That all might be true the right now if we want real change, a message needs to be sent. It needs to be a clear message. Just because you work at three letter, and someone said the word "terrorist" does not mean you are not still responsible for your actions.
Why because the the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court alone decided it has the right to determine what is and what is not Constitutional? Where the fuck is it written in the Constitution that the Supreme court has such power. Clue: it inst.
listed as terrorists for giving unfounded official complaints
Fine even if that is the case we have other laws that cover things like that. "Making false reports", "libel", and "slander", would be some potential examples. These laws carry with them what most people consider to be appropriate penalties and restitution requirements. Slapping the term "terrorist' on everyone who steps even slightly out line has all sorts of negative consequences.
This is no doubt the sort of horrifying terrorist plot the NSA telephone surveillance program has been so successful foiling. Thank good we has such dedicated protectors to save us from the terrorists.
So its not good enough to risk your life and freedom blowing the whistle you have to voluntarily fall on your sword before its virtuous? Wow you have some high standards.
How strange it is that Russia has become the bastion of human rights and the right to expose corruption.
I don't know what news you have been ready but this is hardly the case. The Russian government cracks down hard on anyone who does anything to embarrass it. If Snodew was a Russion who had leaked KGB info they'd go every bit as hard on him as are government has; and then not even consider stopping there.
No they see this as an opportunity to score diplomatic leverage of some kind, or maybe its just an ego thing for Putin to "Stick it to the man" who knows; in any case this is just an enemy of my enemy is a friend situation, nothing especially virtuous on the part of the Russians. Rainbows and moon beams have not suddenly replaced the usual shit from Vladamir's ass.
Its the folks still working at NSA who should be rotting in jail. What they have been doing is illegal. Personally I think anyone still there should be treated as a collaborator. We didn't accept "just following orders" as an excuse after WWII, it would be good for the nation if we locked away everyone at NSA doing anything above sweeping the floors.
Who knows; and you know what probably for the best. Why not have all the friendlies you can announce you are on the way to seek asylum in their country? Might as well make the US law enforcement waste it times trying to figure out who to strong arm.
BS, the China that exists today is little more than 100 years old. There may be cultural elements that go back before the communist take over but as far as how the country is run and what is capable of nope.
China's interests are to tied to maintaining their farce of good relations with our government. They would have interceded and made HK turn him over eventually. Putin's ego on the other hand will triumph over any desire to not raise tensions (which he may actually want anyway); this will offer Snowden much better protection.
exposing hacking of a Chinese university serves no US interests whatsoever
I don't agree I think it serves this interest of every citizen, who wants their vote to count, who expects to have representation in our representative democracy. During the cold war, if you had asked a military commander or the President, "Do we conduct espionage and or spying operations against the Soviet Union" they wouldn't have gone into detail but they would have answered that we do.
We were able to have a sane public debate about our policy position toward the USSR.
What have today is all this secret crap. If prior to last week you'd ask "Do we conduct espionage and or spying operations against the People's Republic of China", the nearest thing to honesty you would have gotten is "I can't answer that' but most likely you'd get some propaganda about how they are a valued trade partner. This is not how a free society is supposed to work, you can't have franchise if you don't know what your representatives actually do.
Seriously if you look at the situation with any objectivity at all there is no way the NSA is on the side of "truth justice and the American way" here. Supporting what they have been doing is nothing more than a response to fear, which is sad in a place that is supposed to be the "land of the free and the home of the brave."
Being better than a bunch of totalitarian scum bags is hardly a thing to be proud of. Morals and Ethics are not supposed to be relative. Its like saying a guy who only beats people is better than rapist. It might be true but you still lock both of them away.
I see no reason we should fight a dangerous shadow war, while we continue to pump billions into there economy every year with free trade agreements. No I don't get that. Infact as hard as US manufacturing has been hit, China probably still needs us more than we need it.
We *could* produce everything we need. Prices would soar it would severely stress our economy but it would probably collapse China's if we simply cut off trade. If their behavior is really belligerent if they really are working against our interests than we should seize the moral high ground call it out in public and deal with it. Fighting where we provide the enemy with wealth and technology; has to be the stupidest foreign policy ever tried.
Yes because the US controls all of SA, sure that is why Chavez was allowed to control Venezuela turning into a communist nation in our own back yard and why his chosen successor was able to take power after his death. Its also why Cuba managed its continued existence thru the entire cold war.
Our own military brass has spoken publicly about how state sponsored hacking might constitute an act of war and could result in a Kenetic response. In that context the NSA has endangered our nation by potentially starting an unauthorized war with China. When will these dangerous criminals be controlled.
