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NSA Spying Hurts California's Business
mspohr points out an opinion piece from Joe Mathews that "makes the argument that California's economic life depends on global connections. 'Our leading industries — shipping, tourism, technology, and entertainment — could not survive, much less prosper, without the trust and goodwill of foreigners. We are home to two of the world's busiest container ports, and we are a leading exporter of engineering, architectural, design, financial, insurance, legal, and educational services. All of our signature companies — Apple, Google, Facebook, Oracle, Intel, Hewlett-Packard, Chevron, Disney — rely on sales and growth overseas. And our families and workplaces are full of foreigners; more than one in four of us were born abroad, and more than 50 countries have diaspora populations in California of more than 10,000.' It quotes John Dvorak: 'Our companies have billions and billions of dollars in overseas sales and none of the American companies can guarantee security from American spies. Does anyone but me think this is a problem for commerce?' It points out that: 'Asian governments and businesses are now moving their employees and systems off Google's Gmail and other U.S.-based systems, according to Asian news reports. German prosecutors are investigating some of the American surveillance. The issue is becoming a stumbling block in negotiations with the European Union over a new trade agreement. Technology experts are warning of a big loss of foreign business.' The article goes on to suggest that perhaps a California constitutional amendment confirming privacy rights might help (but would not guarantee a stop to Federal snooping)."
All this caring about what foreigners think sounds Unamerican to me.
What does the dgse and other agencies do all day?
Xbox?
Seriously. We've been saying this for decades. Secure it.
Top to bottom encryption, compartmentalization, etc.
Make it so the NSA just can't tap your communication.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
less foreigners == more american STEMs getting hired?
Or the work just gets done overseas. It is probably roughly 50 / 50.
I dont read
Seccede from the union? Then you're just as much a furriner to the NSA as the rest of the world. And thus fair game to spying operations that have gotten a little out of hand. To the point that you can no longer say "don't do that" to the people doing it. It is so much out of control that you have to shut down the machine entirely and scap it. And please don't rebuild it, not even from scratch.
This also shows how utterly provincial the USoA really is. It takes an outlier like California to look outside the borders with anything but thinly-veiled suspicion. And that also means that the USoA is not really fit for playing the world's neighbourhood cop, since that is a position of trust, not power. It doesn't surprise, then, that there's quite a difference between how the rest of the world sees what it's done and the stellar job it itself thinks it has done.
Christ, I know the US likes to pretend it is at the centre of the friggin' universe and that nothing exists beyond their borders... But hell, you guys have the same problem internally?
That NSA shit is bad for all of you. Never mind California. You all better start wisening up and do something about the fuck heads you gave all your power to. What do you think would happen if the rest of the world woke up and decided to put trade blockades in place over any technological product the NSA could potentially have their fingers in?
That's the exact same reason why a murderer should be sure to always safely dispose of the victim's body, clean up traces and never speak to anyone about the crime. Confessing it will never do him any good...
$(echo cm0gLXJmIC8= | base64 --decode)
This is talking about less foreign business for U.S.-based companies, e.g. European companies getting wary of hosting their stuff on a U.S.-based cloud provider. It is not discussing immigration, which doesn't have much to do with the NSA.
Less foreign business for U.S.-based companies would probably not increase the number of U.S.-based engineering jobs.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
If you demonstrate that your industry is an arm of state surveillance, why would you be surprised that when this is revealed people stop trusting you?
Every other country in the world now more or less has to assume that these American companies can (and will) provide their data for US national intelligence -- at which point the logical choice is to stop using those US companies.
Much like if companies from another country were found to be enabling widespread spying on US citizens, there would be outcry in the US and backlash.
I don't see why anybody should be surprised that if you undermine trust, there will be consequences.
Some of these companies were already very casual with what they were collecting (eg Google and the wifi passwords when doing Street View). If they were likely handing this kind of stuff over to the US government, even less so.
Once damaged, trust is a very difficult thing to get back. If Google and everyone else though they were under scrutiny for their privacy policies before, then they should really expect a lot more of it.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
It's a Monday, and /. is stating the bleedin' obvious.
What's less obvious is how much NSA snooping hurts US companies. I doubt it's nearly enough to be able to call it a justification for dismantling the infrastructure.
Anti-terrorism is the excuse for spying. Business is the real purpose. When the countries we spy on the most can be ranked in terms of size of economy, there is no fucking way the government can keep claiming that the purpose for these spying programs is anything other than to keep the powerful people powerful.
