I think a lot of people are OK with mass surveillance given a basically benign, good government (which many people tend to think our government is, currently).
The problem is that once all of this machinery is in place, it can be used by any government that happens to come to power -- it makes it too easy for a non-benign, dictatorial government to say in power, egregiously abusing the ability to spy on arbitrary citizens.
> a lot of people are OK with mass surveillance given a basically benign, good government
That's so crazy to me. We don't have to go back that far in history to find an FBI director who used surveillance to settle petty grudges, and we had a PRESIDENT within my lifetime [1] that abused this type of information. Even if you believe the US government is generally good, there's no way anyone should believe this stuff won't be abused by bad actors within the system.
I "Have nothing to hide"... So long as the government agents who're tracking me have nothing, either. I will give up all my phone metadata as soon as everyone gives up all their phone metadata. I don't care about the privacy, only about the power imbalance that it creates.
Admittedly, I don't think that it's a good idea: There are many people who do care about privacy, for good reasons. The LGBT teenager who's not out yet - and never will be, to their parents, because of old bigotries. The kinkster with a vanilla SO, who goes out to be beaten and then goes home to have sex. The recovering drug addict, anxious to hide their checkered past, relying on the anonymity of moving to help with their future job prospects and recovery. These are all good reasons to continue a world with privacy... But I personally am fine moving to a more open world, and if society chooses, to damn these people with the rest. It's just important to me that we go into that world with eyes open.
If the technology is there, what's to stop the dictatorial government from installing mass surveillance systems at the drop of a hat? It is a dictatorship after all, it can do that!
Better then, perhaps, to have existing systems with well-understood capabilities and known scopes of operation?
Alternatively, If the dictatorship will have access to surveillance whether or not the good government installs it, then what the dictatorship will do with surveillance is irrelevant.
I am probably naive, but I still doubt the ability of the US Government or even the National Security State (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_security#National_secu...) to be tightly wound enough to advance together to attack our civil liberties in concert. Look at what a mess they've created in other aspects of nat'l policy.
Rather, I believe this slow but steady institutional creep against our civil liberties is mostly the work of independent bureaucrats who realize that by expanding their individual silos of power (i.e., expanding what their departments surveil and parse), they're a) keeping open the funding spigot, b) expanding their personal power and c) solidifying their job security. "National defense," since 1776, but especially since World War 2, has always been a bi-partisan rallying cry, after all.
In practice, the guys who get on TV (also known elected leaders), try as they might, have very little control over what actual policy is implemented in the realm of national security. They're just appealing to our most base instincts to remain elected, I think.
Politics is a lot rougher than most people know and the "goodness" of our government is more on the shady end of the spectrum than most people know. I'd bet most people would be horrified about this kind of power if they did know how unclean the sausage factory really is.
We read about how military, industry, organized crime, intelligence services, etc. influence other governments in untoward ways and assume it doesn't happen here. Whereas the real difference is more of a matter of degree.
This summer, I was working with a Harvard Computer Science student who also said "I don't care, I have nothing to hide." This worried me to no end, that extremely smart kids could be so naive like this.
I challenged him to send texts to one of his buddies, where he would simulate planning of a terrorist attack. He was going to, but then I stopped him, because I would have felt too guilty if he actually went through with it and got into trouble with the law, which I honestly believe he would have.
he being in a top university and not being too rich is already a sign that he plays by the rules. smart, not necessarily.
but the REAL reason not much people care, is because everyone have lives!
when was the last time you went to your town hall meeting? do you even do 1h of research before voting? or do you even vote? ...shit have to go really down until people even have any opinion.
Every Senator or Congressman that votes to continue this Metadata BS program release all of THEIR Metadata. If you have nothing to hide why not release all of the following:
Every Phone number they called in the past 5 years with a date and time-stamp attached from their Home, Office and Cell numbers.
Every email-recipient they ever sent e-mail to in the past 5 years from all their addresses - personal address, Official address etc
Every website visited from their Home IP, Smart phone, Office and desk computer.
