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This executive order was signed in 1981… Shows how afraid people are to mess with the CIA. They shouldn’t even be allowed to operate in the United States let al

This executive order was signed in 1981… Shows how afraid people are to mess with the CIA. They shouldn’t even be allowed to operate in the United States let alone collect information on American citizens. One thing I’ve always wondered is why Snowden exposed the NSA mass surveillance, but didn’t say a word about the CIA despite having worked for both agencies. It is, of course, possible he didn’t know about the CIA collecting data, but I find that pretty hard to believe.

mtgx 5y ago
He was an NSA contractor, not a CIA one.
- dboreham 5y ago
  According to Wikipedia Snowden was a CIA employee between 2006 and 2009.
noarchy 5y ago
Well he is speaking about it now: https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1491961623132651521 https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1491961623132651521
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
at-fates-hands 5y ago
Serious question: We know Snowden took a LOT of documents related to spying on US citizens. I only remember seeing a few things that were released publicly. Is there still a lot more stuff he's going to release, or has released, just without much fanfare? I'm genuinely curious because I remember people on both sides really freaked out about what he was going to release and I just haven't seen the supposed troves of information he was going to release. Is it mainly just because its irrelevant so many years on now?
- digisign 5y ago
  The journalists vetted and decided what to publish. Not all of it was released. Some was probably released and ignored for one reason or another.
- disk0 5y ago
  > Is there still a lot more stuff he's going to release, or has released, just without much fanfare? According to the The Snowden Archive[0] about 400 documents were published through publications out of a total 50,000 documents Snowden collected. As for the rest—First Look Media (parent company of The Intercept) shut down access to its archive, as well as the team set up to handle them, in 2019: "First Look CEO Michael Bloom said that as other major news outlets had “ceased reporting on it years ago,” The Intercept had decided to “focus on other editorial priorities” after expending five years combing through the archive.[1]" Very cool! Poitras and Greenwald apparently retain full copies, as well as the outlets that received them in the first place I'd assume. As a last note I'll leave a medium post by Barrett Brown[2], an excellent reporter whose series of columns in the Intercept received the National Magazine Award—incidentally he burned it on a livestream in protest against First Look Media's decision to shut down their Snowden archive (got to see it live, the YouTube video is private now though unfortunately) [0]: https://www.cjfe.org/snowden https://www.cjfe.org/snowden [1]: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-intercept-shuts-down-access-to-snowden-trove https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-intercept-shuts-down-acces... [2]: https://barrettbrown.medium.com/why-the-intercept-really-closed-the-snowden-archive-e99f46bbfbbc https://barrettbrown.medium.com/why-the-intercept-really-clo...
  - CRConrad 5y ago
    > First Look Media (parent company of The Intercept) > Poitras and Greenwald Yeah, back then they all used to be among the good guys. One thing I haven't quite understood, though: When and why, exactly, did they turn into raving loony pro-Putin mouthpieces? Or is the plural unfair; is it just Greenwald?
Vecr 5y ago
The data is compartmentalized, he probably did not have an easy way to exfiltrate it. He had a good portion of NSA data available without too much suspicion, due to his position. Most CIA or NSA employees did not ever get that much access. There's probably a motivation factor as well.
tootie 5y ago
It's unclear after reading this stuff if the program is still active or if this exposure is something historical
autoexec 5y ago
> Shows how afraid people are to mess with the CIA. They shouldn’t even be allowed to operate in the United States let alone collect information on American citizens. I think it's incredible that politicians haven't cracked down on three letter agencies ages ago. The threat to themselves seems like it should have been obvious. As long as they're sucking up data on US citizens (including presidents and congressmen) it would make it very very easy for those with that data to control anyone. When the NSA can lie to congress and face no consequences is it because the government if fine with that or because they are too afraid to do anything? It makes the highest offices of our government seem very weak and vulnerable. If they're terrified to do anything about them, what possible chance could the rest of us have?
- virissimo 5y ago
  Perhaps politicians don't crack down on three letter agencies because when they try, their careers are ruined by those same three letter agencies. Here's an example: https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/48603/did-the-cia-feed-false-information-to-mccarthy-to-discredit-his-true-claims-that https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/48603/did-the-c.... See this for a previous HN discussion of the same: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25397168#25409105 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25397168#25409105.
  - thr0wawayf00 5y ago
    McCarthy is a pretty unique figure in US history in that he was infamous for propagating the second "red scare" in the US. That's not to discredit these reports by any means, but it's not like he was do-gooder either. He was a vicious politician that didn't hesitate to accuse his enemies of being communist, which sometimes resulted in arrest and prosecution. [0]"McCarthyist" anti-communist (i.e. opposition political organization) laws were passed that were later struck down by the Supreme Court. His ability to accumulate power this way made him a major political target, which isn't quite the same as someone just trying to reel in the 3 letter agencies. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism
- mistermann 5y ago
Gollapalli 5y ago
It was supposed to be illegal for the CIA to operate within the US.
c0nducktr 5y ago
Seems as simple as the CIA murders people, while the NSA just collects intelligence, right?
heavyset_go 5y ago
From what I understand, Snowden had access to a whole trove of NSA data that he chose to leak. He might not have had similar access to CIA documents.
whitepaint 5y ago
https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1492091045873553411 https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1492091045873553411

mtgx 5y ago

He was an NSA contractor, not a CIA one.