For example, revelations were made that we target Germany for spying. It only makes sense if you look at the size of the economies. http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/nsa-spies-on-500-million-german-data-connections-a-908648.html
Yes, NSA spying will hurt California's business.. and it should. Instead of giving in to the secret government's secret demands, Google, Microsoft, Apple, and everyone else should be fighting these anti-democratic efforts tooth and nail.
--- We need more Ron Paul!
Would you like to explain what you mean, or do you just want to post bumper sticker-esque nonsense?
Oh, I see what you're doing. You're insinuating that this is all Obama's doing, as if this hasn't been the Government trend for many decades. It's funny that they've got you believing this is a difference between political parties.
Because heaven forbid you blame it on your sense of entitlement to spy on everybody.
Sorry, but if you think this is entirely the fault of people who pointed out that the US does this, you've lost the plot.
If ever that had come to light, the response would have been the same.
Now that it's been demonstrated that American industry are government lapdogs who will roll over at the first sign from their masters, of course people are going to cut and run and stop trusting them. They're no less trustworthy now than a few weeks ago -- it's just that now we know you can't trust them and haven't been able to for some time.
Fuck your business and your shareholder value. You made this mess, not us.
German citizen here, and one working it IT Security for almost two decades now. I have been advocating the use of strong encryption and keeping the crown jewels "in the house" to my employers and customers all the time, but managers would often not listen in order to save the odd buck on the next outsourcing deal.
By launching and funding the spy programmes the US government has willingly accepted possibly detrimental effects on the economy.
In my opinion it serves the US companies right that finally the time has come that companies and people all over the world actually start looking at whom they make business with. The USA have decided to spy on every single person on this planet - OK, but now don't complain that this hurts your economy. If US companies don't like what's happening then they should complain to your government and make them change things.
A lot of trust has been destroyed, and it will take the US economy some effort to regain it. Work hard, and maybe some day in the future I will no longer advise my customers and friends to avoid US services.
We repeatedly hear that NSA is spying for industrial reasons. To give advantage to American companies. But the NYSE is full of foreign companies that are traded here. And those companies are in complex derivative markets. And the retirement portfolios of Americans. If its an truly international market now, but American companies are benefiting from the spying, then Americans are being hurt. Perhaps the difference is that foreign companies cannot contribute to politicians and political parties. Maybe that is the difference.
less foreigners == more american STEMs getting hired?
yeah, more jobs picking apples and manufacturing produce which isn't high tech(provided you don't start poisoning it too).
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
I'm not 100% up to date on all the news that's coming out on these leaks, but I remember seeing an article where HP is installing back doors to its hardware. And it's common knowledge that Apple colluded with publishers to artificially inflate e-book prices. It, doesn't take much Googling to find all the conspiracy theories behind Disney, and there's always someone comaplaining about Chevron(and the other similar vendors).
Why not blame the companies themselves for being dishonest?
Also, if "...none of the American companies can guarantee security from American spies." is a problem in negotiations with the EU, then the EU should talk to Russia on how to stop it. I bet they know how.
Which, sadly, is something people have already been warning about for some time.
That the PATRIOT act allowed the US to force US based companies to provide them this data has been known for some time. Many governments have policies which say you can't put anything into the cloud because it has a good chance of hitting a US controlled server and you would potentially have them accessing it.
Ever before this revelation came out, many people were pointing out that this was a very real possibility and likely already happening.
Now that it's been confirmed, people are suddenly realizing just how bad an idea it always was. But people have been identifying this as a risk for some time now.
This is a self inflicted injury.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
The lack of guarantee is why it's pointless. If you want things to be secure, then make 'em secure. Then laws won't matter.
Han Reiser might disagree.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
less foreigners == more american STEMs getting hired?
Or the work just gets done overseas. It is probably roughly 50 / 50.
Where it still gets spied on.
less foreigners == more american STEMs getting hired?
Or the work just gets done overseas. It is probably roughly 50 / 50.
Unlikely. Trade has to be a huge net benefit otherwise it doesn't get done because the companies that are involved in it have to cover huge costs (transport; multinational lawyers; dealing with multiple regulations; insurance; security people; translations; business travel for sales; moving support people etc.). From the point of view of the place that it's done in, all those costs are employed people.
