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Prankster Calls NSA To Restore Deleted E-mail
First time accepted submitter manu0601 writes "Since the NSA snoops, intercepts and store our e-mails forever, why not use it as a backup service? It just lacks the API to restore files, therefore this guy [YouTube video] called the NSA to ask for a backup restoration. Guess what? It did not work." After all, why should we have to pay twice for services already performed with tax dollars?
I'm telling you, the government just isn't providing service. So what are we paying them for, anyway?
Lawyers are trying to do that for evidence in ordinary criminal court cases. Not likely to work.
Although if people are interested, I'm sure the government could start that service. Just like google they would probably reserve the right to scan your email. If you want it, write your legislators.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Perhaps the NSA could restore all of the sites the Church of Scientology has brought down over the years. You know the NSA is monitoring them since they act like domestic terrorists.
It's funny, but could you get yourself into legal trouble with this?
I'm sure they could come up with some trumped up charges under the Patriot Act or something.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I love how the lady kept trying to get this guys information even tho they supposedly couldnt help him. WE HAVENT BEEN KEEPING TRACK OF YOUR EMAILS BUT WE SURE WOULD LIKE TO.
I don't envy the hell that (s)he has unleashed on their self
Rather boring and uneventful. How did this ever get posted anyways?
If, for the sake of retribution and showing muscle, the NSA feels the need to waste tax money on bullying this Iranian/Dutch young man by intimidating him, at least the rest of the world knows who can't be trusted with spy tools that are meant for protecting the Ustated Nites of America.
Damn you, XKCD. See what you did?
Great demonstration of great telephone manner and customer service for a challenge customer, Respect NSA. I for one welcome our new customer service overloads!
We should all call in to obtain copies of our emails. Maybe even offer to typographically error correct them. But I wonder what would happen if everyone created fake suspicious emails to themselves and bombarded the NSA's systems? Would it become a "white noise" to the search algorithms?
Just wait until this individual attempts to travel in the near future. If you phone the NSA and acknowledge that they have your email, they will retaliate.
After all, the government right now is persecuting a "leaker" who they "claim" is lying because after all, they swore up and down that they weren't reading email and listening to phone calls of average Americans. And the government wouldn't LIE, now would they? So the leaker has to be wrong. And yet, they pursue him like he has some relevant information that can cause damage.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
SHUT UP Alanis!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Is the water you drink clean?
Is your food supply safe?
Do the lights come on when you flip a switch?
Can you travel through the air at nearly the speed of sound for a few hundred dollars?
When you turn on the radio in your car, do you hear voices/music coming out of the speakers?
Can you read this message?
Are you speaking English?
Because if you are, you can be assured that your government is doing at least some things you find useful. There are places - quite a few actually - for which the above do not all apply. The taxes there are exceptionally low, and you may wish to consider relocating to take advantage of the savings and buy the above items yourself. Note: if you form a group to provide such services, that's cheating. another word for that kind of cheating is called "Government."
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
If I was the NSA, I'd reply back saying his life is too pedantic and boring to record entirely, so they get filtered out ;)
It's on Google's Youtube, he mentions Iran, he mentions the NSA. If it didn't trip flags, their system isn't working.
tsk tsk - he should have put in a freedom of information request instead.
As a future convenience, you have been added to our service, all at no charge to you.
Our whole goddamned civilization is going to collapse under the irony. It's all lolcats from here on out. Damn, the alienz are going to be dumbfounded when they finally stop by to check up on us.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
they just took really long coffee breaks and beat up people, who pissed that the work wasn't getting done, came over and attempted to do it themselves :)
Once, in a previous life before becoming an enlightened free software user, I had a windows 95 install that got infected with a virus and died. For reasons that are obvious or easily guessed I probably deserved it but I also lost valuable data when I sanitized the harddrive. If the NSA could retrieve a pre-infection copy of my clipart folder from 1997 I'd pay up to a 5$ service charge without hesitation. I can't imagine I'm the only one who might actually have a legitimate use for my own intercepted data, either.
This individual might consider a non-contra deal with the Oliver North School of Back-Up Management.
Why do you equate the government "regulating" useful things with the government doing useful things?
"Government regulation" of something usually refers to restrictions being placed on it. In other words, the opposite of providing that thing.
Becoming part of the foundation of a building is not considered construction.
http://www.volokh.com/2013/09/01/illegal-sell-anti-nsa-shirts-bearing-nsa-logo/
The opposite of providing that thing ... poorly.
