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The Most Striking Thing About the WikiLeaks CIA Data Dump Is How Little Most People Cared (qz.com)
Last week, WikiLeaks released a trove of web pages describing sophisticated software tools and techniques used by the C.I.A to break into smartphones, computers, and IoT devices including smart TVs. Despite the initial media coverage, it appears normal people don't really care much about it, reports Quartz. An anonymous reader shares the report: There's also one other big difference between now and 2013. Snowden's NSA revelations sent shockwaves around the world. Despite WikiLeaks' best efforts at theatrics -- distributing an encrypted folder and tweeting the password "SplinterItIntoAThousandPiecesAndScatterItIntoTheWinds" -- the Vault 7 leak has elicited little more than a shrug from the media and the public, even if the spooks are seriously worried. Maybe it's because we already assume the government can listen to everything.
Most people with half-a-brain already assumed that the CIA, NSA, and FBI were doing stuff like this. This merely confirmed our suspicions.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
These were things the Obama admin were in charge of. The press doesn't want to cover it
...perhaps the media is seriously compromised.
Even the President bypasses them. What does that say?
EVERY. SINGLE. PERSON. I. KNOW. has commented on Vault#7
It is simply not being reported.
This recent "leak" concerns expected activity, and legal activity, the CIA possessing the technical means to gather intelligence. The 2003 leak concerned domestic surveillance by agencies prohibited from performing domestic surveillance. In short, the public expects the CIA to be able to break into an iPhone.
Do i win?
With what we've learned from the whole Ed Snowden situation, this doesn't come as much of a surprise. We all know the American Government is spying on citizens and have for years.
people only care about issues as much as the multinational "news" corporations tell them to care.
Deep State. We are in a simulation and being played.
It was fiction in 1998... and now it appears to be all too real.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120660
The only question that remains is how autocratic are those in power to manipulate these capabilities to their benefit and at the expense of the public welfare.
I think most people have figured out wikileaks only seems to be pushing an agenda with their leaks
did you forget to take your meds?
But I do not think that's the reason no one really cares. I think most people don't trust wikileaks.
Julian is clearly a complete and total fuck head with a political agenda.
Personally, I would have a hard time believing anything released by that jack ass has not been carefully cherry picked.
At this stage, everyone knows the US government is spying on the everything they do. Most people just don't care. Everyone also knows that wikileaks guy is a fart muffin. So... they also don't care.
Most "normal" people the summary refers to have never heard of the Wikileaks release concerning the CIA. In fact, I am pretty sure if I took an informal poll of friends and family most of them (8/10 at least) wouldn't have any idea what Wikileaks is.
The majority of people do not consider whether they are being spied on, it doesn't occur to them at all. It's not necessarily that they don't care, but they are simply unaware it's an option. If you don't follow tech news this is not something that comes up on people's radar.
Sometimes I will tell friends about hacks that can break into phones or ways that government or companies can intercept traffic. A few might express concern, but not enough to do anything about it, the spying is "out of sight, out of mind", it doesn't affect them. Most others think I'm just being paranoid or making stuff up.
Trump has quoted CNN and NBC too.
Oh wait, those have 0 credibility too. I see what you're saying.
Eh, yeah I'm pretty much resigned to the idea that the government is constantly spying on us and always will and there is probably very little we as the individual will be able to do to make it stop. Kick up enough noise and they'll get you on trumped up charges or you'll suddenly find yourself a victim of an accident. Especially those of us with limited money and no-power. Can't wait till I'm six feet under and don't need to deal with this non-sense anymore.
Remember, the best way to cover up information in the age of the internet is not to censor it, but to present so many conflicting and mutually exclusive sets of information that the casual observer doesn't have a baseline from which to judge truth or fiction. All they will be able to know is that they are being lied to -- but they will be incapable of telling who is lying or how much of what they are hearing is lies. Poison any legitimate leak with factually false information and the entire thing becomes suspect.
No one cared because it had no "mascot" like we had with Snowden or Manning.
I only heard CNN mention the dump for a couple days then seemingly dropped it entirely in favor of more trump. So either the alphabet guys are kindly suggesting that the media limit its coverage, or most Americans don't care unless there's a celebrity figure behind it. I'm guessing it's the latter, because out of the possible answers that one makes me facepalm the hardest.
Shut up you CIA shlll. This has nothing to do with left vs right, and everything to do with us all losing our liberty.