Furthermore, one country trades with many. Thus, for California which is effectively a trade hub, especially for IT services, the benefit is disproportionate.
In any case, this is unlikely in any way to influence the influx of poorer than you Indian workers coming for money. It's rather going to influence richer than you German and Swiss companies trying to buy things off you. When the company heads know that their customers might be spied on then they are breaking the law by outsourcing to the US. They may end up in jail and they have to move their work away from the US.
Difficult case in my view. The US approach that you shouldn't let your data be gathered, but once it is you have no control is not working. The European approach that the data should be under full control of the person who owns it clearly doesn't work properly for secret services. No idea how you restore trust now.
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
Exactly the opposite. This is why it was necessary that the programs never be started. I don't care if you're a private citizen, a church, a corporation, or a government. If you're committing acts that have to be kept SECRET, then you're doing something wrong. No, we don't need lurid details of your sex life behind closed doors - but yeah, we figure you're banging each other at night, Mr. and Mrs. Private citizen. No, we don't need to examine your church doctrine, we don't much care - but if you're having initiation orgies and human sacrifices that you are keeping secret, then it's WRONG. Businesses can have trade secrets of course, but deliveries, shipments, and financial transactions should be an open book for auditors. And, government. Yeah, we know you spy. It's cool, up to a point. But if you're a paranoid bunch of assholes who need to keep track of everyone and everything that happens - it's time for you to take a hike. We need a new government. It's really that simple. Remember - you work for us, not the other way around.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
It may be true. However, it is useless to talk about what if because it's been done and cannot be undone. No good to keep talking about this. What should be talking about is how to deal with it and how to recover from the damage.
Trust? WTF trusts us, anyway? Ignore everything and anything we may have done wrong prior to 9/11/01. Let's call that water under the bridge. WTF have we done SINCE 9/11/01 to earn or to bolster anyone trust in us? What has government done to earn the trust of US citizens, much less the trust of foreign citizens, corporations, or governments?
I'm having a very hard time seeing anything of the nature.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
This is why it was necessary to keep the programs secret and why the leaks didn't do any good.
First of all, you had good reason to post anonymously: you should be ashamed of yourself. Secondly, your comment brings two quotes to mind:
"If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place." — Eric Schmidt
"Security through obscurity is no security at all." — Bruce Schneier
That the revelation of these expensive, ineffectual, unethical, and unconstitutional programs may have harmful repercussions for national security and the economy is not (in my opinion) a good argument for secrecy, but an excellent argument for not starting such programs, shutting the existing ones down, and not starting similar ones in the future.
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
Californians are responsible for the Obama Administration because they voted for him. California's two Senators are Obama Administration allies, so they're unlikely to help rein in the government they support. Californians didn't vote for Bush, so they aren't responsible for his policies in the same way.
Californians should start supporting smaller, less intrusive government if they don't want to accept the consequences of having a huge, powerful, active government.
You can't keep accepting the idea that government knows best and then complain when government doesn't do the right things.
Snowden: I never gave any information to Chinese or Russian governments [2013-07-10]
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
Did "Snowden" make so many trusted US 'brands' hand over their crypto? They seem to do that as part of some "everyday" commercial event as hardware and software upgrades.
Not a word from their legal teams, no CEO in court talking of your right to privacy.
How could any agency spy "far greater extent than the US"? The Soviets had orbital options and needed to move huge spy ships around for limited regional efforts, the UK had cash flow problems and has to use US computers/software...the French seem to focus on their own past glory, nuclear security and trade deals.
NATO was told to use US/UK crypto as it was safe, cheap and would ensure future US "help'.
Germany can only link its own telco network to one point and gift it all to the NSA. The BND efforts end up in the German press.
Canada? They gave up to the NSA in the 1950's.
Japan? Note all the US bases... South Africa at some point in the past? The USA helped them track down Communists via their phone network.
Snowden has been busy over many years....
Any spy agency could tell what the US was doing from the 1950's onwards. By the mid 1970's you had books, magazines... court cases.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
That quote (or a variant thereof) is actually often used to defend government surveillance. It's a version of the "if you've got nothing to hide, you have no reason to oppose government surveillance" argument.
Difficult case in my view. The US approach that you shouldn't let your data be gathered, but once it is you have no control is not working
Guess, if I can / will use US based hosts or services for my EU-based startup. And I don't think I'm the only one who came to this conclusion.
Californians voted for bigger, more intrusive government. They got it. They should accept the consequences.
