4 ms·

"On the other hand, because of Strafor's mission" The dissemination of information? What's wrong with that?

danilocampos 15y ago
> The dissemination of information? What's wrong with that? ...Nothing at all? It's a simple matter of the type of information they disseminate. A type of information of particular interest to people with skin in the game of world politics. That is, a guy on Stratfor's secret client list probably has much more interesting email to read than a guy working at a Radio Shack in Sarasota, Florida.
- jonhendry 15y ago
  "It's a simple matter of the type of information they disseminate. " And that type of information is? You seem to be one of the people assuming Stratfor is some kind of Blackwater intelligence company. They aren't.
  - danilocampos 15y ago
    > And that type of information is? You seem to be one of the people assuming Stratfor is some kind of Blackwater intelligence company. They aren't. Oh, thanks so much, jonhendry! I really appreciate your filling me in. Reading America's Secret War, by Stratfor's founder, had left me entirely in the dark about their mission and capabilities until this very moment. I stand enlightened. The fact remains, the sort of person who is emailing high-level folk at Stratfor either knows things or wants to know things of geopolitical importance. A source with a compelling piece of data the public doesn't know about, perhaps. Or a business tycoon with a question that, knowing it was asked, completely invalidates the public narrative that company had spun. So if your mission is to get access to data about how people are running the world, a great place to start is a private global intelligence firm. No one is saying they're not allowed to do what they're doing. Only that "trades emails with a private intelligence analysts" is probably going to be a pretty good proxy for "has interesting, secret shit to talk about."
    - jonhendry 15y ago
      "Reading America's Secret War, by Stratfor's founder, had left me entirely in the dark about their mission and capabilities until this very moment. I stand enlightened." If you read it, what makes you think Dick Cheney would be involved? The book apparently contradicts everything the neocons stood for. Cheney would probably prefer that Stratfor were shut down, so that he could control the flow of information. "No one is saying they're not allowed to do what they're doing." Really? People are tossing around the word 'evil', but they should be allowed to keep doing it? "Only that "trades emails with a private intelligence analysts" is probably going to be a pretty good proxy for "has interesting, secret shit to talk about."" Ah, so you've gone from justifying it by saying they're evil and up to no good, to justifying it by saying they merely have interesting, secret shit to talk about. Lots of people have interesting, secret shit to talk about. So basically it's really just a voyeuristic thing for you and the moralizing is a pose.
      - danilocampos 15y ago
        > If you read it, what makes you think Dick Cheney would be involved? Nothing. Good luck finding anything where I say "Dick Cheney is involved with the operations of Stratfor." > Ah, so you've gone from justifying it by saying they're evil and up to no good, to justifying it by saying they merely have interesting, secret shit to talk about. When I say interesting in the context of "how people are running the world," I mean interesting as in "lied to the public about an issue of global importance." > So basically it's really just a voyeuristic thing for you and the moralizing is a pose. Nope. I doubt I'm going to read any of what's leaked. It's just my fervent hope that one of these days a leak can begin to remedy the sorts of injustice that only the well-moneyed and well-connected can perpetrate with impunity. Any entity that needs Stratfor's analysis of global events and decisions seems like a reasonable candidate to deliver an important payload in such a leak.
        jonhendry 15y ago
