Slashdot Mirror
New GCHQ Chief Says Social Media Aids Terrorists
An anonymous reader sends this report from Sky News:
The new head of GCHQ has accused social media websites of helping terror groups and called for closer ties with intelligence agencies. "'However much they [tech companies] may dislike it, they have become the command and control networks of choice for terrorists and criminals, who find their services as transformational as the rest of us." ... Mr. Hannigan said that smartphone and other mobile technologies increased the opportunities for terrorist activity to be concealed in the wake of the exposing of secret cables and documents collected by US and UK authorities by whistleblower Edward Snowden. Mr. Hannigan said that smartphone and other mobile technologies increased the opportunities for terrorist activity to be concealed in the wake of the exposing of secret cables and documents collected by US and UK authorities by whistleblower Edward Snowden.
If we start screaming, crying, and arresting people as soon as they express a view we don't like we have not defeated the Muslims. We have become like the Muslims.
If only they wouldn't breath our cause would be aided. Get over it gov'ment. Do your work the way your supposed to without invading our privacy and whining over every thing we do that keeps you honest and working for US.. the people. Encryptions protects us from you. We use social media because we like it... etc. etc. etc.
Digital is, by definition, imperfect. Analog is the way to go.
.. same as the old boss
In other news:
Cars help terrorists: they use them as a means of transport. We should add kill switches and gps units to all cars so the goverment can track every individual car and stop it if needed.
Subway helps terrorists: They use it as a means of transport. We should force every person using it to identify and keep all this data on a database.
Houses help terrorists: They use them to hide and to stay warm and to plan new attacks. We should have a camera on every house connected to a government agency so we can track who is in the house and what is he doing.
Books help terrorists: They read them and get funny ideas. We should create a system where people would identify themselves before reading a book.
Also, this not only applies to terrorists. It also applies to child molesters, please think of the children.
When his defense asked, "Which computer has Jon Johansen trespassed upon?" the answer was: "His own."
"Anonymous reader?" LOL, we know it's you cold fjord. Keep choking down that authoritarian cock you piece of shit. It must surely be tasty.
Slashdot IS social media, which is why NSA and GCHQ created a fake Slashdot to hack into a Belgian Telecom company.
You dirty terrorists, you! Bad Slashdot! BAD!
Seriously, though, this is beyond belief and beyond the pale. Where do they get these morons? Most of these people are guilty of perjury (at best) and outright conflict of interests and gross violations of basic human rights at worst.
When is this going to stop and when are we going to get rid of these idiots? Where is Senator Franck Church when we need him?
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
Electricity, roads, mechanized farming, and every other technology that makes up our modern way of life.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
...get a search warrant. Or, to be a bit more accurate: stop whining about how difficult your job is now and just do what you should have been doing all along. If you are having trouble identifying "persons of interest", that is not my problem. If encryption is too hard for you to break covertly, that is not my problem. If you can't do your job without every single person holding the door open for you to have a look around inside, that is not my problem. See a theme here, Hannigan? You are paid a handsome salary to detect nefarious arseholes who would do damage to the UK and its interests; perhaps you should earn that salary instead of moaning about the IT industry making the life of your staff difficult. If a dragnet is the answer, you are asking the wrong questions.
Not really, but anyway, it's as good an excuse as any to finally get rid of all this social media crap.
Not to mention air. All terrorists breathe air (at least until they blow themselves up). Wait a second... I breathe air! Excuse me while I turn myself in as a potential terrorist.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Yeah yeah, bad bad bad. Need to stop the bad guys.
Look! I'm superman, I just saved a bus that was about to die full of school children, but I used my super powers to stop it, so support me.
Whoa while you were thinking about that, I just saved another school bus full of children. I know you have no proof but that's how good we are. Support us.
Oh man the WHOLE WORLD almost was destroyed, but us invading your privacy saved it. I know there no evidence, it's secret, so you know, they don't figure out how we saved the whole world and stop us from saving it..but yeah...just hand those freedoms over or next time, they'll get ALL THE CHILDREN IN THE WHOLE WORLD.
Thank you.
Although from time to time there might be real threats out there that are stopped but lets face it, there's enough information out there for anyone who wants to actually hurt someone, shoot someone, or blow someone up that it could happen all the time with lots of people dying, and no one able to stop it.
It's not happening. Why? Because it's not as bad as they'd like us to believe.
