4 ms·

You nailed it, I think. If surveillance works, then Paris, Beirut, Bagdad et al wouldn't have happed. Realizing it's a pipe dream, I'd love to see a world accep

You nailed it, I think. If surveillance works, then Paris, Beirut, Bagdad et al wouldn't have happed. Realizing it's a pipe dream, I'd love to see a world accept that we the west have done so much damage that nothing will stop terrorism. Accepting that means we can throw those wasted resources at things that have a better chance of working - throw the tech that detects copyright infringements at detecting pro-ISIL sites, and use DCMA-style tactics to take them down. Fund new research to put effective bomb and weapon detectors into every doorway. Because protecting borders doesn't work either (crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside). Build schools, instead of bombing them. Stop selling weapons to the very people that shouldn't have them. Teach politicians to value non-American lives as much as American ones. Stop honouring violent death, and honour the deaths of people who move humanity forward instead. There's an endless stream of ideas of what we could do, if only we actually wanted it.

vacri 11y ago
It's not that "we have done so much damage", it's just that terrorism exists, full stop. Europe has a long history of home-grown terrorism - Paris in particular had a lot of various groups attacking it in the 80s, for example. The US has it's own home-grown terrorism as well, the stereotype being the KKK.
- thomasrossi 11y ago
  There are indeed plenty of third-generation Algerians in France. The ones I know are happy being in France though, I am not sure it is home-grown, it has been planned with local help, but the source was tracked in Turkey, then lost. I think they have a good protocol to handle communication outside internet.
  - vacri 11y ago
    When I say European home-grown terrorism, I'm not thinking of recently arrived demographics, but groups like Irish and Basque separatists.
criddell 11y ago
> If surveillance works, then Paris, Beirut, Bagdad et al wouldn't have happed. I don't think surveillance is very good at preventing terrorism, but I think it could be useful to law enforcement after the fact to round up co-conspirators. I bet that once the identity of the Paris attackers was learned, the NSA pulled up a graph several levels deep of everybody they communicated it or associated with. It could very well help them figure out who else is involved and should be watched. For the record, I'm opposed to surveillance and would be even if it were shown to be very effective. Privacy is important and is worth more than the lives that have been or will be lost to terrorists and other criminals.
- jasonwatkinspdx 11y ago
  I'm opposed as well (I think big piles of personal info are radioactive), but it's worth pointing out that this usage, of finding folks after the fact, should be easy to do in a way that allows proper judicial review, even if the process is expedited. Working from an actual crime makes a lot of things more straightforward vs trying to justify surveillance of someone thought to be a risk, or connected to a risk of some hypothetical future crime.
- pakled_engineer 11y ago
  They found one of the terrorists phones dumped in a garbage can outside the theatre they attacked, and got the address of their hideout from the messages, so used just regular police work. All these guys were already on watch lists for fighting in Syria and returning just nobody seems to ever watch the watch list.
  - Canada 11y ago
    If that phone was properly secured then those messages wouldn't have been accessible.
    - jacquesm 11y ago
      That's roughly equivalent to 'if those documents had not been properly shred that data would not have been available'. Each and every operation of this magnitude leaves a trail. The party perpetrating it will try what they can to erase that trail but that will always be an imperfect process. Maybe next time the phone will be secured, they will scrub themselves of parking tickets, they will burn up their escape vehicle after a few minutes ride and so on. All the media has succeeded in doing is educate the terrorists about how to be more successful in evading capture and possibly being more successful in carrying out the attack in the first place.
prawn 11y ago
I liked this comment on Reddit which I think is relevant in a discussion about combatting this form of terrorism: "The problem is that we have forgotten the power of ideology and the way that you cultivate civilized discourse and expectations. In the Western world, we've spent the last 40 years shitting all over the best weapons we have to address ideology: philosophy, literature, poetry, art, music and religious discourse. We've marginalized the way to talk about the abstract elements of human experience, and now we find that we have nothing to say."
paublyrne 11y ago
Fund new research to put effective bomb and weapon detectors into every doorway. I don't want to live in a world that has bomb detectors in every doorway.
- noamyoungerm 11y ago
  I live in a country that has bomb detectors in every doorway. It's not that bad - at the very least, everybody preferrs a bomb detector to another suicide bombing. I think that when terror is something that can happen constantly for months at a time, people learn to keep living their lives without fear, but also to take measurable actions that really prevent the next attack.

