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NSA's Novel Claim: Our Systems Are Too Complex To Obey the Law

Posted by timothy on from the complex-simple-same-thing dept.

Reader Bruce66423 (1678196) points out skeptical-sounding coverage at the Washington Post of the NSA's claim that it can't hold onto information it collects about users' online activity long enough for it to be useful as evidence in lawsuits about the very practice of that collection. From the article: 'The agency is facing a slew of lawsuits over its surveillance programs, many launched after former NSA contractor Edward Snowden leaked information on the agency's efforts last year. One suit that pre-dates the Snowden leaks, Jewel v. NSA, challenges the constitutionality of programs that the suit allege collect information about Americans' telephone and Internet activities. In a hearing Friday, U.S. District for the Northern District of California Judge Jeffrey S. White reversed an emergency order he had issued earlier the same week barring the government from destroying data that the Electronic Frontier Foundation had asked be preserved for that case. The data is collected under Section 702 of the Amendments Act to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. But the NSA argued that holding onto the data would be too burdensome. "A requirement to preserve all data acquired under section 702 presents significant operational problems, only one of which is that the NSA may have to shut down all systems and databases that contain Section 702 information," wrote NSA Deputy Director Richard Ledgett in a court filing submitted to the court. The complexity of the NSA systems meant preservation efforts might not work, he argued, but would have "an immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the United States.' Adds Bruce66423: "This of course implies that they have no backup system — or at least that the backup are not held for long."

42 of 245 comments (clear)

  1. Too Big to Be Indicted... by mbone · · Score: 4, Funny

    The computer version.

    1. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by B33rNinj4 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      This is pretty much what will happen. The precedent was set with the banks and auto industry. I don't see why the NSA can't use the same argument.

    2. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by TaoPhoenix · · Score: 5, Interesting

      This argument has a bit of a different feel to it though.

      Up till now for a decade the agencies just invoke "we're scary and secretive, we don't need to follow your puny little laws because of National Security but we need a billion dollars in next year's budget to build more systems to hold data forever and ever".

      And you can bet they cherry pick their data so that they have ten years worth of people's email and Slashdot posts, but suddenly when a lawsuit comes along, suddenly that data vanishes. But then it becomes vital to an investigation! "Oh look, we found it again!"

      --
      My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
    3. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by GameboyRMH · · Score: 4, Insightful

      We can call this The NSA Defense (our systems are too complex for the law), and the inverse of it is The Amazon Defense (the law is too complex for our systems).

      --
      "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    4. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by mi · · Score: 2

      The precedent was set with the banks and auto industry.

      Not sure about the auto industry, but banks and other financial institutions did spend untold billions on revamping their systems to comply with the new regulations. Working for them became horribly difficult — at least one client of mine had to hire a consultant, whose sole job was translating change-requests (such as: "We need to increase the JVM's memory limit of the risk-computing application") from engineer's English into regulation-compliant legalese...

      Oh, and then an actual user had to sign-off on it — try to explain the intricacies of Java garbage-collection to an equity-options trader...

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    5. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by ibwolf · · Score: 2

      The banks, on the other hand, are very easy to "kill" — just stop using them. Unlike the government, they have no way to compel you.

      Yes, "just" stop using them. Like we can "just" stop voting in all these rubbish politicians.

      Most people can't stop doing business with them because they are already in debt and clearing that debt will take decades. Even if not in debt, not having a bank account and debit/credit card(s) and other financial services can cause you all manner of difficulties.

      Banks, on top of providing essentially services, have built a money sucking machine. And they've made very sure to entangle the leeching part thoroughly in with the good bits.

      The only way to address this, without plunging the economy into chaos, is for the government to step in and untangle it (cutting the proverbial Gordian knot). "Just" not doing business with the banks will either accomplish nothing (because you can't get enough people involved) or will precipitate a financial collapse.

