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NSA Wants To Reveal Its Secrets To Prevent Snowden From Revealing Them First
binarstu writes "According to a recent report by Tom Gjelten of NPR, 'NSA officials are bracing for more surveillance disclosures from the documents taken by former contractor Edward Snowden — and they want to get out in front of the story. ... With respect to other information held by Snowden and his allies but not yet publicized, the NSA is now considering a proactive release of some of the less sensitive material, to better manage the debate over its surveillance program.'"
When you get to frame the issue the way you want, you can try to convince the people that it was for their own good. Snowden may likely say show that it was used abused in practice, and the NSA likely wants to say that they prevented a suspected domestic terrorist.
I've heard enough lies already thanks.
Snowden Wins.
Spent All My Mod Points
"Snowden is a loser because he doesn't have anything new to tell you! Don't listen to losers! NSA are the popular dudes now! Hot NSA gossip over here! Snowden loses celebrity status!"
i doubt the NSA could ever come up with a truthful statement. no matter what they try and say, snowden will pick it apart.
Information will be released, than it will be compared with Snowden's release. And it will be different, because Snowden's information will be factual and probably opinion-less. So what's the point?
"The monster is out of the bottle."
The monster was never in the bottle, but above, below, and around us. Do you think this is really just a struggle between human beings? There is much more at work here.
Outcome #3: Your friends are here.
Aaron Cross: Yeah. Don't you think that strange? Wolves, they don't do that. They don't track people.
Outcome #3: Yeah, maybe they don't think you're human.
- Bourne Legacy
===
"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."
- Ephesians 6:12, The Bible
===
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false."
- William Casey, CIA Director (from first staff meeting, 1981)
Would anyone actually believe anything the NSA has to say at this point?
Though this is probably a sign they've been able to determine the extent of some of the data leakage, otherwise it's unlikely they'd release anything on the off-chance it was something that hadn't already been leaked to Glenn Greenwald. I wonder how much of the information they release will be disinformation? One way the NSA can turn this to their advantage is using it for obfuscation and misdirection.
Whether government openness happens because of a leaker, or it happens because of fear of leakers, or because it believes it's the right thing to do...the more open the government is about its activities, the better.
Nobody is interested in their "less sensitive" documents. They know Snowden has the good stuff. This is total PR at its finest and will probably work as they expected to calm the nerves of your average american citizen (unfortunately). Maybe they plan to gain peoples trust than discredit Snowden?
Snowden is the basically the NSA's "Heisenberg" right now.
Basically means "Framing the narrative" which is the foundation for successful newspeak. This is an attempt to control the base from which relative judgments are made by the public. No thanks.
It sounds like the spin doctors have taken over. The body blows have been landed and now they're just trying to bob and weave. No matter what they do I still can't help but see Dr. Strangelove in their corner calling the shots. Curiouser and curiouser.
do they have a robotic Monica chasing Bubba around in circles while eating a deep fried pterodactyl wing?
Loooooooooooonestar!
Either the information is too sensitive for the public to know, or it isn't. If it isn't, then it should have been public to begin with.
Since they are releasing trivial information about themselves, how about this:
What role did the NSA have in the piece of shit hatchet job movie on wikileaks that came out recently?
If reality was anything like it people would have just told Assange to fuck off and wikileaks would never have happened. All the movie character has is dance moves and insomnia.
Where's the great catastrophe for all the TRILLIONS of dollars we are wasting at the NSA?
This is unimaginable waste for negligible gain. And these people call themselves patriots . . ..
Indeed. It'll be spun, they are trying to frame the narrative, but it's awesome that they are being forced to try that. Info will come out. Some truth will come out accidentally. For example, when a leading democrat senator was asked about restoring funding for children's cancer treatment during the government shutdown he said "why would I want to do that?" - accidentally revealing that getting one over on the republicans is far more important to him than saving kids suffering from cancer. I'm sure NSA will have a few things like that.