IF even ONE of the 535 US esteemed legislators in both houses agrees to this...lets say that Swine would be airborne in record numbers.
How is that the same at all? The NSA presumably already has all of that info. The Senators who are saying "I trust the NSA with my data" are trusting the NSA with their data. That doesn't mean they want everybody to know their metadata.
In case anyone else missed it on the first pass: the article mentions that the FBI "went so far as to come up with assassination plans on Occupy Wall Street leaders," but the linked source[0] describes the FBI uncovering an assassination plot, not making one themselves.
I think OWS was the real reason for the ramp up in "total information awareness" surveillance.
I don't think most people realized how effective it was at bringing out collective activism and anger, and how much danger that put the establishment in. They were clearly looking at Egypt and back to OWS and thinking "that shit can NOT be allowed to happen here".
So, how to stop the next one? Mass surveillance - pick out the seedlings of discontent and crush them before they grow big enough to become threatening again.
I'm convinced is also the reason why they considered assassination. They were getting a little desperate.
I have increased the amount of chatter I put out, trying to raise awareness with friends and family, but I feel myself evaluating each and every post - what flags is this raising? How might this be used against me in the future? I am travelling to the US from Canada for Thanksgiving, and that fact alone gives me pause when I say things critical of the political system.
I warm my chilled self by holding onto the thought that recognizing our self-censorship is the first step to fighting against it.
> How might this be used against me in the future?
I was already doing that, but because "The Internet never forgets", not because of surveillance.
Or in other words, I've already assumed either outright surveillance from the ISP or the botnetted-computers my friends/family use to go to visit my Facebook crap, or later database breaches/hacks conducted by criminal elements.
I mean, all you have to do is look at /r/cringepics, "lamebook", 4chan, etc. etc. to realize that people actually are watching what you post, commenting about those things you post (in forms easily queried by Google) and those people don't work for NSA (who in any event can neither retain the entire Internet indefinitely, nor actually look at everything that's captured even if they felt like it).
So watch what you say if you feel you must, but I don't see why NSA in particular would cause a shift in your behavior, if having things you said come back to bite you later is something you're worried about as a concept, you've long had reason to be concerned.
I was like this too, then I took the plunge. I installed the Flagger app linked in the post and regularly chat on AIM about things a Good American should not.
I recently flew to DC (for the StopWatchingUs protest) and even did a body scanner opt-out. Went through without a squeak. The government...they don't care about terrorism. They're just grabbing for power. Even if they did finger me somehow, the TSA is too hairbrained to figure it out.
Just remember that by saying exactly what is on your mind is exactly what makes you a patriot. This is the founding principal of our country. By doing this, you are fighting the same way our founders did.
I do the same thing, and as a Canadian, I wonder about exactly the same thing. I was boycotting travelling to the US but need to travel through there on my way somewhere. I probably shouldn't be concerned as I'm a complete nobody, but I am. I would guess lots of others are as well. It can't be good for tourism.
I'm a little shocked there isn't more outrage in the 'Land of the Free'. Things have degraded to the point that I would think there would be a story on major TV news sites every night.
Of course the surveillance is about control... It seems so obvious to me that I don't even give it much thought, but I think there are far too many variables affecting the current state of affairs, regarding the NSA, surveillance, etc. It wasn't just one event, one government administration, one legislative change or one technological advancement that got us into this mess. Several factors have converged to create the current police state, but I ask: Why are people suddenly so upset about finding out that the NSA has found an efficient means to surveil the populous when so many organizations have been doing this for years?
Nobody was getting upset when Google was reading your emails; Facebook was reading your private messages; Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile were tracking your calls and geo-locations... All for the sake of more efficiently marketing to you. Advertisement is just another form of control. They don't tell you or force you to do or not do something, they just efficiently convince people to part with their money and make those people think that it was their own idea to do so all along.