      Unfortunately, getting the government to do something about this "just" requires us to vote some decent people into office *sigh* yes, "just".

    6. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by meta-monkey · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Credit unions.

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    7. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by mi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yes, "just" stop using them [banks]. Like we can "just" stop voting in all these rubbish politicians.

      Unlike politicians, who impose themselves even upon those, who voted against them, banks have no power over you if you don't use them. You don't have to convince other people to stop using banks — just stop doing it yourself and you'll be free from them...

      Most people can't stop doing business with them because they are already in debt

      Nobody forces people into the debt. They take it voluntarily and are genuinely happy, when their applications are approved. Without banks, you'd have to save money for 10 years before buying a house. With banks, you can move-in right away and pay off in 15 years. Loans are a service, that banks provide to willing customers.

      Banks, on top of providing essentially services, have built a money sucking machine

      I'm not aware of this "money sucking machine". Could you, please, elaborate?

      The only way to address this, without plunging the economy into chaos, is for the government to step in and untangle it

      Just what is it, that you'd like to see "untangled"?

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    8. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      True nobody forces me into debt but for all intents Im forced to to have a bank account so I can get paid my wages.

    9. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by TubeSteak · · Score: 5, Informative

      Unlike politicians, who impose themselves even upon those, who voted against them, banks have no power over you if you don't use them. You don't have to convince other people to stop using banks â" just stop doing it yourself and you'll be free from them...

      Uhhhh... The global recession puts the lie to your notion that not doing business with banks means I'm free of their ill effects.

      Nobody forces people into the debt. They take it voluntarily and are genuinely happy, when their applications are approved. Without banks, you'd have to save money for 10 years before buying a house. With banks, you can move-in right away and pay off in 15 years. Loans are a service, that banks provide to willing customers.

      During the mortgage bubble, banks were doing several things
      1. Forging a higher stated income onto loan documents so they could lend more money
      2. Giving loans to people that they knew would not be able to afford it (NINA/NINJA loans)
      3. Offering minorities ARM loans or loans with much higher interest rates than they would offer to white borrowers with the same credit score.

      Blaming the borrower ignores the mountains of evidence showing wildly illegal, fraudulent, and outright deceptive behavior by the loan industry.
      If you don't know this stuff, you must be willfully ignoring the facts as they've been reported.
      Even Fox News has been reporting on it.

      --
      [Fuck Beta]
      o0t!
    10. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by mi · · Score: 2, Informative

      The global recession puts the lie to your notion that not doing business with banks means I'm free of their ill effects.

      Nope. You are only affected as much as you were involved with the banks — being there customer or an employee, or dealing with other people, who were. But the recession was not the bank's fault — rather it is that of the politicians, who forced banks (with the threat of "discrimination" lawsuits) to give money to unqualified borrowers.

      1. Forging a higher stated income onto loan documents so they could lend more money

      Nope. It was not the banks doing the forging — it was the applicants. Bank-employees may have looked the other way, but the actual forgery was done by the customers.

      2. Giving loans to people that they knew would not be able to afford it

      Refusing to issue such a loan was to expose the firm to a discrimination lawsuit. But, once again, you are ignoring the role of the actual applicants, who lied on their applications — putting the blame solely on those, who were supposed to catch the lies.

      3. Offering minorities ARM loans or loans with much higher interest rates than they would offer to white borrowers with the same credit score.

      Citation needed.

      Issuing repayable loans is the banks' bread-and-butter. That's, what they do. They normally have every incentive to issue as many loans to qualified borrowers as they can, while keeping the unqualified out. The bubble started, when the government messed up those incentives by, on the one hand, suspecting every rejection of being racially-motivated and, on the other, lowering the standards, under which banks could unload (sell) their loans to the government. It was this combination, that created the mortgage bubble — not some inherent evil of the "banksters".