They're more worried about snowden leaks showing how fucking terrible they're being, and being voted out of power. They'd much rather know everything about you so they can scare you about them fucking with your life in legal ways with 'investigations' and other thins to torment you so you don't oust their power through legitimate means one day.
Just take a look at videos of what police do to people who obey the laws and refuse to give them information, ID and other things because they don't have to. This is just the evolution of that.
Root Access To Society Granted.
Would you like to A) Pass oppressive new laws that otherwise wouldn't stand a snowball's chance in hell of passing?, B) Accumulate more power to yourself, eroding Democracy while claiming to protect it?, or C) Both at the same time?
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Drinking water allows terrorists to remain hydrated, even in dry environments! Social media aid those who use them.
Thank you, Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden and so many others, for courageously defending humanity, my freedom and more!
The largest means of support for terrorist groups is the U.S. Dollar. Perhaps we should get rid of that, too.
Prediction for end of Universe #42: Fencepost error in Quantum_bogosort.cpp
It's not only social media sites, it's the whole internet! Giving everyone a way to communicate with others makes it impossible to control the terrorists.
And not only the terrorists, also the pedofiles, the drug lords, all kinds of criminals can communicate using the internet.
We're in a slippery slope that ends in total chaos.
A slippery slope that started with the telephone.
Every technological advance beyond what we had at the end of the 19th century is inherently evil and has to be destroyed. It's so obvious that only terrorists and other criminals have a reason to deny it.
-
Or, in other words, why the fuck are we listening to the director of the signals intelligence and cryptography agency? Everything that comes out of his mouth has necessarily to be a lie.
A lack of access to birth control helps terrorists breed even more terrorists.
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."
This just in!
Also aiding Terrorists:
1. Air
2. Food
3. Water
4. Pillows
5. Gravity
6. The sun
Did Mr. Hannigan say "that smartphone and other mobile technologies increased the opportunities for terrorist activity to be concealed in the wake of the exposing of secret cables and documents collected by US and UK authorities by whistleblower Edward Snowden"?
I'm still not sure yet.
"The hallmark of humanity is the ability to move beyond sensory inputs" - Mary Helen Immordino-Yang
I recall how these same social networks were highly praised for their value in helping those that needed to break out of oppression get around the roadblocks that local intelligence agencies were trying to quell.
more or less, the British equivalent of the NSA.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
What he doesn't mention is that the existing powers of the government(s) are already more than sufficient. In cases where there is good reason to watch someone, the processes existed even before the attacks on the US. If one reads the US Congress report on the 9/11 attacks, it is striking to see how much these guys were already under surveillance. There is no example of 'we had a viable suspect and some legal barrier kept us from closing the case'. And the Boston Marathon bombings showed us how useful the global Internet surveillance has been. In other words, Mr Hannigan and his ilk don't need any more power. The existing powers are demonstrably more than sufficient. The fact that they keep asking for more power tells us more about them than about the threat of terrorists.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
Who is "we"? It looks to me like most people are voting solely based on hot button issues like abortion, and even worse, they're continuing to vote for Republicans and Democrats. The people who take a stand and refuse to vote for scumbags, as well as protest and donate to organizations like the EFF and ACLU, are few and far between.
Paper helps terrorists make plans, maps help them find their way, cars help them get there, air helps them breath, food helps them grow, playing cars stave off their boredom, blah blah blah.
I would say that supporting tinpot dictators in these countries has probably been the #1 factor in creating these guys, with any #2 being such a distant second that it hardly counts. Yet it is these very same "security" agencies that have been patting themselves on the back as they trained and supported the secret police in all these countries. Using terms like "Realpolitik" to justify their actions.
Well sorry, you don't let the serial killer go just because he also runs an after-school program for the kids. Or even if he happens to own an oil well or two.
Plus it wouldn't be social media that the top terrorist dogs use. Those guys would be using couriers running around on motorcycles with cryptic notes. The only people that are using social media that these KGB types are scared of are new peaceful political movements that might organized to create a society that doesn't give them the free hand that they enjoy today and hope for tomorrow. Including movements in countries where they enjoy tight relationships with the corrupt evil regimes that have their boots on the throats of their people now.
Think about how much effort the American security services have spent going after Occupy NY whereas how little effort they have spent going after any police who violated the civil rights of those same protesters. That is the social media they seek to control.
There are actually a few other things that help terrorists;
Mobile phones, telephones, radio waves, email, speech, pens, paper, smoke signals...actually who is this idiot?
