5 ms·

NSA's Acting Director Tried to Save Top Scientist from Purge

41 points by _tk_ 1y ago

duxup 1y ago
> He rose through the ranks of the agency to become its chief data scientist. Friends and former colleagues of Mr. Nguyen said he had been in charge of developing artificial intelligence systems to improve the gathering of foreign communications. He has also been involved in the intelligence community’s work on quantum computing, which has the potential to break current encryption systems and revolutionize espionage. Lost job because a political appointee claims he did something or other…. but won’t show any proof of it. Current administration is a clown car of incompetence.
- quantified 1y ago
  Why do you say incompetence? They are systematically trying to mess things up. Doing more or less a good job of it, crashing it gently enough to avoid losing their heads.
  - subscribed 1y ago
    Almost like they were running the playbook "how to comprehensively destroy the USA damaging as much of the western relationships as possible".
    - ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
      Purges at the NSA (political or not) are hardly destroying the US. Snowden did more damage to the NSA than Trump and Co have done.
  - Gibbon1 1y ago
    A friend had an apt description of these guys. They are TV people. Take that and run with it and it all makes sense.
    - mindslight 1y ago
      That explains a lot, but it still doesn't capture the extent of the outright malice.
      - Gibbon1 1y ago
        I have a friend that used to work for TV people at one time. End of comment about those people, it is so much worse than you can imagine.
  - duxup 1y ago
    I don’t give up on incompetence being the cause easily, nor a little of both.
- treetalker 1y ago
  > Lost job because a political appointee … Not entirely sure this is accurate: according to the article, Gabbard (political appointee) fired him because Trump ordered her to do so. The question is why Trump gave that order; I suspect, but cannot show any direct evidence, that Laura Loomer (not a political appointee) had something to do with it. (As discussed in the article and as we know from many other instances and sources, Loomer goes about picking people to get rid of — for whatever reasons — and apparently has a lot of sway with Trump.) But don't get me wrong: I agree with you in spirit! > Current administration is a clown car of incompetence. Self-evident.
- bananapub 1y ago
  this isn’t incompetence, it’s deliberate destruction of the functioning of the US state. they don’t want it to work anymore.
- gosub100 1y ago
  Well, we already have proof all NSA employees violate the constitution. Does that help?
josefritzishere 1y ago
This is the most short-sighted things that the government has done in generations. America used to go out of our way to attract and even "steal" talent.
tucnak 1y ago
https://archive.is/YonXY https://archive.is/YonXY NSA science departments being demolished is lowkey great news; as a European, I feel like there's already enough SIGINT going around on their part. No doubt they'll be capitalizing on AI advantage anyway. If this kind of news means there will be less of it, we all stand to gain from it. Especially now that the U.S. has become comically unreliable, and indeed, dangerous—ally to its friends, it's hard to view this bit of news in bad light.
- FirmwareBurner 1y ago
  >NSA science departments being demolished is lowkey great news; as a European Ironic to read this gloat, given the new spyware, chat control and anti online privacy acts that the EU countries are pushing for, which will also be achieved using US/Israeli tech instead of domestically developed one, because the EU has none. So your tax money will go to the US big-tech(again!) so that your government can spy on you. I don't think this is something to be happy about just because hey at least the US has domestic issues.
  - tucnak 1y ago
    Ironic that you should mention Chat Control, given that the most powerful parties behind Chat Control are all backed by the U.S. (mostly Washington guys targeting EU bureaucrats exclusively, and never targeting U.S. policy-makers in the first place) such as Thorn, weProtect, etc. known to be affiliated with State Dept. and to a lesser extent, the NSA. Thorn has been lobbying for Chat Control since 2012, and it's crawling with U.S. spooks. There's barely enough plausible deniability, but not enough to fool the journos: https://balkaninsight.com/2023/09/25/who-benefits-inside-the-eus-fight-over-scanning-for-child-sex-content/ https://balkaninsight.com/2023/09/25/who-benefits-inside-the...
    - FirmwareBurner 1y ago
      >the most powerful parties behind Chat Control are all backed by the U.S. Of course the US would benefit from EU's chat control. Duh! Nothing eye opening in your comment. That's like being surprised the shovel makers benefit from a gold rush. If the EU started the demand, the US will happily supply because otherwise someone else will. However, my biggest problem as an EU citizen is the fact that the EU is implementing chat control in the first, not that the US is happily supplying it since the US government is not accountable to me, but sadly it seems mine isn't either. > and never targeting U.S. policy-makers in the first place Why would they shit where they eat or bite the hand that feeds them?
CaptWillard 1y ago
... " tangential connections to the intelligence agencies’ review of Russian efforts to influence and meddle in the 2016 election." That's a really cute way to describe a deliberate fabrication of intelligence in an effort to unseat an elected President of the United States.
- generj 1y ago
  What was fabricated?
- nubianwarrior 1y ago
  Any evidence of this fabrication?
  - ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
    This is intelligence. You gotta purge your enemies, not prosecute them with evidence.
- DrillShopper 1y ago
  What part of that bothers you? That there was an investigation or that it targeted Trump based on discovered evidence?
jmclnx 1y ago
Well glad to see the New York Times calling it exactly what is going on, purge. As in what is common in the USSR and Russia. Yet congress and the courts are allowing Trump to destroy all the hard work prior generations put in to trying to better the US. Now the US will end up like many Countries that people are trying to leave as fast as they can.
- ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
  >Now the US will end up like many Countries that people are trying to leave as fast as they can. This is not supported by the data. Seems like we're having to kick people out and have soldiers at the border to prevent incursions.
  - staplers 1y ago
    not supported by the data https://www.itij.com/latest/news/us-overseas-tourist-arrivals-continue-decline-june https://www.itij.com/latest/news/us-overseas-tourist-arrival...
    - ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
      Those are tourists not coming to the US. This is about people trying to leave the US. We are having to force people out at gunpoint.
      - staplers 1y ago
        We are having to force people out at gunpoint. Why is that? I haven't heard a compelling argument other than "criminals" which doesn't hold up to data scrutiny.
        ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
        You are being intentionally obtuse. I'm not engaging with that.
metalman 1y ago
simple solution, fire the scientists, and them hire them back on as security consultants at three times there original salary, and include in.there job descriptions things like ,wallking the halls on alert for suspisious persons, maintaining and operating equipment, publishing reports on any findings, keeping co workers uo to date on technical issues.......