See water, food, electricity.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
Why does getting jailed for recording a call to an agency known for recording everybody's calls without legal oversight, in order to get a recording of a conversation (even if by email) strike me as just a tad ironic?
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
The first thing I though when I read the headline was that it was someone in the US doing this. The second thing I thought was that this person has probably already been arrested. Then I watched the video and heard the guy is in Holland so I doubt he will be getting in trouble. Surely the long arm of the NSA doesn't reach so far as to have a citizen of Holland physically detained for abusing their phone line? Not yet anyway. I am wondering precisely what number he called. I would not expect the NSA to have a publicly posted customer service number, it would be bombarded with calls like this - but maybe I'm wrong. Really, I am curious to know the nature of the number he called.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
Water is provided by the water cycle, by nature, by evaporation and by geography and geology. The government only decides the ALLOCATION of water. It does not "provide" water. In fact, its job is to DENY certain people water, in order to control.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
You would be hard pressed to find in the US Constitution the permission ("enumerated power") for much of what the Federal government does.
That is not to say that what they are doing isn't "legal", it is, because they say so.
Hey, the Patriot Act law (with 99% Republican approval) let them copy my Intellectual Property. Surely I have the right to demand at least a copy of my own product!!!
Oh, wait, not in a Police State.
Thanks Bush. Thanks Republicans. From 2006 to infinity...AND BEYOND!!
What a strange thing to say. Where I live (in the US) water is provided by a small co-op. They recently had a huge rate hike to comply with new government regulation... for some reason they don't even get subsidized. Now who knows nothing?
Clean water? The Federal Government doesn't do this. State and local governments do this.
Lights? The Federal Government does not supply electricity to homes. Local governments, usually through public corporations, and some private companies do this. (The TVA did sell directly to large manufacturers in the 2000's but I don't know if they are still doing this--regardless, manufacturers are not houses.)
Air Travel? The Federal Government doesn't do this--they only "regulate" it. Airlines are privately owned.
Radio? The Federal Government doesn't do this--they only "regulate" it. Local radio stations are privately owned.
Reading? The Federal Government doesn't do this. Parents, siblings, teachers do this. I was taught by my mother and teachers--before the Federal Government turned the Public School into the Government School. With social promotions and "being there" promotions, very little reading happens.
Speaking English? The Federal Government doesn't do this--they require "bi-lingual" education which obstructs the speaking of English. I learned English from family members, reading books and some teachers.
The Federal Government of the USA has done very little to enable my pursuit of happiness. In fact, the Federal Government has taken definite and effective steps to disable my pursuit of happiness. The situation is atrocious now compared to when I was growing up and even more from when my father grew up. I love my country, America, but I fear the Federal Government.
They'd have trouble arguing that something was a deep black national intelligence secret after sharing it with the DEA. A prosecutor or someone in discovery in a civil suit can make legal demands for information.
The resulting case would be educational, in that it would put more than one lawyer's kid through college.
govt, doesn't provide food water or electricity... what socialist country do you live in?
an anonymous source writes: "this user is now on an official watch list"
Well, sort of. one government service is protecting water rights.
I cannot dump my sewage in the stream upstream of you, nor can I dam up the stream and keep all the water for myself while you die.
Nor can I dump the waste from my factory or hog farm into the watershed.
This is a problem going back for millennia, and one of the reasons that people formed governments.
It has to do with what economists call "tragedy of the commons", a problem that governments are probably the only workable solution.
Water, food, electricity, flight control, radio communications, the internet - all the result of FEDERAL government regulations. Without those, you have unfettered capitalism and race-to-the bottom economics. There's a reason most US cities are no longer completely socked in with smog, and it has nothing to do with local government spending or private sector voluntary efforts to reduce pollution.
For all the bullshit money-wasting stuff the feds do, there is still a lot that you would sorely miss if it were never here or were to disappear tomorrow.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
I cannot dump my sewage in the stream upstream of you, nor can I dam up the stream and keep all the water for myself while you die.
Nor can I dump the waste from my factory or hog farm into the watershed.
AKA denying people water!!! See government is EEEEEVILLLL!!!!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
You're right, food safety is completely useless. As long as you pay Monsato/Nestle/PepsiCo/McDonalds/etc/etc/etc for your food, it doesn't really matter if it's tainted and you die from it.