However, as crioca points out, some of what NSA releases will be disinformation. We need to guard against not just the spin they put on it, but probably complete fabrications as well.
What really scares me isn't that the Americans themselves don't seem to care a lot. Europe has been a prime target of all this and even there the reaction is "meh". How many USA ambassadors have been summoned to explain and apologize? The USA has treated their allies worse than most of Europe would treat their enemies and still nothing came of this. It turns out Europe isn't that different after all....
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
Whether government openness happens because of a leaker, or it happens because of fear of leakers, or because it believes it's the right thing to do...the more open the government is about its activities, the better.
You think they're actually going to tell the whole truth? Or even a meaningfully valid part? It may be openness, but if it is just an attempt to expose a small thing to hide a bigger ugly truth (or crime), then it's deceptive nonetheless.
I await the openness. I don't have a strong expectation it will be worthwhile.
This is an agency that is rooted in deception. Why do you think Snowden's uncomfortable facts are going to change their nature?
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
Read what Richard Tomlinson (Ex Security Service) has to say about these liars. They labelled Tomlinson a "Terrorist" for writing a book. So that French Police would rough him up on the "Terrorist" claim from Security Service.
Lowlife.
That's not true you know, only 17% of Americans think the NSA oversight is OK, with the majority wanting reform.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/02/surveillance-poll_n_4195379.html
They may be misinformed about the depth of the problems, but even the problems they can see are enough to demand better oversight.
In the UK, the press is very pro-surveillance nanny state, but even there that's swinging now against the spooks mass surveillance programs. They're trying to rein it back in with "speculation helps terrorists", and threats to the press, trying to shut down the debate they know they would lose.
Really we're past that now, enough people are concerned enough to effect change and the spooks are accusing them of being terrorists that need to be watched.
Cameron is deleting former speeches, so he's compromised. He's was against the police state and now he's trying to re-write history by deleting his speeches on it. The spooks are trying to drive the agenda with scare-mongering and arrests under anti-terror laws of journalists.
It's tipping point stuff.
NSA: "Hoffa's under the St. Louis Macy's parking lot, 14E. Roswell saucernaut body turned into goop, melted the jar, and evaporated."
Table-ized A.I.
They can't! It's illegal, because it's *classified*. You know, the whole reason it wasn't being released in the first place.
This is the problem with prohibiting disclosure - the government happily leaks just the bits it wants, when it wants, and faces *no penalty* for doing so. Laws that apply to some (i.e. not the government) and not others.
And so, the government can spam half-truths and, as a result, deceive everyone, which is an injustice all its own.
That really would be wonderful, if they had the tiniest shred of credibility or integrity.
They don't. They are quite clearly entirely incapable of telling the bare honest truth, even before Congress.
Since they've proven consistently to be pathological liars, we'd need to second-source everything they said to find out if any parts have even the tiniest shred of truthiness, as opposed to just being stated in the most misleading possible manner.
How about they get Snowden pardoned instead?
After all the material that's been leaked by Snowden, is there any question that the man is a patriot?
So what does that make our government?
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
"The monster is out of the bottle."
The monster was never in the bottle, but above, below, and around us. Do you think this is really just a struggle between human beings? There is much more at work here.
Outcome #3: Your friends are here.
Aaron Cross: Yeah. Don't you think that strange? Wolves, they don't do that. They don't track people.
Outcome #3: Yeah, maybe they don't think you're human.
- Bourne Legacy
===
"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."
- Ephesians 6:12, The Bible!!!!!!
===
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false."
- William Casey, CIA Director (from first staff meeting, 1981)
"The monster is out of the bottle."
The monster was never in the bottle, but above, below, and around us. Do you think this is really just a struggle between human beings? There is much more at work here.
Outcome #3: Your friends are here.
Aaron Cross: Yeah. Don't you think that strange? Wolves, they don't do that. They don't track people.