41 points by _tk_ 1y ago

> He rose through the ranks of the agency to become its chief data scientist. Friends and former colleagues of Mr. Nguyen said he had been in charge of developing artificial intelligence systems to improve the gathering of foreign communications. He has also been involved in the intelligence community’s work on quantum computing, which has the potential to break current encryption systems and revolutionize espionage. Lost job because a political appointee claims he did something or other…. but won’t show any proof of it. Current administration is a clown car of incompetence.

quantified 1y ago
Why do you say incompetence? They are systematically trying to mess things up. Doing more or less a good job of it, crashing it gently enough to avoid losing their heads.
- subscribed 1y ago
  Almost like they were running the playbook "how to comprehensively destroy the USA damaging as much of the western relationships as possible".
  - ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
    Purges at the NSA (political or not) are hardly destroying the US. Snowden did more damage to the NSA than Trump and Co have done.
- Gibbon1 1y ago
  A friend had an apt description of these guys. They are TV people. Take that and run with it and it all makes sense.
  - mindslight 1y ago
    That explains a lot, but it still doesn't capture the extent of the outright malice.
    - Gibbon1 1y ago
      I have a friend that used to work for TV people at one time. End of comment about those people, it is so much worse than you can imagine.
- duxup 1y ago
  I don’t give up on incompetence being the cause easily, nor a little of both.
treetalker 1y ago
> Lost job because a political appointee … Not entirely sure this is accurate: according to the article, Gabbard (political appointee) fired him because Trump ordered her to do so. The question is why Trump gave that order; I suspect, but cannot show any direct evidence, that Laura Loomer (not a political appointee) had something to do with it. (As discussed in the article and as we know from many other instances and sources, Loomer goes about picking people to get rid of — for whatever reasons — and apparently has a lot of sway with Trump.) But don't get me wrong: I agree with you in spirit! > Current administration is a clown car of incompetence. Self-evident.
bananapub 1y ago
this isn’t incompetence, it’s deliberate destruction of the functioning of the US state. they don’t want it to work anymore.
gosub100 1y ago
Well, we already have proof all NSA employees violate the constitution. Does that help?

josefritzishere 1y ago

This is the most short-sighted things that the government has done in generations. America used to go out of our way to attract and even "steal" talent.

tucnak 1y ago

https://archive.is/YonXY https://archive.is/YonXY NSA science departments being demolished is lowkey great news; as a European, I feel like there's already enough SIGINT going around on their part. No doubt they'll be capitalizing on AI advantage anyway. If this kind of news means there will be less of it, we all stand to gain from it. Especially now that the U.S. has become comically unreliable, and indeed, dangerous—ally to its friends, it's hard to view this bit of news in bad light.

