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Crashing the Wiretapper's Ball
An anonymous reader writes "Wired is running an article with some great investigative journalism. Writer Thomas Green snuck into the ISS World Conference, a trade show featuring communications-tapping equipment and normally a press-free event. There, he got some very interesting quotes from the attendees." From the article: "You really need to educate yourself ... Do you think this stuff doesn't happen in the West? Let me tell you something. I sell this equipment all over the world, especially in the Middle East. I deal with buyers from Qatar, and I get more concern about proper legal procedure from them than I get in the USA."
"Do you think for a minute that Bush would let legal issues stop him from doing surveillance? He's got to prevent a terrorist attack that everyone knows is coming. He'll do absolutely anything he thinks is going to work. And so would you."
And don't think for even one minute that whoever succeeds Bush will change anything about this.
It's no news that the most repressive regimes usually also has the citizens that are most interested in their freedom. Old news.
It's also sad (and true) that people who fear their government (read: KNOW their government works AGAINST their interests) are more aware that tapping happens, and that it does have quite BAD consequences.
Here, in the "free" world (I know, I use quotation marks very liberally, but these fit like none I've ever used before), people are still on the "you don't do anything bad, you don't have to fear" attitude. This is very different in countries that either have or used to have very tough restrictions on their freedoms. When you talk to someone from the former East Block, you'll probably get very different responses when it comes to issues like this.
They're also smart enough to question pretty much everything they read. They're used to lying newspapers and TV stations. That's something we should pick up soon, I'd say.
So of course the awareness about wiretapping and snooping is by a magnitude higher in countries where people expect their government to pursue interests that are diametrally different from their own.
Actually, that's the case with every person, as far as I can judge. Over here, in the "free" world, too many still believe the government works in their favor.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Attitudes like this guy's are dangerous. It's the "if you don't have anything to hide why are you objecting?" and the "these guys just make the product" sentiments that just bury us deeper and deeper.
Ultimately, the government derives its mandate from the people, so they do answer to us. He's forgotten it, and so has every single politician and bureaucrat out there. Is there any way short of a violent assertion of our second-amendment rights that will remind them? Sometimes I fear there is not...
I think that to achieve greatness the article would have needed more specifics about products and purchasers, rather than a drunk in a bar telling us to let the NSA do its job.
One good item was the Dutch cop's remark that "we're 3 or 4 years ahead of this stuff", which would imply that by the time products hit the trade show circuit all the real players already have them.
What?? Cutting edge investigative journalism is all around us.
How else would we have learned about that Angelina Jolie caused the breakup of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Anniston??? Or that Oprah just lost another 40 pounds (or it gained 60 back)??? What about those photos of Brittney Spears not buckling her baby???
Problem is most folks actually care more about these topics than WMD, intelligence manipulations, torture, political corruption/bribery, or sole source contracts. Seems like most folks pick one side of the fence and then anyone who questions ANY decision becomes an evil liberal or neo-con with some secret, political agenda.
I think the larger problem is that the public has stopped caring about trivial things like laws or ethics because truth bas become relative and the other party always lies. Dare to question Halliburton and it's because you're a liberal zealot who hates big business. Dare to question affirmative action's effectiveness and it's because you're an evil racist. It's hard to have a normal discussion anymore without huge political overtones.
AS a registered Democrat, I'll just point out that the Republicans don't have a lock on this sort of nonsense. The Democrats fell all over themselves helping to pass the so-called Patriot Act.
~*~ Tara
Its true that its the SC's role to rule on the Constitutionality of laws, but why does that free Congress from having to think about the Constitutional ramifications of the laws they wish to pass? Shouldn't they consider people's rights and Constitutional restrictions on government when they are deciding to pass a law?
As it is, it seems its too much trouble for Congressmen to even read laws before voting on them. I think that is a pretty large breakdown in the system.
In 1996, I would have laughed at this post, and gone on my merry way.
In 2006, this is fucking scary, because I can't tell if its a joke or not.
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
From the article:
"in the end, all this surveillance gear and attendant hype becomes meaningless with simple precautions like encrypted VOIP, a good implementation of virtual private networks, and proxies and SSH for web surfing, IM, internet relay chat, webmail and the like"
Which all goes to show that none of this is actually about stopping crime. It is about consolidating power.
No one has a right to their *own* opinion. They have a right to the TRUTH.
That doesn't mean that your idea is not valid, because what they have done is violate their oath of office to serve the interests of The People and uphold the Constitution.
I would like to see a general principle that says that anything a public official does in their capacity as a public official, they do under oath. Isn't that what an oath of office is for? Otherwise, what does such an oath mean?
