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France Sues U.S. and UK Over Echelon
gaijin|dog writes, "According to this article, the U.S. and UK are to be sued over Echelon. From the article "The British and U.S. governments are to be sued in France after claims that they have spied on French companies, diplomats and Cabinet ministers. French MPs claim to have evidence that the European Airbus consortium lost a Fr35 billion (£3.5 billion) contract in 1995 after its offer was overheard and passed to Boeing." " Now, I'd rate the probablity of actually getting said money at just about the same as, say, Rob and Heather Graham dating,
France and Japan were mentioned above as the leading infiltrators against American firms. France's spy agency, the Direction Generale de la Securite Exterieure (DGSE) , aims its effort at the same U.S. technology that is of interest to the SVR: computers, aerospace, and production tools and processes. The DGSE's specialty is infiltrating spies into U.S. and foreign offices of high-tech U.S. multi-national corporations. In 1993, a French government document listing as worthwhile targets two dozen U.S. companies - including Boeing, IBM, and Texas Instruments, was leaked to newspapers. The French are aggressive. Former CIA director Richard Helms says, "They [the French] have admitted to me in private that they go through the briefcases of visiting businessmen."
Russia and Japan are not exactly our strongest diplomatic allies. However, France and the United States are military and political allies. Should allies be spying on each other? According to Pierre Marion, director of French intelligence from 1981 to 1982, "Even during the Cold War, getting intelligence in economic, technological, and industrial matters from a country with which you are allied . . . is not incompatible with the fact of being allied." In the post-Cold War era, Marion says, "The competition in terms of technology and commerce and industry is stronger than it was during the Cold War. There should be more emphasis put on that, and on industrial espionage." The French government admits that it directly passes stolen secrets to French-owned corporations. Intelligence on the private sector for the private sector; France, a Western nation with a democratic system of government, has a view of economic intelligence that is the polar opposite of the American stance.
You would want tiny antennas (at least in terms of the active elements) and very close range to the target of interception.
Or long range, still tiny active element and huge, perfectly paraboloid reflector. Telescopes have reflectors up to few meters in diameter, and they have no problems receiving "signals" at the wavelength of hundreds nanometers.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
This is what used to be done in an exceedingly classy fashion as the old "international incident." Foreign power spies. You spy back. You catch $FOREIGN_POWER's spy. You make a big deal about it. Scandal ensues, lots of fun for everyone, etc. A lawsuit of any kind is just a prissier version of the same old thing.
Of course, good may come of this - greater exposure of Echelon is ultimately a good thing for everyone as it keeps the US and its allies a little more honest. Of course, the fact that we're here discussing Echelon means it's been superceded, but it's the idea that counts, eh?
-- TM, listening in on my Congressman's Phone Sex session on his cell.
This is basically to draw publicity to what the US and UK are doing, and I'm all for it in that respect.
That's quite likely. There is also the possability of going through the EU to get at the U.K. At any rate, everyone spies on everyone else. The 'arrangement' seems to be that as long as the intelligence is not used commercially, everyone (officially/diplomatically) looks the other way. France got caught cheating in the '80s and just wants to make it clear that they're not the only ones cheating (I don't blame them there).
All told, I'm glad this happened as well. There seems to be a bit of a truth shortage these days.
I am a lawyer, but this isn't legal advice. If you need legal
advice, see an attorney licensed in your jurisdiction.
French courts simply lack jurisdiction over the U.S. The U.S. has
absolutely no obligation to appear (and I'd call my congress-critters
and demand another impeachment if there were a U.S. appearance), and
would have no ability to enforce any ruling it entered.
The only way this *possibly* gets heard in a courtroom (at least
with the U.S. as a party) would be in the U.S. Supreme Court. Even
then, were a judgment entered, it could not be paid without an
act of Congress authorizing payment of funds from the Treasury.
Also, it's been a *long* time since the Court heard a case of
original jurisdiction (probably since diplomatic immunity was
established). I'm not sure the current rules of court even
provide for the situation (I'd have to look them up, and I'm just
not that interested).
hawk, esq.
A couple of years ago at a conference, I was relating my summary
of anglo-french history to a group that included some Europeans.
Roughly, in the second half of the eleventh centrury, a french
duke got irritated and took the english crown for himself. He
still held about a third of France. Over time, this got whittled
down, and the british sent an army across to reclaim/expand their
french holdings. Having done so again, they got neglectful, and the
french holdings again dissipated. Periodically, the brits would send
an army that would trounce a french army three to four times its own
size.
After about 500 years of this, the french finally noticed
that they had castles to hide in. When the brits came, they simply
didn't go out and play, and eventually went home due to long supply
lines. The brits never figured out that since they held the
entire area except for the castles, that they could build their
own castles.
Then came the 20th century, and they discovered that they hated the
germans more than one another.
At this point I was interrupted with a sharp, "No we didn't."
:)
seems it was merely expedient to fight together for a few years
I don't mean to bash the french, but...
If the quality of their automobiles (internationally regarded as hideous crap eclipsed only by the former eastern bloc) is any indication of their engineering acumen, perhaps the potential client for the aforementioned contract made a *very* smart decision by going Boeing. (ooh! a pun!)
Brak: What's THAT?
Thundercleese: A light switch.. of TOTAL DEVASTATION!
Dude, serious engineers decry fly-by wire for everything but military aircraft, where losing a few is a given. Not an option for civilian aircraft, where hundreds could die. Boeing is being very rational and conservative if they are (rightly) maintaining hydraulic control as primary. Ever hear of *bugs*, my friend?
The 777, I don't know about. You may be right there. If so, 'DOH!'
As for airframes, I grant you that. (As well as british dominance in race engine building. HUH? 'wretched' a term I once saw describing british auto reliability. Whoda thunkit?) But Europe != france!
My beef with france is their notoriously Xenophobic, NIH attitude about just about everything. Hell, they actually have what amounts to a ministry of cultural purity!
You don't grow intellectually thinking like that. As a person, or as a nation.
Brak: What's THAT?
Thundercleese: A light switch.. of TOTAL DEVASTATION!
I'd take a French car over American junk any day. Heck, the only country in the world still building cars with solid axles is... USA! That stuff dates from the horse and cart!
Actually I'd like to see you take your ifs-crap vehicle where i take my solid-axle jeep.
Use the right technology for the job, and solid-axles work in some places, heavy workloads, rock-crawling, etc...
Nick
-- "It's a sad day for American capitalism when a man can't fly a midget on a kite over Central Park" - Jim Moran
> Sometimes, I really feel like killing an american for the pleasure
Really? What a sweetheart. If you'd care to supply your name and address I'm sure we could find some nice biker-dude to give you an opportunity. But maybe Anonymous Coward describes you better than we thought. Tell you what, next time the Germans decide they like the weather in Paris, we'll let them keep it.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
> is really a fascist nation
Well at least we don't tell our citizens they're not allowed to watch too many French movies! There certainly are groups here who tend towards fascism, and fortunately many of us vote against them. There are also groups that tend towards anarchy, and they occasionally get their way too. We're a BIG country with a lot of people, and you can still drive from one end to the other without being bothered. (Unless maybe you're a black man in a nice car. That's another story.)
> and NOT a true friend of us Europeans
I really didn't want to bring this up, but this is kind of a funny remark from a guy in a country that tried to take over ALL of Europe. Twice! I have news for you, if we wanted to own Europe we could have done so already.
> here in Europe it's illegal to spy on the citizens without reasons
It's illegal to spy on US citizens without reasons here too. We have laws against it, the NSA is NOT allowed to do it and to give the individuals who work there the benefit of the doubt I'm certain most of them take that seriously. We also have the ACLU to vigorously sue the government when they go too far. Too often law enforcement is over-zealous. The FBI and Martin Luther King, for instance, or the LA cops that planted evidence and even shot people. Note they're now on trial. Nothing's perfect, but the fight goes on.
> dictatorship of total surveillance
Agreed! Unfortunately, there are many here (as in other countries) who seem to be willing to give up their freedom to catch the "bad guys". If this wasn't being fought everyday by independent journalists, the ACLU, etc etc it would've happened already.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
WWI was the UK's, France's and Canada's war.
I'm pretty sure Russia was involved as well... helped lead to nasty things like the Bolshevik Revolution.
* And remember, it's spelled N-e-t-s-c-a-p-e, but it's pronounced "Mozilla."
They may be France's closest allies, but they're also pretty damn powerful enemies. If France tried to go to war with the US and the UK, they'd find the whole might of NATO turned against them. That would be outright suicide.
No, France can't take that route, and they know it. Frankly, the Airbus thing is probably just an excuse; they know they won't get their money back. What they're trying to do is set a precedent. Open the way for other nations to sue. And hopefully destroy Echelon in the process; knowing the US they'll destroy Echelon rather than hold onto it and destroy their reputation (sad to say, the only thing the U.S. government values more than keeping its power is keeping what little image it has left). This is a ploy to make the US and UK lose face, and I'm all for it if it'll hurt Echelon even a little bit.
