Re: [liberationtech] Why we can't go back to business as usual post-PRISM.
All, I am still trying to digest the full significance of everything that has been disclosed and discussed in the past 72 hours, but the issues that I keep coming back to in my head, and which I will likely write more about, are: 1. This scandal, and the financial crisis that happened not long after it really began, represent major situations where all three branches of government failed, both in their own capacities, and in their role as checks on the other branches of government. 2. President Obama's defense of PRISM as being court-sanctioned, entirely consistent with what we would do, for example, in a criminal investigation, is so blatantly disingenuous that it truly staggers me. Criminal investigations do not take place in secret courts that issue secret orders. Some do involve documents under seal, but to argue, as Obama did, that the FISC is just like any other court is just wrong. Secondly, (and I have read this point elsewhere), his implication that members of Congress should have just spoken up if they were concerned, when doing so would have been considered a crime of the highest order, is unbelievable. (If you missed it, his speech on PRISM is transcribed here: http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2013/06/07/transcript-what-obama-said-on-nsa-controversy/.) Generally, I am not surprised by any of this. I, like many, already knew that Palantir does work for the NSA, that the NSA oversteps its reach regularly, and that government is severely broken. I don't have a cell phone and never have, this type of scenario being a major reason why. But to hear the President of the United States--and not George W. Bush--defend such brazenly unconstitutional activities is deeply, deeply disturbing to me, and leaves me feeling as though the nation has finally completed its slide into a larger-than-average third-world autocracy, run by small-minded men who mainly fear the unknown. Given that I'm a person who asks a lot of questions, it makes me incredibly anxious knowing for certain that I live there. Aaron -- Too many emails? Unsubscribe, change to digest, or change password by emailing moderator at compa...@stanford.edu or changing your settings at https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech
Re: [liberationtech] Why we can't go back to business as usual post-PRISM.
I don't know who you are or what work you do; perhaps it is the greatest work ever done in law and the digital age. You were linked on Hacker Newshttps://mailman.stanford.edu/pipermail/liberationtech/2013-June/008839.html, so I will assume what you are concerned with is important. There is an aspect of this story worth mentioning. It is how *little* power the government has used to protect and provide for the poor and disadvantaged. And just when the economy was improving, just when health care for all could be possible, just when the *evidence* that government could work not just for the privileged, this story, important in it's own right, has the potential to undermine this progress. Government has to begin to work for the collective good of the people and not be exploited by private interests. Yes. We need to protect the people from abusive government power. But it is as much of a problem of how private interests, through law and economics, limit the governments power to achieve a public good. Health care, education, infrastructure, and jobs, are some of the areas that increased, not less, government power could be effectively utilized. I worry that governments ability to work for our common good, is going to be undermined through recent news. I hope all will keep in mind the richness and complexity of the issues at hand. Thanks. -- Too many emails? Unsubscribe, change to digest, or change password by emailing moderator at compa...@stanford.edu or changing your settings at https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech
[liberationtech] Why we can't go back to business as usual post-PRISM.
Many people in spheres of cryptography and digital rights activism have long assumed (or—frankly—known about) pervasive government surveillance of the Internet and other communications networks. So it's unsurprising that there is something of an undertone in PRISM discussions of meh, it's terrible but it's not really news or even so far, this is less bad than I was assuming. It would be nice to think that we could go back to business as usual, quietly fighting (or tolerating) these intrusions—but I don't believe we can. The recent revelations come with a radical increase in the risk of harm from these programs, even to those who were already assuming they existed. To understand why, it might be helpful for me to share how I answer this unrelated question: Why would you use AES/RSA/etc. when the NSA employs more mathematicians than anyone else and may well have cracked them? The answer: if the popular cryptographic constructs have been cracked, the knowledge that they were cracked—even without the how—would be insanely valuable. So much so that unless you presented an existential threat to the cracking party, they would be very hesitant to use that ability against you if even a tiny risk existed that doing so could reveal their capability and thereby make it less valuable. In the case of mass surveillance programs not only is there a risk that people would change behavior—switching to SSL with PFS for all communications, making more use of high-delay mixing networks, decentralized services, non-cloud open source software, etc.—but since these programs are obviously illegal to many outside of the incestuous world of intelligence, by revealing the capability they risk it being simply taken away by the rule of law. (Even those who have convinced themselves that these programs are lawful and righteous must recognize that they are on thin ice and public opinion may go another way). And so—before the capability was made public, it _likely_ wouldn't have been used against mere political nuisances, at least not without the additional cost of creating a solid pretext for the resulting intelligence. But now this deterrent is gone: the burden of utter secrecy is reduced. And if these programs are not eliminated, greatly curtailed, or made moot, we can expect them to be employed much more freely. -- Too many emails? Unsubscribe, change to digest, or change password by emailing moderator at compa...@stanford.edu or changing your settings at https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech
