omnibus PRISM/NSA/free Edward Snowden/encryption tutorial thread

Mark Hertsgaard wrote it, and, yes, it's essential reading and available cheap.

mea culpa

There is so much info to be dug out of the lower reaches of the executive branch, where the work actually happens, that being shut out by the political parts of an administration should not be a major impediment to investigative reporting. You'd have to cultivate sources who work in the bureaucracy below the assistant secretaries.

yeah but you don't get to be interviewed by Joe and "Mika."

I keep being amazed how 99.9% of everything is about the messenger and not the message. Is it really that easy to divert everyone's attention?

There is so much info to be dug out of the lower reaches of the executive branch, where the work actually happens, that being shut out by the political parts of an administration should not be a major impediment to investigative reporting. You'd have to cultivate sources who work in the bureaucracy below the assistant secretaries.

― put 'er right in the old breadbasket (Aimless), Thursday, May 29, 2014 10:02 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

feel like there are fewer and fewer journalists (with less and less time) to do this sort of reporting, and as you say fewer and fewer dollars to support their work. this seems like a top-ten impediment to improving our democracy IMO.

judging by the student newspaper here in 20 years there won't be any

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/governments-collecting-personal-data-without-limit-says-vodafone/2014/06/06/ff0cfc1a-edb4-11e3-9b2d-114aded544be_story.html?hpid=z1

Britain’s Vodafone revealed Friday that several governments are collecting surveillance data directly from its networks without any legal review and publicly urged more safeguards against such unfettered access to the private communications of its customers.

The declarations, made by the world’s second-largest cellular carrier, show that the type of access to telecommunications networks enjoyed by the U.S. National Security Agency also occurs in other countries where legal protections almost certainly are lower. Vodafone’s networks span much of Europe and parts of Africa and Asia.

.The company said that voice, Internet and other data could be collected without any court review in “a small number” of nations

A

http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2014-06-20/ex-nsa-chief-pitches-advice-on-cyber-threats-to-the-banks.html

Former NSA head Keith Alexander making big bucks now

who could have seen this coming

http://pando.com/2014/07/16/tor-spooks/

yeah i've always been befuddled by the detail about snowden's crypto party when his own documents seemed to suggest the NSA dgaf about the use of tor

Russia has granted fugitive National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden permission to remain in the country for three more years, Snowden's lawyer said Thursday, a measure that promised to further strain U.S.-Russian relations.

from Washington Post

i wonder what snowden thinks about crimea

Don't think he's in Russia because he thinks Russia is a better country.

that's not why he's there but i don't know what he does or doesn't think about russia

He probably thinks Russian behavior in Crimea is wrong, but since he can't go anywhere else and believes he can't get a fair trial here (since he was charged under the espionage act which bars certain defenses from being raised), he is there.

when he asked putin that question about surveillance and then wrote a whole opinion piece about it afterward he seemed to be telegraphing pretty clearly 'so yeah russia is doing this too obv and by extension it sucks'

this is a good read:
http://www.wired.com/2014/08/edward-snowden/

It's obvious to me that Snowden is only in bed with Russia for the most practical of reasons, which is to avoid a long, harsh prison term. I don't imagine he is there to express any ideological sympathy with the Putin government. If he had better choices, he'd exercise them.

Schneier confirms something that I've always feared. The companies that built all this surveillance/hacking stuff for the NSA wanted a better return-on-investment so now everybody has this stuff.
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2014/08/quantum_technol.html

Laura Poitras' film on Snowden to debut at the NY Film Festival

http://www.filmlinc.com/nyff2014/blog/laura-poitras-citizenfour-edward-snowden-nsa-nyff-world-premiere

memorialized in Union Square NYC

http://www.buzzfeed.com/hayesbrown/there-is-a-nine-foot-tall-statue-of-edward-snowden-in-new-yo#1buf434

http://s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/2014-10/10/13/enhanced/webdr04/enhanced-20284-1412960464-6.jpg

smarmy update from the Daily News; statue "forced to defect"

Edward Snowden, while still welcome in Red Square, got the boot Friday from Union Square.

A towering 9-foot-tall sculpture of the bespectacled Snowden was evicted from the Manhattan park Friday over its creator’s lack of a proper permit.

Artist Jim Dessicino kept the all-white statue, fashioned from gypsum, polystyrene and steel, in the park for about two hours before police chased him out.

