

Three NSA Whistleblowers Back EFF's Lawsuit Over Government Spying Program - d0ne
https://www.eff.org/press/releases/three-nsa-whistleblowers-back-effs-lawsuit-over-governments-massive-spying-program

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btilly
Rule of thumb. If ever the government claims state secrets, they are playing
their, "We did something wrong, and would like to get out of jail free" card.

I know of a number of cases where state secrets was claimed, then later it was
proven that there was no actual state secret proven. (Including the very first
case where state secrets were used as a defense in a court room.) I know of no
cases where state secrets were claimed, and then there turned out to be an
actual state secret at issue.

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mtgx
And then they will lobby to pass a law to make everything illegal they've done
over the past 5-10 years _legal_ , and of course retroactively.

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btilly
Case in point: FISA. :-(

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rhizome
Case in further point: FISAAA

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillan...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Act_of_1978_Amendments_Act_of_2008)

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ajtaylor
I wish the EFF good luck with this case. They are certainly going to need it!
The change in US government attitudes regarding spying on its own citizens (at
least publicly) during the last 10 years is chilling to say the least.

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majke
Don't 'wish'. Donate: <https://supporters.eff.org/donate>

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ajtaylor
Sorry, my response to the problem was to leave the US. But I still wish those
of you living there (including all my family) good luck!

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suprgeek
I sincerely commend the EFF for taking a stand to slow down the descent along
the slippery slope of a 24x7x365 survelied society.

At this point however, it is probably a safe assumption: No matter what the
NSA/NRO/CIA/DOJ or anyone else says, the US gov. in one form or another is
monitoring every single Phone call, E-mail, Chat, Skype and any other form of
electronic communication into and out of the USA. Also the location data that
your cell phone leaks pretty much makes physical surveillance superfluous.

The Technology has been too cheaply available and the temptation too great for
the truth to be anything else.

What the EFF should also be doing is launching a campaign to make end-to-end
encryption the default everywhere. Every e-mail you write /Chat session/Skype
session should be encrypted in transport for every one. Make the cost of doing
this mass-surveillance so expensive that the Govt is forced to prioritize on
the actual targets.

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ljlolel
You presume that it's still expensive for the government to break AES.

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einhverfr
I think that's a reasonable assumption. But even if it is wrong and the NSA
has a shortcut.... And even if that shortcut affects all implementations of
all cyphers....

1) expensive is still relative. Even if there is a short cut it may be only
feasible to decrypt a small part of encrypted communications. So they may have
to prioritize.

2) If everything is encrypted, they may still have to start somewhere.

so yeah, it's not a bad assumption even if it is wrong.

Speaking of which, https works with HN, not that this likely matters much.

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sneak
If they manage to get the NSA off the backbones and repeal PATRIOT so the feds
can't review my entire digital life in realtime with no warrant, I will move
back to the USA.

(But of course not NYC where you are subject to illegal search just riding the
subway.)

I ain't holdin' my breath. :(

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mtgx
If you're still talking to people in USA, especially through Skype, your
conversations are probably already monitored [1]. I think NSA already has a
(secret, illegal) mandate to monitor all American communications with any
foreigners.

[1]
[http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/12/nsa_offers_billions_...](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/12/nsa_offers_billions_for_skype_pwnage/)

[http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9218002/Microsoft_see...](http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9218002/Microsoft_seeks_patent_for_spy_tech_for_Skype)

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sneak
Oh, I know. :(

It sucks because I don't have any good ways of securely communicating with
voice and/or video to people on mobile in the US. PGP, OTR, SSL, etc work
well, but there aren't any good PGP or OTR clients for iPhone AFAIK.

I mostly just censor myself until I can speak to people in person, or
communicate only unimportant things.

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gouranga
Throw your iPhone away as well.

Apple are bound by the PATRIOT act.

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sneak
To what end? Location services? My residential address is on my form 1040.
They already know. :)

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codehotter
If they think this is necessary, then at the very least the legislative branch
of government should sign this into law - just doing it is not how a
democratic government is supposed to work.

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mindslight
Actually it's exactly how "democracy" is supposed to work - giving the masses
the illusion of control over the autonomous government. If the public makes a
stink, escalate to getting the approval of congress. If the public still
complains, fall back on the rules and tell them they need to vote in different
"representatives". Most likely somewhere during this multi-year process, the
momentum of the outrage is lost and the issue goes away. And in the rare case
that the public won't let go of a particular issue, multiple new corruptions
have sprung up in the meantime.

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thechut
I hope that this case brings new facts to lights. This stuff is too scary to
be kept a secret.

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blackaspen
This is the case of "We did something illegal, but it was really effective in
treating X, so we should make it legal now."