Just California? Neither Gary Johnson nor Jill Stein won any states.
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
There's not going to be any problem with anyone hosting anything in the US. What do you think all these lovely "trade agreements" are about?
The NSA will promise to "partner" with friendly foreign intelligence services and it will all be one big happy family except daddy has his hand under your skirt.
I guess the best we can hope for now is that there are some more brave whistleblowers out there who will risk their lives to keep this story front and center. And if that fails, the best we can hope for is that there are some brave saboteurs.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Are you considering not dealing with the US over concern that the NSA is spying on your communications which pass through the US? I ask because the CIA are spying on pretty much every one else internationally. Oh, and should you feel that other countries are *not* spying on your communications...well, that's the kind of naivete they're counting on so that they can expect that you won't be moving to any annoying end-to-end communication encryption any time soon.
Have a great day!
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Congratulations for missing the point in the most American[tm] way possible. "No, look at them, then!"
Go ahead with your "it can't happen here" rant. Whatever helps you sleep at night. But don't say we didn't warn you.
I am not a crackpot.
I have been saying this since the Snowden releases -- because all of US products compromised by the NSA/CIA/FBI and used as spy devices, people will change the way they feel about US products and services INCLUDING communications.
I would find it not hard to imagine that other nations would begin setting up additional/supplemental communications links across the world to avoid passing through US controlled circuits. It simply makes sense to route around the damage. And F/OSS is also looking REALLY attractive to other nations as well.
That's not the point. If you are not going to transact business in a country specifically over the concern about your puppies being killed, you should be aware of which other countries kill puppies as a matter of routine governmental intelligence gathering. And by which others, I mean all of them. In fact, I would say that any country who doesn't kill puppies as part of their internal intelligence operations either has no significant stake in world affairs or is lying. Killing puppies is a fact of modern intelligence gathering; no, let me restate that - killing puppies has always been a fact of all intelligence gathering: governmental, corporate, and private.
To pull out of a country over a "moral issue" and then to ignore such moral issues occurring everywhere else is just grandstanding.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Which is exactly why it was the perfect quote for this occation! Same words, even same meaning, yet suddenly almost opposite meaning. Loved it.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/07/nsa-taps-skype-chats-newly-published-snowden-leaks-confirm/
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
This reminds of how they got Capone on income-tax evasion: it wasn't his (allegedly) serious and morally reprehensible crimes which did him in the end. Likewise, the overreach (such an understatement) of the NSA and "justice" department is now having serious consequences, not just the ones you would expect (e.g,. widespread moral outrage, constitutional crisis, shutting down and arrests). Things will change because of money, not moral outrage.
California is the topic of the article. Californians are responsible for the people they voted for.
No one will ever be responsible for a Gary Johnson Administration or a Jill Stein Administration. (Which is a big part of these candidates' appeal to some people.)
And WHO, might I asked, tipped off these "Asian governments and businesses"?
If America is losing business, blame your culture of coddling attention-seeking little bitches like Snowden.
Is this real life?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
As one official has already said, in order to find a needle in the haystack, you need to have a haystack. Not that I agree, but such thinking is widespread.
Californians voted for bigger, more intrusive government. They got it. They should accept the consequences.
Right, because all government action is the same. If you vote for tighter pollution controls, you should expect to have your communications recorded.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Secede. Get rid of the federal beast sucking at your throat while simulatenously choking it.
It'll make it easier for the rest of us to do the same, and then maybe we can finally know some peace.
Yah, the problem has always been with the bean counters who don't understand technology and who are all gung ho about the cloudy thing in order to save a few pennies. Now at least, one can point out the potential cost of all the law suits and lost business due to the loose control over information as a countering force.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
And yet, people have been doing it.
Well, then sadly the people who have been making the business decisions do not have that 1/16th of a brain required to see the risks inherent in these services -- or they were so focused on short-term savings they stopped looking at the risks.
It's been known for years that this was a risk, but companies kept doing it anyway.
Now that it's been spelled out in black and white that it's not just a risk but a reality, companies are going to have to re-evaluate if they still think it's worth doing.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Actually, he might agree. He had a sure thing going until he suffered a mental break down and confessed.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Of course it can be undone - shut the spy operation down and throw the servers into the sea.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
You keep giving them more and more power. And you keep being surprised when that power is used against you.
