Friday, June 07, 2013

CUI BONO?

So now we know that story is worse: in addition to phone data mining, the government has spying on your Internet use via an ongoing program started late in the Bush era called PRISM, as well as working with credit card companies on surveillance.

Where are all these leaks coming from? Who's informing us of this?

We saw an elaborate PowerPoint presentation of the PRISM program in The Washington Post and The Guardian. Which led to this exchange on Twitter between Marcy Wheeler and Marc Ambinder:



Is Marcy serious about this? I'm not sure, but she did retweet this:



And tweet this:



And now ... where is Glenn Greenwald? He lives in Brazil, right?

Well, yes. But he's not in Brazil right now:
Greenwald, an American, is at this moment in Hong Kong, out of reach of U.S. jurisdiction.
And I just heard an NPR interview with Greenwald in Hong Kong.

Coincidence?

22 comments:

paulocanning said...

I would not put anything past Greenwald. Nothing. Check the pretentious, I-am-saviour sub header on Greenwald's Guardian column.

My beloved Guardian sinks to a new low with this: Rand Paul http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/07/nsa-verizon-surveillance-constitution thanks to Greenwald.

But he does get them the traffic ..

(just threw up a little ...)

Steve M. said...

I was merely thinking that Greewald's zealousness will lead him anywhere he can get information to undermine government surveillance, but the presence of that Rand Paul op-ed in Greenwald's Guardian sends me into real tin-foil-hat territory: Greenwald and the Chinese are trying to get Rand Paul elected president! The Chinese want Rand because he'd be so laissez-faire and isolationist that he'd give China free rein in the resource-rich Middle East and Africa! No more war on jihadists! Do whatever you like, China!

Well, it would be a good political thriller plot.

Victor said...

I'm just shocked that anyone's shocked that the NSA has access to all of this.

And what I find funny, is the shock expressed by the people who helped W get this going through Congress, now that President Obama is using it.

Once you led that horse out of the barn, and locked the barn doors, you can't bitch about who's riding it.

redscott said...

So your response to all of this over the last two days is to minimize it AND to not-so-subtly speculate (it would be irresponsible not to!) that the people disclosing it are Under the Influence of a Foreign Power? Good Lord.

Steve M. said...

Yup. Amazing, hunh? I say you things you don't agree with. Is that allowed?

paulocanning said...

We already have floods of Libertarians and Tea Partiers BTL on the Guardian. Their desperation for US traffic will drive a whole lot more our way.

This is worse than when my beloved paper tried to influence the 2004 election in Ohio, remember that?

Sigh.

And - yes - we all know full well this goes on, or should. And I don't have much of a problem so long as it has democratic and judicial oversight which it appears to have and which does ^not^ necessarily mean that the press needs to know every single detail.

We have had countless plots broken over here - as shown in court cases and imprisonment. So excuse me if I am a bit relaxed about surveillance ...

Freddie said...

"I don't like criticism of the Obama administration, so therefore this prominent critic is a Chinese spy." Well done.

aimai said...

If the Chinese did leak it to Glenn there's nothing wrong with him running with it and they seemingly leaked it to other people simultaneously. I wouldn't be surprised. Doesn't make any journalist who publishes the information some kind of spy or even wrong to do it.

But I will say that clearly right wing fears that Obama will use this information (such as it is) for nefarious purposes are clearly overblown. If he had his hands on the dirt on the Republican congress he could have passed all his legislation in a single session.

Politicians used to do the serious spying and extortion the old fashioned way. Dick Cheney requested reams of information on the potential VP candidates, all of them high republican office holders, and then used that information against them whenever he wanted.

I guess what puzzles me about this is that its a whole lot easier to do real political and public harm to people going in the other direction--targeting a person and gaining access to their specific data--than going top down and collecting data on everyone and then trying to find something of significance on one or more particular people.

But maybe they are just sweeping up everything and tossing what they don't need--collecting data on 300 million people in order to find out something dirty on 100 people? Seems inefficient but then, what do I know.

Steve M. said...

