4 ms·
Actually we all knew the NSA was doing it, and what Snowden leaked was just the proof.
by SerLava 5y ago
Actually we all knew the NSA was doing it, and what Snowden leaked was just the proof.
- jefftk 5y agoWho is "we all"? (ex: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27989385 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27989385)
- beering 5y agoWired reported on the EFF suing AT&T over NSA wiretapping telecom traffic in bulk in 2006. And there were other assorted news reports on Trailblazer, the "Total Information Awareness program", etc. from that time. So maybe not in the widespread public awareness, but if you were Googling trying to answer the question, "Is the USA gov't eavesdropping on all communication traffic?" in 2013 pre-Snowden, then the reasonable conclusion would've been, "Yes".
- jefftk 5y agoI don't think that's what people thought at the time; see https://www.theverge.com/2013/11/6/5072924/google-engineers-issue-fuck-you-to-nsa-over-surveillance-scandal https://www.theverge.com/2013/11/6/5072924/google-engineers-... for something more external. There really was a lot of surprise. The 2006 lawsuit was about AT&T cooperating with the NSA to facilitate tapping their customers, quite different from the NSA surreptitiously digging up and tapping private fiber.