Major businesses in all industries are in various stages of migrating their entire infrastructure to "the cloud", and most cloud computing providers have been known since the Snowden leaks to be PRISM contributors. If the CIA has developed actual hacks to get at the same data that the NSA is walking around with a set of janitor keys to, what idea or emotion is that supposed to evoke in me?
Mostly I'm just disappointed that they participate in 0-days going unreported for longer than necessary, and remaining available to other parties unknown.
Let me say: "YAWN, text me when the cattlecars arrive to haul me to the ghetto"
I seriously doubt that would alarm people at this point. . .
I'ts because nearly everything in the release was already known ancient exploits or techniques. None of this is new.
And because WikiLeaks, while it had potential at one time, is irrevocably tainted by the a-hole in charge.
We've known for years that any wired device connected to the net is vulnerable. Changing the end use of the device does not change a thing regards security.
The majority of us also know the what comes out of his mouth is complete bullshit.
This is why letting an election get decided by popular vote is so damned dangerous.
Few understand the underlying issues and, the few that do, even less care.
People make no sense to me.
Trump is elected and the people riot like chimps. The CIA is hacking and spying on everything under the fucking sun with no oversight and the response is " meh ".
I may have missed it, but did the leaks say the CIA was actually using this stuff illicitly? If not, then it's on par with someone leaking that the Army has tanks. Well... yeah, it's par for the course.
So you are angry whats the next step? write an angry post? go on a protest? what is that going to achieve at best they will say they are going to stop doing it and go on doing the same thing in secret. Maybe a few people will lose there jobs, but they will be replaced by others that are just as unethical.
Until people stop having irrational fears of terrorist, communist, immigrants, homosexuals, witches, ... (pick your favorite group that is going to "destroy" civilization) we will allow agencies the CIA to have too much power, and once anyone has too much power they will abuse it.
In part because they're hosted in Russia.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
Isn't developing and using tools like this kind of their job?
I mean they should never use this stuff against American citizens or without a warrant and due process, etc, etc.... But complaining we have the tools necessary to turn some warlord's cellphone into a microphone is like complaining about how the army has drones that can fly a grenade through his car window.
I mean if anything maybe these tools will be kind of useful. "Hey, before we bomb that large group of people over there, turn on their cell phone cameras and make sure it's not a sweet sixteen party.
WikiLeaks is all bark and no bite. All cowboy and no cattle. All sizzle and no steak. All rape and no recourse.
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What are we supposed to do about it?
The real issue isn't the fact that the CIA/NSA/ [insert bureau here] can do these things. The issue is that they can't be held accountable for it.
We saw this in the financial crash of '08 (albeit in the private sector) as well: no one who is actually responsible for these things will ever see jail time. This won't end anyone's career. There's just not much the American people can do about it, and I think there's a sense among the general populace that they know this, even if only on a subconscious level. It's not apathy. It's a helpless resignation.
The US military can call in a strike on any position in the world, with 1 meter accuracy, and deliver a deadly payload in less than 6 hours. 2 hours to most populated areas. They can wipe out an entire city in a day, even without nukes. They have nearly invisible fortresses both above and below the water all over the globe. They have aircraft which carry nuclear weapons which are nearly invisible to radar and can circumnavigate the globe without ever having to land.
That's insane. And yet we don't react when we find out because, even for the stuff we didn't know for certain, we kind of figured they could probably do it. CIA is the same way, it's just not talked about as much. Most people hadn't hear of (or dind't know much of) the NSA back when Snowden dumped his data) so it was a surprise. The CIA is not a surprise. To anyone. They may be secret, but they're not shrouded in mystery.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
It's mostly alarm fatigue. Constantly we're berated with news about how our rights are eroding and the government is working against us. While much of it is very true, until it extends to the point of interfering with the common citizens daily life, they won't care.
People are sheep. You can shave their coats and even pick off a few to slaughter, as long as the heard is large enough to feel anonymous, they really have no reaction. It's not until the sheep feel like they're the next in line do they care.
Is it a shock that our covert HUMINT foreign intelligence agency has a pile of tools for covertly gathering human intelligence? No. I'd be more surprised if they didn't have stuff like this. These tools are useful for the kind of targeted, one-off, POI-focused surveillance that we want our spies to be doing, rather than the sweeping, rights-trampling dragnets we've been seeing from the FBI and NSA.
