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Google Engineer Wins NSA Award, Then Says NSA Should Be “Abolished”

Dr. Joesph Bonner's quote: I’d rather have it abolished than persist in its current form. I think there’s a question about whether it’s possible to reform the NSA into something that’s more reasonable…But my feeling based on what I’ve read is that I don’t want to live in a country with an organization like the NSA is right now.

agilebyte 13y ago
The NSA announcement is here: http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/press_room/2013/2013_sos_competition.shtml http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/press_room/2013/2013_sos_comp...
ihsw 13y ago
How do you abolish something that the entirety of the federal and state governments rely upon? Intelligence resources are being pooled to the NSA, and cyber-intelligence reports are being sourced wholly from the NSA. They're the single most powerful intelligence agency in the US, and there's absolutely no sign of it slowing down. If there's anything that Obama shall be remembered for, it's that under his administration there was an astronomical consolidation of power. The DHS has progressively been getting more and more involved in pulling the strings of all levels of law enforcement.
- yuhong 13y ago
  Reading the context they did say reform is an alternative.
- rhizome 13y ago
  something that the entirety of the federal and state governments rely upon? This is not the case at all. The NSA has only existed for 65 years, we can do just fine without it.
  - unethical_ban 13y ago
    So have computers.
    - rhizome 13y ago
      Point?
      - nitrogen 13y ago
        I was about to make the same point, that the list of things that have existed for 65 or fewer years includes a number of things I couldn't live without (e.g. my own existence, for one). I agree that the NSA needs to stop wholesale data gathering and needs public transparency, but the age of the NSA is not a useful argument that we can live without it, since we can't live without other things that are younger.
        rhizome 13y ago
        Category error: the topic is the federal and state governments, not the age of things you personally require for existence.
        nitrogen 13y ago
        Just replying to what you said: rhizome 7 hours ago | link | parent | flag *something that the entirety of the federal and state governments rely upon?* This is not the case at all. The NSA has only existed for 65 years, we can do just fine without it.
      - anigbrowl 13y ago
        Don't be obtuse. Part of what makes the NSA powerful is its vast data-processing capacity. If it was just a bunch of spooks with shortwave radios and shorthand pads you wouldn't think twice about it.
- mullingitover 13y ago
  In hindsight, it's probably telling that Obama said he was heavily inspired by Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln vastly consolidated federal power during his presidency, and had some dubious issues with the Constitution as well.
  - bishnu 13y ago
    "some dubious issues with the Constitution as well." Is there a President this is not true for?
    - Zigurd 13y ago
      Carter?
  - jchan 13y ago
    The sad part of that being, of course, the fact that while Lincoln had half of the country in rebellion and offensive war to deal with, Obama has something that is less deadly than bathtubs to deal with. It is almost farcical.
  - jivatmanx 13y ago
    I think you're reading too much into that choice. I believe he chose Lincoln the same reason that Romney said that "Modern Family" is his favorite T.V. show: They both rank #1 in polls.
- Sven7 13y ago
  If you are wondering if its possible to dismantle something large and bureaucratic...there is evidence for it in the shutting down of the German nuclear sector. 17 multi billion dollar reactors, 350k employees, 50-250$ billion in shutdown costs. "Under Control" is a short documentary about it.
pixie_ 13y ago
Is World War II so far away that everyone forgets how fucked up the entire world can become - and it doesn't take long for it all to go to hell either. The NSA has to get their shit together, but we still need real strategical/tactical intelligence inside and outside of the US. So when it does happen (and it will eventually happen) we're prepared not to lose our country, or even the world to the super nuclear powered genetically modified nazi cyborgs.
- jivatmanx 13y ago
  In the 20 interwar years, both Communism and Fascism (Business plot, Leo Strauss, etc.) both had an enormous intellectual following, even in the U.S. In Europe, there was an overwhelming sentiment that Democracy was weak and outdated, which is why the Nazis and the USSR saw each-other as their primary threat, and had both fully anticipated and planned for a European war for years prior. There's nothing like that out there today. Russian hatred for Islamism exceeds the U.S.'s, China is panicky about Xinjiang Province/Pakistan. China and Russia pretty much act purely on interests and have no ideology. While there are few parallels to WWII, there are some with WWI. I hope that stark alliances don't form.
- justin66 13y ago
