6 ms·

Yours is rather a naive point of view. You can do a lot with a little bit of information - it doesn't necessarily need to be blackmail. Just knowing what your

by mmjaa 10y ago

Yours is rather a naive point of view. You can do a lot with a little bit of information - it doesn't necessarily need to be blackmail. Just knowing what your political opponents are investing in, for example, can be enough to exert un-seen control over them in such a way as to weaken their ability to usurp your current power status. Its not all just blackmail and Hollywood-style intrigue...

PJDK 10y ago
Is there any evidence anything like this is happening?
- mmjaa 10y ago
  Wikileaks is full of it.
  - SomeStupidPoint 10y ago
    So link any evidence of it happening, from Wikileaks or otherwise.
    - kingexe 10y ago
      its literally what Hillary was accusing Russia of doing when the whole 'fake news' & her emails getting hacked debacle started.
      - PJDK 10y ago
        Don't get me wrong. I'm sure intelligence services use intelligence they gather to help their country achieve some objective - that's sort of what they're for. That's a pretty massive difference from intelligence services in western democracies being used to further the interests of specific elites - that would be a gigantic scandal.
    - mmjaa 10y ago
      The point is, which you missed, that Wikileaks is all we've got. So far. There really isn't any way to know, for sure, that these apparatus aren't being used for politically motivated means, with all else being considered. We, the people, from who the politic derive their powers, have no idea what they are doing with it. The secrecy level is too damn high.
  - AnimalMuppet 10y ago
    That statement could be interpreted more than one way...
rl3 10y ago
>Yours is rather a naive point of view. You can do a lot with a little bit of information ... You can also do a lot with a lot of information, which is already available without the presence of a blimp. Obviously blackmail isn't the only form of leverage, and there's many other ways surveillance can further a bad actor's agenda.

by mmjaa 10y ago

PJDK 10y ago

Is there any evidence anything like this is happening?

mmjaa 10y ago
Wikileaks is full of it.
- SomeStupidPoint 10y ago
  So link any evidence of it happening, from Wikileaks or otherwise.
  - kingexe 10y ago
    its literally what Hillary was accusing Russia of doing when the whole 'fake news' & her emails getting hacked debacle started.
    - PJDK 10y ago
      Don't get me wrong. I'm sure intelligence services use intelligence they gather to help their country achieve some objective - that's sort of what they're for. That's a pretty massive difference from intelligence services in western democracies being used to further the interests of specific elites - that would be a gigantic scandal.
  - mmjaa 10y ago
    The point is, which you missed, that Wikileaks is all we've got. So far. There really isn't any way to know, for sure, that these apparatus aren't being used for politically motivated means, with all else being considered. We, the people, from who the politic derive their powers, have no idea what they are doing with it. The secrecy level is too damn high.
- AnimalMuppet 10y ago
  That statement could be interpreted more than one way...

rl3 10y ago

>Yours is rather a naive point of view. You can do a lot with a little bit of information ... You can also do a lot with a lot of information, which is already available without the presence of a blimp. Obviously blackmail isn't the only form of leverage, and there's many other ways surveillance can further a bad actor's agenda.