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U.S. bugged EU offices, computer networks

317 points by 1337biz 13y ago

stephengillie 13y ago
Keep your friends close and your enemies closer? The document explicitly called the EU a "target".
- simmons 13y ago
  I wouldn't put too much emphasis on such wording, as various fields use common words in uncommon ways. For instance, cryptographers refer to those they seek privacy from as "adversaries," which may sound excessively agressive to a layperson. (I'm only playing devil's advocate here -- tapping EU networks is damning enough.)
- vidarh 13y ago
  A target for surveillance.
3327 13y ago
This is embarrassing...This is no different than Soviet behavior, and a huge break in trust for the Obama administration. How can a nation host the UN if it is abused and bugged. Just disgusting.
rwmj 13y ago
Maybe Belgium can offer Snowden asylum now. More seriously, who uses public internet terminals for anything? I would never log in from one. I would (and admittedly not very carefully) use a public internet connection with my own laptop. If I was carrying state secrets, I'd hope that my state would have given me a very well-configured laptop which would just use the public internet for a VPN, and would allow no DNS or anything else to be consumed from the public resource.
- tlogan 13y ago
  Spying on officials is not just to get state secrets. It is used also to discover any information (maybe embarrassing, or just private information) which can be used as a leverage in negotiation or, in more severe cases, as a plain old black-mail.
- Ives 13y ago
  That's funny. If the USA asks the Belgian government to jump, they only ask "how high?". A small example: all international bank transfers within Europe (through SWIFT, located in Brussels), are all sent to the USA. Because they need that stuff to catch terrorists. Apparently the US can (and have) even interceped money.
  - jeltz 13y ago
    This used to be true but I do not think it still is. SWIFT opened a data center in Switzerland for the express purpose of not having to send internal European transactions to the US. They could be lying of course and still be doing it.
- auctiontheory 13y ago
  More seriously, who uses public internet terminals for anything? Travelers away from home. And these cafes tend to be much more common outside the US - I've used them from Colombia to Germany to Korea.
Smrchy 13y ago
What could you do with all this money the US is spending on making the rest of the world (its targets?) hate them more with every new revelation? Like throwing your garbage over to your neighbors lawn every day and building higher and higher fences because you sense that they might be starting to hate you. Obama wake up already!
- adventured 13y ago
  The rest of the world likes to spy on the rest of the world. At the government level, intelligence agency jealousy is about the only thing being generated by US spy programs (particularly since the US is substantially cutting in its allies, most of them have known about this for a long time).
dobbsbob 13y ago
Guardian ran an article how GCHQ/NSA installed keyloggers in all public cafes during a g8 event hosting in the UK in hopes of capturing diplomat traffic. They also ran Stingray fake towers galore to capture cell traffic and hacked every blackberry device they could. For some reason they were really interested in spying on Turkey and South Africa of all places. Surprised these internet cafes still aren't using a disposable VPS for every customer to prevent easy keyloggers though I would imagine they can probably smash right through a hypervisor and bug the host and guest.
ck2 13y ago
The crazy thing is - what are they doing with all this "intel" anyway? It's not like the US can make unilateral decisions (except for a president declaring war). Congress has to make decisions and that's like herding cats. Somehow before they were taping everyone's phone calls and internet traffic they produced the report "Bin Laden determined to strike" [1] yet nothing was done with that intel. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bin_Ladin_Determined_To_Strike_in_US http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bin_Ladin_Determined_To_Strike_...
- a3n 13y ago
  1st, economic/business espionage. 2nd, looking for leaks. 3rd, ... terrorism? I doubt much of 3, because they've been in operation since the fifties, which is a very long time for usage to evolve and find a purpose and then entrench itself. I assume 1 is the primary usage.
- Zigurd 13y ago
  The US federal constitution allocates the power to declare war to Congress. Some say this has become completely inverted but brilliant legal minds like John Yoo obviously know better.
  - mpyne 13y ago