All these concerns come down to whether we collectively think these practices are right or wrong, and it is becoming more difficult to make these judgements without a bias and it's difficult to continually evaluate whether your bias has been externally affected by these business practices.
The reason why nothing is truly being done about this massive theft of privacy is because people are complacent with the idea. We can't truly get upset that our governments are taking away our privacy when we have been giving it away to private corporations and religious organizations for so long.
Completely agree. It's hard to care about privacy when we get so much in return for surrendering it. Things don't cost money anymore, instead they cost our private lives. This is a bargain we've been making for a long time, and people are subconsciously aware of it. I think this plays a huge role into why people don't care about the NSA in general...every fucking other organization is spying on them too, what's one more??
I'm convinced the way to combat it is to provide services people use that are convenient and respect privacy. Not via easily-broken promises (Privacy Policy!!) but by enforcing privacy in the client. If cloud services only store encrypted data, you get the convenience and the privacy without compromise.
Once more companies make this shift, I think you'll see people realizing they don't mind spending a few bucks (hell they spend it on new apps all the time) to not have a million anal probes jammed into their private lives 24/7.
"Let’s be extremely generous and say that, on average, 3,000 Americans die every year from terror attacks [...]
The government has yet to prove one credible example of a legitimate terror plot that was prevented thanks to mass surveillance. If they want to insist that spying makes us safer, this would be good information to know."
Is that not evidence that to some degree, the surveillance works to keep terrorism down? One of the biggest deterrents to committing a crime is the certainty of getting caught. I realize that people have blogged about how to circumvent a lot of the security making it seem pointless, but I assume even the appearance of security would make it seem like less of an appealing idea to a would-be terrorist.
EDIT: I should say "interesting" rather than "weird." This post is assuming the psychology of a terrorist is similar to a white collar or petty criminal, which obviously isn't always the case. But maybe it's not too much of a stretch to say it doesn't stop senseless violence or serial killers from committing similar acts of terror.
One of the biggest deterrents to committing a crime is the certainty of getting caught.
Maybe for you, personally, but not for a genuine terrorist.
Saying that domestic spying deters someone with a deep hatred of a country from committing an act of terrorism is like saying that gun laws reduce gang violence.
There is just no way to deter the will of sufficiently motivated person or group of people.
Do you know why crocodiles have red eyes? Well, that's to hide in tomato plants! Have you ever seen a crocodile in a tomato plant? Never? Yeah... Because they are impossible to spot.
>> One of the biggest deterrents to committing a crime is the certainty of getting caught.
No, for a suicidal terrorist it is not. He'd be dead anyway, who you're going to catch? Of course, there's a risk of getting caught before, but that is known and they are sure they can avoid it, it doesn't deter them.
>> but I assume even the appearance of security would make it seem like less of an appealing idea to a would-be terrorist.
To a very stupid terrorist that can't understand it is only an appearance - maybe. However, you can deter very stupid terrorists much cheaper and without destroying civil liberties. And those who can add two and two, you'd do nothing by playing theater with them except wasting resources that actually could have gone to catch them. Every minute NSA analyst spends on spying on innocent people he doesn't spend watching terrorists. And even in the NSA the resources are finite.
Isn't it more banal and just people using budgets and extending their influence within the community that decides the funding? Bad metrics create weird outcomes, etc.
Pick any government agency at random. You'll find weird spending, baffling ideas, inefficiencies, power struggles with other agencies, etc. That agency will try to define their role in a way that maximises the money they need to do that job and that claims authority for that particular area.
I imagine the NSA feels fine about what they do. They probably have a bunch of techniques that they've rejected as being too intrusive or too constitution-violating. Something about "Overton Window" fits here - you hear about Guantanomo and you think "Hey, we're not torturing people like they do there, so we're better".
Add weak oversight, and a favourable exploitable atmosphere about a bogeyman ("THE COMMUNISTS!" "TERRORISTS!" "DRUGS!") and it's easy to see how an agency ends up going too far.