@EdSnowdenStatue · 9h
The #Snowden Statue has moved! For the rest of the weekend you can see it at Campos Community Center, 611 E. 13th St. New York, NY 10009

New Yorker's profile of Laura Poitras, and hourlong video interview of Snowden

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/10/20/holder-secrets

http://www.newyorker.com/new-yorker-festival/live-stream-edward-snowden

new interview of ES by The Nation:

The Nation: Say there was a national Gallup poll formulating the question like this: “Mr. Snowden has revealed gross violations of your personal liberties and rights through surveillance by the American government. The American government argues it does so to keep you safe from terrorists.” Do you think there would be a majority opinion in your favor? You’ve raised perhaps the most vital issue of our time, but for most Americans, who really are having a harder economic time than they should be having, your issue probably is not high on their list of concerns.

Snowden: OK, let me clarify. When I talk about the polling, I’m talking about the principles. It shows these officials are knowingly attempting to shift public opinion, even though they know what they say is not factual. It’s clear it’s public opinion, because elite opinion… I mean, The New York Times and The Guardian came out and said, “Hey, clemency for Snowden.” But for me, the key—and I’ve said this from the beginning: it’s not about me. I don’t care if I get clemency. I don’t care what happens to me. I don’t care if I end up in jail or Guantánamo or whatever, kicked out of a plane with two gunshots in the face. I did what I did because I believe it is the right thing to do, and I will continue to do that. However, when it comes to political engagement, I’m not a politician—I’m an engineer. I read these polls because civil-liberties organizations tell me I need to be aware of public opinion. The only reason I do these interviews—I hate talking about myself, I hate doing this stuff—is because incredibly well-meaning people, whom I respect and trust, tell me that this will help bring about positive changes. It’s not going to cause a sea change, but it will benefit the public.

From the very beginning, I said there are two tracks of reform: there’s the political and the technical. I don’t believe the political will be successful, for exactly the reasons you underlined. The issue is too abstract for average people, who have too many things going on in their lives. And we do not live in a revolutionary time. People are not prepared to contest power. We have a system of education that is really a sort of euphemism for indoctrination. It’s not designed to create critical thinkers. We have a media that goes along with the government by parroting phrases intended to provoke a certain emotional response—for example, “national security.” Everyone says “national security” to the point that we now must use the term “national security.” But it is not national security that they’re concerned with; it is state security. And that’s a key distinction. We don’t like to use the phrase “state security” in the United States because it reminds us of all the bad regimes. But it’s a key concept, because when these officials are out on TV, they’re not talking about what’s good for you. They’re not talking about what’s good for business. They’re not talking about what’s good for society. They’re talking about the protection and perpetuation of a national state system.

I’m not an anarchist. I’m not saying, “Burn it to the ground.” But I’m saying we need to be aware of it, and we need to be able to distinguish when political developments are occurring that are contrary to the public interest. And that cannot happen if we do not question the premises on which they’re founded. And that’s why I don’t think political reform is likely to succeed. [Senators] Udall and Wyden, on the intelligence committee, have been sounding the alarm, but they are a minority.

http://www.thenation.com/article/186129/snowden-exile-exclusive-interview#

i suspect he cares maybe a little about being dropped from an airplane. but even if he's playing the martyr more than a little bit, i have unending respect and admiration for this dude.

is that katrina vanden huevos in the photo on the right?

it is

And we do not live in a revolutionary time. People are not prepared to contest power.

I think this is a really important bit bc i don't buy his explanation that ppl aren't prepared to contest power bc of state indoctrination. states w/ a far larger totalitarian grasp on media /communication (ie actual state-owned media, internet censorship) still seem to be living in a more 'revolutionary time' than we are in the US, cf egypt, iran, ukraine, hong kong?, idk i'm sure there are lots of examples of this. nb that i do accept the kind of zizekian logic that the US is even more totalitarian bc our democracy allows the illusion of change and the free press allow the illusion of free speech while dictatorships are self-evidently fascist. on the other hand tho - he admitted recently in the guardian that the form is important bc you can only express the longing for full freedom if you have the empty shell available to show you what you're missing. also nb it could be Ferguson and Occupy and other things are examples of a revolutionary spirit that exists in the US (tho they seem limited / this could just be a consequence of a compliant media). idk tho. it seems to me like in areas like speech and media the US is very free and i suspect revolutionary spirits aren't so high here bc even w/ dire economic circumstances for many ppl, standard of living has remained historically high? like maybe things aren't bad enough and really it is material conditions that inspire revolutions - not knowledge/education/ideology. if this is true - it really doesn't matter how many drones the US drops on other countries, or how many phone conversations they monitor, or even how much political dissent they suppress. as long as they deliver a certain level of quality of life the majority of ppl will support the government.