We're just Slashdotters. When all's said and done, there's really nothing we can do about Echelon; we simply don't have the kind of power it takes. France has tons more than we do, but even it can't do much by itself. But if it takes a stand, other nations will too, and the combined power of several large nations can do something about Echelon.
I could go on for several more paragraphs extolling the guts France is showing by taking this move, but knowing my luck I'd only start a flamewar. So I'll just shut up now.
Calling France and the UK allies always makes me laugh. I realise that theoretically we are allies but the English have always hated the French and vice versa. In the last century we ended up on the same side in most conflicts (but don't forget whose missiles the Argentinians were firing at us) and so technically we are allies but old scores run deep.
I love stacking my barbecues in the shed at the end of summer - you can't beat a bit of grill on grill action.
I think it really pisses them off a treat that we keep sinking their navy, even in WW2 when we were supposed to be their allies 8-)
I love stacking my barbecues in the shed at the end of summer - you can't beat a bit of grill on grill action.
I'd say that the Korean War was more of the first step rather than the Vietnamese War.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
Going back a few years further - I seem to recall that the French government employed government intelligence agencies to help Thomson win a large contract over (IIRC) Phillips during the 80's. At the time that was reported, it wasn't the first time people had heard of such things from them.
"don't fall into the fallacy of believing that Perl can solve social problems. Maybe Perl 6 can, but that's a ways off"
an enormous (£101) approx $160/year tax on every television set
Do they still play "Neighbours"? If they do, sounds like a good deal to me. Huh huh.
> Actually I'd like to see you take your ifs-crap vehicle where i take > my solid-axle jeep. What would be the point? Here in "Yuurp", we have these neat things called roads. The Romans invented them, I believe.
Hey, it's John Wayne!
s/I'm not either/I am neither/
> WWI was the UK's, France's and Canada's war. No it wasn't. WWI marked the USA's entry onto the world stage. American intervention in the war was decisive even before declaration: US gold and credits kept both British and French economies afloat. Without that aid, a compromise peace would have been inevitable, simply because France and Britain could not long continue the war on the own resources. By the way, `Canada' didn't exist in those days, in the sense you seem to mean: it was still part of the British Empire.
At last, someone points this out. It is, I think, the real motivation behind this action. A whole lot of Europeans, not just the French government, are sick and tired of Britain acting as America's whore. Of course, the sensible course of action here would be de Gaulle's, but it's too late for that.
I think this AC should be moderated up to five, to show the shocking state of American education: the sheer ignorance of the average American youngster when he leaves high school is a far more important issue than all this Hellmouth crap.
France has been engaging in industrial espionage to give French firms an advantage:
http://www.aci.net/Kalliste/industryespion.pdf
I really hope the US and UK countersue, because then maybe more info on both issues will be revealed.
It's very simple -- France has a decades-long record on spying on the U.S. and U.K., too. You should see the list of warnings about French espionage that U.S. multinationals give to their executives. France has to moderate its reaction to avoid an immoderate response if and when they get caught red-handed.
Steven E. Ehrbar
The reason that France has decidet to bring a civil suit agains UKUSA is simply that the laws here in France seem to protect the individual no-end.
F.ex if you wreck your car 10 times in a row and no insurance company wants to touch you with a 10 foot pole, there is a special agency that will *force* the insurance company you choose to insure you. (NOT kidding !)
Bringing a civil suit against UKUSA, in France is a sure-win.
--
Why pay for drugs when you can get Linux for free ?
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
So if France DOES get money from the US, does that also mean that Rob gets to date Heather?
---
---
"To know recursion, you must first know recursion."
Yankees are very quick to denounce France about individual freedoms, but whenever they are TRULY endangered, either by hare-brained governmental schemes (like Echelon), or by big corporations, guess who is the staunchest parangon of individual liberties?
Certainly not the country who has Babylon-on-the-Potomac for a capital...
--
" It's a ligne Maginot-in-the-sky "
The satellite would be on a geostationary orbit. It must have been no mean feat to put that big a thing that high!!!
--
" It's a ligne Maginot-in-the-sky "
--
" It's a ligne Maginot-in-the-sky "
who knows...her character in Austin Powers went for Mike Myers... maybe she has a thing for TTH's like Rob... Hemos is just jealous..don't see why though, Nitrozac drawing all ripped and all...
I post links to stuff here
Airbus is always complaining about spies this and spies that. I think they're just jumping on the eschelon bandwagon.
Frankly, i've been on an Airbus 310, and I'd rather walk. So, my theory is that they lost the deal when someone thought they could get a better jet, the exact number Airbus offered probably didn't play into it at all.
This is just like television, only you can see much further.
Do you have any idea of what's involved in seizing the equipment of another nation's military base?!?
Hint: It usually involves blowing things up.
There is a simple solution to Echelon. Stop sending voice and data over unprotected radio, microwave and satellite links. Even if Echelon was shut down, which I think would be a terrible idea, there are plenty of other countries with SIGINT capabilities.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
The Sugar Grove Naval Communications Facility near Sugar Grove, West Virginia is an NSA satellite intercept facility. See this web page for the FAS list of the NSA's facilities.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
In the case of World War I, the Zimmerman telegram laid the foundation for the United State's entry into the war. The sinking of the Lusitania was more of a final straw. British propaganda was a factor, something that backfired on them in later years when Americans learned how they had been lied to.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
Politics, people. the French have chosen to create a large public broo-ha. They win just by stateing the facts publicly.
Politics is like trying to screw a cat in the ass. -- Bukowski
Go read your histoy books again.
Russia was in the war from day 1. For your info Germans have used almost equal quantities of people and armament on both fronst. The mere difference is that Russians also fought the Austrians and Turkey.
I could continue but I will restrain. No point to answer to an ignorant prat.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
"This sort of argument wouldn't surprise me if it came from a socialist country like France."
Last time I checked, France's name was "the French Republic", not "the People's Republic of France". Also, last time I checked, prices there were set by the market.
> hey should follow US & British example conduct
> air-raids and drop bombs on someone.
France was as far as I know the second contributor (behind the US) to the air war in Kosovo, and has supplied plenty of ground troops. France has already lost several soldiers in peacekeeping operations in Bosnia.
Oh, by the way, learn English:
whinning -> whining
ungreatful -> ungrateful.
I would not be so sure that France would no have no legal ground. Eavesdropping is a felony (article 226-15 of the penal code), and using informations yielded by a felony is a felony (article 321-1). As it was part of an organized scheme, this possibly carries a 10-year sentence and a fine of FRF 5,000,000 (yes, that's about 900 000 US dollars!), with civil penalties on top of that.
I am not a lawyer, but:
Airbus could thus perhaps sue Boeing, or its executives, in France for using informations yielded by eavesdropping. If sentenced, bank accounts or properties belonging to Boeing could be seized.
There is little probability that this would happen. There is a long history of spying between NATO allies, and usually all conflicts are solved by discreet informal agreements between governments.
I blow my nose at you, so-called Arthur-King!
You and all your silly English KNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNniggits!
I don't want to talk to you no more you empty-headed animal food-trough waterer!
Now go away or I shall taunt you a second time!
--
Maybe if that does happen, it'll help the Tories lead a charge to withdraw altogether.
I mean, the EU has no loyalty anymore to democratic or republican forms of government... just look at Portugal's treatment of Austria in recent weeks.
But could somebody please tell us non-us-slashdotters who Heather Graham is? (Wasn't she mentioned on South Park as well???).
------------------------------
The answer is yes, me.
Except, obviously they're very bad at what they do. They have an international spy agency setup to intercept phonecalls, etc. in their own country. I think the French are just looking for an excuse as to why their country produces nothing... I'd blame it on socialism, their 35 hour work week, and the fact that they all smell like crap. (last part is a joke of course ;)
well you're just unaware that there exist technology to produce software that is sufficiently secure to do that job. And that is precisely a European speciality, and something different in European CS courses. This also leads to secure railway signaling system, electronics in car engines and brakes, etc.
Airbus will be controlled by a French-German
dominated company (EADS), after the merger between France's Aerospatiale Matra, Germany's DASA and Spain's CASA in the next few month. FBW technology and generaly the electronics are mainly French, the Germans making the body of the plane. UK's BAe Systems is left with the wings, and I hope with nothing soon, so that they can go and suck Boeing's cock as they have long dreamed of.
send la vache !
Er, last time France considered the UK as an ally to defend against Germany, who has fled to defend their own country ?
>>> the UK is part of the Airbus consortium, so >>> according to the above, France is suing the UK >>> for it's own good. (it's nice of them to care!)
You're wellcome. The UK's doctrinal resentment of the government promoting any industry (apart from banking, insurance of shipwrecks and other money laundering activities), has already cost them their car industry, now their aeronautics are next in line.
