, is to develop the technology for personal identification. The idea that someone can get my SSN and know my birthday and then "steal my identity" pisses me off, and is bullshit. The banks then try to sell insurance to me, to protect me from their fuckup. If the banks give my money to someone who is not me, then I have a hard time seeing why it is my problem, but it currently is. This is the sort of thing the government should tackle, because it falls in the seams of what the commercial world gives a shit about.

Once you have the technology for unambiguously proving you are who you say you are, then the next step is to make cryptography more ubiquitous and easy to use, so when you send a message to your mistress setting up a meet time at the local motel, or Bats sends out an agenda for the next meeting to plan the violent overthrow of our constitutional form of government, encrypting it is no harder typing in the author addresses and hitting the "go" button. Same for voice comms.

Banks would make more money with greater external fraud control. Fact.

[Turdacious]

Texas residents will have a little more protection from the prying eyes of local law enforcement than the rest of America starting in September. A law that takes effect in the fall ends warrantless email searches by state law enforcement officials, in a step that might have implications for email snooping laws around the country.

The new law cancels out a Texas provision that had allowed state, county, and local cops to access emails stored on third-party services like Gmail or Yahoo under certain circumstances without requiring a judge's finding of probable cause.

It was passed by the Texas statehouse long before the recent string of disclosures about the National Security Agency allegedly snooping on U.S citizens, but signed into law on Monday by Texas Gov. Rick Perry. The Texas law is very limited, however: Federal law enforcement officials can still access some Texas residents' third-party emails by issuing a simple subpoena to the companies where the information is stored.

http://redtape.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/0 ... l-searches

[Protobuilder]

Hong Kong says "fuck you and stop spying on our people".

http://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/2013 ... 230476.htm

[Bram]

This is much bigger than initially reported:

http://gizmodo.com/exactly-how-the-nsa- ... -540606531

According to the NSA document, they can retain and use information from Americans if:

*They were retained due to limitation on the NSA’s ability to filter communications.

*They contain information on criminal activity or a threat of harm to people or property. This is not very comforting – the Fourth Amendment wouldn’t mean anything if the government could search your house everyday, but would only act if they found evidence of a crime inside.

*They are encrypted or could be used for traffic analysis.

*They contain "foreign intelligence information," including if it is contained within attorney-client communications.