M, he has praise for OWS's effect on the polity earlier in this interview.

At this time, I would agree that you'd only get revolutionary fervor from Americans if you took away their smartphones. Your last two sentences seem accurate to me.

You really are gonna be thrilled at the movie-star turn of your hero Greenwald in Citizenfour.

i'll watch it when it comes to hbo

Revolution does not always have to be weapons and warfare; it’s also about revolutionary ideas. It’s about the principles that we hold to be representative of the kind of world we want to live in. A given order may at any given time fail to represent those values, even work against those values. I think that’s the dynamic we’re seeing today. We have these traditional political parties that are less and less responsive to the needs of ordinary people, so people are in search of their own values. If the government or the parties won’t address our needs, we will. It’s about direct action, even civil disobedience. But then the state says: “Well, in order for it to be legitimate civil disobedience, you have to follow these rules.” They put us in “free-speech zones”; they say you can only do it at this time, and in this way, and you can’t interrupt the functioning of the government. They limit the impact that civil disobedience can achieve. We have to remember that civil disobedience must be disobedience if it’s to be effective. If we simply follow the rules that a state imposes upon us when that state is acting contrary to the public interest, we’re not actually improving anything. We’re not changing anything.

yeah, that's key. i don't think most people in america get that. it reminds me of the U of California administrators who were like "civil disobedience is fine as long as nobody breaks the law"

"you're allowed to have your voices heard as long as nobody in a position of power actually has to listen to them"

tho that's bc if ppl privilege the rule of law then they're less willing to see it undermined for the sake of change. if things are bad enough, or the law is worthless enough, then violating it becomes easier.

sure but the cognitive dissonance of people supporting "civil disobedience" but only if it obeys the law is notable

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/11/fbis-suicide-letter-dr-martin-luther-king-jr-and-dangers-unchecked-surveillance

so there's something called the USA Freedom Act (uh oh), a "surveillance fix" that's gonna get a lame-duck vote, and this guy says it's crap.

https://www.emptywheel.net/2014/11/12/why-i-dont-support-usa-freedom-act/

When black people do stuff, when they have a complaint, after all this time, all of this history, it still does not qualify as "civil disobedience". It's disorder, violence - plain disobedience. This attitude toward poor blacks is very real and the powers that be still justify this regard based on crime rates.

I don't think comfortable folks realize how easy it is to abuse and disrespect poor black people, I don't think they know how these communities function. I am shocked at what I have read online about Ferguson.

Then again, who ever said people respected civil rights activists? When did that happen? I think we comfortable people get too much magical thinking from television.

Amnesty International has released a program that can spot spying software used by governments to monitor activists and political opponents

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30115679

nice

http://www.theverge.com/2014/11/23/7272157/regin-malware-has-secretly-spied-on-computers-for-years

this is cool

https://www.iab.org/2014/11/14/iab-statement-on-internet-confidentiality/

The IAB urges protocol designers to design for confidential operation by default. We strongly encourage developers to include encryption in their implementations, and to make them encrypted by default. We similarly encourage network and service operators to deploy encryption where it is not yet deployed, and we urge firewall policy administrators to permit encrypted traffic.

We believe that each of these changes will help restore the trust users must have in the Internet, and foster development of new approaches which allow us to move to an Internet where traffic is confidential by default.

backdoor men

The NSA's collection programs are ostensibly targeted at foreigners, but in August the Guardian revealed a secret rule change allowing NSA analysts to search for Americans' details within the databases.

Now, in a letter to Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat on the intelligence committee, the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, has confirmed the use of this legal authority to search for data related to “US persons”.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/01/nsa-surveillance-loophole-americans-data

Great story from Ars: http://arstechnica.com/security/2015/02/how-omnipotent-hackers-tied-to-the-nsa-hid-for-14-years-and-were-found-at-last/

Jesus

feel like i am getting closer and closer to that shotgun canned food bunker

i thought stuxnet was fascinating and cool even if it was unnerving--this 'equation group' stuff is legit petrifying though