    Congress itself was the one who has authorized the current 'War on Terror'. They didn't declare that the nation itself is in a state of war, which is itself accurate if you look around in the U.S., where the war (and wars) have had minimal effect at home.
    - Zigurd 13y ago
      What nation needs to capitulate to end the "war?"
      - mpyne 13y ago
        What nation needed to capitulate for the previous military force authorizations against pirates on the high seas? Non-state actors are not a new development. Personally I would say the AUMF should go away after the withdrawal from Afghanistan but let's not act like there's some magical international legal shield over AQ because they haven't taken over any other national governments.
uvdiv 13y ago
Isn't this the explicit purpose of the NSA, to spy on the communications of foreign governments? And aren't EU members' governments doing the same thing against the US?
- lispm 13y ago
  Time to rethink its mission.
  - uvdiv 13y ago
    Has Germany banned its foreign intelligence agencies from spying on the US government? Is that also covered under its privacy laws?
    - sentenza 13y ago
      If they came out tomorrow and declared that they don't spy on the US, I would probably believe them. Do you know why? Because there is a complete trust asymmetry between the leaders of some states in Europe and the leaders of the US. When the last government was formed in Germany[1], a guy from the FDP (free democratic party) regularly took his notes and other inofficial documents from the coalition negotiations to the US embassy and presented them to US personnel there, while the negotiations were still going on. Guess what his punishment was, when it came out. Nothing. So it seems the leaders of Germany consider the US to be so trustworthy that its spying on them is not seen as problematic. Why would these same people even consider spying on the US, especially since, given the quality of German intelligence services, it is highly unlikely that it would go unnoticed by the US? http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.spiegel.de%2Fpolitik%2Fdeutschland%2Fus-depeschen-fdp-maulwurf-der-amerikaner-outet-sich-a-732517.html http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=... [1]Germany has a coalition government, meaning that two parties govern together with thematic areas of government assigned to either party.
      - adventured 13y ago
        Germany as an ally has known for a very long time, dating back to the split between West / East, that the US was spying on it heavily. The only difference with the latest program revelations is, the German politicians have to pretend to be upset about it as a dramatic performance for the people they represent.
mtgx 13y ago
Was it here that I saw people lashing at Falkvinge for accusing US of spying on EU officials [1]? Ok, he didn't show any real proof at the time, but was it that hard to believe it would happen? I don't know about you, but I'd rather be paranoid than naive this time, especially since we have no idea what else NSA is hiding, and what's the real extent of their spying operations. It seems to me being naive would hurt more, at this point. [1] http://falkvinge.net/2013/06/24/the-united-states-wiretapped-the-mail-of-the-european-parliament/ http://falkvinge.net/2013/06/24/the-united-states-wiretapped...
a3n 13y ago
That's a very unfriendly act. I would love to see Obama have a town hall with European citizens and explain to them why this is a good thing.
fiatmoney 13y ago
There is a continuum between "keep track of what you happen to see", to "penetrate networks and install bugs", to "recruiting human agents in their government" and beyond. It's in general the job of agencies like the NSA to keep track of all foreign governments, but the degree of escalation and hostility is a political decision and not a technical one. If the US government has decided to treat the EU as an adversary, it doesn't exactly bode well for, eg, NATO cooperation, or access to the EU market for trade (particularly in computer services). If the NSA is doing this simply because they have the ability, then they're usurping decisions that properly belong to the democratically elected civil government, such as it is.
- Arwill 13y ago
  I'm pretty sure we'll know in time that the US and Britain were behind some Euro manipulation too. The EU is right now like a big blob of countries. Some of the sovereignty was handed over to it, but its a lame duck when needs protecting itself. But then, when it does act, it acts against its members countries, and not to protect it form outside.
antr 13y ago
I'd be curious to know how would U.S. citizens' reactions be if it were the EU spying on U.S. diplomats and citizens. I can only imagine.
- mpyne 13y ago
  I can only speak for myself, but I'd be pissed that our counter-intel guys didn't detect the bug and that our NSA COMSEC guys didn't employ effective countermeasures. We've assumed people are spying on us as a matter of course, if we've paid attention to world history. The Soviets and Israel especially have had some especially ingenious means to spy on U.S. diplomatic communications.