It does not seem like the UK government gives a sh*t about Airbus. British Airways, which has always been a notorious UK govt puppet, has long refused to buy any Airbus (as El Al did after Albright came to publicly threaten the israelis to stop US aid if they did buy airbus). They are trying to make a transition to an alliance with Boeing, especially since BAe Systems has become a very minor participant in Airbus when the other companies of the consortium have decided to merge.
I'm personnaly sorry of that and have some nostalgy of the times when the UK and French aeronautics industries could do great things together (e.g. Concorde and many common military programs in the 60s). The Germans are much more difficult to stimulate and do not have more ambition than the British have now for this sector, but at least they feel that there interests are common to ours and not to the US's, and their public opinion is not manipulated by constant insulting anti-French flame by tabloid newspaper.
Last time I was in the US I saw this show on Fox that shows tapes taken by employers of their emplyees with hidden cameras.
:>
So this first class seats stuff is just about Air France trying American-style management and making sure the people that clean the plane do not talk about stealing headsets or newspapers left by the passengers
Oh they did recently when Blair thought that BAe could make a deal with the Germans, bundle Airbus in a company dominated by an Anglo-German conglomerate and sell it to the Americans with a good profit.
Things has not turned up this way however. BAe Systems is a minor and reluctant participant in Airbus, and while the French and Germans are discussing whether the A3XX should be assembled in Hamburg or Toulouse, all they manage to do is suggesting that it be assembled in the US... Thanks to our British friends for their inimitable sense of humor however.
i'm all for this, on the "exposing echelon" front, but given that france is notorious for using its intelligence serivice to benefit french companies, the irony is really killing me here...:)
-k. ^-^ ^D
One French official claims that "Frenchelon" intercepts about 2 million messages per month. While on an incredibly smaller scale than Echelon's estimated 3 million messages per minute, they're making themselves out to be major hypocrites here.
Hey, then again, maybe this was the reason for France's stupid effort to force French web sites to use the French language. Much easier to read those intercepted emails that way, eh Jacque?
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
Seriously, if France were gone from the UN, who would care? Their purpose there these days seems to be barely anything more than to oppose the U.S. It's not as if I'm even saying that all of the U.S.'s policies were right -- in fact, I disagree with a good deal of its international policies. France, though, seems to put no more deliberation into their UN votes than to see which way the U.S. is leaning and then take the opposite tack.
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
glwillia@hormel.hotmail.com writes:
Remove the producer of Spam from my email address to email me
Sorry, but I don't think that glwillia@com is a valid email address. :)
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
Clearly France doesn't actually expect to get any money out of this deal. Negotiations under the table probably went sour, so France has put a small thorn in the side of the U.S. and Britain by drawing mass media attention to Echelon. Projects like Echelon are much less effective, and more despised, when public knowledge of them increases.
If the foreign government doesn't cough up the damages you seize their assets in your country. The US did it with Iran after the shah was deposed. Apart from the embassy and consulates though (which are inviolate) the US doesn't actually have any assets in France.
You're forgetting private property. I don't think it'll happen, but they could theoretically seize property owned by american companies.
"Espionage ruined an Airbus contract? Lets confiscate some planes, office buildings and factories then..."
Unlikely in the extreme, but they certainly have ways if they want to. A lawyer might complain that this property isn't owned by the american government which did the spying. This is easily countered by the american people being responsible for electing their own government (it's a democracy after all) and american corporations are largely owned by american people.
This sort of argument wouldn't surprise me if it came from a socialist country like France. The reason they (probably) won't is the obvious trade war (or worse) that would follow.
They may be France's closest allies, but they're also pretty damn powerful enemies. If France tried to go to war with the US and the UK, they'd find the whole might of NATO turned against them. That would be outright suicide. First of all. This won't happen. Why? France is a member of NATO and of the EC. Second, why should they. They formed a joint army with Germany and the Benelux country's. And they have much influence in Europe. The only problem we in the EC have is Great-Britain. They are Fuc&^* things up all of the time.
Well the french probably won't have much luck against the USA; except maybe to prove they (the US) is really a fascist nation and NOT a true friend of us Europeans. However I bet the case is different with the UK, who afterall is a member of the EU. I wouldn't be surprised if Echelon violates at least a dozen European laws (Privacy Protection laws immediately spring to mind).
Remember, folks, here in Europe it's illegal to spy on the citizens without reasons. And just because the US is slowly being transformed into a dictatorship of total surveillance doesn't mean the rest of the world will have to follow.
Where were you when they took freedom of speech away from the Net?
I could use having the government pass eschelon info on to me. I don't have the money for it or nothing, but I'll do yardwork for any government official who's interested in hooking me up. Like I used to date this girl who started cheating on me with this guy who she thought was really deep cause he listened to the cure and shit like that. If I'd had eschelon access, I'd have known about it and wouldn't have had to spend a month wondering why all my friends were snickering at me. I'd also like to know why some girls think you're deep just because you listen to albums containing 72 straight minutes of non-stop whining. I don't know if eschelon could help with that problem, but it's much more of a national security (or personal insecurity at any rate) issue than whether or not people buy planes from boeing. Anyway, if there are NSA staffers or CIA operative who have access to eschelon data and need yardwork done, let me know. I have my own leaf blower.
--Shoeboy
Are you serious? By and large, America isn't exactly thrilled about the UN. The head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (Jesse Helms) just gave a speech at the UN, where he said that if the UN tries to push around the US, the US will QUIT the UN. How that would actually work, I'm not sure (with UN headquarters in the US and all). The US currently owes the UN something like $1Billion in back dues. The Republicans in Congress won't pay for "family planning" programs sponsored by the UN, because many of the support abortion.
Jesse is a putz, but he's got a point. I'm not so sure that I want other countries to have any say over how I live my life and how my government functions. (I wish the US would keep its nose out of other countries, too...)
-jon
Remember Amalek.
Sorry I have to speak on this. You probably think we didn't know about the attack before it happened. The US Government knew about the attack before it happened. Why do you think all of our ships were in dock and all three carriers were out at sea. The government has admitted this (don't have a link but search any engine and you'll find plenty.)
Roosevelt wanted us in the war but the public was strongly against it. How could he get us into war? Hmmmm.....
Please don't use the Pearl Harbor attack as an example. Our government wanted in that war and that's why we got in.
They'll do it the same way the U.S. sues other countries and foreigners!
How can they enforce the verdict? Well.. it's not too hard actually..
Can they *make* the US pay, under threat of prison? Of course not...
Can they change national policy and not deal with the US until the US pays up? Sure they can.
Did iCrave-TV obey a US court order, even though they are in Canada? Sure they did.. why? Not because the US troops could march in and get them, but because it seems liket he *proper* thing to do: defend themselves.
"Giant antennas" would be quite inefficient at monitoring
GSM phones, i.e. UHF->microwave devices.
You would want tiny antennas (at least in terms of
the active elements) and very close range to the target
of interception.
Wave theory. Very important stuff. Most people have NO
idea how much "stuff" is on the air everywhere.
What you say about greenpeace may be true, I have no idea. I have no love for Greenpeace. I take exception with the idea that it was only greenpeace that was against french nuke testing. That's a fallacy of composition designed to get France off the hook, because Greenpeace is a flaky organization lots of people love to hate. It's not just greenpeace that was upset about the French in the South Pacific. Nobody wanted the French down there.
... do you see why that might be difficult to organize?
Some background:
France is in Europe. It was setting off bombs on the other side of the world. Imagine the outcry if China wanted to set off nukes in the French countryside. The French just didn't care that this part of the world might not like having nukes set off. There is no need for empathy, we are French.
So, how does France deal with this touchy situation?
French agents went in and blew up a civilian ship in New Zealand. Saying it was Greenpeace, and the Americans, and they deserved it for messing with France does not make it okay.
As to Greenpeace not sending protesters into the interior of communist China prior to secret nuclear tests
"You don't frighten us, English pig-dogs! ---Go and boil your bottoms, sons of a silly person. I blow my nose at you, so-called Arthur-king, you and all your silly English knnnniggets. Thppppt!"
== I am not Me.
... is a European consortium, not a French company.
Open Source. Closed Minds. We are Slashdot.
Open Source. Closed Minds. We are Slashdot.
Allies?
in WW2?
Don't make me laugh.
well I do not think the french govt will have to hire lawyers. There are already more than a bunch of lawyers working for the state and they get ^aid whatever happens, so they might as well work!!
Dr Lolo
---
Dev elpizw tipota, dev phoboumai tipota eimai lephteros http://euclidian.org
Read the article.
It is NOT the french government suing. It is a civil class action. Of course they won't get their money back. But if they do formally win the lawsuit it will be a BIG incentive for companies to use encryption AND it will make it hardly possible for the government to pass laws restricting the use of encryption.
Just think of it. Which MPs can vote for a law that prevents companies to protect themselves against USUK spies? Specially if they have a court ruling that they indeed have been spied on, and that they could not get their money back despites the ruling.
Laurent
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Dev elpizw tipota, dev phoboumai tipota eimai lephteros http://euclidian.org
It is NOT the french government suing. So on this regard i do not mind being a french taxpayer.
