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Is there a chance, nay, is there not certainty, that some individual or group of persons in the NSA could or does, by selectively monitoring, personally gain tr

Is there a chance, nay, is there not certainty, that some individual or group of persons in the NSA could or does, by selectively monitoring, personally gain tremendous wealth or influence? E.g., if I were an NSA employee and used my access to follow the phone calls of, say, the officers of Goldman-Sachs? What information, of financial value, could I possibly gain? What possibilities for gain await a a rogue organized group of such employees?

omeid2 9y ago
It is called Information Asymmetry[0] in Contract Theory. NSA, KGB, FBI, Google, Facebook, any institution with access to large-scale privileged information– you name it, has at least one case to support the use of this advantage. Perhaps Nixon and Hoover case is the most obvious one.[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_asymmetry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_asymmetry [1] https://www.nytimes.com/1991/06/05/us/tape-shows-nixon-feared-hoover.html https://www.nytimes.com/1991/06/05/us/tape-shows-nixon-feare...
willstrafach 9y ago
If you tried that, you would get a screen informing you that searching US Persons is forbidden. As it sounds intentional in your scenario, you would then be fired and be subject to further action.
- giardini 9y ago
  willstrafach says: "if you tried that, you would get a screen informing you that searching US Persons is forbidden. As it sounds intentional in your scenario, you would then be fired and be subject to further action." Nonsense! Firstly if the bad guys had the assistance of a systems administrator, they could modify privilege levels to suit their needs. No warnings would be issued and no forbidden access would be noted or logged. But more importantly, you speak as if there were only one way to "selectively monitor" or that, to monitor, one must use the programmed pathways into a system! But any decent system has realtime monitoring software, database patching tools and editors, realtime modification tools and in-house ad-hoc reporting software that is neither logged nor monitored. Furthermore, all systems have backups and backups can be stolen or copied. The backed up data can be restored and examined on systems other than the one from which it was collected. Snowden accessed "secure" data w/o timely detection. IIRC he also claimed that, had he the desire, he could have listened in on White House phone conversations w/o detection. This is all w/o the addition of rogue software/hardware or outside help. Were that available, the possible range of techniques would be much greater. You lack imagination.

omeid2 9y ago

It is called Information Asymmetry[0] in Contract Theory. NSA, KGB, FBI, Google, Facebook, any institution with access to large-scale privileged information– you name it, has at least one case to support the use of this advantage. Perhaps Nixon and Hoover case is the most obvious one.[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_asymmetry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_asymmetry [1] https://www.nytimes.com/1991/06/05/us/tape-shows-nixon-feared-hoover.html https://www.nytimes.com/1991/06/05/us/tape-shows-nixon-feare...

willstrafach 9y ago

If you tried that, you would get a screen informing you that searching US Persons is forbidden. As it sounds intentional in your scenario, you would then be fired and be subject to further action.

giardini 9y ago
willstrafach says: "if you tried that, you would get a screen informing you that searching US Persons is forbidden. As it sounds intentional in your scenario, you would then be fired and be subject to further action." Nonsense! Firstly if the bad guys had the assistance of a systems administrator, they could modify privilege levels to suit their needs. No warnings would be issued and no forbidden access would be noted or logged. But more importantly, you speak as if there were only one way to "selectively monitor" or that, to monitor, one must use the programmed pathways into a system! But any decent system has realtime monitoring software, database patching tools and editors, realtime modification tools and in-house ad-hoc reporting software that is neither logged nor monitored. Furthermore, all systems have backups and backups can be stolen or copied. The backed up data can be restored and examined on systems other than the one from which it was collected. Snowden accessed "secure" data w/o timely detection. IIRC he also claimed that, had he the desire, he could have listened in on White House phone conversations w/o detection. This is all w/o the addition of rogue software/hardware or outside help. Were that available, the possible range of techniques would be much greater. You lack imagination.