      Blaming the borrower ignores the mountains of evidence showing wildly illegal, fraudulent, and outright deceptive behavior by the loan industry

      Nope. The borrower signing a fraudulent loan application is the main guilty party. Those failing — willfully or otherwise — to catch his lies may be somewhat responsible too, but the primary responsibility is with the applicant.

      If you don't know this stuff, you must be willfully ignoring the facts

      Yeah, yeah. And if I don't agree with you, I must be stupid and incompetent.

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    11. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by Roger+Wilcox · · Score: 2

      You do seem to be stupid and incompetent (your words,) but not because you don't agree with the GP. Rather, it is because of the ridiculous arguments you are making:

      "But the recession was not the bank's fault â" rather it is that of the politicians, who forced banks (with the threat of "discrimination" lawsuits) to give money to unqualified borrowers."

      First of all, the article you link says nothing to support your claims of forcing or discrimination or even lawsuits. The closest the article gets to supporting your claims is to state that "rules of spending" were "loosened" for the banks by the politicians. How can you not see at this point that the banks (and the other giant corporations) are the ones wagging the dog here? They bribe politicians through so-called lobbying in order to bring about the loosening and tightening of rules that suit their favor. That much is plain as day! And you can't argue that these particular loosened loan rules didn't favor the banks. Obviously the banks stood to benefit, which they did, greatly and at taxpayer expense.

      Now, to your credit I will say that blame for the recession can't be laid fully on the banks: each of us is also at fault for failing to lynch (literally or metaphorically) the bigwig asshats (meaning bankers and politicians, I don't discriminate) who are continuously allowed to pull this shit and get away with it.

      "Nope. It was not the banks doing the forging â" it was the applicants. Bank-employees may have looked the other way, but the actual forgery was done by the customers."

      "May have looked the other way," as you put it, implies that bank employees were complicit in the forgery, which they were. So why use this statement argue that they weren't forging income numbers? They were further "loosening the rules" and they should have known better.

      Did you know that it is a bank's responsibility to assess the creditworthiness of it's debtors? If they make a bad investment on a homeowner and the loan isn't repaid, that's money that they lose! As you pointed out, this is their bread and butter business. They knew what they were doing here, and they used the government's new generously low (bribe-induced) requirements to help themselves unload what they knew to be bad loans on Fannie Mae.

      .

      This is how the system works, folks! Isn't it wonderful? Truly, We The People need to step in and clean house if we want these shenanigans to cease. Arguing about whether it was a bank's fault or a government's fault is meaningless. From the perspective of common people, the banks are the government and the government is the banks. They both have a vested interest in working together to milk us like we are livestock, which they do.

    12. Re:Too Big to Be Indicted... by TubeSteak · · Score: 2

      Nope. You are only affected as much as you were involved with the banks â" being there customer or an employee, or dealing with other people, who were. But the recession was not the bank's fault â" rather it is that of the politicians, who forced banks (with the threat of "discrimination" lawsuits) to give money to unqualified borrowers.

      1. The global recession caused millions of people to lose their jobs, for so long, that the government has been extending unemployment for years (up until recently)
      2. You're trotting out the long debunked claim that the Community Reinvestment Act caused this
      3. Your debunked claim is supported by... an essay from Orson Scott Card. I will rebut with the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank

      [Citation Needed]

      Here's some reading for you.
      https://www.google.com/search?q=Goldman+sachs+subprime+fraud
      https://www.google.com/search?q=credit+suisse+mortgage+fraud
      https://www.google.com/search?q=Washington+Mutual+loan+fraud
      https://www.google.com/search?q=Bank+of+America+racial+settlement
      https://www.google.com/search?q=wells+fargo+racial+settlement
      https://www.google.com/search?q=PNC+Financial+racial+settlement
      https://www.google.com/search?q=suntrust+racial+settlement
      https://www.google.com/search?q=robo+signing+settlement
      https://www.google.com/search?q=JPMorgan+mortgage+fraud+settlement

      This is a fun press release:
      The Federal Reserve Board on Wednesday issued a consent cease and desist order and assessed an $85 million civil money penalty against Wells Fargo [...]. The order addresses allegations that Wells Fargo Financial employees steered potential prime borrowers into more costly subprime loans and separately falsified income information in mortgage applications

      If you noticed, I'm intentionally not rebutting you point by point,
      because everything you've parroted has already been said and rejected a thousand times already.

