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First Confirmed Prism Surveillance Target Was Democracy Activist (fortune.com)
A new report by Television New Zealand in collaboration with The Intercept, based on leaks of former U.S. National Security Agency worker Edward Snowden has for the first time named a target of the NSA's controversial Prism program. The target was a middle-aged civil servant and pro-democracy activist named Tony Fullman. Fullman, who is originally from Fiji but has lived in New Zealand for decades, is an advocate for democracy in Fiji and a critic of Fijian prime minister Frank Bainimarama, who took power in a 2006 coup. From a Fortune report: According to The Intercept, the NSA in 2012 monitored Fullman's communications through the Prism program and passed on information to the New Zealand intelligence services. Around the same time, the New Zealand authorities raided Fullman's home and revoked his passport. The New Zealand intelligence services were not themselves allowed to spy on Fullman, who was a New Zealand citizen. However, as Snowden has repeatedly described, the agencies of many Anglophone countries spy on each other's behalf, in order to bypass their national legal restrictions. Fullman suggested in the article that people in the group may well have said violent things about Bainimarama, but this was just venting, not a plot. According to the report, they never suspected someone was listening into their communications. The NSA was said to be helping by analyzing Fullman's Facebook and Gmail activities. The 190 pages of intercepted documentation seen by The Intercept apparently didn't reveal evidence of a plot.
And this is exactly why the general public needs encryption and why various TLA outfits and buddies like to use the "think of the children" garbage to denounce it.
You might wonder why a pro-democracy country is spying on a pro-democracy campaigner. It's not because of any 'terrorist' BS, that's just the excuse. They monitored him, so that when they negotiate with Fiji in future, they can offer him up as a bargaining chip.
From the article: "Fullman reckons the timing of the raids was connected with the New Zealand foreign minister’s visit to Fiji for trade talks, just days later."
And this is why NSA and GCHQ spying on their own countrymen's communications is a bad thing (it is NOT harmless). Because the data they capture is used in political deals against the rights of the target and against the interests of the country as a whole.
New Zealand would have pulled his passport to secure a trade deal if necessary, so that they could tout a trade deal as a political win. All hidden from legal and democratic observation by the veil of 'security'.
I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation for how helping protect Fiji's military government from possible plots connects with the goal of protecting the US from terrorism, right?
Was the NSA trying to protect the TSA from dehydration by ensuring that American air travelers would continue to have that Fiji bottled water to confiscate?
It's illegal for most countries to spy on their own citizens, but it's not illegal to share spy data with allies and have them give you the information on your own citizens that your own laws preclude?
This is a violation of the spirit if not the letter of the law. Acquiring such information from allies should be just as illegal as spying on your country's own citizens, full stop.
Scratch my back and I'll scratch yours:
You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.
Fig. You do a favor for me and I'll do a favor for you.; If you do something for me that I cannot do for myself, I will do something for you that you cannot do for yourself. I'll grab the box on the top shelf if you will creep under the table and pick up my pen. You scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours.
http://idioms.thefreedictionar...
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
Oh, yeah, you can trust us, we'll never abuse this surveillance power.
If they have the capability, they're gonna use it. Most likely to stalk their ex-girlfriends and harass those that buck they system. It's just human nature.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
He didn't do nothing wrong, so he hads nothing to hide.
suspected the poor chap of a serious crime.
He might have made a sarcastic remark involving his opponent and the second amendment.
Have gnu, will travel.
oh good, another the 'ends justify the means' argument.
' I shot every third person because. and LUCKLY I hit a real criminal' fits this argument too,
just sayin'.
...in our own government.
However, as Snowden has repeatedly described, the agencies of many Anglophone countries spy on each other's behalf, in order to bypass their national legal restrictions
I am not surprised, but I am very, very disappointed. We have let the terrorists win because we have let them cow us into abandoning any sense of justice and liberty for some bullshit illusion of security. I now fear my own government far more than I fear "teh terrorists". That, or in a more cynical view, the oligarch's who control much of the "free world" are using this opportunity to consolidate their power and neutralize threats. Either way, Snowden should receive the Medal of Freedom.
Simple. He is an activist that promotes Democracy. He believes in things like freedom, liberty and in the rights of the individual.
What could be a bigger crime in the west today than promoting Democracy?
if government agencies can get around laws restricting them from spying on you without consequence then what makes you think the average person can rely on easily available encryption to protect them?
Getting around math is not like getting around a law. That's the short answer to that point.