- uvdiv 13y ago
  Like this? http://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/30/world/us-expanding-its-effort-to-halt-spying-by-allies.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/30/world/us-expanding-its-eff...
- adventured 13y ago
  US allies do spy on American corporations and the US Government. Israel for example has been caught over and over again spying on the US, and is a big concern for US intelligence agencies. http://bigstory.ap.org/article/us-sees-israel-tight-mideast-ally-spy-threat http://bigstory.ap.org/article/us-sees-israel-tight-mideast-... Countries we're neutral with (not allies per se, not at war with), such as China, routinely spy on the US Government and its corporations; ditto Russia (and that goes back a long ways). And of course China is America's largest trading partner, so we're quite friendly there. Or for example, the UK spying on the Germans: http://rt.com/news/uk-germany-wiretapping-criticism-201/ http://rt.com/news/uk-germany-wiretapping-criticism-201/ I would argue that all the major countries are attempting to spy on all the other major countries. Perhaps none so successfully or belligerently as the US of course.
- known 13y ago
  http://www.blacklistednews.com/The_Stunning_Hypocrisy_of_the_U.S._Government/26866/0/38/38/Y/M.html http://www.blacklistednews.com/The_Stunning_Hypocrisy_of_the...
- 13y ago
UVB-76 13y ago
Earlier today US national security adviser Susan Rice claimed the diplomatic consequences of the Snowden revelations were not that significant [1] She was wrong. This is a diplomatic disaster for the US. [1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/29/edward-snowden-president-susan-rice http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/29/edward-snowden-p...
alan_cx 13y ago
MI5 spends a lot of its time and energy keeping an eye on US officials in the UK. Presumably the opposite happens too. This is the "legit" spy game that mostly I find acceptable. Again, its merely about understanding intention. Each side has to verify good intention to proceed with confidence.
woah 13y ago
How can Yahoo's mobile layout be so broken?? This is a major internet company!
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
popee 13y ago
You non-americans are hypocrites! Why, the hell, should americans think about your problems, you only think about yourselves, bla, bla, bla >:-)
sentenza 13y ago
I think this one hit home. Judging from what I can see right now, these revelations have stirred up some unrest among EU politicians[1], most noticeably among the generally US-friendly right. Probably the most significant consequence of this is that it will now definitely be a hot issue for the German election, which is held in autumn. There are three likely outcomes: One possibility is that German politicians take a stand against surveillance while campaigning, making promises, thus causing Germany to become more of a pro-privacy hardliner. This would be a good outcome. Another possibility is that mainstream politicians fail to do so, but the Pirate Party will manage to get the 5% necessary to enter parliament, thus needling them for years to come. This would also be good. The third possibility is that mainstream politicians will ignore it and the Pirate Party will fail, causing the political leadership to see the "privacy vote" as negligible. This would be bad for both Germany and Europe. [1] http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.spiegel.de%2Fpolitik%2Fdeutschland%2Freaktionen-auf-abhoerprogramm-der-nsa-gegen-eu-vertretungen-a-908570.html http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=...
- iSnow 13y ago
  Unfortunately, our (German) current government - which will in all likelyhood be the next German govt too simply does not have the balls to take a firm stand. Germany is pretty pro-privacy, but they still signed the "safe haven" agreement with the US which more or less allows US companies to do anything with the data of German citizens, local laws be damned. However, I believe Ms Merkel has had some colorful things to say in private about the slick Mr Obama who came over on a visit just a week ago. Must be nice to learn that he was blabbing about his high ethical standards while at the same time his spies were wiretapping her communications.
- tater 13y ago
  The politicians might say nasty things and express outrage in public but nothing will change. EU is still in a recession hell and they're nothing Washington can't soothe over with a few checks. Cash rules everything around me. CREAM get the money, dolla dolla bill yall.
  - 13y ago
rdtsc 13y ago
Pretty soon I expect stuff like "US _doesn't_ monitor <X>'s communication" to become the news. The fact that US is monitoring everything will become the default state.