Really??? Nature is conveniently pumping water from Lake Michigan into my home (40 miles away) so my sinks and shower work??? I really had no idea that pipes were naturally occurring features.
Everywhere I've lived (also in the US), water has been provided by the city.
Rather boring and uneventful. How did this ever get posted anyways?
If it is anti-government it goes on the front page, simple as that.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Wow, you are really stretching in order to make yourself correct.
Yes, government does not create water out of nothing. The only one who can create water out of nothing (or for that mater, create anything out of nothing) is the FSM. But no one here was talking about creating water out of nothing.
"a small co-op" Now that brings up something else interesting.
Most people who live outside of cities have telephone service, electricity ONLY because some government entity enabled, cajoled, and forced the larger providers to supply services to the remote areas. See " Rural Electrification Act of 1935" as an example.
For those that don't know, those "remote areas" are where our food comes from.
BTW, Some detail about the regulation and the huge rate hike would have been nice.
The Government provides my water. Its called the Colorado River Compact. look it up. also something about a series of dams that were built on the river
Clean water? The Federal Government doesn't do this. State and local governments do this.
The states and municipalities do the work of building and maintaining water supplies, but they do it to standards developed and enforced by the federal EPA, under the Clean Water Act, which means that you have few instances of a municipality skimping on, say, water main maintenance. The feds also sometimes get involved in interstate water deals and disputes between states over who gets what from a shared water supply.
Lights? The Federal Government does not supply electricity to homes. Local governments, usually through public corporations, and some private companies do this.
Again, the feds, specifically the Department of Energy, are involved in making that all work.
Air Travel? The Federal Government doesn't do this--they only "regulate" it. Airlines are privately owned.
Yeah, those air traffic controllers, crash investigators, aircraft inspectors, pilot license examiners, etc don't do anything important, right? I agree that private corporations play an important role in air travel, but it's not like the feds are not intimately involved in making everything run smoothly.
Radio? The Federal Government doesn't do this--they only "regulate" it. Local radio stations are privately owned.
And that regulation means that you don't have 10 radio stations in your immediate vicinity all broadcasting on 90.1 FM, or radio stations trying to drown out other stations by broadcasting a louder and stronger signal.
I am officially gone from
Not really. The Classified Information Procedures Act (http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode18a/usc_sup_05_18_10_sq3.html) would apply just like always. Ultimately, something would be produced by the NSA, but it might be a summary, heavily redacted, subject to a gag order, or reviewed only by the judge.
They probably got the window cleaners taking names and personal details too. Lol.
Never mind the DEA. The IRS gets to look at that data as well (thanks to the Patriot Act). And they'll go after a dropped nickel, intelligence security be damned.
Want to know what the gov't has on you? Short them a few hundred dollars and wait for the audit. They'll bring every scrap of information they can get their hands on to the audit. A bit of social engineering and they'll read your entire life history back to you. So you pay the tax plus penalties and you've got a peek at your dossier that the 10% penalty could never have bought spent elsewhere.
Have gnu, will travel.
but you can dump all that and more that as long as you have the appropriate license from the government. It isn't like its all "safety first" the government is more about safety first, after profits, and also minimal fines for gross damage to the environment, etc. Polluting the waterways and watersheds are one of the rights of big business, because that's what lobbying gets them.
Only I can judge you.
That sounds like communism, in the UK it is provided by the private sector.
Govt still regulates them however, but that's a far cry from actually providing said water.
The government regulates those things.
Or are you just dense?
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
When Obama Care kicks in full speed, I can drop my health insurance and pay the $360 health care tax. So since the NAS wants to save my emails to mom; why can't those folks in the Aloha State have a public page to allow me to aceess my emails, under the Freedom Of Information Act? The NSA couild turn this Snoden event in to a PR campain that states, "hay! we'ere the good guys, and we can help you out!"
Instead the NSA acts like theyr'e selling an airplane ticket?
Okay, I've actually moved around a lot. Right now my water is via personal well. Before that it was the town, before that a cooperative, before that a public company.
Personally, I've always found I get the best service from the cooperatives. Partially as a result and thinking about the economics I think coops are the best economic model for utilities due to their monopolistic nature - if you at least have the customer owning them, it makes the company care more for serving their owner-customers than making a profit.
I don't read AC A human right
Just lifted this from boing boing because it fits ...