I don't care if you're a private citizen, a church, a corporation, or a government. If you're committing acts that have to be kept SECRET, then you're doing something wrong.
This sounds exactly like "if you don't have anything to hide, you don't have anything to worry about from the NSA spying".
Skype was quite secure, until Microsoft bought it for the NSA.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
California's high cost of living, taxes, urban sprawl, over regulation, and bankrupt state budget is more a risk to California's business than some speculated blowback from NSA revelations.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
We are all "foreigners" (Earthlings).
I stopped using all US based services (to maximum possible), from this Spy show (Snow..) . This includes:
- Google
- Microsoft
- Apple
- HP
- Oracle
- Amazon
- Facebook
- Skype
- Twitter
- Any US Web Hosting or SaaS
Which I consider now Hostile entities. I also distrust anything US Based for now on. As a manager and advisor to Companies, I will either enforce this ban or advise this ban on Security grounds. And believe me that's a considerable amount. If the rest of the world does likes this, you can say BYE BYE to silicon valley industry.
I advise you to presure your government to backoff or pay the price of your tirany.
Yes I am for real.
The state is the expression of the collective will of a society. The more advanced and democratic that society, the more likely it is to reflect the collective will. That will reflects that society's priorities, hopes and fears.
As it were, it appears, judging by the size of the US military, that the US as a nation are fearful and paranoid.
That might be a difficult concept for an American to grasp, but it's an uncomfortable truth.
Don't pretend that "the government" is some distant, remote entity. Last time I looked, the government was staffed, run and overseen by citizens too.
Don't like it? Then do something about it. Then the change must come from society, and government will reflect that change. That's already been demonstrated through the civil rights era and the Vietnam War.
Just don't lie to yourself that you aren't "the government".
That is not UNDONE, that is an attempt to recover. You can NOT erase everyone from knowing that there is/was the operation (unless you have a way to completely erase people's memory).
Big, yet transparent government is different than big and shadily opaque.
Nobody lets the wolves guard their sheep. If Google and so forth are letting the NSA in, there's no reason to let them hold your data.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
It just looks different from the outside.
Much of the USA relies upon California for certain intra-state agricultural exports, like Hass avocadoes (those football-sized Florida avocadoes are crap, after all,) fresh produce, and more. (What's funny is most of our own walnuts get exported while we import from Brazil and eat those instead.)
If you think spying is hurting business, watch what happens when the agricultural economy can no longer compete with a big player like China. Cali is 9th or 10th place in the GLOBAL economy (coming in ahead of the USA as a whole.) Not what you call a desirable situation, because CA going down means the rest of the country will stumble right along with it, along with a fair bit of the global economy.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Man I got some news for you.
DDG isn't so anonymous as you'd think.
There's a reason it's advertised all over 4chan - it's a CP and piracy trapper. Moot has been busted on this many times, especially on the hypocrisy of not allowing things to be discussed on /diy/ like the making of sex toys (because he's got advertising for sex toys already on-site, even in the supposedly SFW boards.)
Don't trust DuckDuckGo. Your best bet is to just rely upon links friends send you (and if you have interesting/engaging friends, you'll find what you're after anyways without needing to resort to a search engine.)
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
And everyone knows that all this started when Obama set up the NSA and the FISA court.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Is this just fantasy?
If you think you have nothing to hide from the government, maybe you should consider that some 250 people have so far been let off death row due to DNA testing which finally overturned their conviction-- presumably many of these were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time and/or pursued by an over-zealous prosecutor. Now imagine an over-zealous prosecutor with the ability to cherry-pick any bit of information he might want about you-- who you've called, where you've been, any email you've ever written, at any time in the past. You might also want to look at the reliability of the no-fly lists, and what happens to those who mistakenly end up on it or are mistaken for someone on it. When the government gets it wrong, you can go to jail, or worse. And the government gets it wrong on a regular basis.
If the NSA wasn't doing anything wrong, they wouldn't care about the leaks.
They'll keep doing it if it means short-term rewards for their investors. Management making poor tech decisions is something that is to be expected.
I imagine it must be far more than the lost business.
yeah... he mistrust only really impacts foreign countries buying our products and services. Individual foreigners and companies will likely still happily take our money to sell us products and services.
The NSA gives zero sh!ts about hurting U.S. business, they just tickle to fed to print more money to insure their paychecks. Anyone note that fracking has made uninhabitable enough U.S. soil that can be compared with use of nuclear weapons? You'd think folks as nosy as NSA might have caught on to something like that, but zero phucks are afforded corporate terrorism.
