Edward Snowden - traitor ?

[LuisDantas]

I'm not talking about the things, I'm talking about the principle. If a military officer decided drone strikes could harm civilians and started tipping off terrorists so they could evacuate before a strike, would you be okay with it as long as he felt morally justified?

That is not a very fair comparison, now is it? Or do you have reason to believe that Snowden aimed information in a similar manner to your example?

If a cop decided homeless kids were just lawbreakers in the making and started arresting them pre-emptively, would that be alright?

Of course not. And again, that is a puzzling comparison to make. Does it connect to the subject matter at all?

This schmuck made a decision that belongs to the American public based solely on his morals.

And...?

That is completely wrong, and is the exact same thing he's accusing the government of being wrong for.

No, it actually isn't.

 

[apophenia]

This ********* (it'll probably asterik out, so think refreshing vinegar and water contained in a bag product) sets a great example. He had access to secrets, and his internal moral compass was used to reveal them. Really? I guess that makes exposing Valerie Plame to being murdered okay, as long as the people who did it thought it was right. Which they obviously did believe, or they wouldn't have released it.

If I exposed an undercover cop in a drug sting because I believe the legalization of pot is right, I could get him killed. But, according to the supporters of this slimeball, that's perfectly acceptable behaviour as long as I use my moral compass to guide me. Mine, not yours. If there was a terrorist plot using these communication methods for planning, he just tipped them off, and maybe we won't be lucky enough to catch their carrier pigeons or smoke signals, or whatever alternative they came up with. How the Hell is endangering the lives of your fellow countrymen to satisfy your inner beliefs okay? Would you be okay with fundamentalist Christians outing gay people in order to drive them out of the community? Same principle.

Completely disagree in this case.

What was revealed was something anyone with any sense would have expected anyway IMO. Any terrorist with enough brains to plan an attack would also have enough brains to know that anything you put on the internet is accessible to anyone with the means to access it.


The smart (and dangerous) ones know about secure communication in public, so privacy is irrelevant to them.

What Snowden has done is force a public dialogue about illegal activity carried out by government agencies.

There is no law which says " Intelligence agencies, by virtue of their Official White Hats, are free to do Whatever They Like without any structured and constitutional oversight".

That seems to be what you are suggesting everyone accept without discussion.

 

[dust1n]

I'm not talking about the things, I'm talking about the principle. If a military officer decided drone strikes could harm civilians and started tipping off terrorists so they could evacuate before a strike, would you be okay with it as long as he felt morally justified? If a cop decided homeless kids were just lawbreakers in the making and started arresting them pre-emptively, would that be alright?

This schmuck made a decision that belongs to the American public based solely on his morals. That is completely wrong, and is the exact same thing he's accusing the government of being wrong for.

Nope... if it's illegal activity, it's called whistle blowing, which (in law, but hardly in enforcement) is protected by the law as a legal action. Not only do you not want me to answer your questions, but I really can't, because they are different situations with different "principles."

 

[dust1n]

I have but it was all dealt with internally. The person was terminated.

Right. Which works well in a corporation which maintain some liability regarding illegal actions. The same can hardly be said about the government.

In that case I was in a position to know what was permitted and what wasn't. I'm not saying Snowden didn't know but the way it's being reported is that he has in his possession more classified information. The reporter that broke the story said that he, the reporter, has seen the documents and knows of information that's contained therein that he didn't feel was appropriate to release to the people. Personally...I'm not sure I feel comfortable with low level IT workers and reporters deciding what should be released to the people. I sort of feel the same way about the government.

I'm going to guess here, that Snowden wasn't a low level IT worker. He worked for the CIA.

In 2007, the CIA stationed him with diplomatic cover in Geneva, Switzerland, where he was responsible for maintaining computer network security.[19] Snowden left the agency in 2009 for a private contractor inside an NSA facility on a United States military base in Japan.[8]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden#cite_note-guardian-reveal-8
At the time of his departure from the US in May 2013, he had been working for consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton for less than three months as a system administrator inside the NSA in Hawaii.[20][21]

Edward Snowden - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I don't know what reporter you're talking about, but seems like they weren't low level either:

Snowden first made contact with documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras in January 2013.[29] According to Poitras, Snowden chose to contact her after seeing her report on William Binney, an NSA whistleblower, in The New York Times. She is a board member of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, along with journalist Glenn Greenwald and renowned whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg.[30] Greenwald, reporting for The Guardian, claims to have been working with Snowden since February,[31] and Barton Gellman, writing for The Washington Post, says his first "direct contact" was on May 16.[32] However, Gellman alleges Greenwald was only involved after the Post declined to guarantee publication of the full documents within 72 hours.[32]


