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I never said PRISM was the same program that engaged in mass surveillance. I also never mentioned Google. Your arguments keep starting off by strawmanning my o

by kakarot 10y ago

I never said PRISM was the same program that engaged in mass surveillance. I also never mentioned Google. Your arguments keep starting off by strawmanning my own. But sure let's talk about Google. You really think Schmidt and friends are clean on this? He is a globalist authoritarian lap dog. https://wikileaks.org/google-is-not-what-it-seems/ https://wikileaks.org/google-is-not-what-it-seems/ And you're also fundamentally confused about something. See, the NSA does not need direct access to all of this data. They allow/encourage/force various companies to comply with certain data collection and retention practices, and tap into this data when necessary. Why? So that people like you can claim they are not directly surveying their citizens. All of the data still exists, and is accessed when needed. It's like if my friend spied on you and reported back to me whenever I asked, but then I come out and say, "Hey mister, I'm not spying on you. I only ask my friend about things necessary to my investigation. If you're being a good dog then this shouldn't even bother you."

lern_too_spel 10y ago
> I never said PRISM was the same program that engaged in mass surveillance. You started off by saying you knew about PRISM because the NSA is building a large datacenter in Utah just to hold PRISM's data. > I also never mentioned Google. I never claimed you did. You claimed that PRISM ingested mass wiretapping data. That data would come from Google and other Internet companies according to the documents. My point was that your belief that it is illegally gobbling up all the communications done on Google's and other Internet companies' communications products is baseless.
- kakarot 10y ago
  I'm going to ignore your warping of my words and focus on the interesting bit here: again, Google. You don't remember when news broke in 2014 that the NSA was snooping on Google's Gmail traffic that was flying around unencrypted within their own network? Google, rightfully embarrassed, subsequently enabled internal end-to-end encryption after the news broke. Here it is straight from the horse's mouth: https://gmail.googleblog.com/2014/03/staying-at-forefront-of-email-security.html https://gmail.googleblog.com/2014/03/staying-at-forefront-of... So... yeah. Not baseless at all. Meanwhile you have yet to provide a single citation throughout all of this.
  - lern_too_spel 10y ago
    I cited Snowden's own documents. According to Snowden's documents, the NSA used email envelope metadata where at least one side was a foreigner to build a connection graph, similar to pen register metadata collection. It didn't look at the contents, which it would have to do in order to be wiretapping. That program (STELLARWIND, which operated behind the Internet companies' backs, not PRISM, which operated via court orders on specific accounts) ended before Snowden even leaked it. https://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/jun/27/nsa-inspector-general-report-document-data-collection https://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/jun/27/ns... Let's recap. You claimed that PRISM is mass wiretapping. It isn't. You claimed that the NSA is mass wiretapping Verizon and AT&T. It isn't. Let's stick to your original claims and see them through to completion. Do you admit you were wrong about PRISM and the telcos?
    - kakarot 10y ago
      Citing Snowden's documents would involve actually giving me a link. I did not say PRISM was mass wiretapping but it is indeed part of the surveillance suite of NSA programs. I did not adequately explain myself in my original post, but I cleared things up afterwards and you are ignoring that completely. You have consistently been framing my arguments in a specific way so that you can attack them in a specific way. I also don't understand why you think that the NSA was not mass wiretapping both of those telco's major junctions. It's a known thing. It's not some fringe conspiracy theory. The Fed has been tapping phone lines since the very beginning. Not all of them sure, but certainly in a dragnet fashion. This has continued with the explosive growth of information networks into the 21st century. I provided links. I do not need to provide any more on that topic. I've honestly never encountered someone before who so earnestly believes as you do that these programs are not widespread or dangerous or grossly overstepping their bounds. It's like denying climate change or something.
      - lern_too_spel 10y ago
        > Citing Snowden's documents would involve actually giving me a link. I gave you a link to a slide diagramming PRISM and a link to the document describing the email envelope program that had shut down. > I did not say PRISM was mass wiretapping but it is indeed part of the surveillance suite of NSA programs. I understand you now concede that PRISM isn't the nefarious new-datacenter-requiring mass data collection you originally claimed it was, that the actual surveillance itself is carried out by the FBI, and that PRISM just enables the NSA to search the FBI's data collected on specific foreigners with a court order. > I also don't understand why you think that the NSA was not mass wiretapping both of those telco's major junctions. It's a known thing. If it's a "known thing," where is the evidence? None of your links claim that the NSA is mass wiretapping the telcos' major junctions. Mass wiretapping Americans would violate the Fourth Amendment (the ACLU successfully sued over phone metadata collection, and collecting voice content would be a much bigger issue), so if you have any evidence at all, present it or be prepared to be labeled a conspiracy theorist.