When Bush lies to the public about matters of government policy, such as the reasons for war or the violations of civil liberties, he should be held accountable as having violated his oath. Note that the oath the President takes does not assure competence or ability, but it does require upholding the Constitution. The Presidential oath is one of the less stringent oaths of office there is -- the oaths other officials take are more stringent.
By the way, Presidential signing statements do NOT have the force of law. The Supreme Court may use them in their considerations, but that's optional and cannot be in contradiction of established law or past rulings. The President cannot exempt himself from any or all parts of the bills he signs -- a signing statement does not give him a line item veto over provisions in a bill. In fact, such a line item veto has been officially declared unconstitutional at the federal level.
So let's start taking oaths of office seriously, and make those who take them take it seriously too.
In theory, there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.
Sure, but it's the job of the Judicial branch to interpret laws as Constitutional or not, not the Legislature's.
The Constitution does not agree with that. Please point out where the power to determine constitutionality is reserved solely to the judicial branch. The whole point of the Constitution was balance in the protection of the people. That requires all three branches to evaluate the constitutionality of everything. Nothing unconstitutional should pass Congress. If it does, then the Executive should not enforce it. If the Executive does illegally enforce the unconstitutional law, then the Judicial should exonerate the charged party. Judicial review isn't a protection of people's rights, it is a limitation. It carried the implication that the other 2 branches aren't tasked with upholding the Constitution. The problem is that they are. I would have no problem for expulsion of all congressmen that voted for a law that was found unconstitutional. For them to pass it would be a violation of their oath of office (but in practicality, it would give too much power to the judicial - just declare something unconstitutional and half of Congress is expelled). Multiple presidents have signed things they knew to be unconstitutional because they wanted to make a political statement. That is Treason.
Learn to love Alaska
This summarizes the attitude of the current Bush administration, whose agents would rather sit at a computer desk surfing for perverts rather than learn Arabic and Turkish and penetrate the relevant terrorist organizations. The former is easy, can be done by fat bureaucrats sipping latte's but unfortunately does not work. The latter requires time, training and true skill but is the only process that works.
First off, there's nothing "dangerous" or "secretive" about this conference. If there was, this guy wouldn't have even known about it, let alone gotten into it. It's a marketing conference where manufacturers of this stuff try to pimp it off on anyone (from anywhere) who has an interest in surveillance. Even average cops can attend. Like someone else said, the most likely reason that they make it "closed" to the press is to give it a pompous air of secrecy that doesn't really exist. The reporter, once he gets his hands on one of the "secret" CDs, finds that there's nothing of any interest on it, and hastily concludes that it must be because of a "small-minded attitude of hostility toward the press"... but anyone with the slightest bit of business sense would also include that it may very well be because they're trying to hype up their conference and make it more attractive to wanna-be spooks so that they can sell more stuff, which is what all businesses are in business to do. (of course, that line of reasoning doesn't support his "they're all out to rob us of our civil liberties" bias, so I'm sure it never crossed his mind.
Second... the quotes in this thing mean nothing. So he got a drunk, loudmouthed salesman to make (completely unsubstantiated) claims about what the US gov't does with this equipment, and how little concerned they are with the legalities of surveillance. Anyone here who's been to a tech conference knows that there are people who claim to know what's "really" going on, and everyone who's met those people knows that they're usually full of sh*t. Reporting a drunken rant as some kind of interesting "insight" is irresponsible at the least.
Then he talks to a Dutch cop, who (of course) says exactly what he wants to hear... "Secrecy is eeeevil... we're much better because we're open about how we catch criminals." (which, of course, allows them the information they need to avoid getting caught
Throughout it all, he acts as if surveillance equipment (in and of itself) is some new threat, that's inherently evil, and which "poses a tremendous threat to human rights and dignity". Seriously... it's a product. There's a marker for it, so people make it and try to sell it. The one reasonable thing that the drunk guy did say was that he should stop harassing the people that make it. I don't think anyone would argue that surveillance equipment of all kinds should be banned, so basically, it's going to get made. Posing the "but it could get used for evil" argument is a waste of time, just like it is with every other man-made object that could get used improperly, but has a primary use that is beneficial.
Basically, this was a hyped-up opinion piece written by a journalist who's "trying to make a difference" by "informing" all the people who are already worked up about privacy issues about just how bad it "really" is. If there was some kind of substance to it, it might be remotely interesting, but at face value, it falls completely flat.
And before anyone goes on some presumptive tirade about how I'm a right-wing blah blah blah who's more concerned about your sex-life than I am about civil rights, save your breath. I'm not saying that unabashed gov't monitoring is good, or necessary or that I support it or any other nonsense like that... I'm only saying that this article is an insubstantial pile of dung written by someone with an obvious bias of the topic looking to paint himself as a champion of "truth".
WATYF
Perhaps they still have the rule of law there...
--jfc
terrorism is the root password for the constitution