7 ms·

Obama pick for NSA review panel wanted paid, pro-government shills in chat rooms

175 points by Libertatea 13y ago

pyre 13y ago
While the headline is a bit over the top, I agree with the general sentiment. The idea that the government will infiltrate these groups, but limit themselves to just influencing the discourse in positive, truthful ways, without creating dossiers on the parties involved seems fantasy to me.
- hacker789 13y ago
  How would you change the headline to make it more accurate?
  - jlgreco 13y ago
    I am guessing his objection is that the title does not mention that the targets would be conspiracy theorists. That is a fairly reasonable objection but on the other hand, how many online discussion venues don't have discussions about conspiracies? HN sure as shit does, as does reddit, slashdot, facebook, 4chan, twitter, IRC, bodybuilding.com's forums...
    - pyre 13y ago
      The title is a truthful statement. The change I would make would be to call them "'ethical' pro-government shills," with the scare-quotes intentionally around the word ethical. The guy was promoting the idea that we would put these shills in place, but they would basically only be steering people away from false assumptions and towards the truth. While this might be a nice idea, it's more fantasy than reality.
- andyl 13y ago
  Hmm - that sounds just like something a paid government shill would say...
  - pyre 13y ago
    It's ok. I'm just a paid government shill that's steering you towards the truth. Trust me. <sleazy smile/> The fantasy is not that this couldn't happen or is not happening. The fantasy is that if such a program were initiated that it would remain within the 'ethical' boundaries that he specified. It's like saying that if we create a national Internet filter to block known child porn URLs that the mechanisms to do this would be used only for blocking child porn. The reality is that people would be busting down the door to knock their favourite-thing-to-hate off of the Internet.
- tonyarkles 13y ago
  You lost me at "positive, truthful ways". :)
  - pyre 13y ago
    I get that. You're lying about your identity to help influence people to know the truth. If you're already willing to lie about who you are, then you're already more willing to do things that might not be so ethical in the first place, which means you probably can't be trusted to limit yourself to only steering people towards the truth.
adolph 13y ago
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1084585 http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1084585 Authors Cass R. Sunstein (proposed member of a panel to review the surveillance practices of the National Security Agency) and Adrian Vermeule, dated January 15, 2008 Abstract: Many millions of people hold conspiracy theories; they believe that powerful people have worked together in order to withhold the truth about some important practice or some terrible event. A recent example is the belief, widespread in some parts of the world, that the attacks of 9/11 were carried out not by Al Qaeda, but by Israel or the United States. Those who subscribe to conspiracy theories may create serious risks, including risks of violence, and the existence of such theories raises significant challenges for policy and law. The first challenge is to understand the mechanisms by which conspiracy theories prosper; the second challenge is to understand how such theories might be undermined. Such theories typically spread as a result of identifiable cognitive blunders, operating in conjunction with informational and reputational influences. A distinctive feature of conspiracy theories is their self-sealing quality. Conspiracy theorists are not likely to be persuaded by an attempt to dispel their theories; they may even characterize that very attempt as further proof of the conspiracy. Because those who hold conspiracy theories typically suffer from a crippled epistemology, in accordance with which it is rational to hold such theories, the best response consists in cognitive infiltration of extremist groups. Various policy dilemmas, such as the question whether it is better for government to rebut conspiracy theories or to ignore them, are explored in this light. File under "elite panic" https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/04/elite_panic.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/04/elite_panic.h...
- md224 13y ago
  That abstract actually sounds pretty interesting. > File under "elite panic" While I agree that conspiracy theories aren't an apocalyptic danger, I tend to think that misinformation and unjustified paranoia can have detrimental effects on discourse in the public sphere.
- dictum 13y ago
  > Because those who hold conspiracy theories typically suffer from a crippled epistemology, in accordance with which it is rational to hold such theories "Crippled epistemology" is an interesting name for being unable to distinguish opinion from fact. What is the name for being unable to distinguish the essence of a fact from its doublespeak explanation?
peterkelly 13y ago
I support Sunstein's nomination for the review panel, and you should too.
- spoiledtechie 13y ago
  And who are you to convince me?
  - yebyen 13y ago
    A paid government shill? [woosh]
- niuzeta 13y ago
  cool. I get that your stance and what you believe. Now convince me why
throwaway_yy2Di 13y ago
This guy is staggeringly authoritarian. He doesn't stop at "correcting" the views of radicalized nutjobs. He wants the bulk of US political speech actively managed, regulated: He outlines six specific reform possibilities to improve exposure to diverse points of view on the Internet: 1) creation of "deliberative domains" where diverse exchange of views can occur online; 2) disclosure of relevant conduct by Web producers; 3) voluntary self-regulation by Web producers; 4) publicly subsidized programming and Web sites; 5) government-imposed rules that would require the most popular Web sites to provide links to sites with diverse views; and 6) government-imposed rules that would require highly partisan Web sites to provide links to sites with opposing views. http://www.scottlondon.com/reviews/sunstein2.html http://www.scottlondon.com/reviews/sunstein2.html
- md224 13y ago
  It seems like he wants to force people to be exposed to diverse/opposing views... isn't that kind of the opposite of authoritarian?
  - throwaway_yy2Di 13y ago
    In the same way that an NSA surveillance state built to defend the democratic way of life is the opposite of totalitarian.
  - tonyarkles 13y ago