Snowden communicated using encrypted email,[29] using the codename "Verax", meaning truth-teller in Latin. He asked not to be quoted at length for fear of identification by semantic analysis.[32]


According to Gellman, prior to their first meeting in person, Snowden wrote, "I understand that I will be made to suffer for my actions, and that the return of this information to the public marks my end."[32] Snowden also told Gellman that until the articles were published, the journalists working with him would also be at risk from the U.S. intelligence community, whom Snowden said "will most certainly kill you if they think you are the single point of failure that could stop this disclosure and make them the sole owner of this information."[32]


The Washington Post reported that the motive behind the disclosure was to expose the "surveillance state" that he felt the United States was becoming.[3]

I'm concerned that we have people with their hands on sensitive information that could potentially end up in foreign hands. I even worry about Snowden being in China leaking info. I don't think he has but it is a concern.

One way to help security (which I think is legitimate) would be have a small, focused NSA, thus eliminating for "breaching space" and not giving access to such info via contracts with private corporations.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Completely disagree in this case.

What was revealed was something anyone with any sense would have expected anyway IMO. Any terrorist with enough brains to plan an attack would also have enough brains to know that anything you put on the internet is accessible to anyone with the means to access it.

As an IT Professional this is simply not true. There are easy ways to mask ones digital footprint. My home network has 4 high encryption firewalls. If you try to hack me you will seemingly have to go through four different cities in the US to get to me even though all four firewalls are here in one city. My 5th firewall is a brick wall because if you get past the 4th wall there's no way to trace beyond that to the 5th wall. Nothing on my network is communicating beyond my network.

It's as if I'm invisible. All my data going out is encapsulated. My operating system is Linux which is more stable and can stand up against virus attacks and hackers. I have it setup like this because I've worked in IT for the federal government. We use techniques similar to this but on a much larger scale with even more encryption. Many hackers from the middle east and China etc. use hacking techniques that are robust and designed to break through firewalls and layers of encryption methodically and slowly to avoid detection. Stealing low level internet data is easy and common amongst (noob) hackers.

What Snowden has done is force a public dialogue about illegal activity carried out by government agencies.

What he has done is break the law and broke any sort of confidentiality agreements with the company he worked for. I've seen nothing "illegal" presented here considering lawmakers were the ones who voted to reauthorize the program

There is no law which says " Intelligence agencies, by virtue of their Official White Hats, are free to do Whatever They Like without any structured and constitutional oversight".

There is oversight...and it's spelled out in the program itself. This isn't Bush's Patriot Act anymore. Democrats and others lobbied for changes and oversight where there was none in the past.

US Patriot Act Section 215

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]SEC. 502. CONGRESSIONAL OVERSIGHT.
`(a) On a semiannual basis, the Attorney General shall fully inform the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence of the House of Representatives and the Select Committee on Intelligence of the Senate concerning all requests for the production of tangible things under section 402.
[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]
[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]`(b) On a semiannual basis, the Attorney General shall provide to the Committees on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives and the Senate a report setting forth with respect to the preceding 6-month period--
[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]
[/FONT]
[/FONT] [FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]`(1) the total number of applications made for orders approving requests for the production of tangible things under section 402; and
[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif] `(2) the total number of such orders either granted, modified, or denied.'. [/FONT]

I'm not saying it's perfect but it's there whereas it wasn't in the past.

 

[Alceste]

As an IT Professional this is simply not true. There are easy ways to mask ones digital footprint. My home network has 4 high encryption firewalls. If you try to hack me you will seemingly have to go through four different cities in the US to get to me even though all four firewalls are here in one city. My 5th firewall is a brick wall because if you get past the 4th wall there's no way to trace beyond that to the 5th wall. Nothing on my network is communicating beyond my network.

It's as if I'm invisible. All my data going out is encapsulated. My operating system is Linux which is more stable and can stand up against virus attacks and hackers. I have it setup like this because I've worked in IT for the federal government. We use techniques similar to this but on a much larger scale with even more encryption. Many hackers from the middle east and China etc. use hacking techniques that are robust and designed to break through firewalls and layers of encryption methodically and slowly to avoid detection. Stealing low level internet data is easy and common amongst (noob) hackers.



What he has done is break the law and broke any sort of confidentiality agreements with the company he worked for. I've seen nothing "illegal" presented here considering lawmakers were the ones who voted to reauthorize the program



There is oversight...and it's spelled out in the program itself. This isn't Bush's Patriot Act anymore. Democrats and others lobbied for changes and oversight where there was none in the past.