Going too far if you regulate children's play areas or the size of holes in fishnets doesn't mean much. Obviously, going too far when you're NSA ends up with a really bad situation.
Oh really? Please show me in the Constitution where the words "police state" are mentioned.
"Unconstitutional" has become a lazy way to dress up a claim that something is bad. I'm not saying that what's going on with surveillance in the U.S. is a good thing, but you're not helping your cause here.
(For that matter, there's nothing about a "right to overthrow [a] corrupt government" in the Constitution either. nullsocket may be thinking of the Declaration of Independence, and its basis in the social contract theory of Locke's Second Treatise on Government.)
I think it's more about money. Wherever there's an opportunity to do the following: 1) make money and 2) keep control of the flow of money, there are people who would do it at the expense of others.
I see this in Congress and a lot of government leaders not just within NSA.
[+] [-] dilap|12 years ago|reply
The problem is that once all of this machinery is in place, it can be used by any government that happens to come to power -- it makes it too easy for a non-benign, dictatorial government to say in power, egregiously abusing the ability to spy on arbitrary citizens.
[+] [-] IvyMike|12 years ago|reply
That's so crazy to me. We don't have to go back that far in history to find an FBI director who used surveillance to settle petty grudges, and we had a PRESIDENT within my lifetime [1] that abused this type of information. Even if you believe the US government is generally good, there's no way anyone should believe this stuff won't be abused by bad actors within the system.
[1] Granted I was 1 year old when Nixon resigned.
[+] [-] GauntletWizard|12 years ago|reply
Admittedly, I don't think that it's a good idea: There are many people who do care about privacy, for good reasons. The LGBT teenager who's not out yet - and never will be, to their parents, because of old bigotries. The kinkster with a vanilla SO, who goes out to be beaten and then goes home to have sex. The recovering drug addict, anxious to hide their checkered past, relying on the anonymity of moving to help with their future job prospects and recovery. These are all good reasons to continue a world with privacy... But I personally am fine moving to a more open world, and if society chooses, to damn these people with the rest. It's just important to me that we go into that world with eyes open.
[+] [-] sliverstorm|12 years ago|reply
Better then, perhaps, to have existing systems with well-understood capabilities and known scopes of operation?
Alternatively, If the dictatorship will have access to surveillance whether or not the good government installs it, then what the dictatorship will do with surveillance is irrelevant.
[+] [-] pstuart|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tejay|12 years ago|reply
Rather, I believe this slow but steady institutional creep against our civil liberties is mostly the work of independent bureaucrats who realize that by expanding their individual silos of power (i.e., expanding what their departments surveil and parse), they're a) keeping open the funding spigot, b) expanding their personal power and c) solidifying their job security. "National defense," since 1776, but especially since World War 2, has always been a bi-partisan rallying cry, after all.
In practice, the guys who get on TV (also known elected leaders), try as they might, have very little control over what actual policy is implemented in the realm of national security. They're just appealing to our most base instincts to remain elected, I think.
[+] [-] Zigurd|12 years ago|reply
We read about how military, industry, organized crime, intelligence services, etc. influence other governments in untoward ways and assume it doesn't happen here. Whereas the real difference is more of a matter of degree.
[+] [-] steven2012|12 years ago|reply
I challenged him to send texts to one of his buddies, where he would simulate planning of a terrorist attack. He was going to, but then I stopped him, because I would have felt too guilty if he actually went through with it and got into trouble with the law, which I honestly believe he would have.
[+] [-] gcb1|12 years ago|reply
but the REAL reason not much people care, is because everyone have lives!
when was the last time you went to your town hall meeting? do you even do 1h of research before voting? or do you even vote? ...shit have to go really down until people even have any opinion.
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] andyl|12 years ago|reply
Bingo. Mass surveillance is a tool to protect the oligarchs from its citizens. The terrorist threat is theatrical misdirection.
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] suprgeek|12 years ago|reply
Every Senator or Congressman that votes to continue this Metadata BS program release all of THEIR Metadata. If you have nothing to hide why not release all of the following:
Every Phone number they called in the past 5 years with a date and time-stamp attached from their Home, Office and Cell numbers.