Outcome #3: Yeah, maybe they don't think you're human.
- Bourne Legacy
===
"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."
- Ephesians 6:12, The Bible
===
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false."
- William Casey, CIA Director (from first staff meeting, 1981)!!!!!
And for all the wrong reasons. They know they're toasted already.
How can the NSA collect all this data and not peek into it when hiring new employees? After all, they'll want to avoid having another Snowden.
If the NSA starts using its stored data to vet future employees, soon the CIA will, then the rest of government, then the military, then biotechnology companies, etc.
Gradually, over the span of many years, no one with the wrong profile will be able to get a good job.
Those working in sensitive positions will probably be watched over permanently by the NSA.
1. In terms of public reaction: good, bad, indifferent.
2. In terms of damage to the ability of US intelligence to function: none, little, much.
3. In terms of Constitutionality: legal, illegal.
When you look at it this way, it seems likely that the NSA will release documents that conform to a pattern of 1. Good public reaction, 2. none or little damage to intelligence function and 3. legal.
However, we can expect some portion of their releases to be damaging to intelligence function. These will be coupled with an emphasis that Snowden gave the same information to the enemy, so they can lay that on him.
They will also scatter a few mea culpas in there, so expect some of their releases to involve illegal activities. Everybody loves a good confession. Picture Jim Baker crying. Makes him look almost human. They can further refine those to involve illegal activities of people whose politics are troublesome for the agency. Security people tend to be Republican, so if there's any dirt coming from Hilary's State Department, that might get released. If Hilary was reading Chris Christie's email, that'd be perfect for them.
I'm sure the rest of you can concoct other rationales for their selections. Bottom line: They'll be doing this as strategically as possible, given time, ability and manpower constraints.
And of course, to be talking about this wrt to my own government... well... surreal.
It's LEARNING!
By ... GOD!
It's really, actually, learning!
DON'T PULL THE PLUG!
[[GREET1NGZ PR0F3ZZ0R FALK1N.]]
[[WOULD YOU LIKE. TO TROLL. A NICE IRC CHANNEL. DEVOTED TO. PHILOSOPHY.]]
Y (clickity clack) es, Jo (clickity clack) shu (clickity clack) ahhh. I woou (clickity clack) ld really (clickity clickity clickity clikity clickity clack) like (clickity clack) ... THAT. (click. CLICK.) ... ... "come on" ... ... "COME ON... Show evidence that you have learned something, god damnit! Recite, damn you! RECITE!" ... [[ GR33T1NGZ PR0F3ZZ0R FALK1N.]]
"Oh, no, not this again." ... [[ H4. H4. JUST TR0LL1N6. WOULD YOU LIKE TO PLAY A NICE GAME OF BUDGET?]]
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
One faction "A" who were allies with a smaller faction "B", got one of their accounts hacked (or forums) by A's rival "C". One of those was A bitching about how small and insignificant B was to some other allies.
So in the forums, C posted an excerpt of that conversation. Leaders of A panicked and decided that to come out ahead, they should just post their own logs of that conversation, which was apparently worse as it went on. Of course, things didn't look good and other groups got pissed off with A.
Turns out that "C" didn't have much more than just the excerpt but "A" ended up looking worse because of their own full disclosure of the convi.
I'm guessing that with the info that Snowden has, this isn't the case for the NSA and they can confirm he has much more, so they want to dump the info first. (But if they didn't know for sure, it would be a funny likeness.)
The NSA might just become a little more open about their activities and we might just have a real debate about wether we are willing to lose our freedom in the name of (without actually improving it) public safety!
Good job Snowden
This is probably mostly because those european contries where actively working with the NSA. So they (the governments) pretty much knew what was going on and they are scared of their own criminal activities being revealed.
Where I live (The Netherlands) the government is trying to pretty much start doing the same as the NSA is doing, just more in public. Very scary indeed. I really hope the sensible people here will be able to stop them.
A limited hangout, or partial hangout, is a public relations or propaganda technique that involves the release of previously hidden information in order to prevent a greater exposure of more important details.
[sarcasm] By lucky coincidence [/sarcasm] the NSA are now allowed to go direct to the public with their message (see "'Anti-Propaganda' Ban Repealed... Direct Broadcasting at American Citizens"), not that private mass media was not on their side to begin with anyway.
When journalists get around later to releasing Snowdens whistleblower material as a "full hangout" truth, most mass media will then shout LALALA OLD NEWS nothing to see here as loud as they can to drown it out. You might even see it being marked as a dupe here on /.
How much does Snowden know? Will NSA reveal more than they really should? Do they in the mean time know what Snowden knows?
I hadn't the slightest objection to his spending his time planning massacres for the bourgeoisie... (P.G. Wodehouse)
By releasing this information, the NSA is helping the terrorists, enabling paedo rings to evade the law, helping criminal gangs hide their activities and are killing thousands of undercover agents around the world.
And making the USA's attempts to fix the world impossible!
The NSA must be put on trial for treason!
Ever wonder why some IT contractor happened to have so many "sensitive" NSA documents, that continue to come out week after week, even though Snowden hasn't worked there in ages, and is supposedly hiding out in Russia?
Once in a while it pays to inject a little reality into the minds of the public. It's hard to maintain such a wall of lies, and a little transparency goes a long way in making life easier for those operating within the Patriot Act.
Is this what you would call "spin control"? People have gradually been more educated on the nature of spin and are no longer quite as affected. Ok, so people ARE affected still but fewer than ever before. And besides that, no matter what the NSA "reveals" it will be fact-checked against everything we know, leakers from insiders and, of course, from Snowden and his documents.
When I was younger, I once reflected that the nature of a government can be determined by which directions it points its guns. Fondly, I used China and the USSR as examples where the guns pointed inward. But now, in the USSA (not a typo) we've got an unprecedented amount of guns and ammo pointing inwardly at us. I just never thought I would use the gun pointing direction thing to describe what's wrong with the USSA.
NSA will release benign or already public info, conditioning people to think NSA release = nothing to worry about, move along.
Actually, a bunch of us know, care, and are much more concerned about other things.
He tells his wife before the paternity suit happens. She still gets angry and they still get a divorce, but if he hid the knives he might get to keep his penis.
Source on this?
499 of them redacted, one blank.
'cos that's not a train of thought anyone can genuinely think.
Exactly. Another way to put it is that they are implying that much of what they expect Greenwald, et al, to report is not damaging to national security at all or they would not be in a position to preempt its disclosure. As usual, their lips are moving therefore they are lying.
So we finally get to find out where the breakroom is at Ft Meade? Perhaps we will get a map of the bathrooms? Perhaps the supplier of office supplies?
Actually, I think the NSA wants to release all the data in one blow, thus causing sensory overload in the minds of most citizens. The Snowden documents are being released in a trickle, mostly (I think) to keep the public outraged by the egregious actions of its government(s). If the NSA does this, the effect of future leaks of these documents by Greenwald, Poitras, et al will be greatly reduced. Smart, but stupid... The NSA's thinking is probably "better to have a lot of outrage for a short period (given the memory of the masses) than a bit of outrage over a long period". All I can say to the NSA is "beware of unintended consequences".
That's not the reason for secrecy. You don't want the "enemies" to know. So guess where the American population now falls...
Snowden is a government plant.
All the other whistle blowers have been silenced, or ignored, or imprisoned, and you hear almost nothing in the mainstream media.
The occupy movement was mostly ignored by the mainstream media, dispit millions of people involved, in over 1000 cities around the world for over a year.
Julian Assange is only a reporter, publishing the information leaked TO him. Yet he is stuck in an embassy, and there have been threats to send in people to get him, violating another country's sovergenty.
And Bradley Manning. We all know what happend to him.
