I saw the question on Reddit after a different revelation last month. I feel like we're going to ask that question more and more.
I can only hope more and more of us are inspired, as Snowden was by Levinson (Lavabit's CEO) and many of us have been by both of them, and we act to protect ourselves and constrain our governments from overreaching to where they can't help repeating the disasters of previous overreaching governments.
My reply on Reddit when I see people bring that up is simple:
You insult people who have experienced a police state by calling what we are experiencing a police state.
A police state has no distinction between legislation and executive.
Our legislation is currently investigating the president for:
* CIA coverup of the attack on our Benghazi consulate'
* IRS targeting of political opposition
They're planning on using their primary power, the power over our nations money, to enforce not only strict budget cuts, but requiring that the President's signature legislative victory be repealed.
That's before we discuss the court and how they've treated the President. Remember when they threw out his NLRB nominations as unconstitutional?
Now someone will bring up spying, but I urge you to realize that Congressional distaste for spying is centralized among the less important Congresspeople. Our leadership on both sides of the aisle is largely supportive of the infrastructure, seeing as they wrote and passed all of the laws that make it possibly. That's not an executive behaving without regard to legislation, it's one working with them.
I don't see a police state, and I think being cavalier with terminology does a grave injustice to lessons of the past and the people who have experienced (and are experiencing) a totalitarian government with truly no checks and balances.
I got in a bicycle accident on my way home, and somehow managed to get myself home (I don't remember this part) with my face pretty much split open. So, I called 911, and an ambulance and some cops came. The cops asked him some questions.
He freaked out. I got this lecture the next day about how he didn't sign up for this, how I needed to keep his name out of my trouble, how I'm bad news, etc.
I couldn't help but think that talking to the police meant something very, very different where he's from than where I am.
I don't know about a police state, but I've maintained for a while we're clearly living in a very dystopian society.
The problem now is who's going to step into the vacuum and start providing services these people are being persecuted for?? I think this is the real issue. The further you push people down, the more they scatter and go further underground.
The final difference between a true police state and now is that they're allowed to say that they're not allowed to say anything, or that's how it feels.
If you are inspired by him, you should realize that he would want you to focus on the message, not the man himself. He's done a lot to initiate change, but others have in the past too. If we don't follow it up with appropriate political pressure, his sacrifices will have been in vain.
Sounds almost like he self-immolated. Russia is not such a bad place after all, for people with cash, and as a good professional he will certainly get some, and will enjoy celebrity status, and KGB will care for him rather than scare him.
Sacrified his life? Please stop. He merely leaked classified data and sold pieces of it here and there. He is basically living the life of a celebrity right now yet dramafies his existence.
CALEA (Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, 1994) addresses real-time monitoring of the communications of a single person, by way of a warrant. Lavabit has complied with warrants in the past [1] without shutting down services. Real-time interception does not fundamentally break Lavabit's security model [2] of encrypting incoming email and never storing the user's password, which is required to use their private key when they wish to access the mail. The implication in this shutdown is that the basic security model would be compromised, allowing untargeted retroactive snooping without needing to wait for the user to log in. Such a system is functionally equivalent to not having server-side encryption at all. Regardless of your stance on government snooping, this is just bad security, allowing a successful attacker to take all data in one shot rather than only being able to snoop on users currently accessing their mail.
"Note how a country's human rights problems becomes of interest to the US political and media class only when that country defies the US"
I am glad Greenwald has cottoned on to this and also made pointed remarks on the use of the abuses of others to question the ethics of Assange and Snowden in their "choice" of destination.
It's reminiscent of the cold war retort from the soviets.
Snowden: "Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo, Apple, and the rest of our internet titans must ask themselves why they aren't fighting for our interests the same way".
Indeed, they must. Your move Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo and Apple.
Shifting the blame and the burden for policy reform onto firms is not only silly but also unfair, you can't really expect them to shut down, they are not one man operations like Lavabit.
And now we have completed the move to the story is about Snowden.
