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Report: Russia and China Crack Encrypted Snowden Files
New submitter garyisabusyguy writes with word that, according to London's Sunday Times, "Russia and China have cracked the top-secret cache of files stolen by the fugitive US whistleblower Edward Snowden, forcing MI6 to pull agents out of live operations in hostile countries, according to senior officials in Downing Street, the Home Office and the security services," and suggests this non-paywalled Reuters version, too. "MI6 has decided that it is too dangerous to operate in Russia or China," writes the submitter. "This removes intelligence capabilities that have existed throughout the Cold War, and which may have helped to prevent a 'hot' nuclear war. Have the actions of Snowden, and, apparently, the use of weak encryption, made the world less safe?"
The first question that comes to my mind is, "Has anything actually been cracked?" Maybe this is all just some kind of release to make Snowden looked bad. All I know is that spying is all about lying. All I know is that I'm an American who feels compelled to be an Anonymous Coward when talking about things like this... in America, and wondering if that makes any real difference. All I know is that they, ultimately, will die just as I will die. All I know is all they know, when you reduce it down. The spy is in me, and try as I might... I cannot decipher my own secret.
Even if there are never any charges, the bad (Snowden) PR of the news story itself is enough motivation for them to manufacture an issue (if they think they can get away with it). No one ever actually charged Assange with rape, did they?
The timing is convenient.
I mean, last week, OPM gets pwned by $FOREIGN hax0rs. Everyone who's ever had a clearance, your SF-86 data has been compromised.
And today, out of the blue, agents (who, you know, tend to have clearances and whose real-life identities and/or cover identities may well have been compromised last week) are being pulled back, on account of ... Snowden?
The timing is *too* convenient.
And Snowden is responsible for all this, right? If you are going to blame someone, how about you blame the right group of people, like the US administration? Snowden just pointed out to the 1984 like environment we all live in. This was already known to some extent but not proven and all he did was provide the proof. If you are doing "nothing wrong" (as Google execs like to repeat at every opportunity), how about you leave the bathroom door wide open while you are going about your business? Better yet, how about a live cam feed from your bedroom so we can watch you all the time ;)?
Also it's a very interesting time. Right after they find out that the recent breach by the Chinese Government got the personnel files with information for all executive employees up to cabinet level (including the security clearance data) they reveal that the Chinese (and Russia) got secret personnel information after all via the Snowden leaks. Something seems weird about this timing.
Seems like of they embraced him as a citizen doing what was right, instead of sending him to Russia, things would be safer for mi6
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
It's more likely that "Chinese hack of federal personnel files included security-clearance database" was responsible for the recall.
Snowden didn't post any files on the net.. He met his contacts in person in Hong Kong and hand delivered them (USB?) to Greenwald(reporter) and Poitras(film maker) in person. He claimed that he did not take any of NSA files on his laptops with him to Russia./P
What I find difficult to believe:
1. Russia or China would make it known they cracked anything.
2. Western intelligence would make it known they know what Russia and China were able to do.
3. Articles which read like propaganda, provide no details and cite no specific sources.
Or SF86 wasn't the only data stolen, and the US government only chose to reveal that it was just SF86 stolen.
It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if the US government has a lot of knowledge of basically every spy network in the world, allied and non-allied countries alike. It's called counter-surveillance, and the US has been doing it for a long time.
I disagree, entirely, with everything you said but I am not sure why you are modded troll. I believe you legitimately believe what you state to be true, and I see the logic behind your view - but I disagree with your conclusions and your initial starting point. I want privacy, I will accept the lost security. I accept that people, maybe even my friends and family, may die. It is a rough world and shit happens. We, my friends and family, do not sit and worry about the potential outcomes from insecurity. We do, however, all pretty much agree that we do not want our details/data being harvested and warehoused by people who have no business with that data.
I will not sit silent while my rights are eroded to make you sleep better. I will protest and, eventually, I will leave. I am not a person you want to leave. I imagine you think that Capital Gains taxes are low. Rest assured that I paid more in taxes last year than you have paid in the last five - coupled with property taxes it may be greater than your ten year contribution. Additionally, I am vocal *and* running for the State Senate. I am actually on your side. You do not want me to leave.
See, I do not see the two as mutually exclusive. It is possible to have privacy AND security. We already have really good laws that allow this. What we are missing is a warrant, preferably in an open court though I think it is acceptable to use John Doe as the plaintiff's name. When we see something intrinsically wrong with an open and honest government then we are going to get a dishonest and closed government. When we make knee-jerk reactionary legislation we are going to get unforeseen outcomes.
We have committed some atrocities in the name of freedom as of late. When I say "we" I do mean you and I. This is not a 'royal we' or the likes. We are the government, the government is our people. We have done some horrific things but it is not too late for reparations and it is not too late for rehabilitation. I do not mean the cliché when I say this country needs an intervention. The last time we had an intervention it was some crazy bastards who smashed airplanes into people. Let us hope we can have an intervention before it reaches that point again.