vacri 11y ago

It's not that "we have done so much damage", it's just that terrorism exists, full stop. Europe has a long history of home-grown terrorism - Paris in particular had a lot of various groups attacking it in the 80s, for example. The US has it's own home-grown terrorism as well, the stereotype being the KKK.

thomasrossi 11y ago
There are indeed plenty of third-generation Algerians in France. The ones I know are happy being in France though, I am not sure it is home-grown, it has been planned with local help, but the source was tracked in Turkey, then lost. I think they have a good protocol to handle communication outside internet.
- vacri 11y ago
  When I say European home-grown terrorism, I'm not thinking of recently arrived demographics, but groups like Irish and Basque separatists.

criddell 11y ago

> If surveillance works, then Paris, Beirut, Bagdad et al wouldn't have happed. I don't think surveillance is very good at preventing terrorism, but I think it could be useful to law enforcement after the fact to round up co-conspirators. I bet that once the identity of the Paris attackers was learned, the NSA pulled up a graph several levels deep of everybody they communicated it or associated with. It could very well help them figure out who else is involved and should be watched. For the record, I'm opposed to surveillance and would be even if it were shown to be very effective. Privacy is important and is worth more than the lives that have been or will be lost to terrorists and other criminals.

jasonwatkinspdx 11y ago
I'm opposed as well (I think big piles of personal info are radioactive), but it's worth pointing out that this usage, of finding folks after the fact, should be easy to do in a way that allows proper judicial review, even if the process is expedited. Working from an actual crime makes a lot of things more straightforward vs trying to justify surveillance of someone thought to be a risk, or connected to a risk of some hypothetical future crime.
pakled_engineer 11y ago
They found one of the terrorists phones dumped in a garbage can outside the theatre they attacked, and got the address of their hideout from the messages, so used just regular police work. All these guys were already on watch lists for fighting in Syria and returning just nobody seems to ever watch the watch list.
- Canada 11y ago
  If that phone was properly secured then those messages wouldn't have been accessible.
  - jacquesm 11y ago
    That's roughly equivalent to 'if those documents had not been properly shred that data would not have been available'. Each and every operation of this magnitude leaves a trail. The party perpetrating it will try what they can to erase that trail but that will always be an imperfect process. Maybe next time the phone will be secured, they will scrub themselves of parking tickets, they will burn up their escape vehicle after a few minutes ride and so on. All the media has succeeded in doing is educate the terrorists about how to be more successful in evading capture and possibly being more successful in carrying out the attack in the first place.

prawn 11y ago

I liked this comment on Reddit which I think is relevant in a discussion about combatting this form of terrorism: "The problem is that we have forgotten the power of ideology and the way that you cultivate civilized discourse and expectations. In the Western world, we've spent the last 40 years shitting all over the best weapons we have to address ideology: philosophy, literature, poetry, art, music and religious discourse. We've marginalized the way to talk about the abstract elements of human experience, and now we find that we have nothing to say."

paublyrne 11y ago

Fund new research to put effective bomb and weapon detectors into every doorway. I don't want to live in a world that has bomb detectors in every doorway.

noamyoungerm 11y ago
I live in a country that has bomb detectors in every doorway. It's not that bad - at the very least, everybody preferrs a bomb detector to another suicide bombing. I think that when terror is something that can happen constantly for months at a time, people learn to keep living their lives without fear, but also to take measurable actions that really prevent the next attack.