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What I would like to see more in this conversation (on HN) is the potentially harmful effects of whistleblowing. It's nice that Snowden/das Spiegel/guardian wer

What I would like to see more in this conversation (on HN) is the potentially harmful effects of whistleblowing. It's nice that Snowden/das Spiegel/guardian were meticulous in making sure people weren't endangered by the leaks, but we can't count on it in general. State secrets are often nefarious. However, they are often well-meaning (nuclear weapons schematics, etc). It is highly non trivial to ascertain the long-term impact of intelligence leaks upon the state.

Analemma_ 10y ago
If the government would like to provide some examples of concrete harm caused by whistleblowers, I'd be happy to evaluate their claims and asses, on balance, whether the benefits were worth the costs. They never do, though. They always just say "it's classified" and that we have to take them at their word that the damage was grave.
d33 10y ago
Well one could argue that one way to limit the risk of people blowing the whistle is by doing less evil in secret, isn't it?
- phkahler 10y ago
  Part of the problem is that some parts of the government treat everything as a secret by default. That in itself changes the way people there think about things and how they act. I'm sure it helps foster habits that you want in place when people handle real secret information and it make it easy - you don't need to think about how to handle anything. But it's really not appropriate outside of being a convenience.
throwaway2016a 10y ago
If you're disclosing nuclear weapon plans you are not whistleblowing you are just a spy. Whistleblowers expose an organization for doing something illicit. If your job is to make nuclear weapons than that's not really illicit in that context. But if your job is to surveil enemies over seas and you are actually also surveilling people domestically (sorry, I mean collecting meta-data on) without warrants and doing it completely in the shadows, that is over the line.
alexandercrohde 10y ago
Maybe you're unclear on exactly what a whistleblower means. Definition (by google): "a person who informs on a person or organization engaged in an illicit activity." So by definition, you can only whistleblow if the government (or company) is doing ILLEGAL (and often IMMORAL) things. So you may not find many people on HN who are too interested in arguing about the downsides of whisteblowing; it'd almost be like asking what the upsides of spousal abuse are.
- wallace_f 10y ago
  > it'd almost be like asking what the upsides of spousal abuse are. Essentially, yes, but the difference is with the sad fact that a certain percentage of people, unfortunately, have a will to bow before power in certain ways, i.e. enter nationalism. In other words, it's more like arguing about the upsides of torture, or the upsides of unjustified wars--those are atrocities committed by your government, not your neighbour. These I have seen discussed with (unbelievable) earnest on cable news, such as CNN.(1) 1 - https://theintercept.com/2016/09/09/wolf-blitzer-is-worried-defense-contractors-will-lose-jobs-if-u-s-stops-arming-saudi-arabia/ https://theintercept.com/2016/09/09/wolf-blitzer-is-worried-...
- gydfi 10y ago
  The trouble is that in most of the recent prominent government "whistleblowing" cases (Snowden, Manning, the other one I forget) there's a great deal of disagreement on the legality of what has been exposed. The issue is that an individual sets himself up as judge and jury on the subject of complicated legal matters which he might not fully understand. I will say that both Snowden and Manning went well into the territory of leaking stuff that wasn't illegal in addition to stuff that was at least debatable.
  - DarkKomunalec 10y ago
    "an individual sets himself up as judge and jury on the subject of complicated legal matters" Legal channels were shown to be utterly ineffective in these matters, accomplishing nothing but drawing retribution against the would-be whistleblower: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/12/15/nsa-inspector-who-criticized-snowden-not-using-official-channels-found-guilty http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/12/15/nsa-inspector-wh... And how many judges were consulted on wether the spying was legal, let alone got to rule on it? How carefully chosen were they? And how legitimate are such secret trials? You accuse whistleblowers of playing judge and jury for merely revealing what the government is -doing-. Finally, the entire appeal to 'legal matters' is misguided - whistleblowing is done when someone feels something is -morally- wrong, regardless of what the law, written by the government and interpreted in secret, says.
ionised 10y ago
By definition, 'whistleblowing' is always a positive thing.
- Sacho 10y ago
  I'm not sure. For example, imagine a whistleblower uncovers government illicit activity - instead of deporting illegal immigrants, ICE gives them fake IDs and passports and moves them to a new area to restart their life. Considering the polarization around enforcing immigration limits, that kind of whistleblowing might be seen as a negative thing by a lot of people. You could probably draw similar stories around any other currently illegal but largely accepted activity - e.g. imagine a whistleblower uncovering that a police department doesn't charge people with possession of marijuana. It seems to me that whether you consider a particular whistleblower a "positive" depends on your political stance on the illicit activity they were uncovering.