I wonder what his favorite food is? What is his favorite band? Where is his favorite place to shop? What does he think of the architecture of St. Basils?
A few more weeks and it will be 'Privacy Expert Snowden says...' and no one will remember why he's even famous.
Neither the story itself nor the actual title of the piece is about Snowden; whoever submitted the link to HN highlighted the comment by Snowden in their own title. Did you click the link? Did you read the article?
It's even more ironic when you consider that Greenwald has criticized others in the media for focusing more on Snowden and his day-to-day actions or location instead of the NSA revelations.
Kind of sucks for those customers though, who can't get their email out. I get it, but man I'm glad I didn't use lavabit. The lavabit founder is probably going to have to deal with some serious civil legal problems, and maybe even criminal ones too.
I don't know where I stand on this. I feel like the NSA can't respond because they're trapped by the same secrecy that they operate in from speaking out, although the lies and backtracking don't help, so this echo chamber is just amplifying itself to the point people are making big bold moves that hurt themselves (and their customers) when anyone has yet to demonstrate a single instance of where the NSA has misused their information (if you don't assume the DEA parallel reconstruction is using NSA data, which is maybe speculative or not).
Well at least Obama is meeting with Tim Cook about this, because that makes sense. I've been thinking, why doesn't Tim Cook go talk to the president about this. Because...yeah.
Help me with this. A) I'm a non dev and b) I'm trying to cut to the chase vs use inflamed terms like Freedom of Speech and Police State. I'm piecing this together from the few comments I see that trying and get to the core of the issue.
i) Lavabit's provided a communication service (email) that was uniquely designed so as the content's literally did not touch their servers. Therefore, if the NSA came to them wanting to look at communications by their users they would literally be told "It's impossible to do that"
ii) NSA (or government in general) says "We cannot allow you to have a service that is completely untraceable. You need to begin having a way to trace this.
iii) Lavabit's understands that this is their commercial value proposition. Should they be forced to do this they literally go out of business.
iv) They fight it hard for a while but realize it's futile so shut up shop vs slowly go out of business.
Is that right?
As a side note I'm somewhat uncomfortable with the Greenwald/Snowden circular loop. It's very close to a propaganda loop and not all that different to other media outlets who get two like minded people and thus really just have a mutually agreeable conversation vs a reporting role. The danger being of course it's passed off as news by being positioned as such.
> that was uniquely designed so as the content's literally did not touch their servers
It only touched their servers in encrypted form, never plaintext.
They would have had to wiretap their customer to retrieve content (for example, client side JS monitoring the next time the user accessed their email on the server) since all email was encrypted on the server harddrives and only accessible via the user.
Instead if it wasn't encrypted they could have used a normal search warrant which would have given the police access to the plaintext content immediately.
What was unique about Lavabit is that they never had the ability to decrypt the content without involving the user, since they never had the "private key".
I'd love to know what the consequences of making public these secret court orders and trials. One company standing up to the government and making public the actual content and threats could make a big difference.
Yet a "safe" email system is now gone. A better idea would be to move yourself and your encrypted email company to a country that will let you keep providing such a useful service (assuming there is one).
Email is not safe, by design. Even if you do encrypt the contents using PGP or GPG, the headers are too much exposure. They will know who when and with whom you correspond, and all the hosts the mail passed through (if you are not using anonymous re-mailers). The current implementation of email is "defective by design". But _there_are_ alternatives [1], you must just start using them.
[1] RetroShare, BitMessage, I2P Bote, Freenet + Frost and some others, which haven't tried yet.
With NZ becoming less safe, it seems that's exactly what Mega intends to do for its storage service and the upcoming secure e-mail service. If he does it right, it could fill the space left Lavabit and Silent Mail.
The darker side of this, they can't speak about it because of state secrets, and any other individuals involved in other stuff has to deal with the same problem.
I'd think, people would end up speaking out when they're threatened by the NSA to shut up, but they have nowhere to go for legal advice.