I'm mostly upset that this stuff was mishandled and leaked, not that it exists.
So am I upset that our spies are spying? No, no I'm not.
Qz is just trying to white wash the situation.
'CIA dilemma: Must hire millennials, very group that respects the Constitutionâ(TM)
It is the younger generation that understands new technology. But it is hard to weed out the people who will work without any respect for the Constitution or without any respect for privacy, says former CIA officer Ray McGovern.
The former head of the CIA Michael Hayden came up with an explanation for how thousands of secret documents ended up in the hands of WikiLeaks. The files were released this week, showing how the agency hacks smartphones and TVs. Michael Hayden says they may have been leaked by insiders, most likely young CIA recruits, from the generation known as millennials.
RT: Michael Hayden doubts whether millennials understand loyalty and secrecy. Why would he say that, do you think?
Ray McGovern: It is very painful to hear General Hayden say those things, because these millennials, or whoever it is that is leaking information, are loyal in a way that he has not been, to their only oath, the only oath we all take, and that is to support and defend the Constitution of the US against all enemies, foreign and domestic. In an unprecedented situation, two of General Haydenâ(TM)s predecessors as head of NSA said he did illegal things in wiretapping and monitoring Americans. That was Bobby Ray Inman, who was pretty much the creator of the NSA, and who worked on the laws that prohibit these things. He said, âoeI drafted the laws, I know what is in those laws, and it admits of no exceptions.â Bobby Ray Inman, after it was disclosed that General Hayden had done this at NSA said, âoeHe clearly violated the law.â One more recent predecessor as NSA director was an Army General named William Odom, and Odom when he heard about Hayden, almost couldnâ(TM)t control himself. He said, âoeHayden should be court-martialed since he still on active duty, and he should be removed from office and so should George Bush who ordered him to do that.â
Here we have this same character⦠General Hayden accusing leakers of disloyalty. That is like the pot calling the kettle black because if anyone is guilty of not abiding by his oath to defend the Constitution, it is General Hayden himself. I have a little bit of difficulty refraining from being angry.
RT: If other people in the agency agree with him, what should they do now? Just recruit older people?
RM: The problem is they are caught between a rock and a hard place. They need the young people. The young people know how to do this stuff. Thatâ(TM)s really important. It is really hard to weed out young people who will do this stuff without any respect for the Constitution or without any respect for privacy. To weed those out and only let old people like me, who donâ(TM)t know anything about how to tap into these things. They cannot do this without the young people. And by hiring young people, it is really hard to say âoethis person will violate the Constitution, but this person wonâ(TM)t.â
One of the interesting things here is that when we gave Edward Snowden the award for Integrity in Intelligence that was in June of 2013. In July, we were at a hacker conference outside of Amsterdam, and we noted that we wanted to give this prize to Edward Snowden, but we had no way of getting there because he was at Sheremetyevo Airport and nobody knew how to get to him. Guess what? Those millennials, those hackers passed the hat around and collected enough money for the four of us â" Colleen Rowley, Tom Drake, Jesselyn Radack and myself - all whistleblowers to go to Moscow and back, pay for our fares and a fairly decent hotel as well. That is how strong these people who know how to do this technology feel about the need for privacy to protect our Constitution.
RT: WikiLeaks says the file dump is just a small fraction of what they have on the CIA. What else
'CIA dilemma: Must hire millennials, very group that respects the Constitutionâ(TM)
It is the younger generation that understands new technology. But it is hard to weed out the people who will work without any respect for the Constitution or without any respect for privacy, says former CIA officer Ray McGovern.
The former head of the CIA Michael Hayden came up with an explanation for how thousands of secret documents ended up in the hands of WikiLeaks. The files were released this week, showing how the agency hacks smartphones and TVs. Michael Hayden says they may have been leaked by insiders, most likely young CIA recruits, from the generation known as millennials.
RT: Michael Hayden doubts whether millennials understand loyalty and secrecy. Why would he say that, do you think?