Every email-recipient they ever sent e-mail to in the past 5 years from all their addresses - personal address, Official address etc
Every website visited from their Home IP, Smart phone, Office and desk computer.
IF even ONE of the 535 US esteemed legislators in both houses agrees to this...lets say that Swine would be airborne in record numbers.
[+] [-] ChrisAntaki|12 years ago|reply
It's not just metadata, they collect full audio & text content as well. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A
[+] [-] tedunangst|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] AutoCorrect|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bkirwi|12 years ago|reply
[0] http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/06/30/1220039/-FBI-Kept-Q...
[+] [-] crdoconnor|12 years ago|reply
I don't think most people realized how effective it was at bringing out collective activism and anger, and how much danger that put the establishment in. They were clearly looking at Egypt and back to OWS and thinking "that shit can NOT be allowed to happen here".
So, how to stop the next one? Mass surveillance - pick out the seedlings of discontent and crush them before they grow big enough to become threatening again.
I'm convinced is also the reason why they considered assassination. They were getting a little desperate.
[+] [-] rubbingalcohol|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] robertfw|12 years ago|reply
I warm my chilled self by holding onto the thought that recognizing our self-censorship is the first step to fighting against it.
[+] [-] mpyne|12 years ago|reply
I was already doing that, but because "The Internet never forgets", not because of surveillance.
Or in other words, I've already assumed either outright surveillance from the ISP or the botnetted-computers my friends/family use to go to visit my Facebook crap, or later database breaches/hacks conducted by criminal elements.
I mean, all you have to do is look at /r/cringepics, "lamebook", 4chan, etc. etc. to realize that people actually are watching what you post, commenting about those things you post (in forms easily queried by Google) and those people don't work for NSA (who in any event can neither retain the entire Internet indefinitely, nor actually look at everything that's captured even if they felt like it).
So watch what you say if you feel you must, but I don't see why NSA in particular would cause a shift in your behavior, if having things you said come back to bite you later is something you're worried about as a concept, you've long had reason to be concerned.
[+] [-] orthecreedence|12 years ago|reply
I recently flew to DC (for the StopWatchingUs protest) and even did a body scanner opt-out. Went through without a squeak. The government...they don't care about terrorism. They're just grabbing for power. Even if they did finger me somehow, the TSA is too hairbrained to figure it out.
Just remember that by saying exactly what is on your mind is exactly what makes you a patriot. This is the founding principal of our country. By doing this, you are fighting the same way our founders did.
[+] [-] Nerdfest|12 years ago|reply
I'm a little shocked there isn't more outrage in the 'Land of the Free'. Things have degraded to the point that I would think there would be a story on major TV news sites every night.
[+] [-] thatinstant|12 years ago|reply
Nobody was getting upset when Google was reading your emails; Facebook was reading your private messages; Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile were tracking your calls and geo-locations... All for the sake of more efficiently marketing to you. Advertisement is just another form of control. They don't tell you or force you to do or not do something, they just efficiently convince people to part with their money and make those people think that it was their own idea to do so all along.
All these concerns come down to whether we collectively think these practices are right or wrong, and it is becoming more difficult to make these judgements without a bias and it's difficult to continually evaluate whether your bias has been externally affected by these business practices.
The reason why nothing is truly being done about this massive theft of privacy is because people are complacent with the idea. We can't truly get upset that our governments are taking away our privacy when we have been giving it away to private corporations and religious organizations for so long.
[+] [-] orthecreedence|12 years ago|reply
I'm convinced the way to combat it is to provide services people use that are convenient and respect privacy. Not via easily-broken promises (Privacy Policy!!) but by enforcing privacy in the client. If cloud services only store encrypted data, you get the convenience and the privacy without compromise.
Once more companies make this shift, I think you'll see people realizing they don't mind spending a few bucks (hell they spend it on new apps all the time) to not have a million anal probes jammed into their private lives 24/7.