I wonder if the government or the NSA could manage to shut down a class action if there would be one.
Now that we are seeing more and more publicity surrounding this issue and companies are at least attempting to be transparent, how can we spark a fundamental change in the way the Govt sees this issue.
The public need to hold these people accountable in some fashion, criminally is probably out of the question. Whether it be by some investigation committee by congress, supreme court intervention, or simply voting the current incumbents out.
We need to stop the Govt from just abiding by the letter of the laws and not by going with the Spirit of the law. The Government shouldnt be finding loop holes in their laws or playing games about the meaning of words when the are questioned by officials.
What's up with all of these news articles where person A thinks topic B is word "C", in quotes? Maybe I'm missing something, but just throwing words onto events and calling it news looks like unthoughtful neurolinguistic programming. "this thing is called 'horrifying'". Often the articles don't declare the subject, so we just see that an invisible someone has done something. Sort of like "Wall graffitied with "$GANGTAG" sign". Off topic, I know. Just having a tough time grappling with news articles titled like this..
[+] [-] spodek|12 years ago|reply
I saw the question on Reddit after a different revelation last month. I feel like we're going to ask that question more and more.
I can only hope more and more of us are inspired, as Snowden was by Levinson (Lavabit's CEO) and many of us have been by both of them, and we act to protect ourselves and constrain our governments from overreaching to where they can't help repeating the disasters of previous overreaching governments.
[+] [-] criley2|12 years ago|reply
You insult people who have experienced a police state by calling what we are experiencing a police state.
A police state has no distinction between legislation and executive.
Our legislation is currently investigating the president for: * CIA coverup of the attack on our Benghazi consulate' * IRS targeting of political opposition
They're planning on using their primary power, the power over our nations money, to enforce not only strict budget cuts, but requiring that the President's signature legislative victory be repealed.
That's before we discuss the court and how they've treated the President. Remember when they threw out his NLRB nominations as unconstitutional?
Now someone will bring up spying, but I urge you to realize that Congressional distaste for spying is centralized among the less important Congresspeople. Our leadership on both sides of the aisle is largely supportive of the infrastructure, seeing as they wrote and passed all of the laws that make it possibly. That's not an executive behaving without regard to legislation, it's one working with them.
I don't see a police state, and I think being cavalier with terminology does a grave injustice to lessons of the past and the people who have experienced (and are experiencing) a totalitarian government with truly no checks and balances.
[+] [-] neutronicus|12 years ago|reply
I got in a bicycle accident on my way home, and somehow managed to get myself home (I don't remember this part) with my face pretty much split open. So, I called 911, and an ambulance and some cops came. The cops asked him some questions.
He freaked out. I got this lecture the next day about how he didn't sign up for this, how I needed to keep his name out of my trouble, how I'm bad news, etc.
I couldn't help but think that talking to the police meant something very, very different where he's from than where I am.
Food for thought.
[+] [-] at-fates-hands|12 years ago|reply
The problem now is who's going to step into the vacuum and start providing services these people are being persecuted for?? I think this is the real issue. The further you push people down, the more they scatter and go further underground.
Sad, sad state of affairs for this country. . .
[+] [-] buro9|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] markkat|12 years ago|reply
In short, the difference between a surveillance state and a police state is a matter of nature, but they have capabilities in common.
I think a police state will likely follow.
[+] [-] spoiledtechie|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nicholassmith|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ck2|12 years ago|reply
He sacrified his life for us. He is the inspiration.
Certainly no president in the next few terms will rest until he is rendered, he has to look over his shoulder now forever.
Thank you for your sacrifice Mr. Snowden.
[+] [-] john_b|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] muyuu|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vectorpush|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] anovikov|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pearjuice|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jedbrown|12 years ago|reply
[1] http://ia600908.us.archive.org/9/items/gov.uscourts.mdd.2362... [2] http://possibility.com/LavabitArchitecture.html
[+] [-] MWil|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eliasmacpherson|12 years ago|reply
I am glad Greenwald has cottoned on to this and also made pointed remarks on the use of the abuses of others to question the ethics of Assange and Snowden in their "choice" of destination. It's reminiscent of the cold war retort from the soviets.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_you_are_lynching_Negroes
[+] [-] mtgx|12 years ago|reply
Indeed, they must. Your move Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo and Apple.