by kakarot 10y ago

lern_too_spel 10y ago

> I never said PRISM was the same program that engaged in mass surveillance. You started off by saying you knew about PRISM because the NSA is building a large datacenter in Utah just to hold PRISM's data. > I also never mentioned Google. I never claimed you did. You claimed that PRISM ingested mass wiretapping data. That data would come from Google and other Internet companies according to the documents. My point was that your belief that it is illegally gobbling up all the communications done on Google's and other Internet companies' communications products is baseless.

kakarot 10y ago
I'm going to ignore your warping of my words and focus on the interesting bit here: again, Google. You don't remember when news broke in 2014 that the NSA was snooping on Google's Gmail traffic that was flying around unencrypted within their own network? Google, rightfully embarrassed, subsequently enabled internal end-to-end encryption after the news broke. Here it is straight from the horse's mouth: https://gmail.googleblog.com/2014/03/staying-at-forefront-of-email-security.html https://gmail.googleblog.com/2014/03/staying-at-forefront-of... So... yeah. Not baseless at all. Meanwhile you have yet to provide a single citation throughout all of this.
- lern_too_spel 10y ago
  I cited Snowden's own documents. According to Snowden's documents, the NSA used email envelope metadata where at least one side was a foreigner to build a connection graph, similar to pen register metadata collection. It didn't look at the contents, which it would have to do in order to be wiretapping. That program (STELLARWIND, which operated behind the Internet companies' backs, not PRISM, which operated via court orders on specific accounts) ended before Snowden even leaked it. https://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/jun/27/nsa-inspector-general-report-document-data-collection https://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/jun/27/ns... Let's recap. You claimed that PRISM is mass wiretapping. It isn't. You claimed that the NSA is mass wiretapping Verizon and AT&T. It isn't. Let's stick to your original claims and see them through to completion. Do you admit you were wrong about PRISM and the telcos?
  - kakarot 10y ago
    Citing Snowden's documents would involve actually giving me a link. I did not say PRISM was mass wiretapping but it is indeed part of the surveillance suite of NSA programs. I did not adequately explain myself in my original post, but I cleared things up afterwards and you are ignoring that completely. You have consistently been framing my arguments in a specific way so that you can attack them in a specific way. I also don't understand why you think that the NSA was not mass wiretapping both of those telco's major junctions. It's a known thing. It's not some fringe conspiracy theory. The Fed has been tapping phone lines since the very beginning. Not all of them sure, but certainly in a dragnet fashion. This has continued with the explosive growth of information networks into the 21st century. I provided links. I do not need to provide any more on that topic. I've honestly never encountered someone before who so earnestly believes as you do that these programs are not widespread or dangerous or grossly overstepping their bounds. It's like denying climate change or something.
    - lern_too_spel 10y ago
      > Citing Snowden's documents would involve actually giving me a link. I gave you a link to a slide diagramming PRISM and a link to the document describing the email envelope program that had shut down. > I did not say PRISM was mass wiretapping but it is indeed part of the surveillance suite of NSA programs. I understand you now concede that PRISM isn't the nefarious new-datacenter-requiring mass data collection you originally claimed it was, that the actual surveillance itself is carried out by the FBI, and that PRISM just enables the NSA to search the FBI's data collected on specific foreigners with a court order. > I also don't understand why you think that the NSA was not mass wiretapping both of those telco's major junctions. It's a known thing. If it's a "known thing," where is the evidence? None of your links claim that the NSA is mass wiretapping the telcos' major junctions. Mass wiretapping Americans would violate the Fourth Amendment (the ACLU successfully sued over phone metadata collection, and collecting voice content would be a much bigger issue), so if you have any evidence at all, present it or be prepared to be labeled a conspiracy theorist.