Instead of arresting social media site owners, forums users and people with "illegal thoughts"; let's arrest all the senior officials that new the GCHQ are spying on their own via the NSA and arrest senior NSA officials for knowingly spying on their own via the GCHQ.
You cannot talk to these people because they are "at war" like so many radical groups against different ideas.
When all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail.
A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
....terrorists? Air. Therefore we should ban air, and anybody caught breathing air will be jailed under suspicion of being a terrorist. A study conducted from whatever think tank you like showed that all terrorists have this 1 common feature; they breathe air. Intelligence agencies have suggested that by targeting air, we can help reduce the threat of terrorism and are calling for close cooperation with trees and plants to help weed out the problem.
so we install cameras in every bedroom to see if they're fucking with condoms or not?
I mean, that's basically what it goes to. Government agencies having agents who have access to information about who fucks who and how they fuck, with no oversight. It's better than having cameras in the bedrooms since this way they'll get even people who aren't fucking at home but at love hotels etc.
and why they would be interested in that is that information gives power over many people, especially if they at the same time run propaganda for a conservative 'no sex or naughty stuff' fashion.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Terrorists commandeer many of society's tools. From Boeings to biology to printing presses, almost any tool that serves a society can be turned by terrorists to serve their ends.
Sandwiches Aid Terrorists
Toothpaste Aid Terrorists
HD TVs Aid Terrorists
Sleep Aids Terrorists
Coffee Aids Terrorists
Money Aids Terrorists
...Another fact we all now know: Robert Hannigan is a fuckwit... and you can probably find a reason that he in some way also aids terrorists.
Also, this not only applies to terrorists. It also applies to child molesters, please think of the children.
I found the original article
The web is a terrorist's command-and-control network of choice
I understand why [the private sector] have an uneasy relationship with governments. They aspire to be neutral conduits of data and to sit outside or above politics. But increasingly their services not only host the material of violent extremism or child exploitation, but are the routes for the facilitation of crime and terrorism.
Yup, he rings that bell.
To those of us who have to tackle the depressing end of human behaviour on the internet, it can seem that some technology companies are in denial about its misuse. I suspect most ordinary users of the internet are ahead of them: they have strong views on the ethics of companies, whether on taxation, child protection or privacy; they do not want the media platforms they use with their friends and families to facilitate murder or child abuse.
Three times in total.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Copied directly from TFS:
Mr. Hannigan said that smartphone and other mobile technologies increased the opportunities for terrorist activity to be concealed in the wake of the exposing of secret cables and documents collected by US and UK authorities by whistleblower Edward Snowden. Mr. Hannigan said that smartphone and other mobile technologies increased the opportunities for terrorist activity to be concealed in the wake of the exposing of secret cables and documents collected by US and UK authorities by whistleblower Edward Snowden.
C'mon man. How can you screw up the summary that badly? There are only 3 damn sentences and we still can't avoid a dupe.
Slashdot: The only place you can have a dupe in a single summary.
Intelligence agencies are well aware that no worthwhile discussions happen here any more, so they won't read what you write here. Of course, neither will anyone else...
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
This whole topic is flawed. Do you know who the real terrorists are? The corrupt US government. If we would get our troops out of these foreign countries and leave them alone 90% of this "terrorist" problem would go away. How would we like it if foreign soldiers set up camp on American soil and randomly started blowing things up in order to make the country safe for rich corporations to exploit. Why are we surprised that they hate us when the American military has directly killed their loved ones in order to increase US corporate profits? We are not in their country to protect their citizens, we are there to steal their stuff (or get it at a substantial discount). You want peace in the middle east then get the hell out. Stop trying to install puppet dictators in order to lower the price of crude oil exported to the US. Stop supplying weapons to BOTH sides of a conflict in order for the weapon makers to get obscene profits. They will happily go back to killing each other instead of trying to kill us.
banksters.Let's clamp down on who can use them! :rolleyes:
In related news, the new GCHQ head also said that he hoped the terrorists don't decide to set up their meetings in police break rooms. That would be worse than using social media, because then they'd also get free coffee and donuts. In the meantime, he has mentioned the possibility of saving you all from the terrorists by expanding surveillance powers to include social media access to private messages without a warrant (or rather doing so legally).
I'm from the US, can someone from the UK verify that the above cynicism is accurate for your country as it would be for ours?