Analemma_ 10y ago

If the government would like to provide some examples of concrete harm caused by whistleblowers, I'd be happy to evaluate their claims and asses, on balance, whether the benefits were worth the costs. They never do, though. They always just say "it's classified" and that we have to take them at their word that the damage was grave.

d33 10y ago

Well one could argue that one way to limit the risk of people blowing the whistle is by doing less evil in secret, isn't it?

phkahler 10y ago
Part of the problem is that some parts of the government treat everything as a secret by default. That in itself changes the way people there think about things and how they act. I'm sure it helps foster habits that you want in place when people handle real secret information and it make it easy - you don't need to think about how to handle anything. But it's really not appropriate outside of being a convenience.

throwaway2016a 10y ago

If you're disclosing nuclear weapon plans you are not whistleblowing you are just a spy. Whistleblowers expose an organization for doing something illicit. If your job is to make nuclear weapons than that's not really illicit in that context. But if your job is to surveil enemies over seas and you are actually also surveilling people domestically (sorry, I mean collecting meta-data on) without warrants and doing it completely in the shadows, that is over the line.

alexandercrohde 10y ago

Maybe you're unclear on exactly what a whistleblower means. Definition (by google): "a person who informs on a person or organization engaged in an illicit activity." So by definition, you can only whistleblow if the government (or company) is doing ILLEGAL (and often IMMORAL) things. So you may not find many people on HN who are too interested in arguing about the downsides of whisteblowing; it'd almost be like asking what the upsides of spousal abuse are.

wallace_f 10y ago
> it'd almost be like asking what the upsides of spousal abuse are. Essentially, yes, but the difference is with the sad fact that a certain percentage of people, unfortunately, have a will to bow before power in certain ways, i.e. enter nationalism. In other words, it's more like arguing about the upsides of torture, or the upsides of unjustified wars--those are atrocities committed by your government, not your neighbour. These I have seen discussed with (unbelievable) earnest on cable news, such as CNN.(1) 1 - https://theintercept.com/2016/09/09/wolf-blitzer-is-worried-defense-contractors-will-lose-jobs-if-u-s-stops-arming-saudi-arabia/ https://theintercept.com/2016/09/09/wolf-blitzer-is-worried-...
gydfi 10y ago
The trouble is that in most of the recent prominent government "whistleblowing" cases (Snowden, Manning, the other one I forget) there's a great deal of disagreement on the legality of what has been exposed. The issue is that an individual sets himself up as judge and jury on the subject of complicated legal matters which he might not fully understand. I will say that both Snowden and Manning went well into the territory of leaking stuff that wasn't illegal in addition to stuff that was at least debatable.
- DarkKomunalec 10y ago
  "an individual sets himself up as judge and jury on the subject of complicated legal matters" Legal channels were shown to be utterly ineffective in these matters, accomplishing nothing but drawing retribution against the would-be whistleblower: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/12/15/nsa-inspector-who-criticized-snowden-not-using-official-channels-found-guilty http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/12/15/nsa-inspector-wh... And how many judges were consulted on wether the spying was legal, let alone got to rule on it? How carefully chosen were they? And how legitimate are such secret trials? You accuse whistleblowers of playing judge and jury for merely revealing what the government is -doing-. Finally, the entire appeal to 'legal matters' is misguided - whistleblowing is done when someone feels something is -morally- wrong, regardless of what the law, written by the government and interpreted in secret, says.

ionised 10y ago

By definition, 'whistleblowing' is always a positive thing.

Sacho 10y ago
I'm not sure. For example, imagine a whistleblower uncovers government illicit activity - instead of deporting illegal immigrants, ICE gives them fake IDs and passports and moves them to a new area to restart their life. Considering the polarization around enforcing immigration limits, that kind of whistleblowing might be seen as a negative thing by a lot of people. You could probably draw similar stories around any other currently illegal but largely accepted activity - e.g. imagine a whistleblower uncovering that a police department doesn't charge people with possession of marijuana. It seems to me that whether you consider a particular whistleblower a "positive" depends on your political stance on the illicit activity they were uncovering.