  It'd be more to the point to remember that we survived the cold war, an era where good intelligence was even more necessary and the dangers to the country were bigger and more immediate, with tighter controls on what intelligence services could do.
  - derefr 13y ago
    Did we have tighter controls, or were they just better at keeping their work out of the news?
    - justin66 13y ago
      We had tighter controls. It wasn't really an issue of "their work," it was an issue of what they were allowed to do with it under the law. For example, one of the fake controversies after 9/11 involved NSA and domestic intelligence not sharing as much information as some believed might have been valuable in preventing the attacks, in retrospect. This sharing was prevented - very deliberately - by statute. Those statutes have been weakened since, in the name of security and with little consideration of why they existed in the first place. edit: I was really only thinking of statutory control of intelligence gathering with my comments. Philwelch brings up an interesting point regarding (largely illegal) espionage, but I think the points still stand.
northwest 13y ago
> Google Engineer Wins NSA Award, Then Says NSA Should Be “Abolished” That's one thing. Now make these 2 events happen in the opposite order. ;-)
znowi 13y ago
This guy has the balls. Kudos, Mr Bonneau. I'm curious if he will get a private reprimand from Google execs for unpleasant commentary on their partner :)
- proexploit 13y ago
  I honestly don't understand people's opinion around this. I'm not trying to refute your comment, just understand and see if I missed something. As far as I have read, Google complies with NSA letters (which seems to be required by law, although perhaps not a favorable one) and PRISM is said to give the NSA additional direct access (but I haven't seen any indication of this being proved or confirmed to be known to the companies involved). Has there been some information proving Google and other companies are actually working with the NSA or is it simply based on the idea that you think it might be likely and they'd deny it either way (if they confirm it, they work with the NSA and if they deny it, they work with the NSA). I'm not suggesting blindly trusting any company or person but do we have actual knowledge in this subject I missed or simply opinions?
  - MrKurtz 13y ago
    I think he's being cute. For me this quote sums up what PRISM is really about: "Nobody wants a box in their network...[Companies often] find ways to give tools to minimize disclosures, to protect users, to keep the government off the premises, and to come to some reasonable compromise on the capabilities." http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57593538-38/how-the-u.s-forces-net-firms-to-cooperate-on-surveillance/ http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57593538-38/how-the-u.s-fo... Basically: in order to prevent the feds from installing boxes on their networks companies offer to do their own interception, which in my opinion is the far better alternative. "Direct access" isn't accurate.
- yuhong 13y ago
  On this matter I posted this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6078124 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6078124
ChrisAntaki 13y ago
>> Like many in the community of cryptographers and security engineers, I’m sad that we haven’t better informed the public about the inherent dangers and questionable utility of mass surveillance. Thought provoking.
bgentry 13y ago
tikkun.org seems to be down. Here's the Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/2013/07/25/google-engineer-wins-nsa-award-says-id-rather-have-it-abolished-than-persist-in-its-current-form/&strip=1 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://... Here's the blog post from the Google Engineer (Joseph Bonneau) about accepting the award: http://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2013/07/19/nsa-award-for-best-scientific-cybersecurity-paper/ http://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2013/07/19/nsa-award-for-...
dobbsbob 13y ago
Is this guy a google engineer because he thanks the people at Yahoo in his blog. Not that it matters, just happy he told them to go fuck themselves while accepting the award
Daniel_Newby 13y ago
This is silly coming from a company whose trusted computing base was nearly eaten by China. If any company needs the tightest possible OODA loop w.r.t. cyber-threats, it is Google. There has been a lot of utter horseshit about how the NSA's activities will make Europeans distrust American cloud computing. Well the NSA is nothing compared to the Communist Party espionage organizations.
- pvdm 13y ago
  >trusted computing base was nearly eaten by China Citation ?
  - Daniel_Newby 13y ago
    http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-10434721-245.html http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-10434721-245.html
8ig8 13y ago
The winning engineer is currently doing an AMA on Reddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1j6qo4/i_am_joseph_bonneau_2013_nsa_award_winner_for/ http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1j6qo4/i_am_joseph_bon...