      Yeah, yeah. And if I don't agree with you, I must be stupid and incompetent.

      And in yesterday's news: https://www.google.com/search?q=citigroup+mortgage+discrimination
      I honestly don't know what alternate world of facts you're living in.
      Going by your Orson Scott Card essay, Fark.com headlines are more informative than what you've been reading for the last 6 years.

      --
      [Fuck Beta]
      o0t!
  2. Fine ... by gstoddart · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If you can't have your data available to demonstrate what you're doing it lawful, and you are going to delete it, then only reasonable conclusion is what you are doing cannot be proven lawful.

    Therefore, the program is not lawful, and you need to stop.

    Problem solved.

    This amounts to "your honor, we collect so damned much information we couldn't possibly hold onto it long enough to be subject to legal oversight. Trust us."

    What crap.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    1. Re:Fine ... by oodaloop · · Score: 5, Informative

      I imagine the problem is that these databases only hold collected data for a short period of time, say 30 or 90 days. The data scraped is massive, so it is constantly deleting old data to make way for more. IAA Intelligence Analyst, and I know of some imagery databases, for example, that only hold the last 30 days of imagery. If you forced them to hold all of it for years, it would mean increasing server space by orders of magnitude.

      --
      Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
    2. Re:Fine ... by gstoddart · · Score: 5, Informative

      So, basically, your saying that they should just expect everybody to simply trust that what they're doing is entirely legal? Because the logistics of actually proving this is so difficult they can't do it?

      I say horseshit to that.

      We know the data they scrape is massive. What we don't know is that they're complying with the law in order to do it.

      And I fail to see why the benefit of the doubt should be given in this case.

      Sorry, but it's "trust, but verify", and if you can't verify, you can't bloody well trust. The whole point of these lawsuits is that they likely go beyond the scope of their legal mandate. Saying you couldn't possibly be bothered to hold onto the evidence the court has demanded is just too damned bad.

      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    3. Re:Fine ... by bigpat · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Sarcasm aside I think you make an important point... Between the “state secrets” privilege and the apparent willingness of the NSA to engage in a wholesale violation of the US Constitution and lie to congress and the courts I seriously doubt it would be remotely possible for a court to narrowly "rule on the facts" of the particular case. Rather courts are going to have to rule on the law and the probability that the NSA is violating individual liberties and then issue injunctions which give the government and the NSA and US government future instructions that the 4th amendment applies to their surveillance activities in the US despite whatever the Patriot Act might be interpreted to mean... meaning the courts will have to issue rulings based on what is permissible rather than issuing narrow injunctions against particular acts.

      So for instance the court should simply rule that for the NSA to force companies to hand over business records including communications logs and the like that they need a warrant that complies with the 4th amendment and is issued: "upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized"

    4. Re:Fine ... by JWW · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I totally get that their systems very likely need to purge inconsequential data to remain effective. However, if the court forced a private company to retain data under a court order, it wouldn't care one wit about whether that was feasible within the system or not. If the private company did not comply, their officers would be held in contempt.

      The NSA should not get special treatment in this case.

    5. Re:Fine ... by oh_my_080980980 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Really? That's not what the NSA was instructed to do. The NSA was instructed to hold *some* information that was involved in a court case. They were not forced to hold it for years nor were they forced to hold everything. In fact when the NSA was asked to do so they did not say they couldn't do it. Instead they said they didn't think the hold order applied to the information they deleted.

      Please stick to the topic on hand and not make up a scenario that did not happen.