US Patriot Act Section 215


I'm not saying it's perfect but it's there whereas it wasn't in the past.

Isn't it for a court to decide whether or not the NSA spying on all Americans is legal? IMO, it was reasonable for Snowden to believe that the program is a violation of constitutional protections against unlawful search and seizure. I think his concern that employees at the non-accountable private firm he worked at could pull detailed records of any individual American was also reasonable. The Patriot act might allow this level of surveillance and carelessness with your privacy and personal information, but the constitution is a higher law. If the expanded powers in the patriot act are illegal under the constitution, the patriot act must change.

Needless to say, a person can not be held to a contract that requires complicity in illegal actions, so it doesn't matter at all what he signed.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Isn't it for a court to decide whether or not the NSA spying on all Americans is legal?

Yes..and they do. This is something that is getting lost in the discussion. The fact that you're asking the question means others aren't doing better to inform people of the process.

United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

IMO, it was reasonable for Snowden to believe that the program is a violation of constitutional protections against unlawful search and seizure.

It may have been reasonable for him to assume but I simply believe he didn't have enough information as to all aspects and nuances to the various programs. This is why it's never left up to one person to decide what is best for others. It wasn't his job solely to release classified information. If it was a dead program or an ongoing program it takes more than one to decide. When releasing classified information it takes a committee of people with congressional input/oversight to do this.

I think his concern that employees at the non-accountable private firm he worked at could pull detailed records of any individual American was also reasonable.

May be true but each one with access to this sensitive data would be under the same federal non-disclsure agreements. Anyone working there whether having access or not most likely singes a non-compete agreement as well. I've worked for Fed. Govt, I've worked as a contractor for Fed Govt., I've worked for private consulting firms and I now work for a Local Govt. Every place I've worked I've signed these agreements.

The Patriot act might allow this level of surveillance and carelessness with your privacy and personal information, but the constitution is a higher law. If the expanded powers in the patriot act are illegal under the constitution, the patriot act must change.

I would agree with you but I don't think (this) Patriot Act is like that. At least from what I can tell it's nothing like it was under Bush. I will fully admit that more oversight is needed but it is a far cry better than what it was. It does appear to balance privacy and national security a heck of a lot more that under the previous administration.

Needless to say, a person can not be held to a contract that requires complicity in illegal actions, so it doesn't matter at all what he signed.

The problem as I see it here is...he may not be in the position to decide what is legal and what isn't if he isn't fully aware of how these programs function.

 

[Alceste]

Yes..and they do. This is something that is getting lost in the discussion. The fact that you're asking the question means others aren't doing better to inform people of the process.

United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


It may have been reasonable for him to assume but I simply believe he didn't have enough information as to all aspects and nuances to the various programs. This is why it's never left up to one person to decide what is best for others. It wasn't his job solely to release classified information. If it was a dead program or an ongoing program it takes more than one to decide. When releasing classified information it takes a committee of people with congressional input/oversight to do this.

May be true but each one with access to this sensitive data would be under the same federal non-disclsure agreements. Anyone working there whether having access or not most likely singes a non-compete agreement as well. I've worked for Fed. Govt, I've worked as a contractor for Fed Govt., I've worked for private consulting firms and I now work for a Local Govt. Every place I've worked I've signed these agreements.

I would agree with you but I don't think (this) Patriot Act is like that. At least from what I can tell it's nothing like it was under Bush. I will fully admit that more oversight is needed but it is a far cry better than what it was. It does appear to balance privacy and national security a heck of a lot more that under the previous administration.

The problem as I see it here is...he may not be in the position to decide what is legal and what isn't if he isn't fully aware of how these programs function.

A whistle blower is not the judge and jury. Snowden doesn't need to know what the outcome of a legal review will be. He had a reasonable belief that the activity he participated in is illegal or unethical or both. The journalist he spoke to - Glenn Greenwald - is a constitutional lawyer and shares that belief.

Regardless of whether the US is able to justify total surveillance of the American public with no meaningful oversight (perhaps by a constitutional amendment, as the NSA has requested), Americans have a right to know what personal information the government is collecting and why. Canada and the UK have privacy laws stipulating these requirements (compliance with them used to be my job). I assume the US has a similar privacy law. If they don't, perhaps they should.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Snowden doesn't need to know what the outcome of a legal review will be. He had a reasonable belief that the activity he participated in is illegal or unethical or both.

Personally...I don't think he did.

The journalist he spoke to - Glenn Greenwald - is a constitutional lawyer and shares that belief.

And even though he's not a judge he made a judgement. Again, personally, from what I've seen he released, the attributes of the program, the oversight, and the court process...I don't believe either of them were in a position to release this information without a full detailed understanding of the programs....again..which is why a committee does this in accordance with the law and understanding of how said release will affect national security.

