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Buried deep in the article is a quick nod to the relative ease of work-arounds, for org's actually aspiring to competence: > I once asked a U.S. cybersecurity

Buried deep in the article is a quick nod to the relative ease of work-arounds, for org's actually aspiring to competence: > I once asked a U.S. cybersecurity executive how his company handled the banned-documents problem in the context of securing the networks of their own clients. His answer: They would assign U.S. leaks to British analysts and leaked U.K. documents to American analysts. But mostly the article is a simplistic attack on a simplistic policy, by a (claimed) John Hopkins professor in this area. Very heavy on how the current policy makes his life in academia more difficult. Minimal interest in what workable improvements (from the US Nat'l Security Establishment's PoV) would look like. And scarcely a mention that the whole problem would be far smaller if our Establishment was less shitty at preventing leaks of its secret documents. EDIT/Responses: (Dylan16807) Yes, small picture, the leaks are a different topic. But at the "professor of strategic studies" level, arguing for changes in national security policy - maybe he should pay more attention to the bigger picture? That could include mention of the degree to which "simplistic idiocy" security policies discourage and demotivate the young people who our Establishment needs as responsible clerks handling its secret documents. (cowsandmilk) The "(claimed)" is a sarcastic dig - at the sophisticated worldview which he should bring to this subject, vs. the simplistic way he presents in the article.

cowsandmilk 1y ago
Why (claimed)? It’s pretty easy to verify this person is a professor at SAIS. And the Atlantic is a big enough publication that if someone was impersonating him, it would have been found out since publication.
Dylan16807 1y ago
> And scarcely a mention that the whole problem would be far smaller if our Establishment was less shitty at preventing leaks of its secret documents. That's a very different topic, and even if it was perfectly fixed there's still so many existing documents causing constant hassle.
AnthonyMouse 1y ago
> Minimal interest in what workable improvements (from the US Nat'l Security Establishment's PoV) would look like. An obvious improvement would be to not prohibit people with a security clearance from looking at documents that are already publicly available. If the concern is that the documents could be forgeries, train them to have a suitable skepticism about the authenticity of leaks rather than prohibiting them from reading it. What if they are already skeptical and want to view the documents for some other reason? What if the government has already conceded that they're authentic, or it's something that can be easily verified given the information, so the authenticity isn't in question? What if they're in a position to prove that it isn't authentic, which could be highly useful information to the government, but nobody ever finds out if they avoid reading it because of a senseless prohibition?
aspenmayer 1y ago
> EDIT/Responses: Your responses deserve their own comments, and by posting in this way, you circumvent the voting mechanism of other HN readers.
- bell-cot 1y ago
  Thank you(?) - but one response amounted to "oops, add /s", and the other to "a bigger picture looks appropriate for this topic". And from how my comments are usually voted here, I suspect that few other HN readers want to see more of 'em.
  - aspenmayer 1y ago
    > And from how my comments are usually voted here, I suspect that few other HN readers want to see more of 'em. It just feels uncouth or unseemly to reply in the original post as an edit, and it’s unfair to the person you’re replying to, as they may not know you replied, because you didn’t, technically. It feels manipulative and like you are avoiding downvotes that would otherwise arrive when you comment on how your comments are voted on. This feels like thwarting the will of users and subverting the will of the users as expressed through their responses. It’s hard to even have a conversation when you edit/reply, so it’s not really promoting conversation like the guidelines encourage us all to do. And this is as someone who usually agrees with you and your comments!

cowsandmilk 1y ago

Why (claimed)? It’s pretty easy to verify this person is a professor at SAIS. And the Atlantic is a big enough publication that if someone was impersonating him, it would have been found out since publication.

Dylan16807 1y ago

> And scarcely a mention that the whole problem would be far smaller if our Establishment was less shitty at preventing leaks of its secret documents. That's a very different topic, and even if it was perfectly fixed there's still so many existing documents causing constant hassle.

AnthonyMouse 1y ago

> Minimal interest in what workable improvements (from the US Nat'l Security Establishment's PoV) would look like. An obvious improvement would be to not prohibit people with a security clearance from looking at documents that are already publicly available. If the concern is that the documents could be forgeries, train them to have a suitable skepticism about the authenticity of leaks rather than prohibiting them from reading it. What if they are already skeptical and want to view the documents for some other reason? What if the government has already conceded that they're authentic, or it's something that can be easily verified given the information, so the authenticity isn't in question? What if they're in a position to prove that it isn't authentic, which could be highly useful information to the government, but nobody ever finds out if they avoid reading it because of a senseless prohibition?

aspenmayer 1y ago

> EDIT/Responses: Your responses deserve their own comments, and by posting in this way, you circumvent the voting mechanism of other HN readers.

bell-cot 1y ago
Thank you(?) - but one response amounted to "oops, add /s", and the other to "a bigger picture looks appropriate for this topic". And from how my comments are usually voted here, I suspect that few other HN readers want to see more of 'em.
- aspenmayer 1y ago
  > And from how my comments are usually voted here, I suspect that few other HN readers want to see more of 'em. It just feels uncouth or unseemly to reply in the original post as an edit, and it’s unfair to the person you’re replying to, as they may not know you replied, because you didn’t, technically. It feels manipulative and like you are avoiding downvotes that would otherwise arrive when you comment on how your comments are voted on. This feels like thwarting the will of users and subverting the will of the users as expressed through their responses. It’s hard to even have a conversation when you edit/reply, so it’s not really promoting conversation like the guidelines encourage us all to do. And this is as someone who usually agrees with you and your comments!