Ray McGovern: It is very painful to hear General Hayden say those things, because these millennials, or whoever it is that is leaking information, are loyal in a way that he has not been, to their only oath, the only oath we all take, and that is to support and defend the Constitution of the US against all enemies, foreign and domestic. In an unprecedented situation, two of General Haydenâ(TM)s predecessors as head of NSA said he did illegal things in wiretapping and monitoring Americans. That was Bobby Ray Inman, who was pretty much the creator of the NSA, and who worked on the laws that prohibit these things. He said, âoeI drafted the laws, I know what is in those laws, and it admits of no exceptions.â Bobby Ray Inman, after it was disclosed that General Hayden had done this at NSA said, âoeHe clearly violated the law.â One more recent predecessor as NSA director was an Army General named William Odom, and Odom when he heard about Hayden, almost couldnâ(TM)t control himself. He said, âoeHayden should be court-martialed since he still on active duty, and he should be removed from office and so should George Bush who ordered him to do that.â
Here we have this same character⦠General Hayden accusing leakers of disloyalty. That is like the pot calling the kettle black because if anyone is guilty of not abiding by his oath to defend the Constitution, it is General Hayden himself. I have a little bit of difficulty refraining from being angry.
RT: If other people in the agency agree with him, what should they do now? Just recruit older people?
RM: The problem is they are caught between a rock and a hard place. They need the young people. The young people know how to do this stuff. Thatâ(TM)s really important. It is really hard to weed out young people who will do this stuff without any respect for the Constitution or without any respect for privacy. To weed those out and only let old people like me, who donâ(TM)t know anything about how to tap into these things. They cannot do this without the young people. And by hiring young people, it is really hard to say âoethis person will violate the Constitution, but this person wonâ(TM)t.â
One of the interesting things here is that when we gave Edward Snowden the award for Integrity in Intelligence that was in June of 2013. In July, we were at a hacker conference outside of Amsterdam, and we noted that we wanted to give this prize to Edward Snowden, but we had no way of getting there because he was at Sheremetyevo Airport and nobody knew how to get to him. Guess what? Those millennials, those hackers passed the hat around and collected enough money for the four of us â" Colleen Rowley, Tom Drake, Jesselyn Radack and myself - all whistleblowers to go to Moscow and back, pay for our fares and a fairly decent hotel as well. That is how strong these people who know how to do this technology feel about the need for privacy to protect our Constitution.
RT: WikiLeaks says the file dump is just a small fraction of what they have on the CIA. What else do you expect to come out?
RM: I suppose they
Now fuck off and go back to your CIA basement to collect your pay check.
Oh no, US government is trying to spy on everyone. Oh no, android enabled TVs are susceptible to hacking.
Seriously, did that leak bring anything news worthy? Everything shown was either logical to assume or we knew about already.
I care a lot.
I'm waiting to see what will be done about it, by the new sheriff. Maybe nothing, maybe little, but... Wait and see.
We get to vote them out again in a little while.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Most people don't care. They never did, not even back in 2013.
The difference now is back in 2013 the media needed headlines. Now they're more focused on Trumps spelling mistakes in his tweets.
Circa Snowden, it was cool to be up-in-arms about privacy.
It would be nice to think that people finally took the time to think about how much personal data they give away for free with the intent of it being broadcast to the entire world (FB). It would also be nice to think that they actually thought about the nobody that they knew being scooped up by black helicopters and imprisoned by the New World Order's thought-crime task force.
Realistically, they probably just got bored of the whole topic.
So far the most interesting part seems to be how they have studied foreign governments and entities, such that they can leave the fingerprints of a hack that can be traced back to whoever they want. Want to Blame Russia for a Hack? The CIA knows exactly how to do this.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
"Couple that with the fact that to most people, Wikileaks has little to no credibility at this point, ranking right up there with Brietbart news and the National Enquirer. I mean when Trump starts quoting you.. it's the kiss of death for your credibility."
Very persuasive and well thought out argument negating the credibility of Wikileaks. Your assessment was spot on given all the evidence provided. Good job. Wait..you..you aren't wearing pants, are you? You know who wears pants? Trump.
But right vs left is such a good way of distracting the people! After all, both sides of the political establishment are very different in who they want to give the things that they steal from you to.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Maybe there are 'more interesting' things going on, but in the last week have asked more then a few of my non - tech industry friends if they have heard about the new wiki leaks drop and non of them have. Frankly it just isn't being reported. That is one of the problems with our modern media, they serve as a filter for what is important but are driven by political ideology even more so then what sells and certainly have no real way of determine or interest in what is and isn't important to people. Many people are appalled when they hear about this drop, but it has been dreadfully under reported because the trump administration is much more salacious.