It may come out in the end that I'm completely off base or that I'm right....I think more info is needed on these programs. If it is discovered that these programs are in violation with law...then by all means reform them or scrap them. If they're within in the law, which personally I suspect they are, then Snowden has to answer some questions in court.

 

[Alceste]

Personally...I don't think he did.



And even though he's not a judge he made a judgement. Again, personally, from what I've seen he released, the attributes of the program, the oversight, and the court process...I don't believe either of them were in a position to release this information without a full detailed understanding of the programs....again..which is why a committee does this in accordance with the law and understanding of how said release will affect national security.

It may come out in the end that I'm completely off base or that I'm right....I think more info is needed on these programs. If it is discovered that these programs are in violation with law...then by all means reform them or scrap them. If they're within in the law, which personally I suspect they are, then Snowden has to answer some questions in court.

What oversight and court system are you talking about? The one that approves 100% of the requests submitted?

 

[Dirty Penguin]

What oversight and court system are you talking about? The one that approves 100% of the requests submitted?

It's FISA. And yes.., there is oversight. But as I said...More oversight is needed. I'm not disputing that. Personally I think in time as more and more is revealed it won't be that big of a deal....

I found this very interesting..because much of this is what I've been saying. Much of this I can attest to having worked in govt. with top secret clearance in the IT section with access to reams of personal and classified data. How things appear on the surface become not so big a deal when you peal back the layers. And yes...there's a vice versa to that too but I don't think that's the case here.

http://www.zdnet.com/how-did-mainst...a-prism-story-so-hopelessly-wrong-7000016822/

 

[Alceste]

It's FISA. And yes.., there is oversight. But as I said...More oversight is needed. I'm not disputing that. Personally I think in time as more and more is revealed it won't be that big of a deal....

I found this very interesting..because much of this is what I've been saying. Much of this I can attest to having worked in govt. with top secret clearance in the IT section with access to reams of personal and classified data. How things appear on the surface become not so big a deal when you peal back the layers. And yes...there's a vice versa to that too but I don't think that's the case here.

http://www.zdnet.com/how-did-mainst...a-prism-story-so-hopelessly-wrong-7000016822/

Let's lay wagers. My money is on it being a pretty big deal. Either the constitution or the patriot act will have to be amended to continue the practice.

One of my jobs as a privacy law compliance officer was vetting IT projects. IT people never seemed to see what the big deal was with privacy and personal information, but they nevertheless had to work with me to resolve any legal issues.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Let's lay wagers. My money is on it being a pretty big deal. Either the constitution or the patriot act will have to be amended to continue the practice.

We'll have to see. I don't thinks it's going to amount to being a big deal.....but I do think they may make some small changes.

One of my jobs as a privacy law compliance officer was vetting IT projects. IT people never seemed to see what the big deal was with privacy and personal information, but they nevertheless had to work with me to resolve any legal issues.

Not amongst any IT people I know or work with. I take privacy very seriously. Everyone I've worked for and with has as well. I've been doing this for well over twenty years. My job is data security, access control, intrusion detection/prevention. When we backup our data it is secured in a fire resistant lock box and stored offsite with a data warehouse. We deal with compliance on various levels such as state and federal law requirements, software, music and video licensing and compliance.....I don't know about others but this industry is not to be taken lightly as we are entrusted with and enormous amount of responsibility......but I fully acknowledge there are some bad apples out there.

 

[Alceste]

We'll have to see. I don't thinks it's going to amount to being a big deal.....but I do think they may make some small changes.

Not amongst any IT people I know or work with. I take privacy very seriously. Everyone I've worked for and with has as well. I've been doing this for well over twenty years. My job is data security, access control, intrusion detection/prevention. When we backup our data it is secured in a fire resistant lock box and stored offsite with a data warehouse. We deal with compliance on various levels such as state and federal law requirements, software, music and video licensing and compliance.....I don't know about others but this industry is not to be taken lightly as we are entrusted with and enormous amount of responsibility......but I fully acknowledge there are some bad apples out there.

Look, I'll give you an example. One of the projects I vetted would have involved private contractors gaining access to the sensitive personal information of social services clients in the entire region in order to create a new database. The information would not have been anonymized or encrypted and would have been stored on the contractors' own laptops.

I told them they could not go ahead with that plan and be considered compliant with privacy laws. They needed to anonymize the data so no file could be linked to any specific person, and the laptops had to be encrypted and password protected. They were really irritated with me and argued that they should not have to have to change anything, since the contractors were contractually obligated not to do anything inappropriate with the information.

