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I suspect this author and editorial organization would, in fact, call all the similar activities by the government 'spying', that you and I would agree should b

by gojomo 14y ago

I suspect this author and editorial organization would, in fact, call all the similar activities by the government 'spying', that you and I would agree should be called 'spying'. So the fact that other people, sometimes, use and understand 'spying' less consistently isn't very relevant for condemning this headline use as 'misleading'. Wiretapping requires a court order. And it is also 'spying', in the common understanding of the word. ('Spying' does not require illegality. With a court order, wiretapping is legal spying. These NSLs are also currently-understood-to-be-legal spying.) The headline "Google: FBI Spies on its Customers" would have been defensible, too. It's a short, opinionated summary of the equally-opinionated reporting. Yes, it would prompt readers to wonder exactly which kind of 'spying' is meant, which they could find in the article. 'Requests Some Customer Data' would not be enough: there's no indication of the compulsion and secrecy. 'Secretly Investigates' would not be enough, either, because just researching someone via public sources could be a 'secret investigation'. Only 'spying' adds the necessary connotation of surveillance or privileged-document-collection. And sure Wired picked the word for drama. We should expect reports to feature the most-dramatic-yet-still-fair headlines that can be backed up by the reporting. This recent expansion of oversight-resistant domestic-spying is in fact a dramatic development. Google finding a way to hint at its magnitude is also a dramatic development.

dalke 14y ago
In looking around, I see that you are correct about the general use of "spy." I thought that the main meanings were 1) spying taking place in opposition to laws in other jurisdictions but legal in the first (eg, British spies in the Soviet Union), 2) spying taking place against economic opponents, often using illegal methods (corporate espionage), 3) citizens spy against other citizens if they use illegal means, and 4) the government spies against its citizens using illegal means. Only #2 of these might use non-illegal means. Otherwise, I thought that "spying" required a violation of the law. For example, the US law describes spying as "Any person subject to this chapter who, in violation of the law of war and with intent or reason to believe that it is to be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of a foreign power, collects or attempts to collect information by clandestine means or while acting under false pretenses, for the purpose of conveying such information to an enemy of the United States, or one of the co-belligerents of the enemy..." But I see plenty of examples where people use "spying" where I would use "surveillance" or other term. And you know, ... I'm fine with broadening the use of the term 'spying' for these cases. Thanks for the enlightenment!

by gojomo 14y ago

dalke 14y ago

In looking around, I see that you are correct about the general use of "spy." I thought that the main meanings were 1) spying taking place in opposition to laws in other jurisdictions but legal in the first (eg, British spies in the Soviet Union), 2) spying taking place against economic opponents, often using illegal methods (corporate espionage), 3) citizens spy against other citizens if they use illegal means, and 4) the government spies against its citizens using illegal means. Only #2 of these might use non-illegal means. Otherwise, I thought that "spying" required a violation of the law. For example, the US law describes spying as "Any person subject to this chapter who, in violation of the law of war and with intent or reason to believe that it is to be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of a foreign power, collects or attempts to collect information by clandestine means or while acting under false pretenses, for the purpose of conveying such information to an enemy of the United States, or one of the co-belligerents of the enemy..." But I see plenty of examples where people use "spying" where I would use "surveillance" or other term. And you know, ... I'm fine with broadening the use of the term 'spying' for these cases. Thanks for the enlightenment!