agilebyte 13y ago

The NSA announcement is here: http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/press_room/2013/2013_sos_competition.shtml http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/press_room/2013/2013_sos_comp...

ihsw 13y ago

How do you abolish something that the entirety of the federal and state governments rely upon? Intelligence resources are being pooled to the NSA, and cyber-intelligence reports are being sourced wholly from the NSA. They're the single most powerful intelligence agency in the US, and there's absolutely no sign of it slowing down. If there's anything that Obama shall be remembered for, it's that under his administration there was an astronomical consolidation of power. The DHS has progressively been getting more and more involved in pulling the strings of all levels of law enforcement.

yuhong 13y ago
Reading the context they did say reform is an alternative.
rhizome 13y ago
something that the entirety of the federal and state governments rely upon? This is not the case at all. The NSA has only existed for 65 years, we can do just fine without it.
- unethical_ban 13y ago
  So have computers.
  - rhizome 13y ago
    Point?
    - nitrogen 13y ago
      I was about to make the same point, that the list of things that have existed for 65 or fewer years includes a number of things I couldn't live without (e.g. my own existence, for one). I agree that the NSA needs to stop wholesale data gathering and needs public transparency, but the age of the NSA is not a useful argument that we can live without it, since we can't live without other things that are younger.
      - rhizome 13y ago
        Category error: the topic is the federal and state governments, not the age of things you personally require for existence.
        nitrogen 13y ago
        Just replying to what you said: rhizome 7 hours ago | link | parent | flag *something that the entirety of the federal and state governments rely upon?* This is not the case at all. The NSA has only existed for 65 years, we can do just fine without it.
    - anigbrowl 13y ago
      Don't be obtuse. Part of what makes the NSA powerful is its vast data-processing capacity. If it was just a bunch of spooks with shortwave radios and shorthand pads you wouldn't think twice about it.
mullingitover 13y ago
In hindsight, it's probably telling that Obama said he was heavily inspired by Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln vastly consolidated federal power during his presidency, and had some dubious issues with the Constitution as well.
- bishnu 13y ago
  "some dubious issues with the Constitution as well." Is there a President this is not true for?
  - Zigurd 13y ago
    Carter?
- jchan 13y ago
  The sad part of that being, of course, the fact that while Lincoln had half of the country in rebellion and offensive war to deal with, Obama has something that is less deadly than bathtubs to deal with. It is almost farcical.
- jivatmanx 13y ago
  I think you're reading too much into that choice. I believe he chose Lincoln the same reason that Romney said that "Modern Family" is his favorite T.V. show: They both rank #1 in polls.
Sven7 13y ago
If you are wondering if its possible to dismantle something large and bureaucratic...there is evidence for it in the shutting down of the German nuclear sector. 17 multi billion dollar reactors, 350k employees, 50-250$ billion in shutdown costs. "Under Control" is a short documentary about it.

pixie_ 13y ago

Is World War II so far away that everyone forgets how fucked up the entire world can become - and it doesn't take long for it all to go to hell either. The NSA has to get their shit together, but we still need real strategical/tactical intelligence inside and outside of the US. So when it does happen (and it will eventually happen) we're prepared not to lose our country, or even the world to the super nuclear powered genetically modified nazi cyborgs.