    I read that as "lots of people in the media and in Internet discussions disagree with what we're doing and they need to be exposed to at least some content that supports us." Purely authoritarian would be "everyone needs to just talk about our point of view." That wouldn't fly too well on the Internet, so this seems like the next best thing. "No one is saying anything good about what we're doing and we need to change that. Not by changing what we do, but by coercing them to be exposed to things that support us."
  - dictum 13y ago
    I won't touch the value of exposing people to diverse views, but such a system would limit the views to only what's vetted by people and institutions regulating that system. The conspiracy theorists of Sunstein's paper have a term for this: controlled opposition. So you have a website espousing a political view. You'd have to put a section listing other views... but what views do you put in that section? How would you go about deciding what views are opposite to yours? What about less known views? Soon you'd get something like an AdSense For Opinions; an ad area with three views, each with a short description. "DRUGS FOR A BETTER LIFE. We believe every human should use more drugs and medicines daily. betterlifethroughdrugs.org", "US DOLLAR: ROOT OF ALL EVIL. US Dollar proven root of all evil, Bible proof inside. See our proposed alternative currencies. dollar-evil-get-saved.com", "EVERYTHING IS NICE. Life is pretty much swell, man. Chill out. whatareyouevenworriedabout.net" Every possible political position and opinion would have to be considered if you want to show diverse views.
rayiner 13y ago
For context, Cass Sunstein is a prominent law professor (formerly at U Chicago, now at Harvard). He writes a lot about law and economics and also about the mechanics of democracy. He writes a lot about behavioral economics and is a proponent of government mechanics to get people to do the right thing when they would ordinarily fall prey to fallacious reasoning: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nudge_%28book%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nudge_%28book%29. The referenced article arises from the intersection of his interest in democracy and his interest in behavioral irrationalities. Essentially, it asks: "how do you have democracy when lots of people believe nutty irrational things?" E.g. most people, when polled, regularly believe that the U.S. spends > 5% of its budget on foreign aid. They also think that something like half the U.S. population is black and the other half is Hispanic. How do these ideas impact democracy? The article tries to paint him as some scary pro-surveillance type, but he's not. He's no anarco-libertarian--he has a very strong belief in the ability of the state to improve society. But he is a professor and likes to throw out ideas and the paper should be viewed in that context.
- Zigurd 13y ago
  You see no irony that, last year, thinking the NSA had implemented a comprehensive surveillance state would be an irrational belief that should be suppressed by active management of public discussion?
  - rayiner 13y ago
    I think it's an awful idea, but then again, most ideas that come out of academia are awful. My point is that it should be viewed as what it is: a professor toying with a concept under a certain set of premises, not the sinister thing the article is trying to make it out to be. Sunnstein is no lover of government suppression of speech. He has written at length about the importance of vigorous debate to democracy. I think he fails to appreciate the ways in which many of his proposals could backfire, but that's hardly a failing unique to him (how many people on this very chatblog opposed Citizens United, and think its a good idea to let the government prosecute companies for airing unauthorized political movies critical of a front running Presidential candidate?).
patrickg_zill 13y ago
Sunstein is an effective argument for the limited powers of government. Would you really want a guy like this having enough power to enforce his arrogance upon the rest of us?
ferdo 13y ago
Sunstein tries to weasel out of words with his name attached at about the 2 minute mark: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OIiOztc52g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OIiOztc52g
fiatmoney 13y ago
If you're interested in issues like this, you should look into why Elgin Air Force Base is the "most Reddit addicted city". http://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/1dz470/most_reddit_addicted_city_over_100k_visits_total/ http://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/1dz470/most_redd...
Torgo 13y ago
"By this we do not mean 1960s-style infiltration with a view to surveillance and collecting information, possibly for use in future prosecutions." To paraphrase James Clapper, "Such information will not be collected (under this program.)"
ihsw 13y ago
Once again, the US Government takes a page from the Stasi: > By the 1970s, the Stasi had decided that methods of overt persecution which had been employed up to that time, such as arrest and torture, were too crude and obvious. It was realised that psychological harassment was far less likely to be recognised for what it was, so its victims, and their supporters, were less likely to be provoked into active resistance, given that they would often not be aware of the source of their problems, or even its exact nature. Zersetzung was designed to side-track and "switch off" perceived enemies so that they would lose the will to continue any "inappropriate" activities. Don't get confused, it's an inevitability that these techniques for attacking subversive groups will instead be used on innocent people not suspected of any crime.
cma 13y ago
Cass Sunstein wrote an op-ed a few weeks ago saying Larry Summers should be considered a candidate for Fed Chairman because he has been pushing for regulation all along, the problem is we just haven't heard about it. This is about the guy who pushed for repealing Glass-Steagall and also pushed for allowing commercial banks to use governement- insured deposits to speculate in derivatives. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-06/summers-s-critics-distort-his-regulatory-views.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-06/summers-s-critics-d...
samstave 13y ago
They are all over any major story on reddit. And the HBGary release proved this to be actively implemented fact. The fact that a significant amount of Reddit traffic comes from Eglin AFB, indicates that this may be where these MISO agents are based.
unclebucknasty 13y ago
Government should be shaped by the people, not the other way around.

