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It's too soon to tell whether this time will be different -- that depends on whether Congress or the executive branch actually changes something in the end. So

It's too soon to tell whether this time will be different -- that depends on whether Congress or the executive branch actually changes something in the end. So far it isn't different. From the perspective of the U.S. and U.K., the Chinese and Israelies and French are undoubtedly doing their best to spy on as much of the Internet as they possibly can, and they're probably pretty successful at it, so why would we unilaterally disarm?

arethuza 13y ago
So we are in an era of Mutally Assured Spying where every power spys on as much as they can just because that's what every other power might be doing? At least in 1984 you only had to suffer the attentions of one of Oceania, East Asia or Eurasia!
claudius 13y ago
> From the perspective of the U.S. and U.K., the Chinese and Israelies and French are undoubtedly doing their best to spy on as much of the Internet as they possibly can, and they're probably pretty successful at it, so why would we unilaterally disarm? From the perspective of the US: It doesn’t really help to assure your so-called ‘allies’ that they are indeed your ‘allies’ and not your vassals if you spy on them to such an extreme. Since you furthermore still rely on said nations for logistical reasons (and being friends with them likely couldn’t hurt anyhow), you might want to scale down your spying to accommodate the public perception. In addition, you’re hurting your own industry, especially service providers such as Google, Microsoft & Facebook, by giving the impression that it is unsafe to provide them with data. From the perspective of the UK: I never quite got what you want to do, but you can’t expect to be even part of a free trade zone if you spy on the other member states of this free trade zone. This holds in particular if it is revealed that said spying is not necessarily restricted to catching terrorists, but also might get your domestic companies some trade secrets, which really doesn’t bode well in other member states that pride themselves on their innovation. Of course if you want to provoke being kicked out of that FTZ and join the union of your over-seas friends, that might actually make sense. Just don’t expect candy from the rest of us, then.
betterunix 13y ago
We should not merely disarm; we should build up defenses so that our citizens cannot be targeted. At the very least people who operate remailers and Tor exit nodes should not have to live in fear of having teams of soldiers assault their homes. This is a classic problem for governments when it comes to cryptography and computer security. On the one hand it is easy for enemies to take advantage of the poor state of computer security, committing various acts of industrial espionage or shutting down critical systems. On the other hand law enforcement agencies want to be able to investigate people, and computer security systems can hamper those investigations; similarly our own spies want to ensure that our enemies are not able to protect themselves.

arethuza 13y ago

So we are in an era of Mutally Assured Spying where every power spys on as much as they can just because that's what every other power might be doing? At least in 1984 you only had to suffer the attentions of one of Oceania, East Asia or Eurasia!

claudius 13y ago

> From the perspective of the U.S. and U.K., the Chinese and Israelies and French are undoubtedly doing their best to spy on as much of the Internet as they possibly can, and they're probably pretty successful at it, so why would we unilaterally disarm? From the perspective of the US: It doesn’t really help to assure your so-called ‘allies’ that they are indeed your ‘allies’ and not your vassals if you spy on them to such an extreme. Since you furthermore still rely on said nations for logistical reasons (and being friends with them likely couldn’t hurt anyhow), you might want to scale down your spying to accommodate the public perception. In addition, you’re hurting your own industry, especially service providers such as Google, Microsoft & Facebook, by giving the impression that it is unsafe to provide them with data. From the perspective of the UK: I never quite got what you want to do, but you can’t expect to be even part of a free trade zone if you spy on the other member states of this free trade zone. This holds in particular if it is revealed that said spying is not necessarily restricted to catching terrorists, but also might get your domestic companies some trade secrets, which really doesn’t bode well in other member states that pride themselves on their innovation. Of course if you want to provoke being kicked out of that FTZ and join the union of your over-seas friends, that might actually make sense. Just don’t expect candy from the rest of us, then.

betterunix 13y ago

We should not merely disarm; we should build up defenses so that our citizens cannot be targeted. At the very least people who operate remailers and Tor exit nodes should not have to live in fear of having teams of soldiers assault their homes. This is a classic problem for governments when it comes to cryptography and computer security. On the one hand it is easy for enemies to take advantage of the poor state of computer security, committing various acts of industrial espionage or shutting down critical systems. On the other hand law enforcement agencies want to be able to investigate people, and computer security systems can hamper those investigations; similarly our own spies want to ensure that our enemies are not able to protect themselves.