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Thanks to Snowden (who keeps on giving, even 5 years more or less to the day after his escape to Hong Kong), we can assume that Japan too conducts dragnet surve

Thanks to Snowden (who keeps on giving, even 5 years more or less to the day after his escape to Hong Kong), we can assume that Japan too conducts dragnet surveillance. It is the state of current affairs that it hardly raises more than a yawn. Still an interesting article, since it reveals that the Japanese take their secrecy really, really seriously, and so we may not assume much of what they are up to, really. The problem with secret government agencies is otherwise generally that they are notoriously difficult to reign in. They are governed by law, but are likely to develop their own agendas, and since lawmakers are kept in the dark they can end up meddling in policy, using all the means at their disposal. Our ultimate line of defense against such, and only hope are the brave whistleblowers. Edward Snowden needs to be pardoned.

auntienomen 8y ago
With the benefit of hindsight, I'd say: 1) The TLAs have fairly healthy cultures. 2) The TLAs are doing what we pay them for. 3) Snowden looks increasingly like a Russian agent. The point of no return for me was seeing him and Assange trying to interfere in Catalonia. Neither had ever expressed the slightest interest, and then suddenly, they're both pushing the same line. What a marvelous coincidence! Snowden can apply for a pardon after he turns himself in.
- kankroc 8y ago
  I'm sure the current US gov will pardon him! /s
- Someone1234 8y ago
  > The TLAs have fairly healthy cultures Weren't the CIA caught red handed spying on congress?
  - java-man 8y ago
    we have no recollection of this fact, Senator.
- Tepix 8y ago
  Thomas Drake showed us (and Snowden) that whistleblowers are the only way to change the illegal dealings of the TLAs.
- cowmoo728 8y ago
  I can't forgive a government agency that waterboards and performs rectal examinations with intentional "excessive force" as a psychological technique. I don't know how it can be said that's a healthy culture, especially when they destroyed evidence about it and spied on the Senators that were investigating it.
  - auntienomen 8y ago
    I think the CIA lost its way during the Bush II administration. (More precisely, I think they were led astray by the Bush administration and then used as a scapegoat.) But Snowden's leaks concerned NSA and related agencies work on signals intelligence. He wasn't fighting against torture, so please don't give him credit for it.
    - rurban 8y ago
      Then you never read about Nixon and Bush I. This was the most criminal era.
      - auntienomen 8y ago
        Your comment is a non-sequitur. Are you trying to communicate something? Or just trying to change topics?
        Vinnl 8y ago
        I think cowmoo728's comment were a reply to your remark about the TLA's (i.e. including the CIA), and rurban's comments a reply to your comment about when the CIA lost its way.
        majos 8y ago
        The comment makes sense to me. It's saying that the CIA didn't "los[e] its way during the Bush II administration", since it did similar things in the Bush I and Nixon administrations (whether or not that's true I don't know).
- meowface 8y ago
  What evidence do you have that Snowden is a Russian agent? Why is it suspicious that both Assange and Snowden happen to support Catalonian independence? It's not exactly a fringe or necessarily right-wing position. It's certainly possible that Snowden was pressured into the Russian government into tweeting his support for it (since he is at their mercy), but even if it's true he's now compromised, how does that at all affect the NSA disclosures?
  - ttul 8y ago
    Russia doesn’t need Snowden to do anything more than A) make the US look like a failed democracy B) seem to be living happily and freely in Russia I would suggest without any qualification, that Putin probably protects Snowden quite astonishingly well from influence or persuasion by any faction inside or outside the country. They need him to feel safe and protected; the rest of his behavior can then be the natural result of this.
    - meowface 8y ago
      That's also quite possible, but how could we ever know if it's true? If he's being coerced or influenced in some way, he wouldn't be allowed to say anything about it. I do get the impression he's probably allowed to speak freely (as long as he's not too publicly critical of Russia or Russian interests), but it's impossible to know. Considering he's a potentially amazing propaganda asset for the Russian government, it's not hard to think they might want to put him up to some things.
- pnathan 8y ago
  re 3: My perception & guess is that he was offered a deal after he dumped the docs: Come to Russia and we'll ask you to use your platform to talk on issues we care about. Snowden has a lot of cred with the Left and libertarians/anarchists, so he is an excellent agent for division.
SiempreViernes 8y ago
Clearly they value secrecy over efficient cooperation of the branches, and I'm not sure this is particularly bad for their net contribution to society.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
marricks 8y ago
Are they governed by law? I'm starting to feel that no one follows the law, or spirit of it at least, unless they have to or can write the laws themselves. Corporations write their own laws through lobbyists and circumvent it when they can. Top secret agents don't really have anyone they are accountable to since they're so top secrete there isn't any public oversight. For some reason the secret courts convened to check them (FISA) are just rubber stamp mills too because hey, those don't really have any oversight either. It really doesn't seem like this stuff will get any better without a ton more oversight. It'll be interesting to see if the Japanese people are more appalled by this and more willing to stand up.
- fossuser 8y ago
  It's worth reading Beyond Snowden which is written by Timothy Edgar, a former ACLU lawyer who got hired into the Obama administration as a PCL advisor and eventually worked at the NSA. He gives a lot of insight into how things actually work with a deep understanding of the issues and the difficulty around these policy tradeoffs. The organizations do take oversight seriously, but there's still a risk of 'turn key tyranny' and there are improvements that can be made. It's possible to have security and civil liberties, but you need effective policy and it can't happen in secret.
- pheon 8y ago
  According to the recent update of the Japanese Telecommunications act, its illegal to record the packet payloads without a court order. However recording the headers, e.g. TCP headers if fair game. So its perfectly legal for ISPs and agencies to record the metadata. Then again Japan dosent have freedom of the press and many other things you might expect.
- mrhappyunhappy 8y ago
  Seeing as how the Japanese are so complacent, I doubt anything will change. From the moment you set foot in a public education system here you are taught to fit in, be quiet and don’t question the elders aka authority.
walrus01 8y ago
> Still an interesting article, since it reveals that the Japanese take their secrecy really, really seriously, and so we may not assume much of what they are up to, really. Pretty much all SIGINT agencies do. Maybe 1 in 20 Canadians even knows that CSE exists or what it does. It keeps a pretty low profile, within the limitations that it can, considering that the gross figures for its budget are public and other public info available from outside of classification. (For the Americans: CSE is the exact equivalent of the NSA, it's been around for a long time and is one of the five eyes partners).
- pacificmint 8y ago
  It's important to remember that while the NSA is now a household name, it hasn't always been that name. I think until 1975 the existence of the agency was still secret, and even after that it was mostly shrouded in secrecy until the 90s or so. The joke used to be that NSA stood for "No Such Agency".
jiveturkey 8y ago
> It is the state of current affairs that it hardly raises more than a yawn. Do you mean here (roughly US, given posting time and time zones), internationally or domestically? Certainly, internationally, I would think it should not be a great revelation. We all know / should have known, long before Snowden, that all countries with a decent GDP are doing international spying. Those with a poor GDP still spend great sums to do domestic spying. I don't think the [non]-novelty of it is a fair criticism. Because, like you say, it is an interesting article. Kudos to The Intercept for a good piece. They could have taken a trivial approach but they didn't. My criticism is, I wonder how the Japanese feel about it. It's too bad The Intercept didn't gauge that for us. Certainly the Japanese have a different standard for privacy than we (US) do, and different consideration of government.
mrhappyunhappy 8y ago
What’s horrifying is that it seems there’s little anyone can do about anything being disclosed by whistleblowers. Things go on business as usual. I wonder if this will ever make it to the Japanese mainstream media or if the state tv kills this fast.

