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Hackers to NSA chief: Read the Constitution
- ferdo 13y agoPersonally, I'm sick and tired of "OMG! SHARIA LAW!" being used as the excuse to spy on all of us. The same demagoguery was used by the Nazis (using Jewish law) as the basis for their depredations. > "Why do so many countries want to attack us?" the person asked. > The general replied that America stands in the way of them reaching their objective, which is to force everybody to comply with sharia law. > "They want to attack us because we're bombing them!" shouted another person, to much chuckling from the audience. And General Alexander should get a costume that doesn't make him look like one of the Love Boat crew.
- splawn 13y agoI hate it when i find myself agreeing with a reductio ad hitlerum, esp when its in response to an argument based on the same kind of fallacy, but i do.
- ferdo 13y agoI also hate using reductio ad hitlerum, so imagine my confusion in finding it pertinent.
- jmduke 13y agoAnd General Alexander should get a costume that doesn't make him look like one of the Love Boat crew. Cheap ad hominems only detract from the actual arguments to be made. Ad hominems that focus on an individual's clothing are especially weak, given the average attire of a programmer.
- ferdo 13y agoCostumed popinjays have proven far more dangerous in history than those that make fun of them. General Alexander isn't worried about social niceties. I won't worry about them either when expressing my opinions about him and his peers.
- jivatmanx 13y agoAlexander could have worn business or business casual attire to this event, but he chose wear official military garb to a non-military event in order to cloak his arguments with official authority. As I've argued elsewhere, the amount of political authority "Emperor Alexander" has managed to accumulate, and the unquestioning treatment he has received in congress and elsewhere, are signs of weakening in the republican system.
- PublicEnemy111 13y agoI don't think it was to cloak his arguments with official authority. I think what he was trying to do is use the blackhat conference as an open forum between the technology experts/hackers and the government. He had to have balls to wear that uniform in front of thousands of outraged people. I may not agree with what the NSA is doing, but you have to respect the man for talking at that conference especially in that uniform.
- dobbsbob 13y agoI doubt most "terrorists" even care about sharia law. A crew of terrorists is basically a crew of thugs and gangsters who want money and power. The so-called sharia ideology is just propaganda to get new recruits. Good example was Abu Zarqawi the Jordanian gangster who went to Iraq to fight for AQIM. He lived like Tony Montana and certainly didn't give a shit about sharia law. He was only interested in making cash G money and running the streets with his coke and guns in Baghdad. Another example is Boko Haram in Nigeria, who's leader dressed up like Tupac in some photos and cruised around in a Mercedes while denouncing the west. He recruited through prison breaks releasing drug dealers and other gangsters in exchange for membership.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- coldpie 13y agoMy jaw dropped when I read that line. I thought that line was just used by the crazy nutballs on Fox news. I honestly had no idea that was a literal justification used by people in power. Crazy.
- northwest 13y ago> America stands in the way of them reaching their objective, which is to force everybody to comply with sharia law. That just can't be. Coming from a supposedly educated man who was also granted enormous power is immensely frightening. It's just not possible, circumstances like these will ultimately lead to the destruction of the country.
- tsax 13y agoI actually agree that that's exactly the jihadists' objective. However, it's silly to say that this can be achieved with random acts of terrorism. 1) 9/11 2) ??? 3) Sharia law!
- WestCoastJustin 13y agoThis was heavily discussed yesterday [1], where tptacek had a great comment [2], which is well worth a read. Anyone interested in watching the talk can head over to Youtube [3]. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6135833 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6135833 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6136338 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6136338 [3] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvVIZ4OyGnQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvVIZ4OyGnQ
- northwest 13y ago> "Why do so many countries want to attack us?" the person asked. That's the 1 uncomfortable question that is at the center of the whole mess. It's literally the vicious circle. The problem is, there are people who have an enormous financial interest in keeping this going. To understand what I mean, look at the scale of the budget that's being distributed (both the absolute and the relative values): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_...
- eshvk 13y agoI may not agree with the guy but I am impressed by him. He had the balls to go on stage in front of a crowd of people who could be aggressive, and presented his case. Not sure how well it was, since I wasn't there. However, that takes courage.
- ferdo 13y agoHe most likely had an armed escort, unlike his opponents.
- adammil 13y agoA group of hackers is not physically intimidating in the slightest, so what's to admire? I would have admired him if he had apologized and resigned.