gnosis 13y ago
Sooner or later, the vast treasure-trove of data that has been collected will be exploited for the purposes of blackmailing, intimidating, harrassing, stalking, or stealing the identities of powerful individuals. And sooner or later, news that this has happened will leak to the media, and there will be widespread fear and outrage among the powerful. Then, and only then, can we expect anything meaningful to get done. Until that point, expect a lot of talk, but no walk. Some years back, it was revealed that the US had bugged the offices of foreign dignitaries at the United Nations. It was just just a blip in the news. Sure, there was some grumbling, but nothing was done. And now we can see that the practice continues. Besides, all these countries spy on each other. What do you think their spy agencies are for? Do you really think that their spying is only reserved for their "enemies"? Do you think they can resist using their sophisticated spying technologies to spy on their allies? Is anyone really suprised? I personally would be surprised if they didn't spy on their allies -- just as I would be if the US suddenly started using swords on the battlefield because they were more honorable weapons than guns which kill from a safe distance. Welcome to the world of Machiavelli and realpolitik. We don't live in Disneyland.
- nraynaud 13y ago
  you mean now that the US and EU are dealing a comercial treaty? Moreover not every spy agency in the world tortures people at a massive scale, assassinate anybody it wants across the world or is part of the biggest army. And many countries are so small that anyways they can't spy that much or act that much on the information, but also many countries would not feel it's right, many of them are less corrupt as the US.
- pcrh 13y ago
  I recently thought that one of the most dramatic ways to frame this current debate would be for all the NSA data for a certain period of time (say one week) to be leaked. Everyone would be able to see that their email (or whatever) had been logged, and many would mine the data to show "interesting" connections between people involved in current political issues. Just imagine the uproar!
- selimthegrim 13y ago
  http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21134540/vp/30328082#30328082 http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21134540/vp/30328082#30328082 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Harman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Harman
kalms 13y ago
Should have been ousted just before Obama's rather tame speech in Berlin - That would have made his speech a bit more interesting.
twodayslate 13y ago
How is this news and why are people surprised at this?
chmike 13y ago
So what ? This is to for the terrorist thing, as they claim.
brown9-2 13y ago
Does anyone want to speculate what Snowden's motive is for leaking these particular documents?
- trotsky 13y ago
  Validation of the claims of documents of substantial value having been held back, in hopes of resolving whatever issue is preventing him from traveling.
auctiontheory 13y ago
Perhaps Snowden will not have to make the long flight to Ecuador after all. In light of these revelations, perhaps London or Paris or Berlin would provide (and will provide) a more agreeable sanctuary.
- mpyne 13y ago
  All 3 definitely knew. London might even be impressed. The only real problem for them is that it's out in the public, and they might have to act surprised and offended for a bit of time until it all blows over again.
- vidarh 13y ago
  The Ecuadorian embassy in London, maybe. Certainly not the UK government, which is intent on remaining the lapdog of the US no matter how much spanking it gets.
leke 13y ago
Finally, EU citizens might get some justice now that our leaders have been spied on.
AlexeiSadeski 13y ago
Shocking. Absolutely shocking.
gerhardi 13y ago
If the documents reveal who are behind this, would USA be willing to extradite the suspects to Europe for trial and punishment?
at-fates-hands 13y ago
After I keep reading all of these stories, I remembered reading the book: "The Watchman: The Twisted Life and Crimes of Serial Hacker Kevin Poulsen" where the book talked about the illegal wiretaps he found the FBI involved in. http://www.nndb.com/people/453/000022387/ http://www.nndb.com/people/453/000022387/ "As a fugitive, Poulsen needled the FBI by hacking federal computers and revealing details of wiretaps on foreign consulates, suspected mobsters, and the American Civil Liberties Union. He also hacked into the details on FBI front companies. At the highest levels of U.S. law enforcement" I'm wondering what he knows or thinks about all the stuff coming out now. . .
Uchikoma 13y ago
The NSA argues to fight terrorism, bugs EU offices, EU officials are terrorists?