[+] [-] papa_bear|12 years ago|reply
"Let’s be extremely generous and say that, on average, 3,000 Americans die every year from terror attacks [...]
The government has yet to prove one credible example of a legitimate terror plot that was prevented thanks to mass surveillance. If they want to insist that spying makes us safer, this would be good information to know."
Is that not evidence that to some degree, the surveillance works to keep terrorism down? One of the biggest deterrents to committing a crime is the certainty of getting caught. I realize that people have blogged about how to circumvent a lot of the security making it seem pointless, but I assume even the appearance of security would make it seem like less of an appealing idea to a would-be terrorist.
EDIT: I should say "interesting" rather than "weird." This post is assuming the psychology of a terrorist is similar to a white collar or petty criminal, which obviously isn't always the case. But maybe it's not too much of a stretch to say it doesn't stop senseless violence or serial killers from committing similar acts of terror.
[+] [-] Lagged2Death|12 years ago|reply
Look, all this talk about surveillance is a red herring.
Since 9/11, I've been diligently praying to Zoltar the Space God every day, begging him to put a stop to Islamic terrorism on American soil.
And as you point out, it's been working great. The lack of attacks is evidence that to some degree, Zoltar is powerful and benevolent.
[+] [-] epoxyhockey|12 years ago|reply
Maybe for you, personally, but not for a genuine terrorist.
Saying that domestic spying deters someone with a deep hatred of a country from committing an act of terrorism is like saying that gun laws reduce gang violence.
There is just no way to deter the will of sufficiently motivated person or group of people.
[+] [-] gritzko|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smsm42|12 years ago|reply
No, for a suicidal terrorist it is not. He'd be dead anyway, who you're going to catch? Of course, there's a risk of getting caught before, but that is known and they are sure they can avoid it, it doesn't deter them.
>> but I assume even the appearance of security would make it seem like less of an appealing idea to a would-be terrorist.
To a very stupid terrorist that can't understand it is only an appearance - maybe. However, you can deter very stupid terrorists much cheaper and without destroying civil liberties. And those who can add two and two, you'd do nothing by playing theater with them except wasting resources that actually could have gone to catch them. Every minute NSA analyst spends on spying on innocent people he doesn't spend watching terrorists. And even in the NSA the resources are finite.
[+] [-] DanBC|12 years ago|reply
Pick any government agency at random. You'll find weird spending, baffling ideas, inefficiencies, power struggles with other agencies, etc. That agency will try to define their role in a way that maximises the money they need to do that job and that claims authority for that particular area.
I imagine the NSA feels fine about what they do. They probably have a bunch of techniques that they've rejected as being too intrusive or too constitution-violating. Something about "Overton Window" fits here - you hear about Guantanomo and you think "Hey, we're not torturing people like they do there, so we're better".
Add weak oversight, and a favourable exploitable atmosphere about a bogeyman ("THE COMMUNISTS!" "TERRORISTS!" "DRUGS!") and it's easy to see how an agency ends up going too far.
Going too far if you regulate children's play areas or the size of holes in fishnets doesn't mean much. Obviously, going too far when you're NSA ends up with a really bad situation.
[+] [-] bnolsen|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mintplant|12 years ago|reply
"Unconstitutional" has become a lazy way to dress up a claim that something is bad. I'm not saying that what's going on with surveillance in the U.S. is a good thing, but you're not helping your cause here.
(For that matter, there's nothing about a "right to overthrow [a] corrupt government" in the Constitution either. nullsocket may be thinking of the Declaration of Independence, and its basis in the social contract theory of Locke's Second Treatise on Government.)
[+] [-] nullsocket|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xacaxulu|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ThomPete|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] orthecreedence|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vermontdevil|12 years ago|reply
I see this in Congress and a lot of government leaders not just within NSA.
Look at Treasury, DEA, etc for examples.
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] jakeogh|12 years ago|reply