That and the most effective ways to make a crime hard to prove is to make sure the time between the events and the report will be as long as possible. Taking your victims phone as you retreat from the scene makes sense, you don't want them doing anything rash like calling any friends or the police.
There should be two or even three standards here. There is a standard for criminal charges and there is a standard for personal judgment about the situation; who can be trusted, who you do or do not want to associate with etc.
I know Georgia, I have never met this Fernando Gont character. Four things I'd say about Georgia are she is not the type to make up facts, she is very very smart, and very career minded, a normally very easy going as far as interpersonal matters. I don't think going public with this will help her career. Sure it games her name out there but It does so as someone you might need to watch yourself around or something, if you don't already know better. If anything these accusations will hurt her unless definitively proven. So I don't see any motive to for her lie. I'd trust her even if she did have motive; because I know her to be trust worthy anyway, but even if that were not the case I can't see any incentive to lie.
As far as how I'll handle myself in the community, and what personal opinions I hold: Georgia says it happened. That is good enough for me. Maybe people how know Fernando will reach the same conclusion maybe the opposite, or maybe something in between but that is for them to decide.
If this was criminal legal matter that would be a different standard. I would just that standard if I was on a jury ( and did not know her, otherwise I'd never get on the jury), than if we take as a given all the physical evidence mentioned in their respective blog posts exits; I don't think there would be enough for me to reach any conclusions that meet the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard. If it were a civil trial that would be a lower standard but would still need to be based on evidence, not sure how I'd go on that. I would have to see this security footage, and photo, the coffee mug etc.
I don't agree. When in history has domestic intelligence not been used in unintended ways? Why do think it will be different this time?
The fact is all the firewalls don't work because nothing stops anyone from changing the rules later on. The only way to prevent a government any government, possible any organization from misusing data is to prevent it from collecting such data in the first place and even that isn't easy. Data gathering is very much a case of you can't put the genie back in the bottle.
Come on that stuff is second rate bullshit propaganda and you know it; apologist asshole. They contain absolutely no detail about what specific information was used, if it could have been known other ways, how far along these 'plots' were, or if the 'conspirators' had any real capability of caring them out.
I think we can pretty safely assume these would be attackers probably had little operation capability if they even really exist. I mean come on the Administration's proudest media moments were foiling things like the Time Square Attack were they saved us from a dangerous 'plot' to set of some fireworks in the back of a car near a propane cylinder. Give me fracking break.
Nobody is listing because nobody listens to habitual liars. The Federal government has no credibility anymore when it comes to anything intelligence related with much of public.
I did not mean to imply the Sony is any better. The OtherOS problem if anything show there is industry precedent for the behavior. It been done so we can expect someone might try again.
We know what at least some folks at MS want things to work, if anything at this point I think the onus is on them to show they are not likely turn these "features" back on in the future after people have already purchased the units.
Actually that is exactly what I would expect from HR. I would expect to send mail to a shared mailbox and get a response in a timely manor. I know there is probably only one or two payroll people and expecting them to drop what they are doing and talk to me right now makes no sense. First supposed I did not get my direct deposit Friday. Its Monday morning, what am I going to do get a paper check from them leave the office and take it directly to the bank where it won't clear for a day anyway? No. So it not important it happens right away.
I would attempt to send my request to the correct person to handle it. It is the payroll admins job to handle these things. It is NOT the system admins job to reset a password. Its helpdesk/support desks job to do that. You would not take your payroll issue to the HR director would you? No, you'd take it to the payroll clerk and they would either take care of it or escalate up the HR chain as appropriate. I don't know why in IT its considered appropriate to just grab anyone at all and expect them do something for you.
Then there is the issue of if you asking for you account to be unlocked, or your password to be reset chances are its because YOU screwed up. You failed to remember your password, chose to ignore the 14 days of expiration notices, can't type etc. If my paycheck is deposited its nothing I had anything to do with, it was an oversight by someone else. They are correcting their own mistake, while IT is correcting yours.
Finally in almost every other situation the person has done their homework, with IT this is almost never the case. "I can't get on VPN?" um okay can you get to say google? "No" Well...
They turned it off for now. What's to say they won't turn it back on a year or two from now?
Still its amazing given the public's reaction to the roomers about the always on requirements they had an opportunity to "fix it" prior to launch and just say it was always just roomers. Seems they could have easily avoided the embarrassing public back pedal here and loss of trust.
"Its only meta data. We got all the logs who went where and for how long but nothing about what they did there so its okay."
"Ah well we only track the movements of non-citizens, but you figure there is 51% chance a non-citizen is aboard if the vehicle has ever been within 90 miles of an airport"
Slashdot Mirror
That all might be true the right now if we want real change, a message needs to be sent. It needs to be a clear message. Just because you work at three letter, and someone said the word "terrorist" does not mean you are not still responsible for your actions.