317 points by 1337biz 13y ago

stephengillie 13y ago

Keep your friends close and your enemies closer? The document explicitly called the EU a "target".

simmons 13y ago
I wouldn't put too much emphasis on such wording, as various fields use common words in uncommon ways. For instance, cryptographers refer to those they seek privacy from as "adversaries," which may sound excessively agressive to a layperson. (I'm only playing devil's advocate here -- tapping EU networks is damning enough.)
vidarh 13y ago
A target for surveillance.

3327 13y ago

This is embarrassing...This is no different than Soviet behavior, and a huge break in trust for the Obama administration. How can a nation host the UN if it is abused and bugged. Just disgusting.

rwmj 13y ago

Maybe Belgium can offer Snowden asylum now. More seriously, who uses public internet terminals for anything? I would never log in from one. I would (and admittedly not very carefully) use a public internet connection with my own laptop. If I was carrying state secrets, I'd hope that my state would have given me a very well-configured laptop which would just use the public internet for a VPN, and would allow no DNS or anything else to be consumed from the public resource.

tlogan 13y ago
Spying on officials is not just to get state secrets. It is used also to discover any information (maybe embarrassing, or just private information) which can be used as a leverage in negotiation or, in more severe cases, as a plain old black-mail.
Ives 13y ago
That's funny. If the USA asks the Belgian government to jump, they only ask "how high?". A small example: all international bank transfers within Europe (through SWIFT, located in Brussels), are all sent to the USA. Because they need that stuff to catch terrorists. Apparently the US can (and have) even interceped money.
- jeltz 13y ago
  This used to be true but I do not think it still is. SWIFT opened a data center in Switzerland for the express purpose of not having to send internal European transactions to the US. They could be lying of course and still be doing it.
auctiontheory 13y ago
More seriously, who uses public internet terminals for anything? Travelers away from home. And these cafes tend to be much more common outside the US - I've used them from Colombia to Germany to Korea.

Smrchy 13y ago

What could you do with all this money the US is spending on making the rest of the world (its targets?) hate them more with every new revelation? Like throwing your garbage over to your neighbors lawn every day and building higher and higher fences because you sense that they might be starting to hate you. Obama wake up already!

adventured 13y ago
The rest of the world likes to spy on the rest of the world. At the government level, intelligence agency jealousy is about the only thing being generated by US spy programs (particularly since the US is substantially cutting in its allies, most of them have known about this for a long time).

dobbsbob 13y ago

Guardian ran an article how GCHQ/NSA installed keyloggers in all public cafes during a g8 event hosting in the UK in hopes of capturing diplomat traffic. They also ran Stingray fake towers galore to capture cell traffic and hacked every blackberry device they could. For some reason they were really interested in spying on Turkey and South Africa of all places. Surprised these internet cafes still aren't using a disposable VPS for every customer to prevent easy keyloggers though I would imagine they can probably smash right through a hypervisor and bug the host and guest.

ck2 13y ago

The crazy thing is - what are they doing with all this "intel" anyway? It's not like the US can make unilateral decisions (except for a president declaring war). Congress has to make decisions and that's like herding cats. Somehow before they were taping everyone's phone calls and internet traffic they produced the report "Bin Laden determined to strike" [1] yet nothing was done with that intel. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bin_Ladin_Determined_To_Strike_in_US http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bin_Ladin_Determined_To_Strike_...

a3n 13y ago
1st, economic/business espionage. 2nd, looking for leaks. 3rd, ... terrorism? I doubt much of 3, because they've been in operation since the fifties, which is a very long time for usage to evolve and find a purpose and then entrench itself. I assume 1 is the primary usage.
Zigurd 13y ago
The US federal constitution allocates the power to declare war to Congress. Some say this has become completely inverted but brilliant legal minds like John Yoo obviously know better.
- mpyne 13y ago
  Congress itself was the one who has authorized the current 'War on Terror'. They didn't declare that the nation itself is in a state of war, which is itself accurate if you look around in the U.S., where the war (and wars) have had minimal effect at home.
  - Zigurd 13y ago
    What nation needs to capitulate to end the "war?"
    - mpyne 13y ago
      What nation needed to capitulate for the previous military force authorizations against pirates on the high seas? Non-state actors are not a new development. Personally I would say the AUMF should go away after the withdrawal from Afghanistan but let's not act like there's some magical international legal shield over AQ because they haven't taken over any other national governments.