175 points by Libertatea 13y ago

pyre 13y ago

While the headline is a bit over the top, I agree with the general sentiment. The idea that the government will infiltrate these groups, but limit themselves to just influencing the discourse in positive, truthful ways, without creating dossiers on the parties involved seems fantasy to me.

hacker789 13y ago
How would you change the headline to make it more accurate?
- jlgreco 13y ago
  I am guessing his objection is that the title does not mention that the targets would be conspiracy theorists. That is a fairly reasonable objection but on the other hand, how many online discussion venues don't have discussions about conspiracies? HN sure as shit does, as does reddit, slashdot, facebook, 4chan, twitter, IRC, bodybuilding.com's forums...
  - pyre 13y ago
    The title is a truthful statement. The change I would make would be to call them "'ethical' pro-government shills," with the scare-quotes intentionally around the word ethical. The guy was promoting the idea that we would put these shills in place, but they would basically only be steering people away from false assumptions and towards the truth. While this might be a nice idea, it's more fantasy than reality.
andyl 13y ago
Hmm - that sounds just like something a paid government shill would say...
- pyre 13y ago
  It's ok. I'm just a paid government shill that's steering you towards the truth. Trust me. <sleazy smile/> The fantasy is not that this couldn't happen or is not happening. The fantasy is that if such a program were initiated that it would remain within the 'ethical' boundaries that he specified. It's like saying that if we create a national Internet filter to block known child porn URLs that the mechanisms to do this would be used only for blocking child porn. The reality is that people would be busting down the door to knock their favourite-thing-to-hate off of the Internet.
tonyarkles 13y ago
You lost me at "positive, truthful ways". :)
- pyre 13y ago
  I get that. You're lying about your identity to help influence people to know the truth. If you're already willing to lie about who you are, then you're already more willing to do things that might not be so ethical in the first place, which means you probably can't be trusted to limit yourself to only steering people towards the truth.