- drunkenmasta 13y agoSo much Grandstanding in the media makes me roll my eyes after a while.
- pat2014 13y agoInstead of calls to "Read the Constitution", what we really need are calls to "Enforce the Constitution" !!
- diminoten 13y agoWe have to stop pretending like there is literally zero difference between passive data collection and actively spying on someone. We also have to stop pretending like being investigated is the same as being found guilty. All this "read the Constitution" talk begs the initial question - what kind of risk are we okay with accepting when we ask for our privacy? Or to flip the question around, what are we getting in return for giving up our privacy, and is it worth it? Frankly, we don't know right now, because no one's telling us (and being honest about it). I just want more information and less PR spin...
- aa0 13y agoIf the difference between passive spying and active spying is 'WHERE ssn='XXX-XX-XXXX', I don't think your 'difference' argument holds any water.
- diminoten 13y agoWhy not? One makes no effort to identify each individual unless probable cause presents itself, and the other is when probable cause already exists and a warrant is granted. It's watching a place vs. watching a person. How is that not "different"?
- aa0 13y agoIt's not watching a place, it's watching a platform/utility with fine-grained categorization and structure of information. I'd compare it to holding the ebola plague in a research facility without publicly providing the safety measures that we put in place to protect the virus from getting out. Do you know how many scientists would be up in arms? The only difference here is that we are dealing with computers which are usually publicly connected no matter what..and if the government has this information, who says hackers aren't going to be able to steal parts of the DB or query it? The very act of having this info, categorized, is just ghastly..and Orwellian.
- diminoten 13y ago
- coldcode 13y ago"They elected me to lead not to read" - Rainier Wolfcastle
- tsax 13y agoThis is hilarious! The Constitution? Paper constitutions aren't worth the paper they are printed on. They are an Americanism. Before the American paper Constitution, constitutions were exactly what the word signified - the structure of a ruling system. And a Constitution always becomes a small-c constitution even apart from the amendment process. Notice the actual result of the New Deal legislation. The rise the administrative state. Agencies that make, execute and judge on rules. Legislative bills that are shells for bureaucrats to fill (Dodd-Frank, PPACA, etc). NONE of these things are authorized by the "Constitution." Please note that I haven't opined on whether I think this development is positive or negative. I do think that is a secondary matter to the importance that smart people such as the HN audience _understand_ the real structure (small-c constitution) of America is only tenuously related to the big-C Constitution. Okay downvote away gentlemen!
- krapp 13y agoTechnically, I believe it's parchment, not paper.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- mindslight 13y agoIf hackers aren't receptive to an argument that the description of a system is not necessarily how the system functions, there's no way we're not absolutely fucked.
- ape4 13y agoUSA, where people are afraid to heckle.
- northwest 13y agoI would rather put it like this: USA, where people already are afraid to heckle. It is probably the alarming symptom of the advanced level of fear instilled in the people.
- kbar13 13y agoPlease explain how it's at all useful to heckle? Heckling is probably the lowest form of displaying your disagreements with the person doing the talk.
- pseingatl 13y agoScary the naivete of a U.S. general who would make such a comment about shari'a. If he really believes such nonsense our defense strategy against Al-Qaeda will be similarly uninformed. The scary thing is that these beliefs are probably widely held amongst high-level U.S. military leaders. If you were to ask them what shari'a law is, they wouldn't have the slightest idea.
- kbar13 13y agoheckling at a speech with hilariously irrelevant quips isn't really conducive to anything, no matter if you agree with how the NSA does things or not.
- bvitrano 13y agoThe government and the NSA are still run by Americans. Which means that those Americans are still at fault for breaking the constitution and feeling above the law. There are many Americans that are still selling their souls to the NSA in order to provide for their families. More programmers are replacing Snowden and more are still being hired. Why? Because government is buying away our freedoms through greedy Americans and corporations. If you want to cut down the NSA spying, the recipe is very simple: stop taking the money and talent from the government. If your employer is constantly submitting RFPs to the government, quit. If you get excited that your company has any "big contracts" with the government, quit. Take away the talent and end the greed for the easy government money. The choice is, as it always has been, our choice.
- argumentum 13y agoThere is an even better choice. Take the job (and money) but hack the system so it no longer works (but still appears to).
- teeja 13y agoI think it was probably instructive for the hackers to analyze the General attempting to do social-engineering.