Known for his biting satire and his dedication to Socialism, [dissident East German songwriter Wolf Biermann] chronicled his life under surveillance with a powerful sense of humor, and nowhere better than in the “Stasi Ballad” from 1974, with its classic refrain – “Die Stasi ist mein Eckermann.”
That is a reference to the German poet Johann Peter Eckermann, who patiently chronicled the utterances of that Olympian figure of German literature, Johann Wolfgang Goethe – ultimately published in Goethe’s Conversations With Eckermann in the Last Years of His Life, which Nietzsche called the “greatest work in the German language”. Here is an English rendition:
I feel a common humanity
With the poor Stasi dogs,
Required to sit through snow and downpours of rain
Tediously listening to me through the
Microphone they have installed
Which catches every sound,
Songs, jokes and soft curses
Sitting on the toilet and in the kitchen
Brothers from state security – you alone
Know all my troubles.
You alone can attest,
How my whole human effort
Is committed with passionate tenderness
And zest to Our Great Cause.
Words which otherwise would be lost,
Are captured firmly on your tapes,
And – I’m sure of it – now and again
You sing my songs in bed.
I sing my gratitude to you,
Stasi is my Ecker,
Stasi is my Ecker,
Stasi is my Eckermann.
Cryonics - Keep cool and carry on.
For retrieval of your data.... or maybe a lawsuit, with a subpoena for their copy of your files; or seek a court order for a copy of the data......
You would be surprised at what people can do when they decide to get off their asses and work together. Ever heard of the early trading companies - East India trading co, United Fruit Co, etc? PRIVATE entities that built more infrastructure and did more for their territories than any government ever did. You don't have to have a government to get something done, all you need is leadership, organization and the will. How about all those churches you see everywhere all over the world. Government built those?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
You'd be surprised at what some people think. But honestly the point I am making is that a government is not some benevolent entity that tries to do things for you. A government is an entity that says "no you can't do that", and uses force to back it up. That's how you get power - by saying "No". 2 year olds know this. Ever wonder why most of licitation deals for the government are private and no one is allowed to see them? You think the government is doing people favors? Sigh.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Been there, dealt with that in a number of industries. I have yet to deal with ANY government employee who knows enough about the basis for the regulations to be anything but a useless twit filling out useless paperwork.
The vast majority of "regulation" is man-made B.S. rent-seeking crony-capitalist extortion. I have "been" a real-deal Quality Control Engineer, so I have "done" enforcement the correct, not the government way.
Your jingoistic suckfest got 4 and my reasoned response got 0. You win! And what you win is a country that continues to go straight into the toilet bowl while you pretend that everything is OK.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Typically the testing is only when a property is sold.
As for regulations...most came about because private industry did not provide adequate oversight. Whether a particular regulatory body is still needed is another matter.
East India company and others were set up as government regulated monopolies.
This guy was hilarious, and I loved how he maintained his sincerity while frustrating the NSA's pursuit of his personal information... at least for the time being. By now, they have a dozen men on his trail. I fear for what's in store for him, especially when he travels. He needs to start using encryption tools for email, cell phone calls and text messages. And he has to take his file down from Dropbox, iCloud, or wherever, and stash them in a private cloud like Cloudlocker (www.cloudlocker.it), where they still need a warrant to get inside.
True, sorta, but the worst excesses occurred before government intervention and "appropriate licenses" were required. here's an example: http://www.environmentalcouncil.org/priorities/article.php?x=264
Also, ask anyone who lived in Los Angeles in the 1960-70's
It was a free-for-all before the 1970's , and then we elected representatives who promised to do something about that and they did ( see Nixon, EPA (1970), Clean Water Act(1972) . BTW, I'm an old person, and I remember very well the days before local, state and federal government intervention into protecting the environment.
What companies can get away with now-a-days is nothing compared to before government got involved.
BTW, many people have made a good case that the reason so many jobs left the USA for third-world countries isn't so much cheap labor, but rather the non-existent environmental rules in those countries.
I suspect you're playing irony here, but most Slashdot readers would not know the history of the companies you named.
It would be difficult to come up with an example more evil than the East India Trading company.
United Fruit is farther down the list, maybe only in the top ten.
All corporations are government charters. That's how you incorporate. What's your point? Corporations are still private.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Perhaps not, but it does give new meaning to the term "pillar of society".
So am I the first to link to today's Dilbert?