[+] [-] brador|12 years ago|reply
In the end the base unit of society is still the human, no matter how many layers we place around them.
[+] [-] a3n|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MrKurtz|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mhurron|12 years ago|reply
I wonder what his favorite food is? What is his favorite band? Where is his favorite place to shop? What does he think of the architecture of St. Basils?
A few more weeks and it will be 'Privacy Expert Snowden says...' and no one will remember why he's even famous.
[+] [-] _bfhp|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brown9-2|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] greyman|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rthomas6|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] btipling|12 years ago|reply
I don't know where I stand on this. I feel like the NSA can't respond because they're trapped by the same secrecy that they operate in from speaking out, although the lies and backtracking don't help, so this echo chamber is just amplifying itself to the point people are making big bold moves that hurt themselves (and their customers) when anyone has yet to demonstrate a single instance of where the NSA has misused their information (if you don't assume the DEA parallel reconstruction is using NSA data, which is maybe speculative or not).
Well at least Obama is meeting with Tim Cook about this, because that makes sense. I've been thinking, why doesn't Tim Cook go talk to the president about this. Because...yeah.
[+] [-] jusben1369|12 years ago|reply
i) Lavabit's provided a communication service (email) that was uniquely designed so as the content's literally did not touch their servers. Therefore, if the NSA came to them wanting to look at communications by their users they would literally be told "It's impossible to do that" ii) NSA (or government in general) says "We cannot allow you to have a service that is completely untraceable. You need to begin having a way to trace this. iii) Lavabit's understands that this is their commercial value proposition. Should they be forced to do this they literally go out of business. iv) They fight it hard for a while but realize it's futile so shut up shop vs slowly go out of business.
Is that right?
As a side note I'm somewhat uncomfortable with the Greenwald/Snowden circular loop. It's very close to a propaganda loop and not all that different to other media outlets who get two like minded people and thus really just have a mutually agreeable conversation vs a reporting role. The danger being of course it's passed off as news by being positioned as such.
[+] [-] dmix|12 years ago|reply
It only touched their servers in encrypted form, never plaintext.
They would have had to wiretap their customer to retrieve content (for example, client side JS monitoring the next time the user accessed their email on the server) since all email was encrypted on the server harddrives and only accessible via the user.
Instead if it wasn't encrypted they could have used a normal search warrant which would have given the police access to the plaintext content immediately.
What was unique about Lavabit is that they never had the ability to decrypt the content without involving the user, since they never had the "private key".
[+] [-] grandalf|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cbhl|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] k-mcgrady|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] coldcode|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] conductor|12 years ago|reply
[1] RetroShare, BitMessage, I2P Bote, Freenet + Frost and some others, which haven't tried yet.
[+] [-] mtgx|12 years ago|reply
https://torrentfreak.com/kim-dotcom-will-move-mega-privacy-s...
[+] [-] mcv|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jokoon|12 years ago|reply
I'd think, people would end up speaking out when they're threatened by the NSA to shut up, but they have nowhere to go for legal advice.
I wonder if the government or the NSA could manage to shut down a class action if there would be one.
[+] [-] MWil|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dspillett|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] speeder|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wil421|12 years ago|reply
The public need to hold these people accountable in some fashion, criminally is probably out of the question. Whether it be by some investigation committee by congress, supreme court intervention, or simply voting the current incumbents out.
We need to stop the Govt from just abiding by the letter of the laws and not by going with the Spirit of the law. The Government shouldnt be finding loop holes in their laws or playing games about the meaning of words when the are questioned by officials.
[+] [-] quantumpotato_|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] susi22|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] mcv|12 years ago|reply