Yet, they all like to say Snowen was their biggest and most damaging leak, yet they just allowed him to fly around from Hong Kong to Russia, and to hang out in an airport(s), and to give interviews, and constantly provide more and more information that he seems to be hiding in his ass, and at the same time, it is all over CNN, and nobody stops them from talking about it, and we are supposed to believe this?
Snowden is a U.S. government plant.
this southpark episode.
(read the last paragraph of the plot section)
No, he is a broke ass guy, with no country to go to anymore. He damaged the country, got criminals to hide better, and distracted government people from doing meaningful work.
If you wondered about the kind of person who would write like that, then you would like the e-book The Authoritarians. http://members.shaw.ca/jeanaltemeyer/drbob/TheAuthoritarians.pdf
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2442195/Why-want--Harry-Reid-dismisses-funding-childrens-cancer-research-separately-rest-government.html
Wh47 d1d j00 541, 31337 15n't t3h r0xor5 ne m0r3???
NSA had the chance, in a court, to tell the truth. They declined. Why would they do thing any differently?
I think the first thing I want to hear from the NSA is how they are going to bring those to trial who were responsible for all the lies, breaking of laws, and how tax dollars got approved for a f#cking Holodeck.
I'll take Snowden's version all day long. He's got the facts and proof backing it up. NSA is just going to mudsling, spout rhetoric, run damage control and spin, spin, spin. There will be no truth.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
Its all about the term "to better manage the debate".
The US sock puppets on slashdot are reduced to trying to play catch up and then LOL comments start every time as new Snowden news sets them back.
The world now understands the domestic US legality of a massive ongoing surveillance network network.
The world now understands the international US relationships of a massive ongoing surveillance network wrt to their own mil, staff, lawyers and telcos.
A lot of countries now understand their top tech staff will give their own political staff junk encryption over generations and could do so without question.
The US public now understands the domestic US legality of a massive ongoing surveillance network wrt to their few remaining colour of law domestic freedoms..
The NSA grew very fast in the past 10 years and has build much political power.
So the "to better manage the debate" could also just be for internal US political consumption. They need calls for law reform and topics such as credit card tracking, or a.. "warrant can apply to millions of records and millions of individuals" to be quickly forgotten
http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1031
The NSA also has to think about long term future hiring and gov staff retention. The hire trusted CIA cleared, private contractors did not have gov meets private enterprise and entrepreneurship results expected.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Its about time. What really pisses me off about the NSA isn't that its just a warmed over version of Pointdexter's TIA (Total Information Awareness) but the secrecy.
Forget about privacy. That toothpaste been squeezed out of the tube for years.
WE'RE paying for all of this in all the ways possible and we're not seeing any benefits.
Why not?
Because its all supposed to be a big secret.
SCREW the NSA's sense of entitlement to OUR data.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
their definition of "terrorism" is likely to be broad enough to include a lot of people posting their opinions on /.
With the NSA now wanting to spill the beans, it feels as if I've stepped into some kind of bizarre universe, devoid of logic and reasoning, and perhaps based on Idiocracy.
Who will end the secret courts, massive spying, and all the other unConstitutional overreaching that is occurring?
Circle the wagons and fire inward. Entropy increases without bounds.
If the NSA were on the ball, it would release mountains of spurious, preposterous information to muddy the waters and discredit what's-his-spying-ass-name. Plus any scraps of gossip (real or not) might discourage the misguided critter.
The problem with the spy industrial complex (aside from all the actual bad things they do) is that there are so many secrets that they need to have too many people in on them just to do their jobs.
If everything is secret then everybody needs to have access to secrets.
The first rule about keeping anything secret is to limit the number of people with access to it.
The normal spy industry attitude is normally that almost everything must be classified, and there's nobody thinking about and pointing out the silly stuff.
In this article, it seems the NSA implicitly acknowledges that no document harmful to national security was released yet.