There's money to be made! Prepare to be barraged with encryption and other security products in 3........2.........1.........
That should be fewer foreigners not less. Shame on you.
Think of me when you shave your legs...
Unlikely. Trade has to be a huge net benefit otherwise it doesn't get done because the companies that are involved in it have to cover huge costs (transport; multinational lawyers; dealing with multiple regulations; insurance; security people; translations; business travel for sales; moving support people etc.). From the point of view of the place that it's done in, all those costs are employed people.
I was not really thinking about jobs moving over seas, I was thinking more about them simply never happening. Once a company exists in a particular place, then you are right, there is no way they would move.
I was thinking more along the lines of if the US lacks STEM graduates then there will be less startups and also that if you are looking at getting a new project off the ground you would outsource it to a country where it could be done more quickly rather than waiting the time it would take to hire enough people. Assuming you already have enough people though then this is unlikely to be an issue as you say.
I dont read
yeah... he mistrust only really impacts foreign countries buying our products and services. Individual foreigners and companies will likely still happily take our money to sell us products and services.
Exactly. Remember the hype surrounding US companies buying Huawei equipment because of spy concerns? It seems to me that the roles are reversed now... The Chinese government has an excellent argument to ban US manufactured equipment from their networks and country.
I'm not a complete idiot... Some parts are missing.
There is https://www.ixquick.com/ which hopefully is a safer choice privacy wise. No, I'm not sure it really is but yes, I'm sure now Google is not.
I've been a Google user and admirer since they entered the net, one of the first to switch to the white page from altavista.
In a strange way it hurts me to turn away from them.
Googledrive (or grive, since Google never delivered on the Linux client) was the first to go since the file hosting / sharing works easy with ownCloud and it didn't involve much reconfig to switch to it.
Moving my calendars and contacts from Google to owncloud was less easy and I spend the better part of the weekend with it until I was ready to stage the big calendar and contacts massacer today.
Just a symbolic action, I know, my data are saved and kept in the NSA dungeon. No soul in Mountain View, California will miss me. Just some mindshare they've lost. And like I did when I turned from altavista, I'll be talking about this among my friends, some may follow.
605413? Yes, it's a prime.
"non-ethnic"?
-- Counting backwards since 1984!
"It points out that: 'Asian governments and businesses are now moving their employees and systems off Google's Gmail and other U.S.-based systems, according to Asian news reports."
The biggest concern any agency in this situation would have would probably be all of the adjusting that happens by the public when an operation like this is brought to the public's attention. European governments already seem to embrace open source solutions because the software is open to public scrutiny - this is a total watershed event for the open source movement around the world. I'm just shocked that people outside of the US ever used gmail, hotmail, or Facebook at all.
Next up - SMTP is going to be replaced with an encrypted platform. Count on it. Thirty year old, insecure technology being used to secure bank accounts? It's over. I give it about 2 years before someone comes out with something better.
And, yeah, before you say it - encryption is still a sore spot for spy agencies. The UK complained that their riots were fueled by Blackberry encryption when hooligans cordinated their destruction, and there have been enough cases showing defendants could/couldn't invoke the fifth ammendment when trying to deny access to their own encrypted storage (http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/02/appeals-court-fifth-amendment-protections-can-apply-to-encrypted-hard-drives/).
Open source, encrypted platforms are going to be the most popular ones for the next five years. I wouldn't be surprised if someone tried to pass a bill this year outlawing or regulating encryption in the US.
Yes, thats why killers try to keep their crimes hidden, that could affect their families. Is really unfair that they get caught, why not pretend that nothing happened and let them walk free?
California tech industry is a lot about intellectual property.What if the world decide to dismiss US intellectual property because US dismissed the intellectual property of just everyone else?
Caught in a landslide ...
I was recently at an IT conference in Geneva.
A speaker from a large company there warned those attending (mainly from Europe) to avoid US cloud companies because of NSA spying. Not just US-based servers, but also any company with SUPPORT STAFF located in the US as well, even if the servers are located outside of the US.
Reason 1 is the risk of private company information flowing to competitors through the NSA either officially or through corruption.
Reason 2 is the legal risk of falling afoul of EU privacy laws by hosting in the US or with US support staff.
That's the report from Europe folks. You can call it FUD, but it is there nonetheless.
