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No, that's not quite the claim I'm making. I'm making a strictly stronger claim - backed by the brunt of articles - which is that China was purposefully perform

by themeek 11y ago

No, that's not quite the claim I'm making. I'm making a strictly stronger claim - backed by the brunt of articles - which is that China was purposefully performing a counter-espionage operation that involved Google because Google had (and has) a partnership with US intelligence. You being in the role and expertise that you are - excluding Operation Aurora for now because you seem to have a certain characterization of it - you know that China and the US hack each other for strategic purposes and that when China hacks the US it is not about dissidents. We can't predict an alternate history here whether China would have gone after Google for other reasons. What we do know is that China went after the intelligence system linked up to GMail and used it for counter-espionage purposes. One Google personal relations spokesperson did say they suspected China of using the system to collect information of terrorists and dissidents as well. Attributing motive of course changes the narrative. Making it sound like China wanted to hack Google for the sole purpose of getting to dissidents makes it sound all spooky and evil. The reporting that has China hacking Google to track down terrorists and dissidents usually 'forgets' to mention the counter-espionage link at all or that the database they accessed was for law enforcement or that they gained access to Google's systems exclusively through this system; so I tend to believe the reporting and sources that include more, rather than less, information. There's purpose behind casting doubt on the intentions of China and the context of the compromise: this is known as spin. Spin is important - for PR and for propaganda - but if you want people to have a real conversation you've got to do what you can to minimize it.

csandreasen 11y ago
> You being in the role and expertise that you are... I didn't mean to imply that I have any inside knowledge of the hack - I'm basing my views on this from what I've read in news outlets. I doubt I have any more knowledge on the subject than you. (Unless I'm misinterpreting sarcasm on your part) > China and the US hack each other for strategic purposes and that when China hacks the US it is not about dissidents. The Chinese intelligence services are going to focus on targets that will forward their own national goals. This will off course include strategic goals such as increasing economic and regional military influence, but don't discount their desire to maintain internal stability. They invest a significant amount of resources into controlling content on the internet and other media venues. In recent memory, their Great Firewall infrastructure was used to target dissidents hosting their materials within the US (which incensed the HN crowd with the whole Github DDOS). There's plenty of good reasons for China to target Google. They have every reason to distrust Google as the US government has to distrust Chinese tech companies, and there's bound to be a wealth of information on their servers useful for counter intelligence, economic, political and likely even military gain as well. I don't we'll ever know exactly what all of their reasons were for breaking in, but I don't think the theory that one of the primary motivations was targeting dissidents can be waved away as just spin.
- themeekforgotpw 11y ago
  Oh no I meant your area of professional expertise in the area of cyber security. I did not mean this particular hack. > wealth of information on their servers useful for counter intelligence, economic, political and likely even military gain as well Perhaps you could go further and tease out why a US company would have information on their servers useful for counter intelligence, political and likely even military gain - beyond of course the merely mundane trope of suggesting that the algorithms or IP are the reason. I'll take a stab, but I'd love to hear how your characterize it: It's because US tech companies, like other multinational corporations inside the US, partner with the US government which some times means intelligence or military sectors - either to provide products and services - to perform research or to fund research - or to offer capabilities as a de facto extension. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act weaponized the US tech service sector to provide data and metadata for US intelligence efforts and for the targeting of foreign nationals. (Incidentally, it's true also that individuals located at Google hacked back into the Chinese C2Cs.) Chinese Intelligence is fully aware of FISA and the USG use of technology product and service backdoors. > I don't we'll ever know exactly what all of their reasons were for breaking in, but I don't think the theory that one of the primary motivations was targeting dissidents can be waved away as just spin. You really don't motivate why we should take the PR statement more seriously than the journalism. And references to 'I don't think we can ever be certain' is an appeal to uncertainty that isn't really there.
  - csandreasen 11y ago
    > Perhaps you could go further and tease out why... I suggested it for much more mundane than you suggested: Google is likely to have valuable political, economic and political information because politicians, businessmen and service members have personal Google accounts, and employees are the weakest link in an organization's security. I don't think anyone's going to be sending out the designs for the next stealth fighter over Gmail, but plenty of people would be sending out innocuous documents, contact information, personal problems, etc. Intelligence services thrive on innocuous information in aggregate.
    - 11y ago

by themeek 11y ago

csandreasen 11y ago

> You being in the role and expertise that you are... I didn't mean to imply that I have any inside knowledge of the hack - I'm basing my views on this from what I've read in news outlets. I doubt I have any more knowledge on the subject than you. (Unless I'm misinterpreting sarcasm on your part) > China and the US hack each other for strategic purposes and that when China hacks the US it is not about dissidents. The Chinese intelligence services are going to focus on targets that will forward their own national goals. This will off course include strategic goals such as increasing economic and regional military influence, but don't discount their desire to maintain internal stability. They invest a significant amount of resources into controlling content on the internet and other media venues. In recent memory, their Great Firewall infrastructure was used to target dissidents hosting their materials within the US (which incensed the HN crowd with the whole Github DDOS). There's plenty of good reasons for China to target Google. They have every reason to distrust Google as the US government has to distrust Chinese tech companies, and there's bound to be a wealth of information on their servers useful for counter intelligence, economic, political and likely even military gain as well. I don't we'll ever know exactly what all of their reasons were for breaking in, but I don't think the theory that one of the primary motivations was targeting dissidents can be waved away as just spin.

themeekforgotpw 11y ago
Oh no I meant your area of professional expertise in the area of cyber security. I did not mean this particular hack. > wealth of information on their servers useful for counter intelligence, economic, political and likely even military gain as well Perhaps you could go further and tease out why a US company would have information on their servers useful for counter intelligence, political and likely even military gain - beyond of course the merely mundane trope of suggesting that the algorithms or IP are the reason. I'll take a stab, but I'd love to hear how your characterize it: It's because US tech companies, like other multinational corporations inside the US, partner with the US government which some times means intelligence or military sectors - either to provide products and services - to perform research or to fund research - or to offer capabilities as a de facto extension. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act weaponized the US tech service sector to provide data and metadata for US intelligence efforts and for the targeting of foreign nationals. (Incidentally, it's true also that individuals located at Google hacked back into the Chinese C2Cs.) Chinese Intelligence is fully aware of FISA and the USG use of technology product and service backdoors. > I don't we'll ever know exactly what all of their reasons were for breaking in, but I don't think the theory that one of the primary motivations was targeting dissidents can be waved away as just spin. You really don't motivate why we should take the PR statement more seriously than the journalism. And references to 'I don't think we can ever be certain' is an appeal to uncertainty that isn't really there.
- csandreasen 11y ago
  > Perhaps you could go further and tease out why... I suggested it for much more mundane than you suggested: Google is likely to have valuable political, economic and political information because politicians, businessmen and service members have personal Google accounts, and employees are the weakest link in an organization's security. I don't think anyone's going to be sending out the designs for the next stealth fighter over Gmail, but plenty of people would be sending out innocuous documents, contact information, personal problems, etc. Intelligence services thrive on innocuous information in aggregate.
  - 11y ago