adolph 13y ago

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1084585 http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1084585 Authors Cass R. Sunstein (proposed member of a panel to review the surveillance practices of the National Security Agency) and Adrian Vermeule, dated January 15, 2008 Abstract: Many millions of people hold conspiracy theories; they believe that powerful people have worked together in order to withhold the truth about some important practice or some terrible event. A recent example is the belief, widespread in some parts of the world, that the attacks of 9/11 were carried out not by Al Qaeda, but by Israel or the United States. Those who subscribe to conspiracy theories may create serious risks, including risks of violence, and the existence of such theories raises significant challenges for policy and law. The first challenge is to understand the mechanisms by which conspiracy theories prosper; the second challenge is to understand how such theories might be undermined. Such theories typically spread as a result of identifiable cognitive blunders, operating in conjunction with informational and reputational influences. A distinctive feature of conspiracy theories is their self-sealing quality. Conspiracy theorists are not likely to be persuaded by an attempt to dispel their theories; they may even characterize that very attempt as further proof of the conspiracy. Because those who hold conspiracy theories typically suffer from a crippled epistemology, in accordance with which it is rational to hold such theories, the best response consists in cognitive infiltration of extremist groups. Various policy dilemmas, such as the question whether it is better for government to rebut conspiracy theories or to ignore them, are explored in this light. File under "elite panic" https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/04/elite_panic.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/04/elite_panic.h...

md224 13y ago
That abstract actually sounds pretty interesting. > File under "elite panic" While I agree that conspiracy theories aren't an apocalyptic danger, I tend to think that misinformation and unjustified paranoia can have detrimental effects on discourse in the public sphere.
dictum 13y ago
> Because those who hold conspiracy theories typically suffer from a crippled epistemology, in accordance with which it is rational to hold such theories "Crippled epistemology" is an interesting name for being unable to distinguish opinion from fact. What is the name for being unable to distinguish the essence of a fact from its doublespeak explanation?

peterkelly 13y ago

I support Sunstein's nomination for the review panel, and you should too.

spoiledtechie 13y ago
And who are you to convince me?
- yebyen 13y ago
  A paid government shill? [woosh]
niuzeta 13y ago
cool. I get that your stance and what you believe. Now convince me why

throwaway_yy2Di 13y ago

This guy is staggeringly authoritarian. He doesn't stop at "correcting" the views of radicalized nutjobs. He wants the bulk of US political speech actively managed, regulated: He outlines six specific reform possibilities to improve exposure to diverse points of view on the Internet: 1) creation of "deliberative domains" where diverse exchange of views can occur online; 2) disclosure of relevant conduct by Web producers; 3) voluntary self-regulation by Web producers; 4) publicly subsidized programming and Web sites; 5) government-imposed rules that would require the most popular Web sites to provide links to sites with diverse views; and 6) government-imposed rules that would require highly partisan Web sites to provide links to sites with opposing views. http://www.scottlondon.com/reviews/sunstein2.html http://www.scottlondon.com/reviews/sunstein2.html

md224 13y ago
It seems like he wants to force people to be exposed to diverse/opposing views... isn't that kind of the opposite of authoritarian?
- throwaway_yy2Di 13y ago
  In the same way that an NSA surveillance state built to defend the democratic way of life is the opposite of totalitarian.
- tonyarkles 13y ago
  I read that as "lots of people in the media and in Internet discussions disagree with what we're doing and they need to be exposed to at least some content that supports us." Purely authoritarian would be "everyone needs to just talk about our point of view." That wouldn't fly too well on the Internet, so this seems like the next best thing. "No one is saying anything good about what we're doing and we need to change that. Not by changing what we do, but by coercing them to be exposed to things that support us."
- dictum 13y ago
  I won't touch the value of exposing people to diverse views, but such a system would limit the views to only what's vetted by people and institutions regulating that system. The conspiracy theorists of Sunstein's paper have a term for this: controlled opposition. So you have a website espousing a political view. You'd have to put a section listing other views... but what views do you put in that section? How would you go about deciding what views are opposite to yours? What about less known views? Soon you'd get something like an AdSense For Opinions; an ad area with three views, each with a short description. "DRUGS FOR A BETTER LIFE. We believe every human should use more drugs and medicines daily. betterlifethroughdrugs.org", "US DOLLAR: ROOT OF ALL EVIL. US Dollar proven root of all evil, Bible proof inside. See our proposed alternative currencies. dollar-evil-get-saved.com", "EVERYTHING IS NICE. Life is pretty much swell, man. Chill out. whatareyouevenworriedabout.net" Every possible political position and opinion would have to be considered if you want to show diverse views.