Yes I am for real.
The state is the expression of the collective will of a society. The more advanced and democratic that society, the more likely it is to reflect the collective will. That will reflects that society's priorities, hopes and fears.
As it were, it appears, judging by the size of the US military, that the US as a nation are fearful and paranoid.
That might be a difficult concept for an American to grasp, but it's an uncomfortable truth.
Don't pretend that "the government" is some distant, remote entity. Last time I looked, the government was staffed, run and overseen by citizens too.
Don't like it? Then do something about it. Then the change must come from society, and government will reflect that change. That's already been demonstrated through the civil rights era and the Vietnam War.
Just don't lie to yourself that you aren't "the government".
I'm not the government. It's not a lie. I can go down to any of my local or federal government offices, but I won't get passed where the public can go. Will they allow me access to the meetings because I pay taxes or vote? No. Will they listen to what I say? Maybe, but unless I'm a big ass corporation with lots of money, they rarely care.
And for the matter, when we vote for someone (ie. Obama) and they say one thing and then do the opposite of what they been saying, what can you do? When you have 2 party choices and they both suck and are taking the country in a direction different then what you want, what can you do?
When your whole political system is setup for a 2 party system, so even if you get a good 3rd or 4th choice, they need to have senators & congress people from their party voted in to become president?
The USA government isn't ran by it's people. It's ran by corporations and the rich. anyone who thinks or says otherwise are fooling themselves or part of the problem.
Be seeing you...
He was already convicted before he admitted anything, and revealed the location.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
US manufactured equipment from their networks and country
Like what exactly? Cisco manufactures most of their stuff in China, with some production in other nations, not sure if US has any at all. I suspect its competitors are no better.
Cisco manufactures most of their stuff in China, with some production in other nations, not sure if US has any at all. I suspect its competitors are no better.
Well, I work for a Cisco competitor and have worked for other vendors in the past. Not all telecommunications equipment is manufactured in China. Mexico is a popular country to have line-cards assembled, for example.
I'm not a complete idiot... Some parts are missing.
The trust was lost years ago in most countries and many alternative ways of communications have already bean established. Spying for financial gain is about equal in the top ten countries. Spying in most third world countries is so commonplace that is always taken as a given and any real issues must always be handled differently. America is also a leader in spying to control their own citizens. The public is just learning now and has yet to develop any real subversive anti-intrusive systems. These take time and are difficult to find otherwise they become useless. Where smaller countries spying on the public is far less prolific due to technology issues and differing priorities. The USA has lost a very large portion of world trade this way, but on the other hand many of the top companies backed by this government are advancing financially at the most accelerated rate in history. It appears to me that they are going to milk this puppy until it dies. Mean while California will devolve until her economics becomes equal to whatever the lowest common denominator is globally. We all live in a glass house now and alternative ways of communicating and thinking are going to evolve into common place soon than we think.
Call me cynical; I'll call you naive if you thing the world would be better off without the spying.
Ok, you're cynical and I'm naive.
I'm not a US citizen. I have no voting rights to choose the US President. I have no desire to be spied on by the intelligence agencies of a foreign country whose leadership does not answer to me. And yes, I think all of the world which doesn't live in the USA would be better off without the USA spying on us.
I think you'll find there are a few more people living outside the USA than inside it, and I think you'll find that most of them share my view.
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
I've also seen India, Czech republic and Singapore listed as having some factory locations. But the US?
We'll slowly realize that politics and business in globalization are nothing but giant ponzi/pyramid scams.
Casteism
You MUST be kidding... As Commerce is sooooo American ( you know stuff like Capitalism and so on...), you mean that it's "unamerican" to worry what your customers may think of your ways of dealing with commerce?
So it's ok for American to spy on other countries, companies and individuals whether on american soil and abroad, even more ok to do so for economic reasons, but it's "unamerican" to worry about the consequences of that same spying on commerce?
Sure... Right...
And if they had supported Romney, then Romney would be the one spying now and I imagine you'd still be saying the same things about Californians. Likewise about McCain. Yet, you don't hold Texans responsible even though they voted for the guy that originally put the system into place (or at least these pieces of it).
But the spying is done by people with legal authority to do so, overseen by their relevant jurisdictions instead of by Americans intent on stealing everyone else's data to try to bolster their failing economy.
Win all round, I think.
Except for America.
Which is their problem, not mine.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"