FirmwareBurner 1y ago
>NSA science departments being demolished is lowkey great news; as a European Ironic to read this gloat, given the new spyware, chat control and anti online privacy acts that the EU countries are pushing for, which will also be achieved using US/Israeli tech instead of domestically developed one, because the EU has none. So your tax money will go to the US big-tech(again!) so that your government can spy on you. I don't think this is something to be happy about just because hey at least the US has domestic issues.
- tucnak 1y ago
  Ironic that you should mention Chat Control, given that the most powerful parties behind Chat Control are all backed by the U.S. (mostly Washington guys targeting EU bureaucrats exclusively, and never targeting U.S. policy-makers in the first place) such as Thorn, weProtect, etc. known to be affiliated with State Dept. and to a lesser extent, the NSA. Thorn has been lobbying for Chat Control since 2012, and it's crawling with U.S. spooks. There's barely enough plausible deniability, but not enough to fool the journos: https://balkaninsight.com/2023/09/25/who-benefits-inside-the-eus-fight-over-scanning-for-child-sex-content/ https://balkaninsight.com/2023/09/25/who-benefits-inside-the...
  - FirmwareBurner 1y ago
    >the most powerful parties behind Chat Control are all backed by the U.S. Of course the US would benefit from EU's chat control. Duh! Nothing eye opening in your comment. That's like being surprised the shovel makers benefit from a gold rush. If the EU started the demand, the US will happily supply because otherwise someone else will. However, my biggest problem as an EU citizen is the fact that the EU is implementing chat control in the first, not that the US is happily supplying it since the US government is not accountable to me, but sadly it seems mine isn't either. > and never targeting U.S. policy-makers in the first place Why would they shit where they eat or bite the hand that feeds them?

CaptWillard 1y ago

... " tangential connections to the intelligence agencies’ review of Russian efforts to influence and meddle in the 2016 election." That's a really cute way to describe a deliberate fabrication of intelligence in an effort to unseat an elected President of the United States.

generj 1y ago
What was fabricated?
nubianwarrior 1y ago
Any evidence of this fabrication?
- ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
  This is intelligence. You gotta purge your enemies, not prosecute them with evidence.
DrillShopper 1y ago
What part of that bothers you? That there was an investigation or that it targeted Trump based on discovered evidence?

jmclnx 1y ago

Well glad to see the New York Times calling it exactly what is going on, purge. As in what is common in the USSR and Russia. Yet congress and the courts are allowing Trump to destroy all the hard work prior generations put in to trying to better the US. Now the US will end up like many Countries that people are trying to leave as fast as they can.

ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
>Now the US will end up like many Countries that people are trying to leave as fast as they can. This is not supported by the data. Seems like we're having to kick people out and have soldiers at the border to prevent incursions.
- staplers 1y ago
  not supported by the data https://www.itij.com/latest/news/us-overseas-tourist-arrivals-continue-decline-june https://www.itij.com/latest/news/us-overseas-tourist-arrival...
  - ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
    Those are tourists not coming to the US. This is about people trying to leave the US. We are having to force people out at gunpoint.
    - staplers 1y ago
      We are having to force people out at gunpoint. Why is that? I haven't heard a compelling argument other than "criminals" which doesn't hold up to data scrutiny.
      - ahmeneeroe-v2 1y ago
        You are being intentionally obtuse. I'm not engaging with that.

metalman 1y ago

simple solution, fire the scientists, and them hire them back on as security consultants at three times there original salary, and include in.there job descriptions things like ,wallking the halls on alert for suspisious persons, maintaining and operating equipment, publishing reports on any findings, keeping co workers uo to date on technical issues.......