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At CIA Starbucks, Even the Baristas Are Covert
An anonymous reader writes with this interesting story about what it's like to work at “Store Number 1,” the CIA's Starbucks. The new supervisor thought his idea was innocent enough. He wanted the baristas to write the names of customers on their cups to speed up lines and ease confusion, just like other Starbucks do around the world. But these aren't just any customers. They are regulars at the CIA Starbucks. "They could use the alias 'Polly-O string cheese' for all I care," said a food services supervisor at the Central Intelligence Agency, asking that his identity remain unpublished for security reasons. "But giving any name at all was making people — you know, the undercover agents — feel very uncomfortable. It just didn't work for this location."
Talk about hyperbole. No, operational security isn't a concern for even those at CIA Starbucks on a daily basis. The reason they don't like names or number tickers or anything else that could directly or indirectly produce a pattern that can track their actions because they're so very aware of how everyone else not part of their system is or can be directly or indirectly tracked through a pattern of their actions. Although I guess if the Chinese and Russians are doing the same thing as part of their systems, it's not wholly unwarranted to think they may end up being tracked.
It's not rampant paranoia because everyone really is trying to get them? No, it's still really rampant paranoia. The thought they they might (1) engage in some top secret op under a variety of aliases, (2) use another series of aliases with their Starbucks coffee, and (3) it's (2) that's the linchpin on how they were secretly poisoned or whatever is absurd. Why? Because (a) it's unlikely they'll be adequately tracked through operation (1), (b) even if they were it's unlikely they'd choose CIA Starbucks as the source of their plan to kill you, (c) even if they did, they don't need to rely upon an alias on a cup to determine it's your drink when your drink may well be unique enough, the person to poison you will likely verify it's actually you before adding the mix to the drink, and there's literally hundreds of ways to kill you that are less obvious (a name on a cup of a prominent dead person looks suspicious as would a tracking number if it's loudly spoken at any point) if you're trying to quietly assassinate a person.
No, this is all about some pretend thing in their heads that they're special enough to kill and yet smart enough to be hidden. The truth is most people are aware of how unimportant they are as a target and don't even attempt to hide themselves. But even those who try don't generally blend in very long--and by standards of the CIA, very long would be the rest of your natural life. The CIA/NSA/FBI all take advantage of this, have a certain level of loathing of the "sheep", and don't want to be placed into the same category because it fundamentally goes against their feelings of superiority of not being so "stupid".
Honestly, "operational security", "ongoing investigation", and "national security" are the words of cowards more often than a real and meaningful thing used to actual protect the populace at large. And I should know as an Anonymous Coward, right?
*Captcha: botulism
There is nothing more annoying than:
1) Fake friendliness (if you care so much about my name try and remember it for next time since I tell you it on almost a daily basis)
2) People who can't pronounce my name
3) People who can't spell my name
4) People who use alternate spellings of my name without confirming the correct one (my name has 3 alternate spellings)
After being annoyed at one or more of the above for the umpteenth time I started giving my name as Dave and don't care if they use Dave, Davie, David, Day or any other variant as it isn't actually my name.
PS: they could just have the loyalty/payment card show them my name and not have to ask but that would be too easy.
[The Universe] has gone offline.
"Because the campus is a highly secured island, few people leave for coffee, and the lines, both in the morning and mid-afternoon, can stretch down the hallway."
What a waste of time and resources!
For a group of people who likes to give the impression they are all super geniuses (and by extension deserve X 100 billion a year in funding), I would expect at least one person could have done some capacity planning and figured out how big the Starbucks need to be for that location. How about some accountability? Fire the person who planned this coffee shop. His/her mistakes cost the country the hourly rate of each person in line * the time they waste standing around.
No, this is all about some pretend thing in their heads that they're special enough to kill and yet smart enough to be hidden. The truth is most people are aware of how unimportant they are as a target and don't even attempt to hide themselves.
Do you think that journalists and aid workers are so unimportant as to not be targets? It seems that ISIS disagrees with you.
Jihadi John: FBI 'identifies' Isis militant who 'beheaded' British aid worker David Haines and US journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff
If they can be targets, why not CIA/NSA/FBI officers?
And it isn't just an overseas threat.
Oklahoma Beheading Suspect Shared Photos of Himself Giving ISIS Salute
The CIA/NSA/FBI all take advantage of this, have a certain level of loathing of the "sheep", and don't want to be placed into the same category because it fundamentally goes against their feelings of superiority of not being so "stupid".
Maybe what it actually goes against is their attachment to their head?
Honestly, "operational security", "ongoing investigation", and "national security" are the words of cowards more often than a real and meaningful thing used to actual protect the populace at large. And I should know as an Anonymous Coward, right?
Even though they can be and have been abused at times, what they are in fact are genuine issues that have to be dealt with by people in responsible positions in government. The fact that you don't deal with that demonstrate your post is disingenuous nonsense.
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