        " I mean interesting as in "lied to the public about an issue of global importance."" It's so secret multiple HN readers have said they subscribed. It's so exclusive that anyone can subscribe for a yearly price that is cheaper than cable TV, let alone secret publications like "Science" or "Nature". You really seem to have the wrong end of the stick here, as in not-clear-on-the-concept of how Stratfor worked. If you want to know if someone has "lied to the public about an issue of global importance", and think Stratfor holds the answer, you would subscribe to Stratfor and compare what Stratfor reported to what the public figure claimed. You've bought into some kind of radical left fantasy of what Stratfor does, turning it into the Trilateral Commission or the Bilderbergers. "Any entity that needs Stratfor's analysis of global events and decisions seems like a reasonable candidate to deliver an important payload in such a leak." See above about the Bilderbergers. Say you're a company doing business with Turkey. Not a huge business, but you've got a lot riding on stability in Turkey. Maybe you import rugs. Maybe you do package tours of Istanbul. Maybe you have a team of developers there. Where do you go for good analysis of the situation there, given the history of military takeovers and whatnot? The newspapers only cover it occasionally, probably too late to do you much good. MSNBC won't cover it at all on a weekend. FOX News would be all "OMG, Turkish Muslims! Threat or Menace?" and be useless. Turkish media might cover it, but not provide good analysis, and you don't know if the coverage is biased there, or if so, how. So where do you turn? You could read the Economist, but that might not be good enough. Maybe you could buy some reports from the Economist Intelligence Unit, or Jane's. Or you could subscribe to Stratfor, which is probably cheaper.
stfu 15y ago
I still don't get what was wrong with Stratefor. I subscribed to their newsletter a long time ago and the content was somewhat on the Foreign Affairs magazine level. Sure, some military and secret service personal were among the subscribers, but they are most likely among the subscribers of the Wired magazine as well. I am truly looking forward to the email leak and what kind of secret in formations they are able to reveal.
- danilocampos 15y ago
  I mean, there's nothing wrong with Stratfor. It's just the business they're in means that the clients who engage them for one-off analysis jobs are often into some pretty... globally interesting things. Think of it like this. Say that, one day, all the pigs in town just disappear. Gone. And everyone's like, "Hey. Where are all the pigs? This is crazy. Hey, Danilo, do you know where the pigs went?" "Me? Uh, no." But a few years later, the town librarian has all his emails leaked. And included among this is a brief exchange, a week before The Pig Event, wherein I ask "So, librarian, any advice on books for transporting livestock? Oh, could you set aside Pigs for Dummies for me?" This message is now... pretty interesting. Does it prove I'm a pig thief? Not necessarily, unless I get into more detail in other messages. It does suggest, though, that I might have known more than I did when the event happened. And that it's worth digging around for links between me and the pigs.
- doktrin 15y ago
  Stratfor was essentially labeled as a form of collateral damage. The self-described Anon spokesperson basically said they weren't one of the "offenders" but were "of interest". I don't feel sold on the merits of going after Stratfor - it's almost as if it was merely a convenient and vulnerable target. It's not too hard to envision just about any company or organization being targeted because of some vague affiliation or "interest".
  - grandalf 15y ago
    Stratfor is an organization (similar in a way to wikileaks) that offers private individuals the option of buying intelligence analysis. I used to be a subscriber. How does stratfor get this intel to share with its clients? By tips provided by trusted sources in government. These people would probably lose their jobs if it was found out that they shared info with stratfor. I would not be surprised if the USG infiltrated anonymous and did this attack as part of a campaign against whistleblowers.