uvdiv 13y ago

Isn't this the explicit purpose of the NSA, to spy on the communications of foreign governments? And aren't EU members' governments doing the same thing against the US?

lispm 13y ago
Time to rethink its mission.
- uvdiv 13y ago
  Has Germany banned its foreign intelligence agencies from spying on the US government? Is that also covered under its privacy laws?
  - sentenza 13y ago
    If they came out tomorrow and declared that they don't spy on the US, I would probably believe them. Do you know why? Because there is a complete trust asymmetry between the leaders of some states in Europe and the leaders of the US. When the last government was formed in Germany[1], a guy from the FDP (free democratic party) regularly took his notes and other inofficial documents from the coalition negotiations to the US embassy and presented them to US personnel there, while the negotiations were still going on. Guess what his punishment was, when it came out. Nothing. So it seems the leaders of Germany consider the US to be so trustworthy that its spying on them is not seen as problematic. Why would these same people even consider spying on the US, especially since, given the quality of German intelligence services, it is highly unlikely that it would go unnoticed by the US? http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.spiegel.de%2Fpolitik%2Fdeutschland%2Fus-depeschen-fdp-maulwurf-der-amerikaner-outet-sich-a-732517.html http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=... [1]Germany has a coalition government, meaning that two parties govern together with thematic areas of government assigned to either party.
    - adventured 13y ago
      Germany as an ally has known for a very long time, dating back to the split between West / East, that the US was spying on it heavily. The only difference with the latest program revelations is, the German politicians have to pretend to be upset about it as a dramatic performance for the people they represent.

mtgx 13y ago

Was it here that I saw people lashing at Falkvinge for accusing US of spying on EU officials [1]? Ok, he didn't show any real proof at the time, but was it that hard to believe it would happen? I don't know about you, but I'd rather be paranoid than naive this time, especially since we have no idea what else NSA is hiding, and what's the real extent of their spying operations. It seems to me being naive would hurt more, at this point. [1] http://falkvinge.net/2013/06/24/the-united-states-wiretapped-the-mail-of-the-european-parliament/ http://falkvinge.net/2013/06/24/the-united-states-wiretapped...

a3n 13y ago

That's a very unfriendly act. I would love to see Obama have a town hall with European citizens and explain to them why this is a good thing.

fiatmoney 13y ago

There is a continuum between "keep track of what you happen to see", to "penetrate networks and install bugs", to "recruiting human agents in their government" and beyond. It's in general the job of agencies like the NSA to keep track of all foreign governments, but the degree of escalation and hostility is a political decision and not a technical one. If the US government has decided to treat the EU as an adversary, it doesn't exactly bode well for, eg, NATO cooperation, or access to the EU market for trade (particularly in computer services). If the NSA is doing this simply because they have the ability, then they're usurping decisions that properly belong to the democratically elected civil government, such as it is.

Arwill 13y ago
I'm pretty sure we'll know in time that the US and Britain were behind some Euro manipulation too. The EU is right now like a big blob of countries. Some of the sovereignty was handed over to it, but its a lame duck when needs protecting itself. But then, when it does act, it acts against its members countries, and not to protect it form outside.

antr 13y ago

I'd be curious to know how would U.S. citizens' reactions be if it were the EU spying on U.S. diplomats and citizens. I can only imagine.