    6. Re:Fine ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Well, if I design a system and I can't prove that it complies with all of the laws that regulates my field then I'm not allowed to sell that system.
      If I sell it anyway then I will be fined. (Or possibly imprisoned if someone gets killed because of me not following the norms.)

      If it is considered illegal when I design a system that is too complex to verify the legality of, why isn't it illegal for NSA?

    7. Re:Fine ... by TheCarp · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I think you are seriously overthinking this. Its very simple. They CAN save data. Period. How do I know? Its very simple here. Do you really believe that if they found credible data on a top Con Queso leader, that they would need to analyse it within a specific time frame before they lose it forever, or do you think they can flag it to be saved?

      Very simple. Being able to do this is a basic requirement for them, so they can do it already, right now.

      So any claim that they could not do this is so disingenuous on its face that it is ridiculous. If you claim in court that you can't be the rapist because you cut your penis off as a child, then at the VERY LEAST, you should fully expect to be dropping your pants in front of somebody who can verify this.

      They may as well be claiming they don't use computers at all to do their work, the claim would be 100% every bit as credible.

      --
      "I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
    8. Re:Fine ... by mrchaotica · · Score: 2

      That's a bit of a dangerous precident to be setting.

      No, it's exactly the opposite of a dangerous precedent. Remember, we're talking about the government here, not the people, and the relationship between the government and the people (and other parts of the government) is explicitly adversarial (hence "checks and balances").

      If it's appropriate for people to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, then it's equally appropriate for the government to be presumed guilty until proven innocent!

      --

      "[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz

    9. Re:Fine ... by rogoshen1 · · Score: 2

      If a program cannot be proven to be useful, we should not allow it..

      As near as I can tell we'd be better served by Fort Meade focusing all of that computing power on folding@home, or seti@home. =/

  3. So it's out of control? by Skarjak · · Score: 2

    I guess they really are making Skynet... Seriously though, everything the NSA has said since this whole scandal started reeks of "The end justifies the means." They're basically a cartoon villain at this point.

  4. Are they arguing Occam's Razor? by timrod · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So wait, the NSA's argument as to why their program is legal.. is that they're too incompetent to design a system that can follow the law. Shouldn't this be grounds to fire everyone at the NSA for incompetence, if this is the argument they're using?

    1. Re:Are they arguing Occam's Razor? by bobbied · · Score: 2

      So wait, the NSA's argument as to why their program is legal.. is that they're too incompetent to design a system that can follow the law. Shouldn't this be grounds to fire everyone at the NSA for incompetence, if this is the argument they're using?

      Well, I'm not sure folks fully understand the issue and it's posts like this that really muddy the water.

      The PROBLEM is that they simply collect too much data to have a prayer of being able to store and process it all. They are drowning in data and there is no practical way to store this data for any length of time so they routinely purge "old" data to make room. From news reports I've read in the past, I'm surmising that the raw data can only be kept for periods measured in days, maybe tens of days, before they run out of disk space.

      When the NSA gets sued, they are subject to having to provide any and all data they have related to the suit. From the moment they get served, or have reason to believe that they are being sued, by law, they cannot delete any data that is related or could be related to the suit. Doing so is destroying evidence, which is a crime.

      So what the NSA is saying, is that they simply don't have enough resources to retain data that might be subject to discovery in a lawsuit due to the number and length of the lawsuits they are facing. Which seems to be reasonable and not an intentional failure of the NSA to abide within the law with their system design and implementation. They got caught off guard with the scrutiny generated by the Snowden affair, and now in the flood of court actions find their data capacity strained.

      I conclude that the NSA is not intending to violate the law, but they feel that the system operation is more important so they leave it running, risking deleting data subject to discovery. You can argue with their choice I suppose, but there ARE reasons for the system's existence and issues with just turning it off.

      --
      "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  5. Can't hold data, or can't tell the truth? by alphatel · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "This of course implies that they have no backup system — or at least that the backup are not held for long."

