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Snowden Demystified: Can the Government See My Junk?
An anonymous reader writes Comedian and journalist John Oliver set out to understand US Government surveillance in advance of the June 2015 expiration of section 215 of the Patriot Act. What resulted was a humorous but exceptionally journalistic interview of Edward Snowden which distilled the issues down in a (NSFW) way everyone can understand. Regardless of whether you view Snowden as a despicable traitor or an honorable whistleblower, it's worth a watch.
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Uh...I just got out of some very cold water, but normally, it would be HUGE, I swear.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
Regardless of whether you view Snowden as a despicable traitor or an honorable whistleblower, it's worth a watch.
I didn't think so.
Oliver criticized Snowden for his complex descriptions of complex issues, and asserted that it's Snowden's job to make the facts easily digestible and relatable for the general public. It's not. In the first place, it's the media's job to do that. That is their raison d'etre. In the second place, distilling issues down to "dick pics" is part of the problem with the modern media. Why fuel that race to the bottom? Idiocracy was supposed to be satire, not prophecy.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
The uploader has not made this video available in your country. :( :(
yes after you we have cameras there now at CIA with sings saying this is a reduced rights zone also we have the right to put a timer system in as well.
There's something about how this is pandered to me in the summary where I just feel like I will never knowingly click this link in my life.
..for those without a VPN.
Then Betteridge says "no".
Yes, the US has become an overreaching police state.
Why did i write that comment subject? Why am I asking if someone can explain what the fuck this post is about? Why did I come to Slashdot? Why am I here on this Earth? Why anything?
It was very interesting to see that people indeed where worried if the gov could see their junk.
I think this is because people have no idea what 'security' or 'privacy' actually is or do not understand the implications.
If you tell people "we know who you called" people will think "I have nothing to hide". Once you say "We saw your dick" then suddenly it becomes real and understandable.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I like John Oliver, but his attempts at humor early in the interview just came off as awkward at best. However, he did finally hit his stride when he started in with his survey results, which showed Americans have no clue and even less concern with educating themselves on todays issues much less wanting to do anything about it. Hopefully Snowden got the message -- that coming here to "Face Trial" as he has supposedly been mulling over would not serve any sort of public debate or discourse that could create change, but only be ratings fodder for Fox and CNN. Because yes -- American's don't care, Americans don't want to know, Americans just want to be given shiny things.
The TSA sure can. They get to feel it up as well.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Just because the government has a certain power, does not make that power rightly American.
Your Constitutional rights are guaranteed in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, your personal safety is not, Brenda Make
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
Speaking on behalf of the NSA, no, we cannot as youve asked, "see" your "junk." We have collected so much vast knowledge of your human anatomy from the comfort of our underground high security facilities that it would be difficult to explain to the lay-citizen how we experience their reproductive organs. In our patented high security JunkChamber the bits and pieces as you call them of nearly every human being who has ever entered or lived in the united states for more than 70 years is experienced at our leisure. Junk from the mid 19th century as well as african american junk which was at the time deemed 3/5ths junk, is painstakingly simulated and recreated in our private parts simulator.
now you may be asking, "what does this do? how does this keep me safe?" but let me assure you the details of which are so complex your poor mind would hardly have the fortitude to endure even a cursory explanation. Whats important is that you remember thanks to this compendium of human evolutionary anatomy (in 3d and projected oftentimes 6 stories tall) has kept us safe from terrorism for eons. Now return to the television, for the idols of america will begin soon and you'll not want to miss the opportunity to tweet and text your friends and ours about the events as they unfold, and the products you aspire to consume.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Regardless of whether you view Snowden as a despicable traitor or an honorable whistleblower
He is both. They are not mutually exclusive IMHO.
The thing about Snowden is, because he chickened out, and hid overseas, he lost his soapbox. Yeah, we are geeks and know what is up with him, but MSM has pretty much ignored him.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
No. Delegation of your work does not relieve you of responsibility. If Snowden delegates to journalists the screening of releases for info that will aid the enemy (say al-Queda) and they fail, as Oliver also points out they in fact did, then Snowden bears some responsibility too. He decided to make the info public. He chose who to release it and trust with such screening. Similar story if the message is not effectively communicated. Contrary to popular myth, geeks can effectively communicate with non-geeks. It just takes a lot of work and effort. Most geeks merely choose not to make the effort.