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Stop using "social media" and it's inherently artificial sociality altogether, and start doing face to face instead.
Killing 2 birds with one stone.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
As an anti-libertarian, I'll have a bob each way by saying that while we must accept that after September 11, "business as usual" isn't going to fly (if you'll pardon the pun), this is a pretty poor start from a man who ought to know better.
Absolute privacy ain't gonna happen in this day and age, but Mr Hannigan needs to make it clear they will be held thoroughly accountable by the people they're meant to be serving. To do otherwise would shred any remaining legitimacy they have.
Russia does not have anti-gay laws, you can be gay in Russia all you want and nobody cares. In fact the Daily show went out with a camera crew during the Sochi games trying to find the alleged persecuted gay people (in both Sochi and Moscow) and could not find any. That report was not discussed on any major News station of course, but it's there for your review as are other people doing similar reporting trying to find the alleged persecuted gay people.
What Russia does have is laws that prevent gays from demonstrating and promoting being gay in places where minors visit. You can go to the gay bar where it's adults only and put up all the banners you want promoting being gay, but not on a public street. It would be akin to the US making fast food advertising illegal (which in some contexts it is), then claiming that the US made fast food illegal. The latter is false, the former is true.
In my opinion, this is not discriminating or oppressive. It would be discriminating and oppressive if they had competing "Hetero Pride" and "Gay Pride" parades, or "Hetero Lifestyle" and "Gay Lifestyle" public debates and only one side received talk time. Neither receive talk time, which seems to be a fair policy.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
However much they [tech companies] may dislike it, they have become the command and control networks of choice for terrorists and criminals, who find their services as transformational as the rest of us... Mr. Hannigan said that smartphone and other mobile technologies increased the opportunities for terrorist activity to be concealed...
I agree fully. Things such as social media and cell phones are priceless boons to those governments which aggressively meddle in the affairs of other nations while persistently spying on their own citizens. It's good to see Mr. Hannigan admitting on behalf of his country how "transformational" the latest technology has been for him and his masters.
People and countries that complain about the sword cutting both ways, should just stop living by the sword.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
Freedom is scary. If people don't like it, perhaps they don't belong in the home of the brave.
"Social Media Aids Terrorists"
So do Vehicles, Phones and Hotels....so what ?
Seems to me that the spooks have far more at hand to use against them when they are using Social Media
instead of hiding in the shadows.....
If they really wanted to Stop ISIL and all other groups, they should go talk to their Money Backers in Saudi Arabia etc....and Freeze their damn bank accounts.
With no cash sources or banking institution willing to do business with them, they'll come crashing down....
This whole thing is just another bad joke.....I wish I could believe in ET.
No it does not.
I mean you would have a point if they actually followed it but if that was the case, we wouldn't have all the NSA spying, the IRS being used to stop dissent, or the post office with their own swat teams. In fact, a lot of things would be different if the constitution was followed and could actually help terrorists.
Cars also help terrorists. Maybe we should consider restrictions on them too, to make sure they can't be used for terrorism. And guns help terrorists. I certainly don't see the Americans raising a fuss about that. Curiously, the UK doesn't seem to be raising a fuss about that either. Heck, western governments frequently help terrorists. Perhaps we should address that one first.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
If you are in the US and don't vote Libertarian, where a candidate is available, then you are continuing the corrupt two party system. Otherwise, follow the old advice: If they're in, vote 'em out. Every time.
so there's nothing to be done about it.
The UK has already banned any information which might be useful to a terrorist. Literally, thats what the law says.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
Dispite the sensationalistic headline, he's actually spot on:
"'However much they [tech companies] may dislike it, they have become the command and control networks of choice for terrorists and criminals, who find their services as transformational as the rest of us."
True. He's not saying social media is aiding terrorists. He says that terrorists use the same tools that normal people use, too.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Russia does not have anti-gay laws...What Russia does have is laws that prevent gays from demonstrating and promoting being gay in places where minors visit.
True but don't those laws explicitly single out gays for the restriction and so are the very text book definition of discrimination? The general principle that you do not want adults going about and loudly announcing their sexuality where minors are present is perfectly reasonable. However if you want to do it in a non-discriminatory way you ban anyone going around and promoting their sexuality where minors are present regardless of what that sexuality is.
... So does breathing. What's the point?
so let's get rid of it.
Terrorists can find ways to use any technology that's been developed in the last 5 000 years.