Slashdot Mirror
Glen Greenwald: Don't Trust Anonymous Anti-Snowden Claims
Glen Greenwald casts a scathing look at the claims (such as by the Sunday Times) that Edward Snowden's leaked information had been cracked by Russian and Chinese spy agencies. Greenwald compares Snowden to some other public figures against whom underhanded tactics were employed by the U.S. government. A slice: There’s an anonymously made claim that Russia and China “cracked the top-secret cache of files” from Snowden’s, but there is literally zero evidence for that claim. These hidden officials also claim that American and British agents were unmasked and had to be rescued, but not a single one is identified. There is speculation that Russia and China learned things from obtaining the Snowden files, but how could these officials possibly know that, particularly since other government officials are constantly accusing both countries of successfully hacking sensitive government databases?
Given that we just had the big story about the Office of Personnel Management getting hacked six ways from sunday by parties unknown, 'OMG Snowden' seems unlikely to be the biggest of the US spooks' problems at the moment.
What we've found out from Snowden, and Manning for that matter, is only a revelation to us. Our enemies already knew.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Edward Snowden had no family to take care of. He was a loner who could afford to flee the country. Most other people are not in this kind of position.
I don't care who you are; people act in their own self-interests. For many government workers, their self-interests include keeping their job, taking care of their families, and not getting thrown into jail. So when a government employee tells you something, you can't trust it. But that's not because they're lying. Most of the time, they're misinformed. Nobody in the NSA knows what anyone else in the NSA is doing. It looks like it's so poorly managed that the management doesn't know what the rest of the organization is doing. (Hey, they should try spying on themselves!) The rest of the time, they're just saying the minimum that is safe to say. The main thing impacting what they say is keeping out of trouble, so they'll say whatever achieves that goal.
Considering that neither you nor I have the circumstances or cojones to do what Snowden did, we're in no position to judge what he or anyone else has done. Most slashdotters in his position like to talk big right now, but the fact is, you'd be scared shitless and do absolutely nothing. Or maybe if you could manage in this economy, you might try to find a different job. Someone really smart and dedicated would work to gain employee status so they could be covered under whistle-blower laws. But that's neither you nor I. The same applied to every other government position.
And as I say, everyone else is in the same position. You want to judge the people who work for the federal government. But they act with total self-interest in the same way that we do. Don't make waves, feed your family, don't get arrested. The only way to fix these problems is to change the law, and that is slowly happening. It may take decades, but it'll happen.
Meanwhile, we all need to be cognizant of the needs to maintain both freedom in our country and also security. We should not sacrifice one for the other. But that makes this a delicate and dynamic balancing act. There are no simple solutions. And on our own, neither you nor I knows the whole solution (in part because the solution has to keep adapting to the ever-changing threats to freedom and security).
By the way, that report was not picked up by most news agencies. BBC had it on their front page but since removed it. It seems that they smell a rat too.
Exactly. Whenever the issue of "damage from leaks" comes up, somebody will say "Ya know, people died because of Manning." And I'll concede that Manning's leaks were far less discriminate than Snowden's, with a much greater potential to compromise a solider in the field.
But name one. Do you honestly believe that if brave, brave Private Schmuckatelli had died to some nefarious sneak attack by The Enemy, betrayed by Manning, it would not be plastered all over Fox and CNN? We'd have tributes, pictures of his wife and kids and dog, interviews with his parents and everybody who ever knew him, lamenting over the loss of Private Schmuckatelli, press conferences, talking heads discussing whether Manning should get death or merely life in prison for his criminal responsibility in this matter. There is zero chance the government would not have exploited that death for maximum political gain.
But it never happened. Not once. Because nobody, nobody, not one person, died because of Manning's or Snowden's leaks. Won't stop them from claiming people did, though.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
A Large government (with virtually unlimited funding) will crack any commodity encryption scheme.
That claim goes against all public analysis of the ciphers in play - what extraordinary evidence do you have to support it? Hollywood doesn't count.
Recall that physical access to the hardware trumps most security. In the crypto world physical access to the person who has the cipher keys would be the equivalent. Ignoring coercion, the CIA and KGB performed many amazing technical surveillance feats back in the day. Some of it damn near unbelievable, beyond what hollywood dreams up (ex 1945-52 a listening device with no power supply or active electronics, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.... There is no reason to believe comparable technical feats no longer occur.