Unless people are mathematicians themselves, they are unable to personally verify the effectiveness of an encryption algorithm. When you use an encryption algorithm, you have to trust it works without a secret decryption algorithm.
Since it's impossible to tell pretended cluelessness from real cluelessness on /., it's often hard to tell.
Eww. Next they'll want to introduce freedom and justice for all. Note the slippery slope, people!
Glad they nipped it in the bud.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Actually, yes. Apparently he was known to have made remarks about inciting a coup, so he was put under surveillance, found to not be a threat to US interests, and the surveillance was stopped.
In other words, due process worked just fine.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
Thoughtcrime
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Since it's impossible to tell pretended cluelessness
I tried appending the emoji for snark. But Slashdot doesn't support that character set.
Have gnu, will travel.
So here's where the BS comes in:
1). He was "suspected of advocating violence". Based on what evidence? Where was the probable cause? Without probably cause this surveillance is illegal;
2). He is a democracy advocate, speaking against a military dictatorship. I'm looking for a problem here... there doesn't seem to be one;
3). The NSA is spying on a New Zealand citizen based on a theoretical set of charges actionable in Fiji. Yeah, there seems to be a huge jurisdictional problem here;
4). Does all this smack of a political quid pro quo?
5). Does all of this smack of too-clever jurisdiction shopping? "The thing that is illegal for you in your country is legal for me in mine, and we're all friends here!"
6). What did they always tell us that Prism (and all similar sig-int programs) were about? Terrorism. We needed sig-int spying because of Terrorism. How is this terrorism? Even if the suspect dude actually meant to try something, this would be criminality, not terrorism. Where is the terrorist ideology here? Oh right, he's a "democracy advocate." Clearly there is terrorism at work there! Anyone advocating democracy cannot be anything but a terrorist.
Simple. He is an activist that promotes Democracy. He believes in things like freedom, liberty and in the rights of the individual.
What could be a bigger crime in the west today than promoting Democracy?
It's not a crime in the US. But it may be in other countries.
Gaggablaghblagh... Aga blah blah... AGA BLAHG BLAH!
www.facebook.com/DareDefendOurRights
www.fairtax.org
This. 'Democracy' in Fiji has historically been tinged with racial supremacy. Bainimarama is a boon to the nation - an ethnic Fijian who looked past the interests of his race, to the interest of his country and all its people.
"Fullman suggested in the article that people in the group may well have said violent things about Bainimarama,"
Yes, much the same way Islamic fundamentalists may well say violent things about infidels. How is monitoring these guys wrong? Because they're culturally 'Christian', and they - er - didn't mean it? Remember Timothy McVeigh and Anders Breivik?
Snowden may be right (or wrong) about the *manner* of monitoring. Maybe a warrant was warranted. But monitoring people threatening violence is exactly what any responsible government does - even 'pro-democracy' activists.
The US gubmint - keeping the world safe for democracy! Or not...
His crime was that the military dictatorship was (yawn...) supported by the US.
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
Yeah, with the contorted logic of the RC Church you can construct anything you like.
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
All true, but nobody is going to prosecute this.
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
"The New Zealand intelligence services were not themselves allowed to spy on Fullman, who was a New Zealand citizen"
When this stuff started coming out, the prime minister of New Zealand rammed through legislation making it retroactively legal for the intelligence services to spy on citizens - mainly because they were caught redhanded directly doing so without even bothering to go through the PRISM facade.
(Disclosure: I'm from NZ but haven't lived there for nearly 20 years as I was becoming more and more unhappy about the deepseated corruption and cronyism I kept uncovering)
New Zealand has an interesting facade of "clean, green and honest" - none of these 3 claims are true, but those in charge have been selling the Kool Aid for so long that the population believes it and tends to react violently towards those who try to show the truth. The government is aided and abbetted by a very pliable media (New Zealand does not have a free press. Negative stories about companies or influential individuals are usually killed by threats of defamation litigation using laws heavily biased in favour of the claimant - effectively NZ defamation law turns the presumption of innocence on its head)
The Internet makes it harder and harder for things to be covered up and more people are becoming uncomfortable about the situation but there is a very strong culture of compliance with authority and "don't rock the boat". This is what allows corruption to spread from the top down until the entire edifice is rotten. The situation is not helped by the factor that the only legal definition of corrupt behaviour in New Zealand is "Bribery". Cronyism, influence peddling and all the other OECD definitions are rife, but "if it's not illegal then it's OK"
Non-kiwis might do well to look at e2nz.org and locals might want to look at laudafinem.com