auntienomen 8y ago

With the benefit of hindsight, I'd say: 1) The TLAs have fairly healthy cultures. 2) The TLAs are doing what we pay them for. 3) Snowden looks increasingly like a Russian agent. The point of no return for me was seeing him and Assange trying to interfere in Catalonia. Neither had ever expressed the slightest interest, and then suddenly, they're both pushing the same line. What a marvelous coincidence! Snowden can apply for a pardon after he turns himself in.

kankroc 8y ago
I'm sure the current US gov will pardon him! /s
Someone1234 8y ago
> The TLAs have fairly healthy cultures Weren't the CIA caught red handed spying on congress?
- java-man 8y ago
  we have no recollection of this fact, Senator.
Tepix 8y ago
Thomas Drake showed us (and Snowden) that whistleblowers are the only way to change the illegal dealings of the TLAs.
cowmoo728 8y ago
I can't forgive a government agency that waterboards and performs rectal examinations with intentional "excessive force" as a psychological technique. I don't know how it can be said that's a healthy culture, especially when they destroyed evidence about it and spied on the Senators that were investigating it.
- auntienomen 8y ago
  I think the CIA lost its way during the Bush II administration. (More precisely, I think they were led astray by the Bush administration and then used as a scapegoat.) But Snowden's leaks concerned NSA and related agencies work on signals intelligence. He wasn't fighting against torture, so please don't give him credit for it.
  - rurban 8y ago
    Then you never read about Nixon and Bush I. This was the most criminal era.
    - auntienomen 8y ago
      Your comment is a non-sequitur. Are you trying to communicate something? Or just trying to change topics?
      - Vinnl 8y ago
        I think cowmoo728's comment were a reply to your remark about the TLA's (i.e. including the CIA), and rurban's comments a reply to your comment about when the CIA lost its way.
      - majos 8y ago
        The comment makes sense to me. It's saying that the CIA didn't "los[e] its way during the Bush II administration", since it did similar things in the Bush I and Nixon administrations (whether or not that's true I don't know).
meowface 8y ago
What evidence do you have that Snowden is a Russian agent? Why is it suspicious that both Assange and Snowden happen to support Catalonian independence? It's not exactly a fringe or necessarily right-wing position. It's certainly possible that Snowden was pressured into the Russian government into tweeting his support for it (since he is at their mercy), but even if it's true he's now compromised, how does that at all affect the NSA disclosures?
- ttul 8y ago
  Russia doesn’t need Snowden to do anything more than A) make the US look like a failed democracy B) seem to be living happily and freely in Russia I would suggest without any qualification, that Putin probably protects Snowden quite astonishingly well from influence or persuasion by any faction inside or outside the country. They need him to feel safe and protected; the rest of his behavior can then be the natural result of this.
  - meowface 8y ago
    That's also quite possible, but how could we ever know if it's true? If he's being coerced or influenced in some way, he wouldn't be allowed to say anything about it. I do get the impression he's probably allowed to speak freely (as long as he's not too publicly critical of Russia or Russian interests), but it's impossible to know. Considering he's a potentially amazing propaganda asset for the Russian government, it's not hard to think they might want to put him up to some things.
pnathan 8y ago
re 3: My perception & guess is that he was offered a deal after he dumped the docs: Come to Russia and we'll ask you to use your platform to talk on issues we care about. Snowden has a lot of cred with the Left and libertarians/anarchists, so he is an excellent agent for division.