âoeTolerance applies only to persons, but never to truth. Intolerance applies only to truth, but never to persons.
You need a british comedian with a crooked smirk to make it into a joke and blame it on trump before people care.
I see the media is in full-out damage control.
Are you really so naive as to think they're only using these tools against non-Americans?
Having hacking tools and using these tools against Americans are two very different things. The former is what was leaked and its exactly the sort of tools the CIA is expect to have in order to perform its mission. If and when the later is shown the public will show greater interest, as they did with the 2013 revelations.
Wow, they really got you trained to just regurgitate on the spot, don't they?
I've seen coverage on The Blaze, Fox News, Daily Wire, Daily Wire, NPR, my local talk radio guys, my local cable news guys, etc.
People saying "it's been ignored by the media" probably haven't been watching the media at all. It has been covered. Not 24/7, and not exactly accurately (some networks are better than others in this regard), but all of them have been talking about it.
The village is being terrorized by a tribble-topped wackaloon and his minions, and people wonder why we're not paying more attention to a gov't agency doing exactly what we assume they do?
As a 41 year old European, I already have the US government listed in my head as a terrorist organization. Don't expect me to voice my opinions about what they do, because ultimately swaying me for whatever bs explanation for justifying their existence would be futile.
Ofc, national media in norway doesn't allow you to comment on important news anyway. Maybe the smaller newspapers, but not the two biggest ones: Aftenposten and Nrk.
The most striking thing about this whole affair is how surprised you're implying we should be ....
Seriously... I'm not upset its happening... of course it is... I'm a bit surprised that it's not better than that.
I would expect some next level shit from the CIA.
People cared about Snowden because NSA overreach affected virtually every US citizen. What NSA was caught doing is ILLEGAL.
Everyone assumes CIA hoards 0-days to be used for espionage purposes against OTHER countries. This is why CIA exists. CIA brass has been publically talking about the cooption of smart* products for such purposes for a number of years.
If there is evidence in one of these leaks of CIA spying on US citizens without a warrant this would be certainly be worthy of more attention.
If CIA was for example caught bulk hacking everyone's smart TV's and recording everything said this would certainly be newsworthy and most likely lead to legal repercussions for the individuals involved.. or maybe not... nobody at NSA went to jail for stealing everyone's phone records.
Nobody cares, because the intelligence community is supposed to be able to get information that the "bad dudes" want to keep from them.
I was very upset by the latest round of Wikileaks. It is clear that our security agencies are not making us safer. As we build western civilization on technology and the Internet of Things IoT, we have to know that our technology can not be used against us. This has the potential to kill new markets like autonomous vehicle because in a recent poll, 70% of women to no trust self driving cars. I imagine with the Wikileaks revelations of using a hacked car for the "perfect" assassination, that this percentage is going to climb.
This needs to stop. When a fatal security flaw is found in a product, the vendor needs to be notified so that the problem can be fixed. If we have the exploit, so does everyone else.
Worse, the latest wikileaks dump is shows the unprofessional-ism of the cyber unit. It looks like 15-year olds are running a spy agency. Lastly, the most unforgivable thing is not being able to hang on to your toys. It is bad enough all these security holes are being exploited, but to lose control of your tools is unforgivable.
I urge everyone to call their senators and leave a message or talk to a staffer. This sh*t needs to stop. The senators control the purse strings and they can stop it.
The civilized world has at least a base level of universal health care for everyone within their country. We find that gets in the way of profit so we won't allow it to happen. This isn't a partisan issue, either - the health insurance industry owns politicians of every flavor and invests heavily to ensure that this does not change.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Bullshit, not giving a fuck is no surprise at all.
Dear sir--
I take exception with your slipshod handling of the facts when you refer to Kellyanne Conway as "a representative of the President".
Proper form dictates that she be refered to with the respect do her position as "the lickspittle lackey of the WORST President EVER".
Yours faithfully,
Brigadier Sir Charles Arthur Strong (Mrs.)
Plain and simple, the mainstream media absolutely controls US society. And they've buried the story for obvious reasons, they love the deep state. Heck they're even part of the deep state. They'd much rather repost Trump/Putin nonsense and rant endlessly over it.
