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Really? Do you really expect intelligence organizations not to do this? This is what we pay them to do. International relations is anarchy. We shouldn't be blam

Really? Do you really expect intelligence organizations not to do this? This is what we pay them to do. International relations is anarchy. We shouldn't be blaming GCHQ we should be lauding Snowden while building surveillance hardened systems.

JosephRedfern 11y ago
"This is what we pay them to do". Who do you mean by we? Sure, we pay tax, but I don't remember ticking the "I'd like to sign up to pay for GCHQ to monitor people porn habits" box on my tax return. If the government were building a device to blow up the moon, would saying "that's what we pay them to do" (due to us paying tax) be a valid excuse?
- 3pt14159 11y ago
  This is a very naive viewpoint. States around the world are going to tap communication cables. It is not blowing up the moon, which is a silly comparison. States rely on information to make decisions, and outside of their borders with not restrain themselves. We can ask them to change but they won't. We're better off just encrypting our systems.
yarrel 11y ago
Really? You expect plumbers not to flood tower blocks and drown everyone in them? Plumbing is what they do!!1
mikosty 11y ago
Still somebody makes a decision to contribute to these systems. Most of those people think they do the right thing I believe. It is important to show that this kind of surveillance is clearly wrong and painfully shameful to be part of.
dreamfactory2 11y ago
Yes, I actually do expect them not to be the kind of morons who could decide it's smart to hoover, aggregate, and store a toxic mountain of data which massively undermines personal and state security. There's a reason for external oversight and governance - you don't need malice in a large organisation to get a really shitty outcome, just a bunch of cogs in the machine each chasing local optima.
- Silhouette 11y ago
  It does seem rather unwise to collect data if they can't protect it. Didn't the US government organisation responsible for security checking millions of employees and presumably storing all kinds of sensitive information about them in the process just have a huge leak? I have a sense of Schadenfreude about that particular incident from the point of view of a government collecting too much data and itself becoming the victim, but when you look at it on the level of the individuals involved and presumably also their family and friends in some cases, it's pretty hard to see any real upside to that kind of result.

JosephRedfern 11y ago

"This is what we pay them to do". Who do you mean by we? Sure, we pay tax, but I don't remember ticking the "I'd like to sign up to pay for GCHQ to monitor people porn habits" box on my tax return. If the government were building a device to blow up the moon, would saying "that's what we pay them to do" (due to us paying tax) be a valid excuse?

3pt14159 11y ago
This is a very naive viewpoint. States around the world are going to tap communication cables. It is not blowing up the moon, which is a silly comparison. States rely on information to make decisions, and outside of their borders with not restrain themselves. We can ask them to change but they won't. We're better off just encrypting our systems.

yarrel 11y ago

Really? You expect plumbers not to flood tower blocks and drown everyone in them? Plumbing is what they do!!1

mikosty 11y ago

Still somebody makes a decision to contribute to these systems. Most of those people think they do the right thing I believe. It is important to show that this kind of surveillance is clearly wrong and painfully shameful to be part of.

dreamfactory2 11y ago

Yes, I actually do expect them not to be the kind of morons who could decide it's smart to hoover, aggregate, and store a toxic mountain of data which massively undermines personal and state security. There's a reason for external oversight and governance - you don't need malice in a large organisation to get a really shitty outcome, just a bunch of cogs in the machine each chasing local optima.

Silhouette 11y ago
It does seem rather unwise to collect data if they can't protect it. Didn't the US government organisation responsible for security checking millions of employees and presumably storing all kinds of sensitive information about them in the process just have a huge leak? I have a sense of Schadenfreude about that particular incident from the point of view of a government collecting too much data and itself becoming the victim, but when you look at it on the level of the individuals involved and presumably also their family and friends in some cases, it's pretty hard to see any real upside to that kind of result.