Why because the the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court alone decided it has the right to determine what is and what is not Constitutional? Where the fuck is it written in the Constitution that the Supreme court has such power. Clue: it inst.
Not an opinion its well corroborated that Obama is an empty suit. Good at delivering scripted speeches you bet, but take away his teleprompter....
listed as terrorists for giving unfounded official complaints
Fine even if that is the case we have other laws that cover things like that. "Making false reports", "libel", and "slander", would be some potential examples. These laws carry with them what most people consider to be appropriate penalties and restitution requirements. Slapping the term "terrorist' on everyone who steps even slightly out line has all sorts of negative consequences.
This is no doubt the sort of horrifying terrorist plot the NSA telephone surveillance program has been so successful foiling. Thank good we has such dedicated protectors to save us from the terrorists.
So its not good enough to risk your life and freedom blowing the whistle you have to voluntarily fall on your sword before its virtuous? Wow you have some high standards.
How strange it is that Russia has become the bastion of human rights and the right to expose corruption.
I don't know what news you have been ready but this is hardly the case. The Russian government cracks down hard on anyone who does anything to embarrass it. If Snodew was a Russion who had leaked KGB info they'd go every bit as hard on him as are government has; and then not even consider stopping there.
No they see this as an opportunity to score diplomatic leverage of some kind, or maybe its just an ego thing for Putin to "Stick it to the man" who knows; in any case this is just an enemy of my enemy is a friend situation, nothing especially virtuous on the part of the Russians. Rainbows and moon beams have not suddenly replaced the usual shit from Vladamir's ass.
Its the folks still working at NSA who should be rotting in jail. What they have been doing is illegal. Personally I think anyone still there should be treated as a collaborator. We didn't accept "just following orders" as an excuse after WWII, it would be good for the nation if we locked away everyone at NSA doing anything above sweeping the floors.
Who knows; and you know what probably for the best. Why not have all the friendlies you can announce you are on the way to seek asylum in their country? Might as well make the US law enforcement waste it times trying to figure out who to strong arm.
BS, the China that exists today is little more than 100 years old. There may be cultural elements that go back before the communist take over but as far as how the country is run and what is capable of nope.
China (The modern nation) is younger than the US.
China's interests are to tied to maintaining their farce of good relations with our government. They would have interceded and made HK turn him over eventually. Putin's ego on the other hand will triumph over any desire to not raise tensions (which he may actually want anyway); this will offer Snowden much better protection.
exposing hacking of a Chinese university serves no US interests whatsoever
I don't agree I think it serves this interest of every citizen, who wants their vote to count, who expects to have representation in our representative democracy. During the cold war, if you had asked a military commander or the President, "Do we conduct espionage and or spying operations against the Soviet Union" they wouldn't have gone into detail but they would have answered that we do.
We were able to have a sane public debate about our policy position toward the USSR.
What have today is all this secret crap. If prior to last week you'd ask "Do we conduct espionage and or spying operations against the People's Republic of China", the nearest thing to honesty you would have gotten is "I can't answer that' but most likely you'd get some propaganda about how they are a valued trade partner. This is not how a free society is supposed to work, you can't have franchise if you don't know what your representatives actually do.
Seriously if you look at the situation with any objectivity at all there is no way the NSA is on the side of "truth justice and the American way" here. Supporting what they have been doing is nothing more than a response to fear, which is sad in a place that is supposed to be the "land of the free and the home of the brave."
Being better than a bunch of totalitarian scum bags is hardly a thing to be proud of. Morals and Ethics are not supposed to be relative. Its like saying a guy who only beats people is better than rapist. It might be true but you still lock both of them away.
I see no reason we should fight a dangerous shadow war, while we continue to pump billions into there economy every year with free trade agreements. No I don't get that. Infact as hard as US manufacturing has been hit, China probably still needs us more than we need it.
We *could* produce everything we need. Prices would soar it would severely stress our economy but it would probably collapse China's if we simply cut off trade. If their behavior is really belligerent if they really are working against our interests than we should seize the moral high ground call it out in public and deal with it. Fighting where we provide the enemy with wealth and technology; has to be the stupidest foreign policy ever tried.
Yes because the US controls all of SA, sure that is why Chavez was allowed to control Venezuela turning into a communist nation in our own back yard and why his chosen successor was able to take power after his death. Its also why Cuba managed its continued existence thru the entire cold war.
No it exposes the fact the NSA is endangering us all by escalating an unauthorized war.
Our own military brass has spoken publicly about how state sponsored hacking might constitute an act of war and could result in a Kenetic response. In that context the NSA has endangered our nation by potentially starting an unauthorized war with China. When will these dangerous criminals be controlled.