    It implies nothing other than the NSA continues to lie whenever an order to turnover data is presented.

    --
    When the foot seeks the place of the head, the line is crossed. Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.
  6. Awesome by 50000BTU_barbecue · · Score: 3, Insightful

    My biology is so complex it's not understood yet either!

    Woohoo! Behold the new lawless me!!!!!

    --
    Mostly random stuff.
  7. The Boy Who Cried Wolf by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Everything concerning the NSA has "an immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the United States."

    Releasing any information has "an immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the United States."
    Saving any information has "an immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the United States."
    Any whistle blowers have "an immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the United States."
    Disagreeing with any official has "an immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the United States."
    Giving out the legal reasoning behing their operations has "an immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the United States."

    Why have more people not clued in that the NSA is "an immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the United States."

    they have damaged the reputation of their agencies simply by believing that none of their secrets would get out. My mom always told me that once more than one person knows something it is no longer a secret and will not be kept that way.

  8. Lies. by Charliemopps · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The NSA, The CIA, the FBI and the Justice department have already been caught in BOLD FACED LIES in regards to their activities on dozens of occasions. The Presidents (both Obama and Bush) have gone on National Television and lied directly to the American people regarding this programs over and over and over again. Several NSA directors have gone in front of congress and lied while under oath. They were then called back and admitted that they're lied. You cannot trust anything they say at all. The only solution to this is to shut down the agency. They are willing to violate the law, the constitution, court order and even the will of the president. No regulatory reform or court order will be effective against an agency that thinks its charter is more important than obeying the law or will of the people. They fundamentally believe that your physical safety is more important than our individual rights. That is totalitarianism. It is not a belief that is compatible with democracy.

    1. Re:Lies. by Gramie2 · · Score: 2

      They fundamentally believe that your physical safety is more important than our individual rights.

      I'd be more inclined to say that they value their own power and influence over your individual rights (I'm not American, and so have no rights in their eyes). If they really worried about your physical safety, they would be getting evidence on polluters, unsafe working conditions, social collapse, the prison industry, and all the other things that contribute to the decay of your quality of life.

    2. Re:Lies. by Princeofcups · · Score: 3, Insightful

      They fundamentally believe that your physical safety is more important than our individual rights.

      You were great until that line. "Safety" is purely a PR term. They are protecting corporate interests, not individual's safety.

      --
      The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
    3. Re:Lies. by fustakrakich · · Score: 2

      The only solution to this is to shut down the agency.

      Impossible. It will just go deeper "underground", and move even more contraband than they do now to keep the money flowing. The entire government is going rogue and the submissive population will do nothing about it. This is the world we live in.

      --
      “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  9. I believe them by towermac · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's the biggest system there is. There's nothing to 'back it up to', for various reasons. The letter of the (original) order can't be complied with, without shutting it off, and saving the current contents for the upcoming hearing (or trial). In the meantime, we have nothing as far as NSA protection goes. I get that.

    That doesn't mean the the spirit of the order can't be complied with. Snapshots of sections, randomly chosen database blocks from among representative groups, a sampling of the most called routines; something. If it's a freaking computer, then there is some way that evidence can be gotten without bringing the system down, assuming cooperation on the part of the admins. I hope they are not getting off the hook.

    1. Re:I believe them by DutchUncle · · Score: 2

      I thought the NSA system *is* the backup . . . for the Internet.

    2. Re:I believe them by dissy · · Score: 2

      No, simply no.

      If they have a method to extract and keep data used against me and my case, then that proves they sure as fuck have a method to extract and keep data used to protect me and my case.

      On a pure technical level both actions are identical.

      They are claiming they can't save X bytes of data that help someone, but of course they can save X bytes of data to ruin a persons life. X = X = X

  10. Speed up the trial! by coolguyclay · · Score: 2

    If the data cannot be saved, then speed up the trial! It's been going on for a while now.