We can do both of these things. We can monitor the bad guys without listening to Grandma's conversation with Aunt Betty about how it is a shame that her great-grandson will not be producing heirs because he caught the gay when he went off to that liberal college. We can have privacy while still giving up some information when we want to get on a plane - like an ID and a reasonable check for weapons. What we do not need is invasive searches for security theater or having to censor ourselves so the TLA listening in to our calls/conversations with friends do not witness our displeasure with the government. We do not need a gestapo nor do we need to insist the government can know nothing about us. Moderation is not the enemy and commonsense is not extinct.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Agreed, 100%. And, I'll add that if the NSA and top government officials weren't such dickheads, Snowden probably never would have acted in the way he did. Government apologists tend to forget that a very large percentage of the NSA's spying is simply UNCONSTITUTIONAL. The NSA possesses all the tools to turn the US into a police state in short order. They are abusing those tools pretty badly. Who knows what the hell is going to happen in the next year, or ten years, if no one stands up to them now?
Partisans are quick to point out that Obama (or Bush, or Clinton, or whoever) would never do anything like that. The partisans are idiots, because THERE ARE people who would do all of that, and worse. I'm quite certain that General Alexander rationalizes how important his work is, and if he were allowed to act without fetters, he WOULD INDEED turn the US into a police state.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Edward Snowden is NOT a hero; he is a severely flawed character who did something good (unmasking a mountain of government lies and deceit towards its own people) while doing something very bad (exposing the intelligence activities of only the more-free and more-decent western nations to their less-free and less-decent enemies). Guys like Snowden and Assange are great at pretending to be all about freedom while amazingly only ever hurting the "good guys" who are more free than the "bad guys" whose interests they NEVER seek to harm.
You want a hero? Try all those opponents of Putin who risk their very lives (and many of whom have been killed) for challenging his evil narrative. Nobody has murdered Assange or Snowden. Had either of these guys been more honorable, they would have found themselves testifying before congress on Capitol Hill after which the public might well have demanded their protection as whistle blowers. They did not have such motives, but merely pretended to be on the side of the angels while actually behaving very badly.
The only reason I can see to have mercy on Snowden is that he found himself, under the Obama administration, in a bad spot. During the Obama years, the administration has zealously prosecuted whistle blowers and the Democrats on Capitol Hill have mindlessly done Obama's bidding to shield him from any and all congressional hearings (a far-less honorable act than the GOP during the Nixon years). They have even turned on journalists they used to like. Snowden, knowing Obama would prosecute him and that no Democrat in Washington (including the press, mostly die-hard Democrats) could be trusted to protect him had one option left: trust the GOP. Being a young leftist, however, he was probably completely programmed by MSNBC, HuffPo, Kos, and the rest to never listen to or cooperate with a Republican. This much makes sense. Turning to Putin however zeros this all out.
The answer is a definitive YES. A country that spies on the entire world deserves to have its secrets spilled. There are no legitimate US intelligence programs. He shouldn't have encrypted anything: he should have dumped everything immediately to everyone.
Disclaimer: IANAL. This post is, however, legal advice, and creates an attorney-client relationship.
Maybe you should reread that quote since you don't seem to agree with what it states.
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. -- Benjamin Franklin
It seems to me that you haven't thought about these issues seriously in light of the activities of Washington and Franklin as intelligence masters during the Revolutionary War, and more generally how civil liberties are expressed in peace versus wartime.
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
Why is all the blame heaped on Snowden?
Because he is the one that arrogantly ignored the democratic process, stole a massive store of intelligence documents, incompetently encrypted them, and made them available for friend and foe alike, and then fled to be among Americas adversaries. Surely you must see some room for assigning culpability to him?
What about "the actions of the NSA"?
The NSA didn't make the documents available to China and Russia. Snowden did.
Running a massive illegal spying operation on the American people,
You mean the copies of the phone records of many, but not all, Americans? That was repeatedly authorized, including by courts. The fact that there is a single recent court decision against it doesn't change that, and may just mean more trips through the courts where it will probably be upheld in the end.
lying about it in sworn congressional testimony,
That isn't actually true either. Congress gets briefed on those programs behind closed doors. What you are referring to is actually the actions of a reckless Senator who was grandstanding in open session.
and having no effective confidential channel for whistleblowers,
CONGRESS. Snowden could have gone to CONGRESS. He didn't. Snowden is culpable.
they deserve far more blame for this than Snowden does.
We've dealt with this - the entire blame is Snowden's.
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
Secret agents in Russia didn't prevent a nuclear war. That's ridiculous! The decision to attack or not attack was a political decision, made by politicians in the public performance of their roles. What, we think a spy dropped something in a politician's drink to make them feel more friendly to their enemies on the day they were set to deliver the "blow them up" command? Sheesh.
Stanislav Petrov prevented a nuclear war once. And he was not a secret agent.
It smells of domestic propaganda when the US has upcoming elections.
I'm not sure it has anything to do with the elections, but it sure has a putrid smell of wanting to justify condemning Snowden as a traitor, pointing to "evidence" that he did harm.
Which, coming from organizations that have been proven to lie to us by the same Snowden doesn't seem all that credible without anything to back it up except their word. I know just how much value I put on their word.
It's also rather unclear how they can say that the intel came from Snowden, and not, say, someone hacking into a system, or a real mole turning info over. How could they possibly know the source, given that the intel likely is duplicated in hundreds of places?