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Dev elpizw tipota, dev phoboumai tipota eimai lephteros http://euclidian.org
I wonder why this lawsuit made it to the news in a british newspapers and not in the french ones. It was not in Le Monde last night nor the night before. And Le Monde does have a lot of briefs. Would this lawsuit be a media coup aimed at british taxpayers who pay for a spying system that spies on Airbus, which is an european consortium, and hence has british employees? Dr Lolo
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Dev elpizw tipota, dev phoboumai tipota eimai lephteros http://euclidian.org
Anything like this, which could easily push the whole Echelon project into public knowledge, is a good thing. The fact is that 95 out of 100 people have no idea that it exists, or that it even could. Granted, the French may have a less than distinguished history of industrial espionage, but I somehow doubt that the US or UK are any less rosy. Instead of abusing France, we should be glad that things like this get into the limelight - if the vast majority has no idea that this exists, there will be no opposal to it.
Obviously you cannot sue the United States before any human court in this world. France can sue the United Kingdom in a court of the European Union, but it cannot sue the United States. The United Nations have been able to set up tribunals, notably to judge war crimes such as those that were committed in Bosnia, but it evidently cannot judge a state that is permanent member of the security council.
Only one court has been able to judge and condemn the United States, and that is the Russell Tribunal, during the Vietnam War. The Tribunal had no authority other than moral, but it did have very much prestige, and its role in bringing out fact to the public eye was of great importance.
This story about France sueing the US and the UK is a farce. However, it may be possible for a small group of individuals with enough prestige (say, the Electronic Frontier Foundation) to set up a special tribunal to judge that sort of matters. The tribunal's verdicts would not lead to any kind of punishment, but they would lead to public awareness, which is, after all, the most important thing.
In the case of World War I, the Zimmerman telegram laid the foundation for the United State's entry into the war. The sinking of the Lusitania was more of a final straw. British propaganda was a factor, something that
backfired on them in later years when Americans learned how they had been lied to.
Sorry, but that's chronologically inaccurate. The Lusitania was sunk on 7 May 1915, and the Zimmermann telegraph was sent in 1917, the year the US entered the war. The sinking of the Lusitania wasn't so bad as the Germans resuming unrestricted submarine warfare.
so what ? i'm french. ... NY ?
and i must say all this contersuing thing makes me laugh.
would it not be good if both parts stopped doingwhatever spying they are doing now?
someonw said 'countersue', eayh i hope you will, so that all that's a thread to our privacy will come to an end.
i hope it's just the first of many suings for privacy.
as a european i must say i'm surprised at how the english let this happen in England: look at it, an american base in England monitoring europeean traffic ???
hell i thought they were europeean too?
are they making this deal to avoid being monitored themselves?
until we find out there is another place in europe monitoring the English.
be it in england or in france i find it surprising that another country has a spying military base in a european country.
what would the US say if they found a european secret spying base in say
-"i'm X president of the US, open!"
-" president of who?"
-"the US, i am your president!"
-"we're not american!"
-"well who are you then?"
-"we're european."
-"so what is it you're doing in the states?"
-"mind your own business!"
remember?
who would you like it?
well i don't like it and i don't also like it if europeans are doing this, especially france, so yes, please, contersue!
-- x
You know, it's just so hard to be pissed about something if the French are pissed about it, too.
In all seriousness, though, I wonder how they came up with that dollar amount and how they found "evidence" to support their claims? Mind you, since the article is typical headline fodder, we don't actually know anything.
By the way, `Canada' didn't exist in those days, in the sense you seem to mean: it was still part of the British Empire.
Actually, Canada was independant of both England and France in the late 1800's.
You're probably thinking of Newfoundland, where I live, which didn't join Canada until the late 1940's. We (Newfoundland) fought in the wars under Britain. The rest of Canada fought in the same way that a little brother helps out an older brother (sorry, can't think of a better analogy than that right now).
Do you seriously think that this will work?
One, if there was such a contest, it would be on the front page.
Two, Slash "-" dot?
SP
"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong." - Voltaire
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
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"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
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"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
I guess this is better then france declaring war on us. Oh wait a minute maybe not, they actually have billion to one chance of winning a lawsuit.
War is necrophilia.
That has changed now. It used to be that you couldn't use or import anything "strongish". They are actually advocating its use now
It is legal
I usually find comment and replies on /. pretty good. But when it cames to matter about the actions of one country that is not the US, you guys become *very* unfair.
Every country uses it's agent for protecting and helping it's biggest company. But you can't even think that France can represent a serious threat to US and countries involved in Echelon. France military budget is a very few percents of the Pentagon's one. And funds for "spies" is a little percentage in it. France shares only one military sattelite with some europeans countries.
I really think spying is not a good thing. Indeed, it is most obviously a bad thing. So we should lower our nationnalist premade point of view. In fact there is no rules in spying, the only rule is to not use murder when spying a friendly country.
We all do know about Echelon, and we all find it bad. If it was good it would have been submitted to the congress, but it is completly out of control for the american People. I really support any action against Echelon and do not consider it as attack aimed to harm, if Echelon could be put under democratic control, we - all of us on earth - could win more privacy.
Since we all speak to each other without any knowledge of the other's country, race, religion we should consider things that makes us the same -Free Software, Technology... -rather than thing that divides us. "Stuff that matters".
no! it's chutzpah, not hypocracy! you've abused the classic chutzpah example (the orphan example) as an example of hypocracy. the menendez brothers are irrelevant to the issue - you want "it's the pot calling the kettle black," or "the mpaa suing the government for passing anti-free-speech laws."
Become a FSF associate member before the low #s are used
More fundamentally, all the evils generally ascribed to corporations rely upon government as a facilitator (e.g. to take the most recent example described on /., abuse of copyright law requires the government to go along with the abusive interpretation and enforce it). On the other hand, the evils of government do not rely on corporations at all; some of the most evil governments in history did not allow the existence of private capital at all.
Hence, the root of the problem is at the government level.
/.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
And Boeing's still scrambling to catch up with Airbus on it's "fly-by-wire" technology. And they can't even do that very well. How much has Boeing's flagship fly-by-wire plane, the 777, sold? Compared to Airbus? Hardly any. It's a failure for them.
Fly by wire scares the crap out of me. I've been working with computers for a decade, and I still haven't found an OS that I would trust my life to, no, not even Linux or Solaris.
Give me alloy cables directly connecting the control surfaces, make them triply redundant, and run them through the trailing edges of the wings (unlike the DC-10, where an engine dropping off tears up the leading edge, and the control cable).
Engineers that deal with material objects (ie. Aerospace, Mechanical, etc) plan for failure, tey assume things will go wrong, and make contingency plans. The only contingency plans for fly by wire I've heard of are the three flight computers in the Shuttle, where they vote and majority rules.
George
Comment removed based on user account deletion
If nothing else, this should at least serve as an incentive to make encription legal in France...
er... "encryption", that is
NSA: America's Fortress of Spies Part one of The Sun's NSA series, Baltimore Sun, 1995
"From a commercial communications satellite, NSA lifted all the faxes and phone calls between the European consortium Airbus, the Saudi national airline and the Saudi government. The agency found that Airbus agents were offering bribes to a Saudi official. It passed the information to U.S. officials pressing the bid of Boeing Co. and McDonnell Douglas Corp., which triumphed last year in the $6 billion competition."
and then I found this article which is far too long to quote here but includes some interesting points including:-
It's also fascinating to see that the UK didn't react when the NSA eaves dropped on the Airbus consortium (partly composed by a British industry) for the benefit of one of its American competitors . Even when her interests are concerned, the UK doesn't hesitate to serve her big brother or hypocritically close her eyes...
and then I noticed another rather strange thing in the same article, namely:-
Echelon members :
How come the French are only hassling the UK and the US? It all seems a bit confused to me...
I also heard (but cannot track down any links at this point) that the methods used to extract the information about the airbus negotiations used the NSA backdoor keys into the Lotus Notes 'secure' email system. Maybe in the light of the recent story about commission policy and the fact that there is a directive currently being worked on concerning the legalities of encryption in the EU may well lead to some interesting policies in the future for NSA 'enhanced' exported software. (here is an essay detailing some of the issues being considered)
The only Good System is a Sound System
Actually France never surrendered during WWI, they won (read back your history book).
you can certainly bet that France would spy on YOU if they had the technology.
Oh yeah, as soon as France builts its first electric generator, we will start designing a prototype that will allow us to communicate over vast distances, with just a wire in between...
Man you look pretty ignorant. France (or the rest of Europe for that matter) is quite advanced in telecoms, probably more judging by the way the US cell phone works. Don't forget France owns the largest market share of commercial space launching... so they might have some sattelites too.
Actually Greenpeace is at the orders of the CIA : they do all mumbo jumbo about the nuclear experiments done by non-US countries, you've never heard them complain about what the US army does. Sunking the Rainbow warriors was just a spy vs spy matter (with some eco-zealots cought between the fires).