> The dissemination of information? What's wrong with that? ...Nothing at all? It's a simple matter of the type of information they disseminate. A type of information of particular interest to people with skin in the game of world politics. That is, a guy on Stratfor's secret client list probably has much more interesting email to read than a guy working at a Radio Shack in Sarasota, Florida.

jonhendry 15y ago
"It's a simple matter of the type of information they disseminate. " And that type of information is? You seem to be one of the people assuming Stratfor is some kind of Blackwater intelligence company. They aren't.
- danilocampos 15y ago
  > And that type of information is? You seem to be one of the people assuming Stratfor is some kind of Blackwater intelligence company. They aren't. Oh, thanks so much, jonhendry! I really appreciate your filling me in. Reading America's Secret War, by Stratfor's founder, had left me entirely in the dark about their mission and capabilities until this very moment. I stand enlightened. The fact remains, the sort of person who is emailing high-level folk at Stratfor either knows things or wants to know things of geopolitical importance. A source with a compelling piece of data the public doesn't know about, perhaps. Or a business tycoon with a question that, knowing it was asked, completely invalidates the public narrative that company had spun. So if your mission is to get access to data about how people are running the world, a great place to start is a private global intelligence firm. No one is saying they're not allowed to do what they're doing. Only that "trades emails with a private intelligence analysts" is probably going to be a pretty good proxy for "has interesting, secret shit to talk about."
  - jonhendry 15y ago
    "Reading America's Secret War, by Stratfor's founder, had left me entirely in the dark about their mission and capabilities until this very moment. I stand enlightened." If you read it, what makes you think Dick Cheney would be involved? The book apparently contradicts everything the neocons stood for. Cheney would probably prefer that Stratfor were shut down, so that he could control the flow of information. "No one is saying they're not allowed to do what they're doing." Really? People are tossing around the word 'evil', but they should be allowed to keep doing it? "Only that "trades emails with a private intelligence analysts" is probably going to be a pretty good proxy for "has interesting, secret shit to talk about."" Ah, so you've gone from justifying it by saying they're evil and up to no good, to justifying it by saying they merely have interesting, secret shit to talk about. Lots of people have interesting, secret shit to talk about. So basically it's really just a voyeuristic thing for you and the moralizing is a pose.
    - danilocampos 15y ago
      > If you read it, what makes you think Dick Cheney would be involved? Nothing. Good luck finding anything where I say "Dick Cheney is involved with the operations of Stratfor." > Ah, so you've gone from justifying it by saying they're evil and up to no good, to justifying it by saying they merely have interesting, secret shit to talk about. When I say interesting in the context of "how people are running the world," I mean interesting as in "lied to the public about an issue of global importance." > So basically it's really just a voyeuristic thing for you and the moralizing is a pose. Nope. I doubt I'm going to read any of what's leaked. It's just my fervent hope that one of these days a leak can begin to remedy the sorts of injustice that only the well-moneyed and well-connected can perpetrate with impunity. Any entity that needs Stratfor's analysis of global events and decisions seems like a reasonable candidate to deliver an important payload in such a leak.
      - jonhendry 15y ago
        " I mean interesting as in "lied to the public about an issue of global importance."" It's so secret multiple HN readers have said they subscribed. It's so exclusive that anyone can subscribe for a yearly price that is cheaper than cable TV, let alone secret publications like "Science" or "Nature". You really seem to have the wrong end of the stick here, as in not-clear-on-the-concept of how Stratfor worked. If you want to know if someone has "lied to the public about an issue of global importance", and think Stratfor holds the answer, you would subscribe to Stratfor and compare what Stratfor reported to what the public figure claimed. You've bought into some kind of radical left fantasy of what Stratfor does, turning it into the Trilateral Commission or the Bilderbergers. "Any entity that needs Stratfor's analysis of global events and decisions seems like a reasonable candidate to deliver an important payload in such a leak." See above about the Bilderbergers. Say you're a company doing business with Turkey. Not a huge business, but you've got a lot riding on stability in Turkey. Maybe you import rugs. Maybe you do package tours of Istanbul. Maybe you have a team of developers there. Where do you go for good analysis of the situation there, given the history of military takeovers and whatnot? The newspapers only cover it occasionally, probably too late to do you much good. MSNBC won't cover it at all on a weekend. FOX News would be all "OMG, Turkish Muslims! Threat or Menace?" and be useless. Turkish media might cover it, but not provide good analysis, and you don't know if the coverage is biased there, or if so, how. So where do you turn? You could read the Economist, but that might not be good enough. Maybe you could buy some reports from the Economist Intelligence Unit, or Jane's. Or you could subscribe to Stratfor, which is probably cheaper.

stfu 15y ago

I still don't get what was wrong with Stratefor. I subscribed to their newsletter a long time ago and the content was somewhat on the Foreign Affairs magazine level. Sure, some military and secret service personal were among the subscribers, but they are most likely among the subscribers of the Wired magazine as well. I am truly looking forward to the email leak and what kind of secret in formations they are able to reveal.

danilocampos 15y ago
I mean, there's nothing wrong with Stratfor. It's just the business they're in means that the clients who engage them for one-off analysis jobs are often into some pretty... globally interesting things. Think of it like this. Say that, one day, all the pigs in town just disappear. Gone. And everyone's like, "Hey. Where are all the pigs? This is crazy. Hey, Danilo, do you know where the pigs went?" "Me? Uh, no." But a few years later, the town librarian has all his emails leaked. And included among this is a brief exchange, a week before The Pig Event, wherein I ask "So, librarian, any advice on books for transporting livestock? Oh, could you set aside Pigs for Dummies for me?" This message is now... pretty interesting. Does it prove I'm a pig thief? Not necessarily, unless I get into more detail in other messages. It does suggest, though, that I might have known more than I did when the event happened. And that it's worth digging around for links between me and the pigs.
doktrin 15y ago
Stratfor was essentially labeled as a form of collateral damage. The self-described Anon spokesperson basically said they weren't one of the "offenders" but were "of interest". I don't feel sold on the merits of going after Stratfor - it's almost as if it was merely a convenient and vulnerable target. It's not too hard to envision just about any company or organization being targeted because of some vague affiliation or "interest".
- grandalf 15y ago
  Stratfor is an organization (similar in a way to wikileaks) that offers private individuals the option of buying intelligence analysis. I used to be a subscriber. How does stratfor get this intel to share with its clients? By tips provided by trusted sources in government. These people would probably lose their jobs if it was found out that they shared info with stratfor. I would not be surprised if the USG infiltrated anonymous and did this attack as part of a campaign against whistleblowers.