I think John Oliver did an excellent job of educating Snowden on how to speak. I think it's something that many people her on slashdot struggle with. Put it in layman's terms. As John Oliver pointed out to Snowden... most people don't get what you are saying. All the geeks do... and are rightfully freaked-out/outraged by it ...but most regular people don't. But mention how the current programs captures all your 'dick pics'... and people start to get it. Hopefully this will help him in the future with how he communicates this with the American public ...and hopefully enough of the American public will be freaked out about it and push for roll-back/limits on these things.
Actually Oliver was doing something very valuable with his interruptions. Forcing Snowden to refrain from technobabble that the general public would not get. Forcing Snowden to be more effective at his self appointed task, to put in the extra effort necessary to phrase things so the general public could understand.
Sometimes simplification is helpful, sometimes it is not. Technobabble can give the illusion of importance. For example is you say the NSA is collecting telephone metadata that sound ominous. If you simplify it and say the NSA is having AT&T share the info on your phone bill, date, number called, duration ... then people would understand and probably not rate the collection of much importance.
So the NSA with their conspirators in 5 eyes agencies, can collect politically bad information, including dick picks, of all politicians, candidates, activists, commentators, journalists and everyone else connected to the political process in the USA, UK and Europe, Australia, Canada, New Zealand...
Putting military in a position of influence over those democracies.
How many times have embarrassing information been used to ensure their favored candidate gets chosen?
Do you seriously think the NSA doesn't collect the dick picks of anyone with political influence? Even in Congress? Even those potentially future politicians? Do you really think that they log everything and self check themselves?
If the military don't account for billions of dollars, they don't account for every search they run. There will be a version of the XKeyscore that doesn't log squat and that 'separate database of US info', well if they send analysts to the UK to get around US legal limits, a non legal limit, self imposed administrative limit, is no obstacle.
My usual response to anyone of the "I have nothing to hide" mindset: Do you close the bathroom door when you go to the toilet? I'm betting the answer is "Yes." Why? Modesty? Propriety? Custom? Doesn't matter. The question is: Does it mean you have something to hide? Not something evil or wrong, just private? So maybe it's OK to have things to hide . . . or at least not flaunt in public.
Now, Do you also close the bathroom door when you are home by yourself, and know for certain that nobody is there to see? Again, I'll bet the answer is "Yes". Why? WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO HIDE? Oh, right, you have nothing to hide, so why are you hiding? The guilty hide when none pursueth! How easy it is to infer guilt!
"only records..."
There no only here, it's just one brick in a big shithouse.
"...or even forwards...actual crimes" DA's have bragged for decades about their ability to indict a ham sandwich.
Various less advertised provisions for "collection" and "sharing" already make broad surveillence an internal US affair. We already have internal checkpoints under various sweeps and searches of the public e.g. Immigration and Customs broadly stopping interior highway traffic without probable cause, wanting to see everybody's trunk, or illicit FEMA home searches and gun confiscations during Katerina. Another thing about police states, people inside the sphere often have a hard time to admit it, perhaps even to themselves, until close to a general breakdown, naked power displays, or open gunfire in the streets.
The fact John Oliver seemed a bit biased against Snowden's "method of delivery", and the complexity of the information he decided to make public being out of his "jurisdiction", were clearly outbalanced by his concise, honest and morally sound answers. Snowden proved in more than enough ways his intentions were good, and the only place where it's still up for debate if the consequences paid off is in closed-minded, nationalist-following individual opinion.
And criticizing the childish tone the conversation took afterwards... Well I can only guess you grew a tolerance to comedy. Or maybe I didn't get the memo that satire is démodé. It's not about fueling anything to the bottom: awareness only comes from public interest, and public interest only comes from mindless, charismatic acceptance, especially when the environment lends a helping hand ("your rights online" is a slashdot section these days after all, up there with science) . That's the reason a certain mustachio-bearing douche started WW2, and the same reason Mandela killed the apartheid. Double-edges my friend, you have to abuse them. Comedy works that way and so does all media/political influence. Good or bad.