Also last times China did some nuclear test I didn't hear Greenpeace so much...
All I can say is I'm glad to see someone with some power pissed off over Echelon. Now, if only this will help our attempts to control the NSA's crap here at home.
:)
The article did not post what the French want? Hopefully, they want damages and the shutdown of Echelon.. and don't just want in on the deal..
One thing I noticed:
Yesterday he said that he would bring an action on behalf of French civil liberty groups.
Actually, this makes it sound like it is not France suing the US and UK, but just French civil liberties groups. Can anyone clear this up?
Jeff
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Okay, I'll just call you a pathetic redneck puke. What's wrong, billy-bob? Lose your job for showing up drunk again? Or are you just frustrated because you haven't gotten laid since your sister got big enough to outrun you? Don't you just wish you were back in the joint so some big black man would make a woman out of you again? Give it up, asswipe. The Jews didn't make a loser out of you. You did it all by yourself. -jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
While I'm all for anyone suing to get echelon shut down, the french government is far from the ideal plaintiff for this kind of thing.
Do they really want all the victims of French espionage to sue *them*?
Oh, well. Glad I'm not a French taxpayer.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
This could start an interesting trend (ignoring for a moment that Airbus are also part owned by a British company) after suing for spying goverments could then move over things like breach of promise (notably the promise that the US gave to reduce green house gas emissions)
The lawyers must be having a field day.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
Citroen spawned the humble, yet quite fantastic 2CV. One of its design specifications was that a farmer should be able to drive it over a bumpy, sandy path with a box of eggs, without a single egg breaking..they're pretty neat things :)
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
The area where this could actually become something is the European Union. France has brought this to their attention, and they are investigating it. England spying on member nations and helping a non-member nation to compete unfairly against other members is not going to be well regarded. Also, the European Union is big enough to be able to make a stink, even if France isn't
A college prof of mine was interviewed for a book that discussed the spying activities of the U.S.'s "allies" for commercial advantage (he's an expert on Japanese affairs).
The book is Friendly Spies by Peter Schweizer.
He opens (IIRC) with a description of the French DGSE team out in Washington state woods, using sophisticated radio equipment to intercept telemetry from the early Boeing 767 tests. He basically goes on to say that not only do they do it, but the Koreans, Japanese, Chinese, Russians, Germans, Israelis, and just about anyone else you can think of do it.
His argument was that the U.S. should both combat and engage in just the same type of spying. The problem, according to a former CIA employee I once talked to (former head of the intelligence directorate), is that even if you got over the legal restrictions placed by Congress on that type of spying, who do you give the information to? At the time of the French allogations, Boeing still had competitors in the US commercial aviation industry. If you get information on French Telecom's bid on a Brazilian phone system, do you give the information to AT&T, MCI, Southern Bell, etc.?
Just one more argument against nationalized companies, IMO. It helps quell this sort of behavior on all sides.
I say we Open Source EVERYTHING. If we have no more secrets, if every single little act of our governments were laid bare - and I mean all governments, all offices, all of the time - then Echelon and its ilk wouldn't be necessary. Face it, as long as there are secrets, there will be spying. As the people are suppposed to _be_ the government, in the democacies of the world, at least, then it seems sort of stupid to keep secrets from ourselves.
There are many things that the people have no need, and indeed, no right, to know - whom is giving the President head, for example - but anything that is actually part of the political process should be an open book. Every cent that the government spends should be accountable. Every memo and every record, including e-mail and faxes should be published for the entire public to read. Yes, the voyeuristic bullshit: "I'll be home for lunch dear, have the KY ready," from some horny congressman to his wife should be excluded. Give our public servants carte blanche to delete up to 50 personal references a year (ammounting to no more than, say, 5,000 words), with a panel that examines, randomly, such deletions, to make sure that this generosity isn't being abused. that would still maintain the privacy that everyone deserves, and keep the world safe for the rest of us.
Neopets - the best free game on the Int
... and it can be found here.
in a totally coincidental turn of events, Heather Graham has been spoted at a local bar with none other than Rob Malda... freaky...
~~~ They call me Little John, but don't let the name fool you...in real life I'm very big.
1) Not a troll, he's really that juvenile.
2) Not moderation, he karma whored before this and now gets an automatic +1 bonus to anything he posts. Other users who have karma high enough to give them the +1 bonus usually use their ability to turn it off (as I have in this posting). IMHO the Karma +1 button is a good thing, it rewards people who actually think before they post, but there should be an option through M2 (M3?) to turn the +1 option off for those who abuse it by posting frivolous or off-topic things at Lv2.
you know, I was almost fooled.
Every nation spies on its allies. While this doesn't scale well to personal relations, you need to know what they're doing so you know that they *are* still your allies. This Is Not something that the U.S. just invented ten years ago.
Jack Valenti and the MPAA are to technology as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone
Hey now! I'm from the US and we are all retarded red-neck idiots! But that doesn't mean you need to call us that to our faces!! You, you, you turd-vacuum! You, you unwashed haggis eating frog lover!
Can't we all just get along?
Just because there is a distasteful troll product of the US public school system in here doesn't mean you need to insult me by proxy as well.
.sig: Now legally binding!
Which is exactly why we need encryption. After this, I will assume France to be on the privacy side of the privacy-security debate.
--
The shareholder is always right.
Did you read the article? They're suing because they think Airbus lost a few billion francs to Boeing because the US gave Boeing information about Airbus's bidding strategy that had been obtained through echelon.
--
The shareholder is always right.
Has anyone managed to find these documents?
I couldn't find anything mentioning echelon on nsa's public information releases or their list of "high-interest items".
I found a few sites mentioning echelon and P-415, though. This one mentions P-145 as being around for at least a decade. That site doesn't seem to be an unbiased source, though, because its homepage links to things like this rant about echelon with a really big font.
This is another site that mentions P-145 and mobile phone monitoring. It contains a document called "An Appraisal of the Technologies of Political Control", a long document which mentions echelon and discusses agreements among various countries regarding sharing of information obtained through echelon-like projects.
--
The shareholder is always right.
correct me if im wrong but wasent it french spies who sunk the rainbow warrior? and also dont the french have giant antenas pointed at Britan to listen in on gsm cell phone conversations?
seems to me whats good for the goose is good for the gander...
You make a good point but the UN would never kick out the US. If they tried I'm sure the US Gov would say something along the lines of, "You like your pretty building? What to keep it?"
-Fyre
- Apple Computer......proudly going out of business for over twenty years.
I'm a US Citizen
.234546576 inches for two weeeks then lost .9987556765 inches of territory the next week, or the espionage of Cold war.
Ok? so what? (incid. so am I)
as I'm guessing most Slashdotters are?
Why? You coming from that American Interent where all 'mericans go?
I'm GLAD we're spying on France
I'm not it means we'll see the legacy of James Bond ruined again by Hollywood milking the hype monster.
It's also "primitive" like the trench warfare that gained
and I don't understand why so many slashdotters are anti-Echelon.
I think you do understand Mr. AC. It has been explained a bazillion times. Echelon spies on American citizens (course they can't defend w/o flaming), Australian citizens (course they can't care), and Brits (course they don't care).
Seriously, don't you think it's in your best interest for your government to be well-informed about the global situation?
WTF does the global situation have to do with businessmen? If you're going to spy on arms tech then do it discretely. They have no reason to be spying on household items.
You would be deluding yourself if you thought that friends don't spy on friends; you can certainly bet that France would spy on YOU if they had the technology. If you're still not convinced, go pick up Sun Tzu's The Art of War and read it until you finally get it...it's much better to be prepared for a conflict that never happens than to be surprised by your ignorance.
Yes, they're going to attack us with our secret Heinz Ketchup recipe.
Besides, we're at the edge, anything developed tomorrow is obsolete yesterday computers are making inventing so easy everything will be an obvious non patentable idea in the next 5 years.
Look this is about industrial espionage. When it gets to arms we'll call you.
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
Why? You coming from that American Interent where all 'mericans go?
I said that because I don't see any relevance of nationality in this situation, not even on the classic question of national bias. They're stealing industrial secrets.
Granted I've been on a spot-the-poster's-lure kick for the last few days.
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
This might be true. However, Echelon is supposed to be a collaboration between various countries, including the UK.
This means that Echelon is subject to the EU legislation. One EU member state spying on other member state surely violates EU internal market rules. Also the emerging 3rd Pillar (Home and Justice Affairs) at least implicitly forbids such a behaviour. The violation of internal market rules, however, are the most serious, since those matters fall in the competence of independent European Communities Court of Justice (which is btw. about only EU institution carrying the acronym EC..).
If UK gets convicted in ECJ (which would take a s**tload of time), it has absolutely no way to refute the ruling. For a system like Echelon this would propably be quite harmful, since the system needs a physical location in Europe.
There is also another fact that could make things more hot between EU and the US: The European Parliament subscribed Echelon report, which will be released on 22nd this month. If the EP really gets pissed, it can block future trade deals between US and EU. In addition to that the on-going competition cases could get more backing..