The liberal tech media freaked out, so did a number of /.'s. The mainstream American media didn't cover it well, for a good reason. The general American public expects the CIA to be doing this type of hacking and spying against foreign governments and terrorist organizations. Mainstream media recognized that, but they are also taking the time to digest the material and thoughtfully write about it as needed. While the tech media skims the leaked documents, writes the first thing on their minds, over sensationalizes the headline and doesn't do any unbiased reporting.
I think a lot of you would freak out if a report came out that said the CIA was lost in this digital world and had very few tools or holes to exploit. This would mean that they can't do their job to properly protect the USA.
Anyone not a US citizen or Green Card Holder, you are welcome to be scared and freak out about this. If your country is working against US interests, you should expect to have exploits run against you if you are doing anything that works against US interests.
It's the IT professionals, and our lawmakers who matter on this - not your average user.
Trump has quoted CNN and NBC too.
Oh wait, those have 0 credibility too. I see what you're saying.
Has he quoted them on the accusations that he & several of his staff have lied more than once about their relation with Putin & Russian diplomats, agents & businessmen?
Most people feel they cannot do anything (except from living under a rock without wifi) to protect themselves from these security threats, and are just forced to accept them. Most aren't even tech-savvy enough to understand how the exploit actually works, let alone know how to fix it. Moreover, the easy way of protecting yourself from these exploits (normally involving disconnecting the affected device from the internet) is normally inconvenient, and doesn't seem worth it to most people, especially when they can't actually tell that the vulnerability is physically there.
And good luck trying to persuade people to stay off the internet in 2017.
Was that someone was able to get all the documentation and source codes out of the CIA's hands and them not knowing about it. There wasn't anything in there that we didn't already know or expect. Just the fact that supposedly 80,000 pages of documents (when its all said and done) got loose into the wild. For an Agency who's mission is secrecy and keeping information quiet, they sure messed that one up.
not to spy domestically. there are not those who wish harm right in your back yard. not to say therecan not be over reach though.
Because it's kinda obviously, under examination, just a bunch of mostly-publicly-available tools that were given to a field operations group... And Julian is AGAIN trying to make this about him.
Incidentally, don't expect to hear from the Shadow Broker again. Just a hunch.
If the leak had been about a Totally Illegal Private Email Server, then people would have chanted to "Lock Her Up"
Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.
...the risk that the CIA is presenting to the USA. By hoarding vulnerabilities in operating systems and software and then developing tools to exploit them, they're making the internet very insecure; as Bruce Schneier puts it, today's top secret government hacking tools are tomorrow's organised crime hacking tools. Which country has the greatest economic and national security dependency on the internet and is therefore the most vulnerable to hacking tools? The USA. The CIA are quickly becoming a bunch of useless idiots to the USA and useful idiots to anyone who wants to exploit the USA (and everyone else). Expect hacking-based disruption and extortion to take a serious toll on all internet dependent economies and especially the USA's.
Is it that we do not care or is it that we are not at all surprised?
More importantly, who feels empowered to make a difference?
The coverage on the part of the main stream media in the United States has been almost non existent. I am not sure what that says about our media. Collusion, Coercion? Obviously the story doesn't fit their national news narrative at the moment. I have seen a lot more coverage of it from the international news source's.
People particularly here in the united states do appear to be pretty desensitized to the issue. The masses never appear to care about much of anything of substance. So no surprise there. The pseudo intellectuals tech crowd seems to be more apt to consider it a good thing to save face when their *stupid* family members ask them if they still think the technological revolution is still playing to our advantage and maybe we've taken things just a little too far. Of course none of this truly means much of anything to anyone. Until these tools are used directly on someone, And then them. And really only them begin to understand just exactly what this all means, But hey! If you got nothing to hide!? right? So.. Lets just see shall we? Because hey! Whats the harm right?
Similar things were said about Snowden's revelations which continue to bear fruit for the world. Don't be fooled into believing the unexamined belief the /. headline wants you to believe—that "most people" don't care. The Democrats are sore that they lost the US presidential election, a majority of state governerships, and control over Congress. They're still pushing this undefended Russophobic idea that the Russians somehow "hacked" (to use their language) the US election. They even chummed up with the CIA to help curry favor for this notion. They're hardly interested in learning that, for instance, the CIA's "UMBRAGE" effort works to plant false evidence making it look like another party did something they actually did (one of the many interesting newsworthy items found in the WikiLeaks initial "Vault 7" leak) carries a vastly different story which challenges the Democrats' as-yet-unproven tale. Neoliberals really want to get their war with Russia on and anyone who doesn't join in that effort will find a chilly reception among the neoliberal elite right now.