My arguments prevailed in the end. Sure enough, a few weeks later one of the contractors had his laptop stolen from his car while he was sitting in a pub. Because it was encrypted and the information it contained was anonymized, we avoided some criminal coming into possession of the names and addresses of every vulnerable social services client in the region.

Of course, a huge part of my role involved trying to persuade government officials they didn't really need to collect the personal information in the first place. No personal data is as secure as that which is not collected.

 

[dust1n]

Personally...I don't think he did.

And the basis for that notion?

By the way, did my last response not merit a reply or something?

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Look, I'll give you an example. One of the projects I vetted would have involved private contractors gaining access to the sensitive personal information of social services clients in the entire region in order to create a new database. The information would not have been anonymized or encrypted and would have been stored on the contractors' own laptops.

I told them they could not go ahead with that plan and be considered compliant with privacy laws. They needed to anonymize the data so no file could be linked to any specific person, and the laptops had to be encrypted and password protected. They were really irritated with me and argued that they should not have to have to change anything, since the contractors were contractually obligated not to do anything inappropriate with the information.

My arguments prevailed in the end. Sure enough, a few weeks later one of the contractors had his laptop stolen from his car while he was sitting in a pub. Because it was encrypted and the information it contained was anonymized, we avoided some criminal coming into possession of the names and addresses of every vulnerable social services client in the region.

Of course, a huge part of my role involved trying to persuade government officials they didn't really need to collect the personal information in the first place. No personal data is as secure as that which is not collected.

In that situation you were 100% justified.

I've argued against data storage such as that.We issued laptops to agents in the field when worked at ATF. The laptop had no data on it other than the OS and a few programs. Agents could use the VPN I setup that encrypted their connection and encrypted the data. The program on the laptop that decrypted the data needed a user ID and password. They had to logon to the laptop first, then login to the VPN. The decryption software would not allow them to logon until a VPN connection was established. After that they still had to login to the server that contained the data. When they logged off no trace of data was left on the laptop. When the laptop was returned to us we removed the hard drive and scrubbed using DOD formatting software. The drive then got reconfigured and put into another laptop in a completely different ATF off in another building. A replacement hard drive was then put into the agent's laptop and returned to the agent.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

And the basis for that notion?

It's just my personal view. But we would need to hear from him as to why he felt as though the information he released was important for him to do so. I would want to know what he understands as to how the programs function.

By the way, did my last response not merit a reply or something?

Not really. I read the Guardian's take on the info as well as the Washington Post. I think the WP had to come out a retract some things they said in the way they characterized the programs. I posted this earlier today...(How did mainstream media get the NSA PRISM story so hopelessly wrong? | ZDNet).

 

[dust1n]

It's just my personal view. But we would need to hear from him as to why he felt as though the information he released was important for him to do so. I would want to know what he understands as to how the programs function.

Well yeah, I caught the "personal" thing; I was asking for the basis for the view?

Not really. I read the Guardian's take on the info as well as the Washington Post. I think the WP had to come out a retract some things they said in the way they characterized the programs. I posted this earlier today...(How did mainstream media get the NSA PRISM story so hopelessly wrong? | ZDNet).

What did that have to do with my response?

 

[dust1n]

What terrible reporting.

"But neither publication assigned an independent expert to vet the claims of their source, 29-year-old Edward Snowden, who had until recently worked at the NSA as a contractor for Booz Allen Hamilton. Snowden provided both publications with classified documents he had spirited out of the NSA. He also made claims that turn out to have been exaggerated."

What claims? When and where did he make them? How were they exaggerated? How convient this is all missing from the opinion guy from an IT magazine owned by CBS.

"That absence of an independent tech check means both publications got the story wrong, as subsequent reporting by other journalists with experience in these topics has confirmed. These are not trivial details, nor is this a matter of semantics. We're not quibbling over words. If you don’t understand the technical workings of these surveillance programs, you can’t understand whether they’re working as intended, you can’t identify where the government has overstepped its bounds, and you can't intelligently debate the proper response. The fact that the government has maintained rigid secrecy compounds the problem."

Guess it's not important to identify the claims or the other reporters...

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Well yeah, I caught the "personal" thing; I was asking for the basis for the view?

Because I've worked on a few top secret projects for various departments within the Fed. Gov. I'm not sure he had full access to the scope of the programs he leaked. He doesn't strike me as someone that who understood what he was leaking.

How Did A Guy Like Snowden Have So Much Visibility | TPMDC

But I really would like to hear it from him. I think he should have his day in court to explain himself.

Now that these guys are on record..let's see what info is released.
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