In summarum: The US is not 100% immune of what the poor idiot Europeans are doing..
And besides, what an Earth the UK gov't has been thinking, if they supported the spying of the Airbus Consortium?? The Airbus was and is 25% owned by UK company named British Aerospace..
-miKa
Give us the grail or we shall take your castle by force!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
If you come and snoop our packets again, we will taunt you some more!
If it was said on slashdot, it MUST be true!
RÉLTN ATDTR PREEL REMAS CRLTS IENNN TMVNE RSEPP SSRPN OIGON QEEEG IPENx SxOxO OUÇOB IxILS xLMCA EAE1S AEIÉA TTTCE OSIMC CSTES NSISR T3SET IEOEx SxDxI xFAMM SOELE OD5NL TAUSN SECLN LÇARS PGÉET NUPÈA RUNCx OATAT FEESI AQDEE BEPEE NDT3R DULT9 UOEUS AAÉTR RIRPS EIEST IFTxR xNxIE VAÉDI xN9AR ÉNSSC SETEL DSARU IERET DRATL ASTME LxLxA RUSIC UUAAE MA5RI ABEAF xELÊA LUSNE xNISN SNIUÉ RÊ5IF ÈICSA EQISE PPDEM USxUx ENTAE MTVUÉ UOSFO SRRUN SLODE xOLCI EÉRCC TLERP UDSCL OSAMV LSExN UROÉT LDNII UGLOL IRNAS ISxMx ExRxI IEISE DRDAO DVFLE LSISU MOTNS TxVNI IRONT LÉAxL ERVRD TxHUO AIERP
threadeds blog
I'd say it's more US vs. The World (e.g. Airbus).
BTW: France as nation (the French government etc) is not involved *AT*ALL* in this lawsuit. So people calling France stupid and hypocritical because of this must be *really* stupid since they can't even read and understand a short fragment of text.
Thank you for making "France sues" out of Times' "French to sue" headline, Hemos.
n -earth-and-can-and-will-do-everything-th ey-want
This is good journalism!
That's about the same as writing (say) "USA has killed peoples in Rome" instead of "Americans have shot two men in Rome".
And now we have the usuall France-is-stupid-and-USA-is-the-greatest-nation-o
type of discussion.
> As for their Aerospace expertise, ever heard of
:-).
. htm
Ariane? It can launch heavier payloads to higher
> orbits than the shuttle. That's pretty important for geosyncronous orbits/communications
> satellites. The only thing the US has in that department are old Saturn rockets from the 70's.
I'm a big fan of the Ariane, but all of this is wrong.
1. The shuttle can launch much more than the Ariane V into LEO: 24.4t (204km orbit) vs 18t (185km)
For higher orbits (i.e. geosynchronous) satellites needs much bigger kick-engines when launched with the shuttle, since Ariane already inserts its payload into eliptic GTOs, the shuttle can't do that. This makes ~5.9t (into GTO) for the shuttle vs 6.8t for Ariane V.
2. The American Titan 4B can launch more than the Ariane V: LEO 21.64t (185) GTO (8620).
3. The US has no old Saturn rockets that could be launched anymore and can't build new ones
The big pluses of Ariane that makes Arianespace the leading launcher are:
1. Price
2. Reliability of service (e.g. no hurricanes in Kourou wich could delay launch (and probably cost the contraction $$s))
3. Precision of orbit injection (wich saves satellite fuel and enhances satellite lifetime)
4. "contract to orbit" time
But not power.
Have a look at
http://www.friends-partners.org/~mwade/spaceflt
It's a great page with detailled information about all known launch systems in the world.
Strange measure of laziness - if France can maintain itself as a player in global politics while reducing working hours for the citizens, they have my vote for a cool system. Ever played Civilization: Call to Power? Even gaming authors are aware of the fact that only an advanced economy can tranform efficiency into happiness as well as wealth. As other posters have already stated - why are you attacking France? For defending the privacy of its citizens? Stay on subject here.
This should be an interesting case since, as far as I know, there are no legal precedents. I presume the World Court division of the UN would handle the case, as there really is no other feasible way to bring a civil suit against another country. The thing is, there really isn't any established international law. The UN may create and attempt to impose laws, but it's really up to the individual countries as to whether or not they will obey them. It could cause a member nation to lose face if it did not follow the rules, but it isn't the same as a private citizen breaking a state or federal law. Be interesting to see what happens..
Don't forget the Statue of Liberty.
Here's my DeCSS mirror, where's yours?
Everytime Americans are affected by ECHELON there is a large uproar. But none of you really cares if your country pisses on the rights of non-Americans. At least they are only babarians, arent they?
Personally, I feel great running around with a spear and crying mystical native words...
Si tacuisses philosophus mansisses
Well, let's say the US and France are part of the UN, which i believe they are. Obviously both countries would very much like to be part of the UN, as they are, already. If the UN were to rule a verdict, the consequence for not honoring the verdict could likely be removal of membership from the UN. But this would make the UN suffer. So, we must be sure both parties actually care about being involved with the UN, which i should hope they are.
In my opinion, the UN is a very powerful organization and i can see no reason the US or France should not wish to say a member of it. The benefits outweigh the risks..
I hope you see my point.
Fortunately coming from the UK, a country with no written constitution, an unelected upper house, video cameras on every street corner, an enormous (£101) approx $160/year tax on every television set, no right to silence, and an authoritarian "socialist" government whose only principle is to cling to power at all costs, I think I can rest easy.
But I'd still rather live here than in America :)
P.S. If that is you dmg have you done any decent trolls recently? Trolltalk isn't what it used to be for finding out intersting trolls.
Just read The Puzzle Palace, there are many documented cases, and our allies know it, so what's the big deal? They do the same thing.
Occasionally there are prices to be paid for such actions. In the late 1960's Israel attacked one of our intelligence gathering ships when they realized we were probably listening to them. Dozens of americans were killed and it was essentially buried.
We go to amazing lengths in our SIGINT (signals intelligence) efforts.
There was once a project to build a dish antenna (a damn BIG one) for the NSA that was intended to pick up faint radio signals that were being reflected by THE MOON. I believe this project was cancelled. The engineering problems were myriad to say the least.
Ignore Alien Orders
2) Forcing genetic engineered food down our throut
Surely no one is forcing consumers to buy the food. Or is the US your only supplier of food?
3) Forcing very strict encryption- and data-protectionlaws. Thanks to the US it's now illegal in Denmark to make backup-copies. Hey, it's even 'illegal' to surf the web (yeah, really stupid law, but apparently the pressure was so strung that the law needed to be rushed through).
Yeah, these laws are stupid. Keep in mind that they are being forced on US citizens too.
3) Spying on everyboddy
Sorry, but everyone spies on everyone. As other /.ers have mentioned, France itself has a track record of spying. I'm not saying spying isn't bad, but it's not the basis for a complaint that the US is worse than other countries in that regard.
1) GM food
If there were sufficient consumer demand for non-GM food, organic growers would have booming business and would be expanding their operations. Moreover, high demand for non-GM food would lead food companies whose food was non-GM to prominently label it as such. Other companies would have to follow suit, as consumers would begin thinking that anything without a non-GM label was GM. Since none of this stuff is happening, apparently not many people care whether their food is GM or not. I find it hard to believe that those people who do care are unable to find organic growers.
2) Encryption/copyright - Err.. I thought I already agreed on that one.
3) Spying - In that case, Denmark should sue the US/UK, instead of France.
So the choice producers are ending up with is either submit to Monsanta and loose sale or change production/recepies to NOT include soya alltogether, and thus raising production costs!
Yeah, but banning GM foods from import would just select the second scenario automatically, if there isn't enough non-GM soya available.
I mean, there either is enough production capacity to feed everyone on non-GM food or there isn't.
If there is, then consumers could by only non-GM food if they so desired, and no one would import GM food because they couldn't sell it. If there isn't, you can't ban GM food because people would starve.
If the organic food is actually available (that is, if there isn't a constant shortage of it), and GM food still sells, that simply means that some consumers place price over whether food is GM or not. Even if GM food were unsafe for consumption, it is hardly the job of the government to force consumers not to buy it. Smoking is undeniably more unhealthy than GM foods could possibly be, but nobody complains about tobacco being shoved down their throat, even if it can still be imported.
Now, I'd rate the probablity of actually getting said money at just about the same as, say, Rob and Heather Graham dating.
Yea, and I probably would have said that the probability of them getting money is just as likely as Dennis Rodman remarrying Carmen Electra, but well, ya know...
Now, I'd rate the probablity of actually getting said money at just about the same as, say, Rob and Heather Graham dating.
Yea, and I probably would have said that the probability of them getting money is just as likely as Dennis Rodman remarrying Carmen Electra, but well, ya know...
This is the same country that used their commandos to BLOW UP and SINK Greenpeace's Rainbow Warrior to ends it's interference in their activities . Further, as has been indicated in other posts, they, *like all other countries*, have routinely engaged in whatever corporate espionage presented itself since time immemorial.