If the Chinese did leak it to Glenn there's nothing wrong with him running with it and they seemingly leaked it to other people simultaneously. I wouldn't be surprised. Doesn't make any journalist who publishes the information some kind of spy or even wrong to do it.

That's right. Freddie L'Hote and redscott misread me. I'm not saying he's a spy. I'm speculating (idly?) that he has one agenda and has pursued it using information garnered from a source with a very, very different agenda.

Steve M. said...

But I will say that clearly right wing fears that Obama will use this information (such as it is) for nefarious purposes are clearly overblown. If he had his hands on the dirt on the Republican congress he could have passed all his legislation in a single session.

Excellent point.

I guess what puzzles me about this is that its a whole lot easier to do real political and public harm to people going in the other direction--targeting a person and gaining access to their specific data--than going top down and collecting data on everyone and then trying to find something of significance on one or more particular people.

But maybe they are just sweeping up everything and tossing what they don't need--collecting data on 300 million people in order to find out something dirty on 100 people? Seems inefficient but then, what do I know.


Well, here's what Chris Andersen said yesterday in comments (when all we knew about was the phone data mining):

Perhaps it is because I work in the field of data analysis, but I really don't see why this particular news story is causing so many people to run around with their hair on fire.

Metadata analysis actually requires large volumes of data in order to improve the accuracy of the results *and* to reduce the incidence of false positives. In other words, if your concern is to protect you personal privacy while still allowing the government to use modern data analysis to track down the bad guys, a larger data sweep is just the kind of thing you should be in favor of.

redscott said...

So GG isn't a spy, just (and, again, this is coming entirely out of your own ass) a dupe for the Commie Chinese "agenda?" I thought the fevered fantasy swamp was the exclusive preserve for right-wing nutjobs, but I guess I was wrong.

Unknown said...

@redscott-It is his blog,you know. It's where he posts things like, his opinions...
You can disagree without being rude or insulting. Oh, I forgot. This is the internet, where people can be faceless assholes.

Steve M. said...

In your Happy Gumdrop Fairy-Tale Land, redscott, everything is black and white and no one ever does anything with the slightest hint of moral ambiguity, because every person is either pure good or pure evil, as is every act.

In the real world, people make moral compromises to achieve what they see as noble ends. What -- even paragons of absolute purity like Glenn Greenwald? Yes, perhaps even he.

Brian Link said...

Now I see why the Right loves conspiracy theories so much. They're fun!

aimai said...

Its not a conspiracy theory so much as it is a theory about interests. If you've ever read anything at all about how nations maneuver in their national interest you would find that "the wildest dreams of Kew are everyday in Kathmandu." Or rather, lots of people have lots of fingers in lots of pies.

Tom Hilton said...

I watched Contagion last night. Excellent movie, and a great cast--especially Jude Law, who was amazing as Glenn Greenwald. So perfect it was uncanny.

Steve M. said...

-especially Jude Law, who was amazing as Glenn Greenwald.

Heh. Indeed.

Anonymous said...

Rachel Maddow ended Friday's show with a story about Chinese hacking of the 2008 candidates' computer systems. Maybe there's something to this after all...

nanute said...

The Chinese Tea Party? Did they request tax exempt status too?

aimai said...

It ought to be noted that Glenn (much as I used to admire him) doesn't do any serious reporting a la Sy Hersh or any other investigative reporter. That's not his shtick. So its highly likely this story was fed to him/leaked to him. The only question is by who and for what reason. Is it irresponsible to speculate? Every single possible leaker has his/her own reasons for doing so--if the case of Bradley Manning tells us anything leakers can have bizarre and pointless reasons for leaking data, as well as self interested, political, etc... It doesn't matter down here in the cheap seats. The one thing you can be sure of is that whatever the state has done, it has done with the state's knowledge and full support. And the leaker's motivations don't change that.

Tom Hilton said...

So the leaker, Snowden, is now seeking "asylum" in...Hong Kong.

I'm not so sure your hat has any tinfoil in it at all, Steve.

Steve M. said...

Yeah, how 'bout that. Amazing.