rayiner 13y ago

For context, Cass Sunstein is a prominent law professor (formerly at U Chicago, now at Harvard). He writes a lot about law and economics and also about the mechanics of democracy. He writes a lot about behavioral economics and is a proponent of government mechanics to get people to do the right thing when they would ordinarily fall prey to fallacious reasoning: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nudge_%28book%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nudge_%28book%29. The referenced article arises from the intersection of his interest in democracy and his interest in behavioral irrationalities. Essentially, it asks: "how do you have democracy when lots of people believe nutty irrational things?" E.g. most people, when polled, regularly believe that the U.S. spends > 5% of its budget on foreign aid. They also think that something like half the U.S. population is black and the other half is Hispanic. How do these ideas impact democracy? The article tries to paint him as some scary pro-surveillance type, but he's not. He's no anarco-libertarian--he has a very strong belief in the ability of the state to improve society. But he is a professor and likes to throw out ideas and the paper should be viewed in that context.

Zigurd 13y ago
You see no irony that, last year, thinking the NSA had implemented a comprehensive surveillance state would be an irrational belief that should be suppressed by active management of public discussion?
- rayiner 13y ago
  I think it's an awful idea, but then again, most ideas that come out of academia are awful. My point is that it should be viewed as what it is: a professor toying with a concept under a certain set of premises, not the sinister thing the article is trying to make it out to be. Sunnstein is no lover of government suppression of speech. He has written at length about the importance of vigorous debate to democracy. I think he fails to appreciate the ways in which many of his proposals could backfire, but that's hardly a failing unique to him (how many people on this very chatblog opposed Citizens United, and think its a good idea to let the government prosecute companies for airing unauthorized political movies critical of a front running Presidential candidate?).

patrickg_zill 13y ago

Sunstein is an effective argument for the limited powers of government. Would you really want a guy like this having enough power to enforce his arrogance upon the rest of us?

ferdo 13y ago

Sunstein tries to weasel out of words with his name attached at about the 2 minute mark: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OIiOztc52g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OIiOztc52g

fiatmoney 13y ago

If you're interested in issues like this, you should look into why Elgin Air Force Base is the "most Reddit addicted city". http://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/1dz470/most_reddit_addicted_city_over_100k_visits_total/ http://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/1dz470/most_redd...

Torgo 13y ago

"By this we do not mean 1960s-style infiltration with a view to surveillance and collecting information, possibly for use in future prosecutions." To paraphrase James Clapper, "Such information will not be collected (under this program.)"

ihsw 13y ago

Once again, the US Government takes a page from the Stasi: > By the 1970s, the Stasi had decided that methods of overt persecution which had been employed up to that time, such as arrest and torture, were too crude and obvious. It was realised that psychological harassment was far less likely to be recognised for what it was, so its victims, and their supporters, were less likely to be provoked into active resistance, given that they would often not be aware of the source of their problems, or even its exact nature. Zersetzung was designed to side-track and "switch off" perceived enemies so that they would lose the will to continue any "inappropriate" activities. Don't get confused, it's an inevitability that these techniques for attacking subversive groups will instead be used on innocent people not suspected of any crime.

cma 13y ago

Cass Sunstein wrote an op-ed a few weeks ago saying Larry Summers should be considered a candidate for Fed Chairman because he has been pushing for regulation all along, the problem is we just haven't heard about it. This is about the guy who pushed for repealing Glass-Steagall and also pushed for allowing commercial banks to use governement- insured deposits to speculate in derivatives. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-06/summers-s-critics-distort-his-regulatory-views.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-06/summers-s-critics-d...

samstave 13y ago

They are all over any major story on reddit. And the HBGary release proved this to be actively implemented fact. The fact that a significant amount of Reddit traffic comes from Eglin AFB, indicates that this may be where these MISO agents are based.

unclebucknasty 13y ago

Government should be shaped by the people, not the other way around.