In my opinion, the last 10min of the presentation, using the analogy of taking pictures of your junk, and which systems would capture, store, and track it, were excellent.
Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
Or some terrorists could use these as a method of passing encoded messages.
Have gnu, will travel.
Most interesting part for me was all the wikileaks references in the "random" non-cherry picked interviews. Had all but forgotten about intersection of Wikileaks and Snowden. Reminded me of all the people who thought Iraq war was about Terrorism... wonder how these things happen?
There is no "Patriot Act". It's called the USA PATRIOT Act and it must be remembered for what it is because what it stands for and what it spells out demonstrates the absolute inanity of the document and the (lack of) discussion when it was voted on.
USA PATRIOT stands for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism.
It was proposed on October 23, 2001, passed by the House on October 24, passed by the Senate on October 25, and signed into law by President Bush on October 26. The Act amended 11 previously passed acts, 108 US Codes, and created 9 new US Codes. The bill itself was 342 pages long and it was passed in 3 days.
I don't think we have since learned our lesson, but at least there will be a historical record of our errors and how quickly we can be bullied into a political frenzy.
"Can the government see my junk"
If the NSA people are that into seeing the junk of a 50 something fat geek, they can have all the look they want.
Frankly, I and much of Slashdot would prefer Natalie Portman (even after becoming a mom), but I guess there's no accounting for taste.
These 15 minute "in depth" pieces are amazing AND effective.
But an actual interview with Snowden was amazing.
And oliver covered every angle from what I could see. He brought some reality to Snowden. And He brought some reality to us.
His humor is the sugar that makes the medicine go down.
I'm still pissed off about police officers confiscating people's houses and cars and using the money to buy margherita machines.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
A fair trial is what he asked for since the beginning. But under current U.S law, almost all evidence would be hidden under the claim of "national security" - essentially a secret trial, apart from knowing that it took place. That is, if it was even a trial as opposed to a "tribunal" as happened to Manning - no discovery of evidence, no jury, no impartial judge, just a panel of officers, all hidden from view.
The government wouldn't even have to charge him with anything related to the issues involved. Chances are he hasn't filed a U.S income tax return as required by all U.S citizens, even outside the country. For that matter, an obscure and rarely enforced law requires government papers to emigrate legally. He could be charged with any number of laws which don't allow any "public interest" defence to bring up the issues he wants to raise.
If the government can see MY junk, their spy satellites must have really impressive image magnification! Er... just kidding. Like the Great Wall of China, it's visible from space...
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
One thing that wasn't clear. ES said that if my gmail account was moved overseas on an international server, then the NSA could have a copy of my account even if there were no international sources/targets. Is that true or false?
Also, that look on Oliver's face when Snowden told him 'you're already on the list' as an associate was priceless.
"Who are you?" "No one of consequence." "I must know." "Get used to disappointment."
I'm ok with the NSA having rarely used, extraordinary powers to capture reeeeeallly bad guys.
I'm not ok with this being used often and without serious external supervision.
Snowden shows us that both of these are the normal case.
Mission creep is pushing the threshold for Terrorism in a spiral downwards and the supervision involves trusting the good folks at the NSA.
Mr. Snowden calls this having the Govt hold a gun to our heads with the promise that they won't pull the trigger.
If the gun is necessary, I for sure want a much better safety and rules of engagement on it.
One concrete thing the the Partiot act re-auth could do is put a hard floor on the threshold for Terrorism.
Perhaps something likely to kill at least 1000 folks.
Aside from 9/11 nothing has come close to that.
Other bad things have happened, but calling them Terrorism seems counter productive.
Both from a liberty/safety tradeoff, and from a take the hit and shake it off like the good folks of Boston did gives the bad guys less encouragement standpoint.
Such a hard floor might limit the use of these extraordinary powers to what they were intended/are needed for.