Hypocrisy is an artform...
I think I am going to go have a glass of champagne...oh, pardon, "sparkling wine" as it is from CA.
rootrot
Don't forget guys, ALL encryption was illegal in France, and last year(?) they changed the law to make it LEGAL - the French aren't totally clueless (just mostly like most Govs.)
----
I hereby inform you that I have NOT been required to provide any decryption keys.
Come on, let's use the UN International court. It is hysterical. US charged with violating Cuba's soveirgnty (Bay of Pigs), convicted, US ignores.
I think we were convicted for one or two other covert deals in the 80s.
It rocks when the US is convicted and ignores the trial.
Note: this is sarcasm, not a troll
There is no body that can convict the US Gov't, save the US Court system (to give financial awards out) and France can hardly sue the US for International espionage.
This is silly. Come on France, play the cloak and dagger game. When you catch them, make a big stink of it, announce a boycott, trade sanctions, and pull your ambassador.
Oh wait, if they try for trade sanctions, the WTO can overturn them. If they violate that, then everyone gets to counter embargo within the WTO, kick France out, our whatever they want.
Let's see an International incident over this stupid project.
GO GLOBALIZATION!
Thad
Thad
that s right but we judged him when we find out. and we never elected a senile movie star as president, so we re not that crazy yet .
first it puts the echelon discussion at a higher level .(It's always good to tell a friend to stop looking under your lady's dress.)and echelon is something that, if it exists , we can't compete with.[Anyway , when it comes to intelligence , there are two leading countries, US and UK...well for this kind of intelligence anyway. Remember enigma...]
..
second there are a lot of undergoing negociations about trade with this world commerce thing. And everybody is playing dirty one after the other (are our cheeses so dangerous for your country ?Just avoid to lit a match near one and there won't be any problem!)
third it tells UK to be a little more on the europe side and a little less on the US side wich has always been their weakness.Being on the europe side doesn t mean you re against USA
fourth there has always been problems with the US in the plane commerce.US never played fair in that field.(remember the concorde plane. too noisy !!! that was so funny!!).The only positive point I see in the US way to trade is that they re playing as dirty with yourself as with the others.(cf intel attacks via to harm amd)
fifth airbus is a true commercial success , which is good, a true technical success,wich is even better, and a trully european project , which was a miracle that changed our way to see things."So , it's possible to actually work together!!!!".
Therefore it needs to be protected at government level.
my 2 francs
>Now, I'd rate the probablity of actually getting said money at just about the same as, say, Rob and Heather Graham dating.
That's what people were saying 20 years ago when a bunch of French villages sued Amoco for the Amoco Cadiz oil spillage. They eventually (it took about 10 years I think) won. Big! A couple hundred million dollars.
So who knows, maybe it'll work this time too.
As for the British they'd really need still to figure out whether they're part of Europe (and Airbus!) or still an American colony.
Michel
Look, that's why there's rules, understand? So that you think before you break 'em. (Terry Pratchett)
I remember a few years ago when a women bought coffee at McDonalds. So as she was driving home she spilled it on herself causing her to get burned. Then she sued McDonalds for millions of dollars.
Now, if this was on Slashdot there would have been a BIG CONSPIRACY about McDonalds giving super hot coffee to Black Women in an attempt to stop them from eating there in the mornings. This Echelon deal and the French is very much the same. I would personally believe that the French are simply poor businessmen and that they are just really pissed off at the US for hurting their economy. So what better way to hurt the US than to appeal to narrowminded people in this country to believe that the NSA caused this to happen. HA HA HA HA HA. That is great. I think that I am going to sue the NSA for causing me to fail my first interview because they gave my future employer information about me and my competing interviewing in favor of someone else. HA HA HA HA
Seems to me that all of a sudden, a lot of people are changing hats. This is such a redneck attitude. Yes, it IS true that ALL countries are actively using intelligence and counter-intelligence services and that, in a way, it's very hypocritic from the French government. BUT, in no way should these implicit facts serve as an excuse to legitimize spying with such "in your face" means. Or in other words, if you get caught with you hand in the bag, "get it the fuck out of there" (yeah, yeah, bad word). Keeping it there and saying that it's known others do it is not a valid excuse.
I will always remember this post as "The great redneck come out".
The role of the russians was mostly ignored in north america because the cold war started right after WWII and both the US and Russia started demonization campaings against each other. I'm sure there are still more people in the US today that call communism evil than people who actually know what it is. (I'm not defending communism here)
So, that'd be about .5 then?
no comment
Who are these people who will defend the actions of their respective governments at any cost? Some people are very quick to jump all over the government when their own liberties are at stake, but wil defend them to the end when they trample the rights of a foriegn power. Another thing: no single country was capable of winning WW1 or WW2.
Historical examples abound from Chinas' loss of the silkworm, Englands loss of cotton farming techniques, to Syria's loss of Damascus Steel. Like it or not, commerce has always been the driving force behind most of the worlds history (one could argue religion).
The point is that nations have always spied on nations, wither they are frinedly or not. Does Echelon really exist? I don't know, maybe, maybe not, but it makes a nice sounding "Big Brother" name. After all it easier to name a program than an individual. Who would ever believe that a single person could make or break a multi-billion dollar deal? Doesn't sound nearly as good as a mysterious international consiparicy...
Look at the information behind the headlines. France is suffering over 12% unemployment, and those who are employed can't even work a 40 hour work week at one job. France knows they are never going to collect a dime. But if the political leaders over there can blame the evil "foreigners", than they look better. History is full of such examples from Hitler, to the newly elected extremists in Austria.
You don't hear about most corporate espionage for the same reason you don't hear about 99% of compromised corporate systems, image. If anyone would like a reality check, or a good book to reference, I would recommend "The sword and the shield, the Mitrokhin archive, the secret history of the KGB". (Pub by Basic Books, author Christopher Andrew) The book is very recent and has been endorsed by unique sources. Look behind the headlines, the rest is nothing more than smoke.
What declassified NSA documents is the article talking about? I find it quite hard to belive that the NSA would declassify anything.
I am far from a legal expert however I believe the precedent is for it to be tried in French courts, under French law. While there is a International Court I do not believe this is the type of case they handle. This idea of precedent is how we try foreign nationals whose country deny them diplomatic immunity.
Nate Custer
"The poet presents his thoughts festively, on the carriage of rhythm; usually because they could not walk" Nietzsche
Unbelievable! If echelon was spying on people in the US, and I'm not saying it isn't, there would be nothing but outrage. Instead I see attacks on France and Europe and claims of US superiority. Many of these posts display the shocking level of ignorance of my countrymen. This is about the US government spying on people who have responded in a legal manner that will expose more of the truth than we have now. If what they claim is true and they prove it they deserve to be compensated. If you can prove the French spied on you, please do, you also deserve to be compensated, otherwise stop your ignorant xenophobic ranting. db
I mean, I can see why the French are pissed off. That's certainly understandable. But sue? How? In what court? What judge gets to order a government (any government) to pay damages to another government? What about the sovereign right of nations? Does anyone else see the problem, here?
This is a little like having a corporation arrested: who the hell gets arrested, since a corporation is only a person on paper, and no one individual can legally be held liable for the entire corporation's actions (this is why you can't sue, say, the CEO for something the corporation did; you have to sue the company itself).
How is this supposed to work?
--- I've been in school *way* too long....
Anyway, on this list of NSA documents with descriptions I found the following passage:
The program, codenamed ECHELON, has been described as a global surveillance network that intercepts and processes the world' communications and distributes it among the primary partners in the decades-old UKUSA alliance-the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand
And this right after it:
In reality, ECHELON is a more limited program, allowing the UKUSA allies to specify intelligence requirements and automatically receive relevant intercepts obtained by the UKUSA facilities which intercept satellite communications (but not the U.S. facilities that receive data from SIGINT satellites). It is also limited by both technological barriers (the inability to develop word-spotting software so as to allow for the automatic processing of intercepted conversations) and the limitations imposed on collection activities by the UKUSA allies-at least as regards the citizens of those countries. Thus, the NAVSECGRU instruction also specifies that one of the responsibilities of the commander of the Sugar Grove site is to "ensure the privacy of U.S. citizens are properly safeguarded pursuant to the provisions of USSID 18."
(no, I don't know what the references to the "Sugar Grove site" are referring to, and don't ask me about all those silly government acronyms). Somewhere on George Washington's National Security Archive is where they claimed to have found these documents about echelon. I searched for a while but found nothing concrete. But I was pretty lazy about it. There's no reason to doubt that some juicier stuff is there somewhere, since it looks like it's a pretty big archive.
And no, I'm not a student at George Washington University (nor am I anywhere near it or in any way associated with it--I just went hunting around their web page looking for this stuff after I read the article).
--- I've been in school *way* too long....
It's extremely hypocritical for France to accuse anyone of spying since it spies on and monitors it's neighbouring and competing nations too.