mpyne 13y ago
I can only speak for myself, but I'd be pissed that our counter-intel guys didn't detect the bug and that our NSA COMSEC guys didn't employ effective countermeasures. We've assumed people are spying on us as a matter of course, if we've paid attention to world history. The Soviets and Israel especially have had some especially ingenious means to spy on U.S. diplomatic communications.
uvdiv 13y ago
Like this? http://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/30/world/us-expanding-its-effort-to-halt-spying-by-allies.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/30/world/us-expanding-its-eff...
adventured 13y ago
US allies do spy on American corporations and the US Government. Israel for example has been caught over and over again spying on the US, and is a big concern for US intelligence agencies. http://bigstory.ap.org/article/us-sees-israel-tight-mideast-ally-spy-threat http://bigstory.ap.org/article/us-sees-israel-tight-mideast-... Countries we're neutral with (not allies per se, not at war with), such as China, routinely spy on the US Government and its corporations; ditto Russia (and that goes back a long ways). And of course China is America's largest trading partner, so we're quite friendly there. Or for example, the UK spying on the Germans: http://rt.com/news/uk-germany-wiretapping-criticism-201/ http://rt.com/news/uk-germany-wiretapping-criticism-201/ I would argue that all the major countries are attempting to spy on all the other major countries. Perhaps none so successfully or belligerently as the US of course.
known 13y ago
http://www.blacklistednews.com/The_Stunning_Hypocrisy_of_the_U.S._Government/26866/0/38/38/Y/M.html http://www.blacklistednews.com/The_Stunning_Hypocrisy_of_the...
13y ago

UVB-76 13y ago

Earlier today US national security adviser Susan Rice claimed the diplomatic consequences of the Snowden revelations were not that significant [1] She was wrong. This is a diplomatic disaster for the US. [1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/29/edward-snowden-president-susan-rice http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/29/edward-snowden-p...

alan_cx 13y ago

MI5 spends a lot of its time and energy keeping an eye on US officials in the UK. Presumably the opposite happens too. This is the "legit" spy game that mostly I find acceptable. Again, its merely about understanding intention. Each side has to verify good intention to proceed with confidence.

woah 13y ago

How can Yahoo's mobile layout be so broken?? This is a major internet company!

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

popee 13y ago

You non-americans are hypocrites! Why, the hell, should americans think about your problems, you only think about yourselves, bla, bla, bla >:-)

sentenza 13y ago

I think this one hit home. Judging from what I can see right now, these revelations have stirred up some unrest among EU politicians[1], most noticeably among the generally US-friendly right. Probably the most significant consequence of this is that it will now definitely be a hot issue for the German election, which is held in autumn. There are three likely outcomes: One possibility is that German politicians take a stand against surveillance while campaigning, making promises, thus causing Germany to become more of a pro-privacy hardliner. This would be a good outcome. Another possibility is that mainstream politicians fail to do so, but the Pirate Party will manage to get the 5% necessary to enter parliament, thus needling them for years to come. This would also be good. The third possibility is that mainstream politicians will ignore it and the Pirate Party will fail, causing the political leadership to see the "privacy vote" as negligible. This would be bad for both Germany and Europe. [1] http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.spiegel.de%2Fpolitik%2Fdeutschland%2Freaktionen-auf-abhoerprogramm-der-nsa-gegen-eu-vertretungen-a-908570.html http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=...

iSnow 13y ago
Unfortunately, our (German) current government - which will in all likelyhood be the next German govt too simply does not have the balls to take a firm stand. Germany is pretty pro-privacy, but they still signed the "safe haven" agreement with the US which more or less allows US companies to do anything with the data of German citizens, local laws be damned. However, I believe Ms Merkel has had some colorful things to say in private about the slick Mr Obama who came over on a visit just a week ago. Must be nice to learn that he was blabbing about his high ethical standards while at the same time his spies were wiretapping her communications.
tater 13y ago
The politicians might say nasty things and express outrage in public but nothing will change. EU is still in a recession hell and they're nothing Washington can't soothe over with a few checks. Cash rules everything around me. CREAM get the money, dolla dolla bill yall.
- 13y ago

rdtsc 13y ago

Pretty soon I expect stuff like "US _doesn't_ monitor <X>'s communication" to become the news. The fact that US is monitoring everything will become the default state.