This rule should certainly apply for anything even remotely domestic.
Anything flowing from the use of these extraordinary powers should certainly be forbidden fruit for a prosecution.
No amount of parallel construction should be able to change this.
Attempts to do otherwise erodes our confidence in the Judicial process.
That said, I'm not sure if it is better to have the NSA continue to collect the information or to have commercial entities hold it until needed.
Either way may work technically, but it would take some work to provide ready access in a time of crisis.
Having the commercial entities hold it makes a neat firewall to help verify that it's use is limited and audited.
I think I just talked myself into the idea that there is no upside to the NSA holding the info unless the technical details are unworkable.
Guess that's another area for adjustment in the Patriot act.
John Oliver did do a great, if unorthodox, job of making the problem personal.
His look after 'you're already on the list' shows how well he plays his part.
He really is good at this mix of comedy as a vehicle for serious news.
In real surveys with a scientific basis, an extremely high percentage of Americans could not name the Vice-President, or any Supreme Court justice, let alone Edward Snowden. Historically, Americans are easy marks for deception by government and 'journalism' (Amiri Baraka's "slobbering prostitute reporters", if you will). https://firstlook.org/theinter... Put that in your crack pipes and smoke it.
Guys! Guys! You've forgotten that there's always a relevant one!
https://xkcd.com/1364/
hi. im Troy McClure. you might remember me from such shows as the simpsons. also Death.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Except for the fact that it doesn't stop at just metadata collection. Apparently the Bahamas is a hotbed of terrorist activity as all your calls are recorded and retained there.
Actually the gov't thinks its a hotbed of drug smuggling. They claim it is a key logistics point for the cartels. Plus there been reports of a little bit of shady banking down there. This could involve drugs, terror and/or tax evasion.
If you don't call you congressman about this issue, the NSA is going to put your DICK in PRISM!
Do YOU know what HAPPENS to dicks in PRISM?!?!?
What if I think he's a despicable traitor who just happened--in the course of his treasonous endeavors--to shed light on the NSA's probably extralegal practices.
But which practices didn't *really* surprise anyone.
It is undisputed Irrefutable public knowledge NSA possess call records of EVERYONE who uses a phone in this country.
Since you specified domestic calls, to be clear those "records" are basically what is on your phone bill. Date/time, phone number, duration.
Nobody has any idea or can know what NSA does with it nor do they have any reason to trust the government.
Actually we know what they are doing. Building a connection network for a person(s) of interest. The FBI has publicly demonstrated such software, using only phone company records to develop such networks as part of organized crime organizations. They showed the topology of the discovered network and pointed out how it revealed middle men and meeting places that had previously been unknown.
The word "collect" does not mean "unless I use"
To be fair, they could simply order AT&T, etc to retain their records. Same data set. So without collection they could still get a warrant and explore the network of connections to the party of interest, as they had done with their (FBI not NSA) organized crime investigations. And what is the rejection rate of FISA warrant requests, 0.05% last I heard.
Now think back to that FBI work. How did they do their analysis? Most likely they had AT&T etc deliver complete data sets for various regions and they searched that data for connections. Basically, possession of the data does not require collection. One warrant can most likely cause bulk deliveries from telcos.
Nobody can see your "junk" without a microscope... :P :P :P
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
The point of John Oliver's crass humor was not to attempt to convince us that it's a good idea to frame "the problem" in terms of junks; John Oliver is a master satirist. The best motivation I can think of for this surveillance piece, was to try and make this piece so absurd as to ensue hilarity, and make it appealing to both those interested in the topic of surveillance and those who aren't. It's a brilliant technique to spread a message, it keeps those who weren't interested in surveillance interested enough to remember Oliver's piece several days later. The real message to the budding interested, because why interview the FBI's Most Wanted Man and not care enough to point his target audience in the right direction, and all those who are behind the message aren't stupid, was to watch CITIZENFOUR.
That and "getting off".
it took me 6 years to get a web site with classified information taken down. Will not work on another web site that has even more classified info on it. Our country asks for this to happen.