1) Genetic enginered food.
Since genetic enginered food isn't labled consumers have NO CHANCE whatsoever to say no to these untested food.
Most soya these day are genetically enginered. It's near impossible for farmers to obtain 'clean' soya, so genetic food enters early in the food-chain. Even organic-farmers are having a hard battle.
Soya and corn is a very common additive in most food, candybars... you name it. Only way to ensure that you are not endangering your health is to buy products that does NOT contain ANY kind of soya or corn.
So if you by 'choice' imply that people should just stop eating, you are correct!
2) Encryption/protection-laws.
The insain law originate from US and the pressure is comming from there: music-industries, movie-industries, NSA/NATO whoever with a control-, power-, moneyaddiction... ie US, land of the-oh-so-free (criminalise sex and hand out guns to everyone!).
3) Spying.
.... Denmark and other small european countries haven't the resources to spy!
Bjarne
1)
;-)
This is misunderstood liberalism, and the kind Monsanta et al is keen on using.
Actually the european consumers DO NOT want GM foods. And that's why US took Europe to court and made WTO rule against the EU decisions against GM food. EU do not want GM-food into our foodchains until it has been SAFE for comsumption and environment. And those evidence are non-existant!
AND supermarkedchains are having a battle of a lifetime keeping GM-food OUT of their stores (that's their policies). Producers are finding it hard to guruantee that their products is non-GM, since Monsanta have succeed in mixing most non-GM soya with GM-soya. So the choice producers are ending up with is either submit to Monsanta and loose sale or change production/recepies to NOT include soya alltogether, and thus raising productioncosts!
Lastly, organic food IS a booming business.
3)
We don't have the resources. And Denmark is more commited to environment-issues. Ie. our Minister of Environment wasn't very popular with the US-delegates at Kyoto!
Bjarne
I don't think it's about spying and money, but that Europe is fed with US being an arrogant
'bastard' ignoring and forcing forreing government to go 'The American Way'.
1) US ignores global warming. US just pis on the agreements made in Rio and Kyoto. Ignoring the fact that their largest state, Alaska, is suffering severely from global warming.
2) Forcing genetic engineered food down our throut, even though there is no evidence that it's safe for humans and environment. Actually UK have had an increase of 50% of people who is allergic to soya, after the introduction of genetic modified soya.
3) Forcing very strict encryption- and data-protectionlaws. Thanks to the US it's now illegal in Denmark to make backup-copies. Hey, it's even 'illegal' to surf the web (yeah, really stupid law, but apparently the pressure was so strung that the law needed to be rushed through).
3) Spying on everyboddy. Echelon have been a hot subject i Europe. Everyboddy have heard about it and noboddy could prove it's existence until recently.
That was the last straw, and the Airbus-issue (eg. this is NOT france vs. US/UK, but Europe vs. US/UK) is just a welcome 'excuse' to tell US to stop bullying contries around.
Bjarne
Airbus doesn't just means French, it also means work for all the parties involved in it, (subcontractors, suppliers) mostly other european countries. We live in the European Union and projects of that size are distributed amongst partners. So you should maybe re-read the fact as: "Trade War: US abuses its military powers to deliver major blow to the European industry" But wait, there is much better... Since Boeing, very close to be a monopoly, has been the sole beneficiary of this information they have thus been given an unfair advantage over other american companies in that deal. The US goverment has taken side in its choice and violated the basic rules of free market. This thing is way more serious than a little cultural feud. France took a stand, but there are 11 other countries in Europe that actually have the same thing to say or who will have their own gripes about it. Who is next to follow suit? The only sour thing is maybe the position the UK is in. They took a major part with France in building The Concorde, they suffered the same resistance by the US when the project went on (bickering about the plane specs and tons of propaganda to ban the plane from US airports) and they took side by going on with it. Still if there is a litigation between UK's pretty dynamic free industry and the US, their own Ministry Of Defence will sell them out and turn their back on them. How many inventions and intellectual properties have been stolen like that from the UK my british fellows? What does their government do about it... Well what can it do? :> :> But I disgress here. This post and other threads in this topic are also available from the Echelon Project Press in both hardback and soft cover format, Fort Meade, Virginia, USA or from it's subsiduary branch the MOD, London, UK for those of us oversea. BTW... Will they make those files public in 20/40 years like the FBI has to or do we have to storm the place like East Germans did with the STASI?
Geezzz... I'm reading a list of reactions on the article and suddenly this poppes up. Even with treshold 1. Is this a first glance on the spamflood we'll get every day here? This is as lame as the AC's trolling raisins and gritts.
And no, I'm not interested in your HW.
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
Unfortunately, nobody else in the vicinty will be able to do a whole hell of alot either. Neutron bombs have a rather wide area of influence....
The fighter, taking pictures of the plane, came out of the clouds as if from nowhere and forced the Russian pilot to dive in order to avoid collision. A fatal stall resulted. The Russian pilot pointed the plane downward, putting it in a steep dive in order to draw air into the engines, but was unable to succesfully restart the engines. The Russian SST crashed into a group of homes.
no, you still haven't figured it out - you shoot traitors, you don't elect them.
"People are people so why should it be
...
that you and I should get along so awfully?"
Spying has always been a part of inter-governmental relations(ally or not)...get over it, or do it better than we do.
I dont think governments are the enemy, but rather corporations. Consumerism/greed will be the end of us all.
Oh, and by the way, piss on the UN, and the WTO, and the MPAA, and the
- Inbred Redneck American
-- A Human Being is nothing more than mobile CO2 factory. Bow to the plants.
democracy is dead
You should stop thinking that France is a small country with small technology : this is completly wrong, and even if they sue you, they do the same thing over you (spying ). Now i'm not sure this is for money purpose.
You never fight for yourself,
you fight for you state...
And they don't care if you want it or not.
What is interesting is that all interesting american post get score 2 or 3
and that french interesting one get score 0...
not funny... this is hypocrisy
I'd rate the probablity of actually getting said money at just about the same as, say, Rob and Heather Graham dating.
"..I'd say more like one in a million."
"So you're saying there's a chance?!?"
.sig last updated Jan. 14, 2000
I don't talk politics with yanks anymore 'cause there is no point. The same old claims and denials get flung and if it gets too uncomfortable they claim "the red threat" "defense".
Hey - not all of us Americans are like this. There are many of us who really know what sort of evil things our government has done... but when we try to talk about it or change things, we're accused of being unpatriotic and told to "love it or leave it".
Americans never hear about the horrible things our government has done in school. We are not taught about things our leaders don't like us to hear. And when some of us do research, look into things like Echelon, our actions in the Iran/Iraq war, etc. we are accused of being crazy and paranoid.
I know what sort of evil bastards run my country. Not all of us defend them and agree with them - please remember that.
I am no lawyer, but I am wondering how France will sue the US. What organization is going to preside over the trials? WTO? UN?
And how can they enforce the verdict? From my reading enforcement of international law has always been a problem.
Thanks in advance, Nick
you were too late buddy
Though I'm all for bringing Echelon to public attention (see my oh-so-witty sig), I'm opposed to this French lawsuit. If it works out, then the French will have done something right, and the universe will unmake itself.
(I apologize to all the French folk out there, but some of us Americans found that funny)
-sig-
But any other government trying to take action to stop the US government spying on their citizens sparks of a load of insults directed against that government.
First time in my life I've felt any sympathy for the French.
Question is: would he be dumb enough to want to date her?
------
sigs are a total waste of bandwith, especially when the signal-to-noise ratio is lower than 1:10.
It's about time a nation complained about being economically spied by other government.
That a company spy another is one (bad) thing, but that a GOVERNMENT AGENCY spies over companies is much different.
Of course France is unlikely to gain any money back with this but if at least it helps raise the awareness in the population this would be good. I must also say that one thing they can do against it is make crypto free (it still is more restrictive than the US
BTW, this didn't stop Airbus to take the #1 spot this year if what I have heard is true.
We Rock (I'm French)
"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be development of an easy way to factor large prime numbers." Bill Gates,
Seriously...
Your English is fine. Your concerns...well, most of the time, at least in my experience the ... discussions we have aren't real hate... but then again, I haven't been here all that long.
I think the big problem is that, not having an opionion on the immediate problem, its easier to get into calling each other names. And once that starts... nothing is sacred.
I've read some of the comments and pretty much gave up. We weren't talking about security or rights online anymore-- we were talking about history... and after we (Humanity) started using gunpowder-- I kinda lost interest.
Back on topic-- Is this a case of Government supported industrial espionage or just good old fashioned industrial espianoge? Inquiring minds would like to know
On a personal note... my only problem with the French dates back to 1066 and the battle of Hastings and it's more aboutlanguage then conquest. I have enough trouble spelling and the addition of French to the language makes my life interesting. (not that the germanic based 'Olde English' would have been any easier mind you)
When it doubt, sling mud... er... obfiscate!
Yeah, that troll ripped off my name!
VICHY
"My freedom may very well cost you your life."
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Bastard.