gnosis 13y ago

Sooner or later, the vast treasure-trove of data that has been collected will be exploited for the purposes of blackmailing, intimidating, harrassing, stalking, or stealing the identities of powerful individuals. And sooner or later, news that this has happened will leak to the media, and there will be widespread fear and outrage among the powerful. Then, and only then, can we expect anything meaningful to get done. Until that point, expect a lot of talk, but no walk. Some years back, it was revealed that the US had bugged the offices of foreign dignitaries at the United Nations. It was just just a blip in the news. Sure, there was some grumbling, but nothing was done. And now we can see that the practice continues. Besides, all these countries spy on each other. What do you think their spy agencies are for? Do you really think that their spying is only reserved for their "enemies"? Do you think they can resist using their sophisticated spying technologies to spy on their allies? Is anyone really suprised? I personally would be surprised if they didn't spy on their allies -- just as I would be if the US suddenly started using swords on the battlefield because they were more honorable weapons than guns which kill from a safe distance. Welcome to the world of Machiavelli and realpolitik. We don't live in Disneyland.

nraynaud 13y ago
you mean now that the US and EU are dealing a comercial treaty? Moreover not every spy agency in the world tortures people at a massive scale, assassinate anybody it wants across the world or is part of the biggest army. And many countries are so small that anyways they can't spy that much or act that much on the information, but also many countries would not feel it's right, many of them are less corrupt as the US.
pcrh 13y ago
I recently thought that one of the most dramatic ways to frame this current debate would be for all the NSA data for a certain period of time (say one week) to be leaked. Everyone would be able to see that their email (or whatever) had been logged, and many would mine the data to show "interesting" connections between people involved in current political issues. Just imagine the uproar!
selimthegrim 13y ago
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21134540/vp/30328082#30328082 http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21134540/vp/30328082#30328082 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Harman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Harman

kalms 13y ago

Should have been ousted just before Obama's rather tame speech in Berlin - That would have made his speech a bit more interesting.

twodayslate 13y ago

How is this news and why are people surprised at this?

chmike 13y ago

So what ? This is to for the terrorist thing, as they claim.

brown9-2 13y ago

Does anyone want to speculate what Snowden's motive is for leaking these particular documents?

trotsky 13y ago
Validation of the claims of documents of substantial value having been held back, in hopes of resolving whatever issue is preventing him from traveling.

auctiontheory 13y ago

Perhaps Snowden will not have to make the long flight to Ecuador after all. In light of these revelations, perhaps London or Paris or Berlin would provide (and will provide) a more agreeable sanctuary.

mpyne 13y ago
All 3 definitely knew. London might even be impressed. The only real problem for them is that it's out in the public, and they might have to act surprised and offended for a bit of time until it all blows over again.
vidarh 13y ago
The Ecuadorian embassy in London, maybe. Certainly not the UK government, which is intent on remaining the lapdog of the US no matter how much spanking it gets.

leke 13y ago

Finally, EU citizens might get some justice now that our leaders have been spied on.

AlexeiSadeski 13y ago

Shocking. Absolutely shocking.

gerhardi 13y ago

If the documents reveal who are behind this, would USA be willing to extradite the suspects to Europe for trial and punishment?

at-fates-hands 13y ago

After I keep reading all of these stories, I remembered reading the book: "The Watchman: The Twisted Life and Crimes of Serial Hacker Kevin Poulsen" where the book talked about the illegal wiretaps he found the FBI involved in. http://www.nndb.com/people/453/000022387/ http://www.nndb.com/people/453/000022387/ "As a fugitive, Poulsen needled the FBI by hacking federal computers and revealing details of wiretaps on foreign consulates, suspected mobsters, and the American Civil Liberties Union. He also hacked into the details on FBI front companies. At the highest levels of U.S. law enforcement" I'm wondering what he knows or thinks about all the stuff coming out now. . .

Uchikoma 13y ago

The NSA argues to fight terrorism, bugs EU offices, EU officials are terrorists?