dboreham 5y ago
According to Wikipedia Snowden was a CIA employee between 2006 and 2009.

noarchy 5y ago

Well he is speaking about it now: https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1491961623132651521 https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1491961623132651521

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

at-fates-hands 5y ago

Serious question: We know Snowden took a LOT of documents related to spying on US citizens. I only remember seeing a few things that were released publicly. Is there still a lot more stuff he's going to release, or has released, just without much fanfare? I'm genuinely curious because I remember people on both sides really freaked out about what he was going to release and I just haven't seen the supposed troves of information he was going to release. Is it mainly just because its irrelevant so many years on now?

digisign 5y ago
The journalists vetted and decided what to publish. Not all of it was released. Some was probably released and ignored for one reason or another.
disk0 5y ago
> Is there still a lot more stuff he's going to release, or has released, just without much fanfare? According to the The Snowden Archive[0] about 400 documents were published through publications out of a total 50,000 documents Snowden collected. As for the rest—First Look Media (parent company of The Intercept) shut down access to its archive, as well as the team set up to handle them, in 2019: "First Look CEO Michael Bloom said that as other major news outlets had “ceased reporting on it years ago,” The Intercept had decided to “focus on other editorial priorities” after expending five years combing through the archive.[1]" Very cool! Poitras and Greenwald apparently retain full copies, as well as the outlets that received them in the first place I'd assume. As a last note I'll leave a medium post by Barrett Brown[2], an excellent reporter whose series of columns in the Intercept received the National Magazine Award—incidentally he burned it on a livestream in protest against First Look Media's decision to shut down their Snowden archive (got to see it live, the YouTube video is private now though unfortunately) [0]: https://www.cjfe.org/snowden https://www.cjfe.org/snowden [1]: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-intercept-shuts-down-access-to-snowden-trove https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-intercept-shuts-down-acces... [2]: https://barrettbrown.medium.com/why-the-intercept-really-closed-the-snowden-archive-e99f46bbfbbc https://barrettbrown.medium.com/why-the-intercept-really-clo...
- CRConrad 5y ago
  > First Look Media (parent company of The Intercept) > Poitras and Greenwald Yeah, back then they all used to be among the good guys. One thing I haven't quite understood, though: When and why, exactly, did they turn into raving loony pro-Putin mouthpieces? Or is the plural unfair; is it just Greenwald?

Vecr 5y ago

The data is compartmentalized, he probably did not have an easy way to exfiltrate it. He had a good portion of NSA data available without too much suspicion, due to his position. Most CIA or NSA employees did not ever get that much access. There's probably a motivation factor as well.

tootie 5y ago

It's unclear after reading this stuff if the program is still active or if this exposure is something historical

autoexec 5y ago

> Shows how afraid people are to mess with the CIA. They shouldn’t even be allowed to operate in the United States let alone collect information on American citizens. I think it's incredible that politicians haven't cracked down on three letter agencies ages ago. The threat to themselves seems like it should have been obvious. As long as they're sucking up data on US citizens (including presidents and congressmen) it would make it very very easy for those with that data to control anyone. When the NSA can lie to congress and face no consequences is it because the government if fine with that or because they are too afraid to do anything? It makes the highest offices of our government seem very weak and vulnerable. If they're terrified to do anything about them, what possible chance could the rest of us have?

virissimo 5y ago
Perhaps politicians don't crack down on three letter agencies because when they try, their careers are ruined by those same three letter agencies. Here's an example: https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/48603/did-the-cia-feed-false-information-to-mccarthy-to-discredit-his-true-claims-that https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/48603/did-the-c.... See this for a previous HN discussion of the same: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25397168#25409105 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25397168#25409105.
- thr0wawayf00 5y ago
  McCarthy is a pretty unique figure in US history in that he was infamous for propagating the second "red scare" in the US. That's not to discredit these reports by any means, but it's not like he was do-gooder either. He was a vicious politician that didn't hesitate to accuse his enemies of being communist, which sometimes resulted in arrest and prosecution. [0]"McCarthyist" anti-communist (i.e. opposition political organization) laws were passed that were later struck down by the Supreme Court. His ability to accumulate power this way made him a major political target, which isn't quite the same as someone just trying to reel in the 3 letter agencies. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism
mistermann 5y ago

Gollapalli 5y ago

It was supposed to be illegal for the CIA to operate within the US.

c0nducktr 5y ago

Seems as simple as the CIA murders people, while the NSA just collects intelligence, right?

heavyset_go 5y ago

From what I understand, Snowden had access to a whole trove of NSA data that he chose to leak. He might not have had similar access to CIA documents.

whitepaint 5y ago

https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1492091045873553411 https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1492091045873553411