SiempreViernes 8y ago

Clearly they value secrecy over efficient cooperation of the branches, and I'm not sure this is particularly bad for their net contribution to society.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

marricks 8y ago

Are they governed by law? I'm starting to feel that no one follows the law, or spirit of it at least, unless they have to or can write the laws themselves. Corporations write their own laws through lobbyists and circumvent it when they can. Top secret agents don't really have anyone they are accountable to since they're so top secrete there isn't any public oversight. For some reason the secret courts convened to check them (FISA) are just rubber stamp mills too because hey, those don't really have any oversight either. It really doesn't seem like this stuff will get any better without a ton more oversight. It'll be interesting to see if the Japanese people are more appalled by this and more willing to stand up.

fossuser 8y ago
It's worth reading Beyond Snowden which is written by Timothy Edgar, a former ACLU lawyer who got hired into the Obama administration as a PCL advisor and eventually worked at the NSA. He gives a lot of insight into how things actually work with a deep understanding of the issues and the difficulty around these policy tradeoffs. The organizations do take oversight seriously, but there's still a risk of 'turn key tyranny' and there are improvements that can be made. It's possible to have security and civil liberties, but you need effective policy and it can't happen in secret.
pheon 8y ago
According to the recent update of the Japanese Telecommunications act, its illegal to record the packet payloads without a court order. However recording the headers, e.g. TCP headers if fair game. So its perfectly legal for ISPs and agencies to record the metadata. Then again Japan dosent have freedom of the press and many other things you might expect.
mrhappyunhappy 8y ago
Seeing as how the Japanese are so complacent, I doubt anything will change. From the moment you set foot in a public education system here you are taught to fit in, be quiet and don’t question the elders aka authority.

walrus01 8y ago

> Still an interesting article, since it reveals that the Japanese take their secrecy really, really seriously, and so we may not assume much of what they are up to, really. Pretty much all SIGINT agencies do. Maybe 1 in 20 Canadians even knows that CSE exists or what it does. It keeps a pretty low profile, within the limitations that it can, considering that the gross figures for its budget are public and other public info available from outside of classification. (For the Americans: CSE is the exact equivalent of the NSA, it's been around for a long time and is one of the five eyes partners).

pacificmint 8y ago
It's important to remember that while the NSA is now a household name, it hasn't always been that name. I think until 1975 the existence of the agency was still secret, and even after that it was mostly shrouded in secrecy until the 90s or so. The joke used to be that NSA stood for "No Such Agency".

jiveturkey 8y ago

> It is the state of current affairs that it hardly raises more than a yawn. Do you mean here (roughly US, given posting time and time zones), internationally or domestically? Certainly, internationally, I would think it should not be a great revelation. We all know / should have known, long before Snowden, that all countries with a decent GDP are doing international spying. Those with a poor GDP still spend great sums to do domestic spying. I don't think the [non]-novelty of it is a fair criticism. Because, like you say, it is an interesting article. Kudos to The Intercept for a good piece. They could have taken a trivial approach but they didn't. My criticism is, I wonder how the Japanese feel about it. It's too bad The Intercept didn't gauge that for us. Certainly the Japanese have a different standard for privacy than we (US) do, and different consideration of government.

mrhappyunhappy 8y ago

What’s horrifying is that it seems there’s little anyone can do about anything being disclosed by whistleblowers. Things go on business as usual. I wonder if this will ever make it to the Japanese mainstream media or if the state tv kills this fast.