5 ms·

As a non-American, apparently I'm already fair game, so there's no harm in using encryption.

greyman 13y ago
But, for example, if they would run a query "select everyone who uses email encryption", and then analyze this subset of people further, then you might have placed yourself under radar, and they can have a closer look at your other non-encrypted traffic. Basically, you revealed that you "have something to hide". Anyway, I have found that if some article claims that you should or should not do something to protect yourself against NSA, it is almost always written by an amateur. The real experts know that we currently don't know which capabilities NSA has and what exactly they do, so it is almost impossible to assess if something will help or not help or hurt. My "amateur gut feeling" tells me that if you really want to send something secretly, you should at minimum setup a separate hardware+software with no connection point to your real identity. But this is not advice against NSA, just an opinion.
- cinquemb 13y ago
  From what the CIA officer who was operating out of the US embassy in moscow had on him when he was caught by russian authorities recently, that makes sense.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
noarchy 13y ago
What is quite telling (at least within US media coverage) is that it is apparently only controversial that the NSA is spying on those in the US. The complete disregard for everyone else in the world seems almost casual, as if it isn't an issue at all. But indeed, let's keep using encryption. It is, after all, the US government that has a long history(1) of trying to keep encryption out of our non-American hands. (1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_in_the_U...
- colinb 13y ago
  Why would you expect the US government, or ANY government to respect the right of privacy of citizens of other countries? The first duty of government is surely to protect the interests of the country to which it belongs - note that I'm in favour of governments belonging to countries, not the other way around. And that first duty surely indicates that any government should do its upmost to pry into the business of anybody where doing so will offer advantage to its citizens. Furthermore, it would be weird if this didn't happen. And if your country, whichever one it is, isn't doing this, and some horrible thing happens which might have been avoided by this kind of spying, then your co-citizens will be rightly outraged and demand to know what the hell your government thinks it is doing. But, equally, your government might [ought?] to consider what it can do to protect its citizens from foreign spying. Most wicked in all of this is not that the spying takes place, but that it does so within the most diaphanous of legal frameworks. I understand that my government might want to spy on me if it thinks I'm involved in something illegal, but I damn well want a clear, unambiguous, legal framework that says who gets to authorise that spying, for how long, and on what grounds. Oh, and the person who does that authorisation had better be a judge, or an elected official that I can un-elect. All this we're-so-clever-because-we-found-a-way-to-subvert-the-law-by-cleve-interpretation nonsense needs to be stopped in a career ending way for those doing it. Oh, and the politicians who gave it a wink and a nod need to be named so we can decide what to do with them at the next election. In summary, countries spy on foreigners. Always have. Always will. But that doesn't excuse them spying on their own. That kind of behaviour has a bad reputation, for a bunch of historically valid reasons.
  - lancewiggs 13y ago
    The current state is a sadly very country-centric perspective. I'd like to live in a world where we all were able to assert our rights, as stated most elegantly under the Declaration of Human Rights (1). Article 7: All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination. Article 12: No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks. Article 14: (1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. Article 19: Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers. The USA's own Elanor Roosevelt was the Chair of the CHR, which drafted the Declaration, and the US is a signatory. (2) (1) http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/ http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/ (2) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human_Rights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human...
mike-cardwell 13y ago
We are all "fair game" in every country in the World, except sometimes our own.
IceyEC 13y ago
If you'd like to fight back, feel free to send me a heavily encrypted email (it's in my profile) with paragraphs from 1984 (or other related, Big Brother type books)! My key is available at https://keyserver.pgp.com/vkd/DownloadKey.event?keyid=0x9C3DEA4F4A1E556D https://keyserver.pgp.com/vkd/DownloadKey.event?keyid=0x9C3D... or you can search for my key with the id '9C3DEA4F4A1E556D'!

But, for example, if they would run a query "select everyone who uses email encryption", and then analyze this subset of people further, then you might have placed yourself under radar, and they can have a closer look at your other non-encrypted traffic. Basically, you revealed that you "have something to hide". Anyway, I have found that if some article claims that you should or should not do something to protect yourself against NSA, it is almost always written by an amateur. The real experts know that we currently don't know which capabilities NSA has and what exactly they do, so it is almost impossible to assess if something will help or not help or hurt. My "amateur gut feeling" tells me that if you really want to send something secretly, you should at minimum setup a separate hardware+software with no connection point to your real identity. But this is not advice against NSA, just an opinion.

cinquemb 13y ago
From what the CIA officer who was operating out of the US embassy in moscow had on him when he was caught by russian authorities recently, that makes sense.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

noarchy 13y ago

What is quite telling (at least within US media coverage) is that it is apparently only controversial that the NSA is spying on those in the US. The complete disregard for everyone else in the world seems almost casual, as if it isn't an issue at all. But indeed, let's keep using encryption. It is, after all, the US government that has a long history(1) of trying to keep encryption out of our non-American hands. (1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_in_the_U...

colinb 13y ago
Why would you expect the US government, or ANY government to respect the right of privacy of citizens of other countries? The first duty of government is surely to protect the interests of the country to which it belongs - note that I'm in favour of governments belonging to countries, not the other way around. And that first duty surely indicates that any government should do its upmost to pry into the business of anybody where doing so will offer advantage to its citizens. Furthermore, it would be weird if this didn't happen. And if your country, whichever one it is, isn't doing this, and some horrible thing happens which might have been avoided by this kind of spying, then your co-citizens will be rightly outraged and demand to know what the hell your government thinks it is doing. But, equally, your government might [ought?] to consider what it can do to protect its citizens from foreign spying. Most wicked in all of this is not that the spying takes place, but that it does so within the most diaphanous of legal frameworks. I understand that my government might want to spy on me if it thinks I'm involved in something illegal, but I damn well want a clear, unambiguous, legal framework that says who gets to authorise that spying, for how long, and on what grounds. Oh, and the person who does that authorisation had better be a judge, or an elected official that I can un-elect. All this we're-so-clever-because-we-found-a-way-to-subvert-the-law-by-cleve-interpretation nonsense needs to be stopped in a career ending way for those doing it. Oh, and the politicians who gave it a wink and a nod need to be named so we can decide what to do with them at the next election. In summary, countries spy on foreigners. Always have. Always will. But that doesn't excuse them spying on their own. That kind of behaviour has a bad reputation, for a bunch of historically valid reasons.
- lancewiggs 13y ago
  The current state is a sadly very country-centric perspective. I'd like to live in a world where we all were able to assert our rights, as stated most elegantly under the Declaration of Human Rights (1). Article 7: All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination. Article 12: No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks. Article 14: (1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. Article 19: Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers. The USA's own Elanor Roosevelt was the Chair of the CHR, which drafted the Declaration, and the US is a signatory. (2) (1) http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/ http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/ (2) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human_Rights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human...

mike-cardwell 13y ago

We are all "fair game" in every country in the World, except sometimes our own.

IceyEC 13y ago

If you'd like to fight back, feel free to send me a heavily encrypted email (it's in my profile) with paragraphs from 1984 (or other related, Big Brother type books)! My key is available at https://keyserver.pgp.com/vkd/DownloadKey.event?keyid=0x9C3DEA4F4A1E556D https://keyserver.pgp.com/vkd/DownloadKey.event?keyid=0x9C3D... or you can search for my key with the id '9C3DEA4F4A1E556D'!