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There's something sick and wrong in the semantics of how the laws have been interpreted here. The authorities seem to have decided that they can record anythin
by zmmmmm 13y ago
There's something sick and wrong in the semantics of how the laws have been interpreted here.
The authorities seem to have decided that they can record anything they want, any time they want. The legal boundary is only crossed when somebody listens to the recording. So it is fine for them to slurp up every bit of data they can tap into and then retrospectively figure out which bits they were authorized to listen to (with almost no oversight, as indicated by this article).
But most normal people don't interpret privacy that way. They consider the act of recording without consent the violation of privacy. The listening afterwards compounds it, but the power of the third party comes from having the conversation recorded, not the listening.
This misinterpretation of privacy is a subtle but deliberate and totally corrupt act by the authorities.
- moxie 13y agoHere is the video clip from General Alexander's congressional testimony three days ago, where he stated this was not happening: http://youtu.be/ZmBAxEWxDFs?t=1h29m50s http://youtu.be/ZmBAxEWxDFs?t=1h29m50s It's not clear to me whether they were sworn in for this hearing or not, but if this new report is true, then this seems to be at least the second documented case of an exposed lie about the scope of surveillance during congressional testimony. The first, of course, being Clapper's "not wittingly:" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9ss2_0emOY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9ss2_0emOY
- cpleppert 13y agoHe might be interpreting the claim as being that Snowden could do that, which is, of course, false.
- gojomo 13y agoI don't follow your "of course, false". Maybe Snowden really could obtain wiretaps of federal judges and the President, either because he was given the discretionary permission to do so in the course of an investigation, or they were available to him with a little trivial privilege-escalation. Alexander might have meant Snowden wasn't supposed to have that capability. Or that Snowden had it but wasn't supposed to use it that way, so he "couldn't" do it under the law (but could in practice). It's hard to say; the testimony has often used obfuscatory weasel words and conveniently shifting definitions, and the avuncular grandparents in the Senate aren't exactly vigorous in their cross-examination.
- superuser2 13y agoWhat everyone misses about the comment on wiretapping the President is "if I had a personal email." There is no reason, none, that the President's Yahoo Mail account would be different from anyone else's Yahoo Mail account, so it's reasonable that that could be tapped without special permission. His statement did not preclude controls on tapping White House or other .gov emails.
- samstave 13y agoWe need to hear what the NSAs version of listening is. Do algorithms parsing streams count as listening? Or only when a human sees it/hears it?
- marshray 13y agoDoes it matter? Just the copying and storage of the bits today is laying the groundwork for any imaginable abuses in the future.
- declan 13y agoThis is a very important point. NSA's definitions do not track common English usage.
- Joeri 13y agoThey could have algorithms transcribing the sound into text, focus on keywords, show the text anonymized to analysts to check whether there's something there, and still claim they're not directly targeting or 'listening' to someone so can do all of that without a warrant.
- tripzilch 13y agoWhat about, it's observed when its wave function collapses :-P
- mtgx 13y agoWhich is why they are keeping the interpretation secret.