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I don't think so. Wasn't it common knowledge that the Government had access to emails via ISPs and shredder well before Snowden's revelations? What was revealin

I don't think so. Wasn't it common knowledge that the Government had access to emails via ISPs and shredder well before Snowden's revelations? What was revealing, I guess was some of the technical details of how it was being done.

tomc1985 6y ago
Not really. There were murmurs, talk of a secret room with fiberoptic splitters at an AT&T datacenter in San Francisco, lots of rumors but most of it was never confirmed
- toomuchtodo 6y ago
  The existence of this facility (as well as others) was confirmed. https://www.wired.com/2013/06/nsa-whistleblower-klein/ https://www.wired.com/2013/06/nsa-whistleblower-klein/ (NSA Leak Vindicates AT&T Whistleblower) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A (Room 641A) > Room 641A is a telecommunication interception facility operated by AT&T for the U.S. National Security Agency, as part of its warrantless surveillance program as authorized by the Patriot Act. The facility commenced operations in 2003 and its purpose was publicly revealed in 2006.
  - burfog 6y ago
    That's what they want you to think. :-) There's also point #4, "Some beautiful misdirection", in https://blog.thinkst.com/p/if-nsa-has-been-hacking-everything-how.html https://blog.thinkst.com/p/if-nsa-has-been-hacking-everythin... discussed 3 days ago at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24139828 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24139828 Maybe they'd really prefer to take the public relations hit of everybody thinking that they spy on Americans.
bcrosby95 6y ago
Part of why Google decided to speed up their timeline on encrypting traffic across their internal network is because they learned the NSA tapped into it.
- marcan_42 6y ago
  I was there when it happened, and basically the entire engineering org was pissed off at the NSA. It went from ongoing project to "we're flipping the switch within a month" or something like that.
  - refurb 6y ago
    Why were they pissed at the NSA? I thought Google cooperated with the NSA to provide access. Or did I misunderstand the situation?
    - jeffbee 6y ago
      There is nothing in Snowden's leaks to support this conclusion, much to suggest that it is false, and Google flatly denies cooperating with the NSA in clear, non-weasel-word terms. https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/06/what.html https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/06/what.html
      - refurb 6y ago
        Well there you go. I guess it was my own assumption based on one of the PRISM slides that show when surveillance for each company started.[1] I assumed it involved cooperation. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/media/File:Prism_slide_5.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/...
        jeffbee 6y ago
        Well, that's court-ordered production of data based on given search terms. Being ordered by a court to do something is not the opposite of "cooperation" but it's not the same thing either. What Googlers were angry about was the stuff in the leaks that showed they were tapping undersea cables.
        refurb 6y ago
roenxi 6y ago
Pre-Snowden nobody took the people pointing the risk out seriously. Snowden was what took the conversation from Conspiracy Theory to "Conspiracy Well Known Facts".
monocasa 6y ago
It was "common knowledge" in the right circles, but that's not enough for a court to find that you have standing to bring suit when the government gets to claim national security against discovery requests. In fact the lawsuit around Room 641A fizzled because the accuser didn't 'really know' what was happening in the NSA room that had split off copies of backbone fiber trunks running into it and the government didn't have to provide an explanation. So unable to prove standing. Snowden's revelations lead to actual case law saying that quite a few of the actions of the NSA were unconstitutional, given actual documentation from the government describing their actions.
- burfog 6y ago
  He jumped to a conclusion, not realizing that the NSA had plenty of perfectly legal reasons to have split off copies of backbone fiber trunks. A great example is point #4, "Some beautiful misdirection", in https://blog.thinkst.com/p/if-nsa-has-been-hacking-everything-how.html https://blog.thinkst.com/p/if-nsa-has-been-hacking-everythin... discussed 3 days ago at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24139828 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24139828 That's some ingenious stuff that is 100% legal. Plus, it's not as if foreign data doesn't cross the USA. The USA is the best path from China to France. Maybe they'd really prefer to take the public relations hit of everybody thinking that they spy on Americans.

tomc1985 6y ago

Not really. There were murmurs, talk of a secret room with fiberoptic splitters at an AT&T datacenter in San Francisco, lots of rumors but most of it was never confirmed

toomuchtodo 6y ago
The existence of this facility (as well as others) was confirmed. https://www.wired.com/2013/06/nsa-whistleblower-klein/ https://www.wired.com/2013/06/nsa-whistleblower-klein/ (NSA Leak Vindicates AT&T Whistleblower) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A (Room 641A) > Room 641A is a telecommunication interception facility operated by AT&T for the U.S. National Security Agency, as part of its warrantless surveillance program as authorized by the Patriot Act. The facility commenced operations in 2003 and its purpose was publicly revealed in 2006.
- burfog 6y ago
  That's what they want you to think. :-) There's also point #4, "Some beautiful misdirection", in https://blog.thinkst.com/p/if-nsa-has-been-hacking-everything-how.html https://blog.thinkst.com/p/if-nsa-has-been-hacking-everythin... discussed 3 days ago at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24139828 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24139828 Maybe they'd really prefer to take the public relations hit of everybody thinking that they spy on Americans.

bcrosby95 6y ago

Part of why Google decided to speed up their timeline on encrypting traffic across their internal network is because they learned the NSA tapped into it.

marcan_42 6y ago
I was there when it happened, and basically the entire engineering org was pissed off at the NSA. It went from ongoing project to "we're flipping the switch within a month" or something like that.
- refurb 6y ago
  Why were they pissed at the NSA? I thought Google cooperated with the NSA to provide access. Or did I misunderstand the situation?
  - jeffbee 6y ago
    There is nothing in Snowden's leaks to support this conclusion, much to suggest that it is false, and Google flatly denies cooperating with the NSA in clear, non-weasel-word terms. https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/06/what.html https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/06/what.html
    - refurb 6y ago
      Well there you go. I guess it was my own assumption based on one of the PRISM slides that show when surveillance for each company started.[1] I assumed it involved cooperation. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/media/File:Prism_slide_5.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/...
      - jeffbee 6y ago
        Well, that's court-ordered production of data based on given search terms. Being ordered by a court to do something is not the opposite of "cooperation" but it's not the same thing either. What Googlers were angry about was the stuff in the leaks that showed they were tapping undersea cables.
        refurb 6y ago

roenxi 6y ago

Pre-Snowden nobody took the people pointing the risk out seriously. Snowden was what took the conversation from Conspiracy Theory to "Conspiracy Well Known Facts".

monocasa 6y ago

It was "common knowledge" in the right circles, but that's not enough for a court to find that you have standing to bring suit when the government gets to claim national security against discovery requests. In fact the lawsuit around Room 641A fizzled because the accuser didn't 'really know' what was happening in the NSA room that had split off copies of backbone fiber trunks running into it and the government didn't have to provide an explanation. So unable to prove standing. Snowden's revelations lead to actual case law saying that quite a few of the actions of the NSA were unconstitutional, given actual documentation from the government describing their actions.

burfog 6y ago
He jumped to a conclusion, not realizing that the NSA had plenty of perfectly legal reasons to have split off copies of backbone fiber trunks. A great example is point #4, "Some beautiful misdirection", in https://blog.thinkst.com/p/if-nsa-has-been-hacking-everything-how.html https://blog.thinkst.com/p/if-nsa-has-been-hacking-everythin... discussed 3 days ago at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24139828 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24139828 That's some ingenious stuff that is 100% legal. Plus, it's not as if foreign data doesn't cross the USA. The USA is the best path from China to France. Maybe they'd really prefer to take the public relations hit of everybody thinking that they spy on Americans.