  11. So what they are saying is... by TheCarp · · Score: 3, Interesting

    So if their system is too complex to obey the law....the short version of what they said is "We built a system without regard to the law" and "We broke the law". Thank you for the confession. Now its time to start dismantling and prosecuting thanks.

    --
    "I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
  12. orphan by NikeHerc · · Score: 2

    This reminds me of the story of the kid who murdered his parents, then threw himself on the mercy of the court because he was an orphan.

    We have (or at least had) a Constitution to protect citizens from governmental abuses of this nature.

    --
    Circle the wagons and fire inward. Entropy increases without bounds.
  13. Too complex? Then simplify them! by kheldan · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Aww, poor NSA, their systems are too complex for them to control according to the law? What a terrible 1st world problem to have! Fear not NSA, I have a solution that will take this horrible burden off your shoulders, and make the rest of us happy at the same time: simplify your goddamn systems to the point where you can 'control' them and be in accordance with the law. Either that or maybe we need to take a chainsaw to your 'systems' and just chop them down to a reasonable size. Here, here's an abacus, that's about all I'd trust you motherfuckers with at this point.

    --
    Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
  14. Target audience by Livius · · Score: 4, Interesting

    They don't actually mean that the system is too complex to obey the law.

    They merely mean that it is too complex for "journalists" to tell whether they are obeying the law or not.

  15. It's the securities, stupid. by Tenebrousedge · · Score: 2

    I don't know about stupid and incompetent, but you're entirely wrong as to the fundamentals of the 2008 financial crisis.

    It's nice to make this about individual responsibility, but that's just not what happened. You probably heard the terms "credit default swap" and "mortgage derivatives" but didn't understand them. Essentially what was happening was major financial companies found that they could package up a bunch of low-rated mortgage-backed securities, hide the information about the individual loans, and turn a bunch of shitty loans into an AAA-rated security, and then trade the risk to someone else. Moody's and S&P were getting their cut from rating these things, and did not even have the information to be able to rate them properly. Then we have the credit default swaps, which were a little-understood and unregulated market, but essentially a way for companies to trade debt as if it were an asset, specifically all of the risk they were exposed to as part of these MBS deals. The concept of trading debt as an asset is not new, but it really only works when you have a good idea of how risky the debt is. There was a booming market[1] in these credit default swaps right up until the first wave of foreclosures hit and the MBS market started crumbling, and then whoever was left holding the bag got screwed.

    Banks generally don't do stupid things, even when the government wants them to. They sure as shit don't advertise things that are going to lose money. There were a lot of people with a vested interest in pinning this on the individual consumer and the government, but the seeds were sown with the repeal of Glass-Steagal. The federal loan program ticked along quietly for over a decade, but the mortgage market exploded due to the derivatives market. Taking a shitty subprime mortgage and packing it into an AAA-rated security was like printing money. There was no governmental obligation to offer NINJA loans, for example, and yet Wikipedia has a lovely advertisement offering free money to essentially anyone with a pulse. The loans peaked in 2006; 2008 marked the first round of foreclosures.

    Wikipedia has a good but lengthy article on the subprime mortgage crisis, and "The Big Short" is a good read that covers the origins and fallout of the crisis. You can also read the Financial Crisis Inquiriy Commission report. In point of fact, reading anything about the subject would be an improvement in your understanding; your specific theory has been destroyed in any number of sources. It's a complicated subject, and to be honest the exact details of a lot of these things escape me, but you have seized upon a simple answer that suits your preexisting beliefs. Start from the evidence and work backwards instead -- why did Bear Stearns collapse? It wasn't because they were issuing mortgages. This will save you from looking like an ignorant Wall Street stooge in the future.

    [1] "The volume of CDS outstanding increased 100-fold from 1998 to 2008, with estimates of the debt covered by CDS contracts, as of November 2008, ranging from US$33 to $47 trillion"

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