Born In the NSA: These Former Spies Are Starting Companies of Their Own

First time accepted submitter ElyKahn (3637855) writes "The diaspora of startups with an NSA pedigree is rapidly growing. These startups, such as Sqrrl, Virtru, and Synack, are typically security-focused and often are commercializing technology projects from the NSA. However, coming from the NSA is a dual-edged sword... the technology is world-class and cutting-edge, but they must also fight the viewpoint of some that the startups are merely a front for the NSA."

Comments

These days I think it's safe to assume

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

The NSA has its grubby little paws everywhere. Whether the company is in bed with them willingly is another matter.

I know a many European business owners who think twice or more before doing business with *any* US company, just because the US surveillance state isn't far behind.

Re:These days I think it's safe to assume

[Trepidity]

Unfortunately, we're increasingly discovering that the European intelligence agencies are pretty strongly in bed with the US surveillance state, too. It's not 100% clear if the situation is quite as bad, but there is substantial evidence that the German, French, Danish, Swedish, etc. intelligence services are routinely helping each other out. There's some suspicion that they're even doing some jurisdiction-laundering through these arrangements: the NSA can spy on Germans because they're foreigners, and then shares data with German intelligence that German intelligence wouldn't be able to legally collect on their own citizens. And vice versa, e.g. Swedish intelligence has apparently been spying on Americans and sharing the info back with American intelligence.