Also, there's been considerable coverage of this from around the world, but if you're only paying attention to American corporate mainstream media you will not find dissenting views that challenge a corporate narrative which stood fully behind Mrs. Clinton's 2nd failed attempt at becoming US President. Americans don't make up most of the people in the world and American mainstream media is taken less seriously these days (for good reason).
Digital Citizen
What "most people care" about is not only not represented by mainstream corporate so-called journalists (stenographers to power, really) but that doesn't even jibe with telling people encryption works.
Digital Citizen
Do you really think the people control this country? Do you want to be a dissenting voice and have the government kill you or take you to a foreign black ops torture site? With all the intelligence services, police, military, etc etc do you think we have any chance in hell of changing things? Maybe that's why.
Maybe it's simply because the last years have shown how really powerless the people on the street are. For example in the Netherlands there was a national referendum to see whether or not the Netherlands would be part of an agreement with the Ukraine. Now you might think that the Ukraine is not truly that interesting to the Netherlands and not critical to the economy. However, after an overwhelming proportion of the Dutch population voting to not sign the agreement the prime minister signed it anyway. If people people cannot even get their way over an unimportant agreement what hope have they got against anything where truly powerful and rich people have an interest? None. And I think that people are resigned to that fact. Understandably as well.
There was nothing here which had not been said before. Assange's Russian spooks let him down a bit.
We're not surprised and I'm not sure anyone trusts wikileaks anymore either.
Maybe it is because the politicized media is at war with wikileaks now and so they refuse to cover it and dismiss it?
Anyone else remember the Batman movie that had a system for using every smartphone on Gotham to locate Joker?
He then nuked the tech, for moral reasons... We all knew that, in the hands of the government, it wouldn't be deleted, it would be turned on, and hardwired so that it could not be turned off or circumvented in any way, and someone would be having a party as they discovered more and more ways to control people using the unfiltered look into peoples' REAL lives.
The release simply highlights the fact that government has been doing exactly that for quite some time now.
Little wonder why nobody seems shocked.
If anything, they are all wondering why the government is behind the times, technically.
While the CIA abusing their power is bad enough, most of you are missing the point and missing one of the reasons why they were not to spy on US citizens to begin with. Tools and information could proliferate to foreign, hostile actors. They were never intended to gather intelligence on US citizens. Nor were they to develop technologies to spy on US citizens and this was one of the reasons. They did so in this case then lost the tools, and potentially the intel, to who the hell knows who on the internet.
Drug cartels may have this information and those tools. Foreign actors may have this information and those tools. Criminals may have these tools and this information. With this done, nearly all of the American people have been put at risk with no capacity to protect themselves.
It should have never happened to begin with. Nor should domestic agencies be doing this as well, for the same reasons. That is why there were protections in the constitution.
I also draw into question just how much the tech sector knew about this and how many have colluded with domestic agencies and the intelligence community.
CIA blackbox devices were uncovered back in the early 90's being used to monitor all domestic phone calls and being adapted to monitor Internet traffic. There has not been a single bit of new or revelatory information to come from Snowden or Wikileaks regarding anything. Just uneducated dipshits endangering the lives of others because they didn't know what the rest of the world already knew. Listen to your elders.
Anyone notice the "leaks" all seem to be pointed towards the west? At the very least, this seems statistically odd. Surely Russia or China have secrets to be outed.
Is that the only reason he's still alive at this point?
.. was that the CIA was able to fake breaches by "Russia", "China", etc.
So, who did actually break into servers during the election - CIA contractors and friends that had these tools for two years?
the asshats that wrote this article are generalising based on anecdotal evidence at best. They haven't got a clue what the overall reaction was.. what a load of fake news.. this type of lazy journalism is why no one cares anymore about what journalists say.
Sure, it was not really "new" news, yet it is, nonetheless, supremely alarming!
One major contributor to the public's lack of enthused reaction is the absolute lack of real responsibility on the part of the media - especially mainstream media.
Media has become a tool of those with the power. Electronic media, in particular, is a powerful tool that does brainwash and brow-beat the public into submission, while leaving a feeling that just hearing it is enough!
The other issue is that most people are truly idiots. Period. Thanks, in LARGE part to ever more powerful corporations!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.