That and the most effective ways to make a crime hard to prove is to make sure the time between the events and the report will be as long as possible. Taking your victims phone as you retreat from the scene makes sense, you don't want them doing anything rash like calling any friends or the police.
There should be two or even three standards here. There is a standard for criminal charges and there is a standard for personal judgment about the situation; who can be trusted, who you do or do not want to associate with etc.
I know Georgia, I have never met this Fernando Gont character. Four things I'd say about Georgia are she is not the type to make up facts, she is very very smart, and very career minded, a normally very easy going as far as interpersonal matters. I don't think going public with this will help her career. Sure it games her name out there but It does so as someone you might need to watch yourself around or something, if you don't already know better. If anything these accusations will hurt her unless definitively proven. So I don't see any motive to for her lie. I'd trust her even if she did have motive; because I know her to be trust worthy anyway, but even if that were not the case I can't see any incentive to lie.
As far as how I'll handle myself in the community, and what personal opinions I hold: Georgia says it happened. That is good enough for me. Maybe people how know Fernando will reach the same conclusion maybe the opposite, or maybe something in between but that is for them to decide.
If this was criminal legal matter that would be a different standard. I would just that standard if I was on a jury ( and did not know her, otherwise I'd never get on the jury), than if we take as a given all the physical evidence mentioned in their respective blog posts exits; I don't think there would be enough for me to reach any conclusions that meet the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard. If it were a civil trial that would be a lower standard but would still need to be based on evidence, not sure how I'd go on that. I would have to see this security footage, and photo, the coffee mug etc.
I don't agree. When in history has domestic intelligence not been used in unintended ways? Why do think it will be different this time?
The fact is all the firewalls don't work because nothing stops anyone from changing the rules later on. The only way to prevent a government any government, possible any organization from misusing data is to prevent it from collecting such data in the first place and even that isn't easy. Data gathering is very much a case of you can't put the genie back in the bottle.
Come on that stuff is second rate bullshit propaganda and you know it; apologist asshole. They contain absolutely no detail about what specific information was used, if it could have been known other ways, how far along these 'plots' were, or if the 'conspirators' had any real capability of caring them out.
I think we can pretty safely assume these would be attackers probably had little operation capability if they even really exist. I mean come on the Administration's proudest media moments were foiling things like the Time Square Attack were they saved us from a dangerous 'plot' to set of some fireworks in the back of a car near a propane cylinder. Give me fracking break.
Nobody is listing because nobody listens to habitual liars. The Federal government has no credibility anymore when it comes to anything intelligence related with much of public.
I did not mean to imply the Sony is any better. The OtherOS problem if anything show there is industry precedent for the behavior. It been done so we can expect someone might try again.
We know what at least some folks at MS want things to work, if anything at this point I think the onus is on them to show they are not likely turn these "features" back on in the future after people have already purchased the units.
Actually that is exactly what I would expect from HR. I would expect to send mail to a shared mailbox and get a response in a timely manor. I know there is probably only one or two payroll people and expecting them to drop what they are doing and talk to me right now makes no sense. First supposed I did not get my direct deposit Friday. Its Monday morning, what am I going to do get a paper check from them leave the office and take it directly to the bank where it won't clear for a day anyway? No. So it not important it happens right away.
I would attempt to send my request to the correct person to handle it. It is the payroll admins job to handle these things. It is NOT the system admins job to reset a password. Its helpdesk/support desks job to do that. You would not take your payroll issue to the HR director would you? No, you'd take it to the payroll clerk and they would either take care of it or escalate up the HR chain as appropriate. I don't know why in IT its considered appropriate to just grab anyone at all and expect them do something for you.
Then there is the issue of if you asking for you account to be unlocked, or your password to be reset chances are its because YOU screwed up. You failed to remember your password, chose to ignore the 14 days of expiration notices, can't type etc. If my paycheck is deposited its nothing I had anything to do with, it was an oversight by someone else. They are correcting their own mistake, while IT is correcting yours.
Finally in almost every other situation the person has done their homework, with IT this is almost never the case. "I can't get on VPN?" um okay can you get to say google? "No" Well...
They turned it off for now. What's to say they won't turn it back on a year or two from now?
Still its amazing given the public's reaction to the roomers about the always on requirements they had an opportunity to "fix it" prior to launch and just say it was always just roomers. Seems they could have easily avoided the embarrassing public back pedal here and loss of trust.
I can hear it now.
"Its only meta data. We got all the logs who went where and for how long but nothing about what they did there so its okay."
"Ah well we only track the movements of non-citizens, but you figure there is 51% chance a non-citizen is aboard if the vehicle has ever been within 90 miles of an airport"