jivatmanx 13y ago
In the 20 interwar years, both Communism and Fascism (Business plot, Leo Strauss, etc.) both had an enormous intellectual following, even in the U.S. In Europe, there was an overwhelming sentiment that Democracy was weak and outdated, which is why the Nazis and the USSR saw each-other as their primary threat, and had both fully anticipated and planned for a European war for years prior. There's nothing like that out there today. Russian hatred for Islamism exceeds the U.S.'s, China is panicky about Xinjiang Province/Pakistan. China and Russia pretty much act purely on interests and have no ideology. While there are few parallels to WWII, there are some with WWI. I hope that stark alliances don't form.
justin66 13y ago
It'd be more to the point to remember that we survived the cold war, an era where good intelligence was even more necessary and the dangers to the country were bigger and more immediate, with tighter controls on what intelligence services could do.
- derefr 13y ago
  Did we have tighter controls, or were they just better at keeping their work out of the news?
  - justin66 13y ago
    We had tighter controls. It wasn't really an issue of "their work," it was an issue of what they were allowed to do with it under the law. For example, one of the fake controversies after 9/11 involved NSA and domestic intelligence not sharing as much information as some believed might have been valuable in preventing the attacks, in retrospect. This sharing was prevented - very deliberately - by statute. Those statutes have been weakened since, in the name of security and with little consideration of why they existed in the first place. edit: I was really only thinking of statutory control of intelligence gathering with my comments. Philwelch brings up an interesting point regarding (largely illegal) espionage, but I think the points still stand.

northwest 13y ago

> Google Engineer Wins NSA Award, Then Says NSA Should Be “Abolished” That's one thing. Now make these 2 events happen in the opposite order. ;-)

znowi 13y ago

This guy has the balls. Kudos, Mr Bonneau. I'm curious if he will get a private reprimand from Google execs for unpleasant commentary on their partner :)

proexploit 13y ago
I honestly don't understand people's opinion around this. I'm not trying to refute your comment, just understand and see if I missed something. As far as I have read, Google complies with NSA letters (which seems to be required by law, although perhaps not a favorable one) and PRISM is said to give the NSA additional direct access (but I haven't seen any indication of this being proved or confirmed to be known to the companies involved). Has there been some information proving Google and other companies are actually working with the NSA or is it simply based on the idea that you think it might be likely and they'd deny it either way (if they confirm it, they work with the NSA and if they deny it, they work with the NSA). I'm not suggesting blindly trusting any company or person but do we have actual knowledge in this subject I missed or simply opinions?
- MrKurtz 13y ago
  I think he's being cute. For me this quote sums up what PRISM is really about: "Nobody wants a box in their network...[Companies often] find ways to give tools to minimize disclosures, to protect users, to keep the government off the premises, and to come to some reasonable compromise on the capabilities." http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57593538-38/how-the-u.s-forces-net-firms-to-cooperate-on-surveillance/ http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57593538-38/how-the-u.s-fo... Basically: in order to prevent the feds from installing boxes on their networks companies offer to do their own interception, which in my opinion is the far better alternative. "Direct access" isn't accurate.
yuhong 13y ago
On this matter I posted this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6078124 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6078124

ChrisAntaki 13y ago

>> Like many in the community of cryptographers and security engineers, I’m sad that we haven’t better informed the public about the inherent dangers and questionable utility of mass surveillance. Thought provoking.

bgentry 13y ago

tikkun.org seems to be down. Here's the Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/2013/07/25/google-engineer-wins-nsa-award-says-id-rather-have-it-abolished-than-persist-in-its-current-form/&strip=1 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://... Here's the blog post from the Google Engineer (Joseph Bonneau) about accepting the award: http://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2013/07/19/nsa-award-for-best-scientific-cybersecurity-paper/ http://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2013/07/19/nsa-award-for-...

dobbsbob 13y ago

Is this guy a google engineer because he thanks the people at Yahoo in his blog. Not that it matters, just happy he told them to go fuck themselves while accepting the award

Daniel_Newby 13y ago

This is silly coming from a company whose trusted computing base was nearly eaten by China. If any company needs the tightest possible OODA loop w.r.t. cyber-threats, it is Google. There has been a lot of utter horseshit about how the NSA's activities will make Europeans distrust American cloud computing. Well the NSA is nothing compared to the Communist Party espionage organizations.

pvdm 13y ago
>trusted computing base was nearly eaten by China Citation ?
- Daniel_Newby 13y ago
  http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-10434721-245.html http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-10434721-245.html

8ig8 13y ago

The winning engineer is currently doing an AMA on Reddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1j6qo4/i_am_joseph_bonneau_2013_nsa_award_winner_for/ http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1j6qo4/i_am_joseph_bon...