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> What this really underscores is that what the PRC is doing through these proxy actors is really reckless and unbounded, in a way that is significantly outside
by oa335 1y ago
> What this really underscores is that what the PRC is doing through these proxy actors is really reckless and unbounded, in a way that is significantly outside of the norms of what we see in the espionage space,"
What norms are he referring to?
- drob518 1y agoYea, I wasn’t aware that there was a rule book for spies. I thought the only rule was “anything goes, but don’t get caught.” But perhaps I’m uninformed.
- Telemakhos 1y agoGiven that the US intelligence community, with PRISM and Upstream and the like, hoovers up all the world's communications, I think the "norms" must be "nobody except the US was able to do this until now." Now China has shown that it can compete in the same space.
- hammock 1y agoWestern intelligence plus Israel* And yeah pretty much. I don’t know anything about anything but it feels like there is a hierarchy (norm? At least what they are trying to enforce) of US > Five Eyes > other Western Intel (France, etc) > Pakistan/Russia/Etc > China/North Korea/Iran; and Israel falls somewhere in that mix as a maverick. Of course in practice it doesn’t work out this way. Reminds me of the recent news that the US will ban Chinese components from undersea cables, globally: https://asia.nikkei.com/content/99550c9ade243fe057e8a2ba6f293fb2 https://asia.nikkei.com/content/99550c9ade243fe057e8a2ba6f29...
- mensetmanusman 1y agoIsrael is a part of western intelligence. Adding them as your main response is strange.
- lazide 1y agoNotably, Israel is not actually located anywhere near the physical ‘west’.
- kasey_junk 1y agoNeither is Australia but you’d almost universally call it the west. Because western in this instance is a cultural qualifier not a geographic one. Objecting to calling Israel the west is at least as weird as including it in the context of this conversation.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- Dylan16807 1y agoHow are you defining West here? If we go by the international date line they're not all that far away and if you zag left as you go further south it works quite well. You need a similar shape on the other side too to get Europe but exclude Africa, so it makes for a pretty reasonable cut of the planet overall. It's a tilted west.
- Dylan16807 1y agoOof people hate this comment. Look, I know it's cultural much more than geographical. But Australia can easily be both. It's not actually a counterexample.
- lazide 1y agoNot the poster, but the Mossad has made quite a name for themselves. I honestly have no idea if Australia even has an intelligence service - do you?
- kasey_junk 1y agoAustralia is one of the 5 eye nations…
- nbngeorcjhe 1y agoHe's referring to the norm that only the American government is allowed to conduct unlawful mass surveillance of American citizens. Who do these Chinese think they are???
- eviks 1y agoThe ones that are in his head, just as soft, curvy, and flexible as the matter inside
- kevindamm 1y agoIndiscriminate targeting. It's clarified at the end of that paragraph, and was part of the article's lead-in: "There's a thought among the public that if you don't work in a sensitive area that the PRC might be interested in for its traditional espionage activities, then you are safe, they will not target you," [deputy assistant director for the FBI's cyber division] said, during a Thursday interview with The Register. "As we have seen from Salt Typhoon, this is no longer an assumption that anyone can afford to make."
- BlueTemplar 1y agoThat's an oxymoron : it's not targeting at this point. (Some high value people do seem to be targeted for even more intensive spying.)