
David Miranda, schedule 7 and the danger that all reporters now face - r0h1n
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/19/david-miranda-schedule7-danger-reporters
======
swombat
Jaw: on floor.

 _The mood toughened just over a month ago, when I received a phone call from
the centre of government telling me: "You've had your fun. Now we want the
stuff back." There followed further meetings with shadowy Whitehall figures.
The demand was the same: hand the Snowden material back or destroy it. I
explained that we could not research and report on this subject if we complied
with this request. The man from Whitehall looked mystified. "You've had your
debate. There's no need to write any more."_

~~~
jmduke
Unless I'm misinterpreting this, those are paraphrases and not quotes. There's
no feasible reason to believe a government official is overtly villainous or
foolish enough to say something like "You've had your fun."

~~~
UVB-76
It does sound _exactly_ like the type of goading comment a government official
would make to a journalist off the record.

~~~
dylangs1030
All of this controversy aside, do you have any real reference point for what a
conversation between a government official and a journalist sounds like, let
alone a goading one at that?

~~~
bdamm
Yes; take what happens at the local politics level, and amplify it up several
orders of magnitude.

------
mcphilip
Is it just me it does anyone else feel like this is one of the most important
articles posted in... decades?

The guardian is obviously put at grave risk for revealing that UK spooks have
gone so far as to oversee destruction of inconvienient materials in the London
office, threatening legal action if this material is not dropped.

I applaud the guardian for their bravery and excellence in reporting.

~~~
thisrod
I grok a different subtext:

It's a journalist's job to know where the skeletons are buried, and where the
escorts keep their address books. Journalists also have ready access to
dictionaries, with which to clarify the meanings of words. Such words include
"mutually", "assured" and "destruction".

~~~
venomsnake
Sadly the way US and UK are mishandling the whole thing can lead to a lot
stuff leaked that could possibly cause real harm.

------
616c
There is something truly entertaining about the insistence they smash the hard
drives.

The number of computer-illiterate C-level assholes I have met all insist on
applying analog world logic to their digital decision making. When you try to
properly correct them for wasting their time or embarrassing themselves to end
up on sites like HN, they lose it. I find it funny how badly such people in
positions of government corporate power need to prove to themselves they have
any recourse in contexts or fields where they are too stupid to find a proper
solution to their own dilemma.

~~~
handsomeransoms
This is not entertaining (or, reading into subtext, absurd) at all. It is
widely accepted that complete physical destruction of hard drives is required
to avoid future forensic recovery, which is what Rusbridger is referring to
when he mentions "passing Chinese agents."

~~~
rdtsc
I think he should with a completely serious face comply, deliver the disk to
them and then smash it with a sledgehammer right in front of their eyes.

Now of course he should have copies spread in multiple locations. But, hey,
they just asked for the information to be returned and destroyed, just comply,
very easy.

Sometimes it is worth taking pleasure laughing at the stupidity of those in
power. That has to be exposed alongside malice and corruption.

~~~
jmadsen
Reminds me of the many times I emailed spreadsheet files to marketing, saying,
"I need that back when you're done"

Generally they got it, but it took some of them a while.

~~~
dredmorbius
Reminds me of the bad old days of locking VCS.

------
dtf
Rusbridger responding to an AMA question on reddit a week or two ago: "Various
difficulties have been put in our way (sorry to be vague, but this is an
ongoing story). We’re working round them. And, yes, more to come....."

[http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1jf6uc/i_am_alan_rusbr...](http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1jf6uc/i_am_alan_rusbridger_editor_in_chief_of_the/cbe31e7?context=3)

------
dnautics
I am not entirely certain about the history of how this happened, but in the
US "the press" has taken on an unintended meaning - to refer to the fourth
estate. So somehow we have created a privileged class of citizens who enjoy
special constitutional protections. Originally, and rightfully, "the press"
refers to the the machine used to print broadsheets (not the people who do the
printing) - and so freedom of the press would probably be best interpreted as
"freedom of _anyone_ to use _technology_ to disseminate information", which is
one step beyond "freedom of speech".

~~~
sbirchall
A worthwhile read on the British history of this subject is "Power without
Responsibility: Press, Broadcasting and the Internet in Britain"

My biggest take from this is that your notion that "freedom of anyone to use
technology to disseminate information" as upheld by the printing establishment
is significantly undermined by the business of printing itself - whereby the
cost of disseminating information has increased consistently to make a truly
"free" press completely prohibitive to the average person. The book goes into
great detail about how this happened and the nature of how the internet
effects this pattern. I would highly recommend this to anyone reading this
thread.

~~~
dnautics
yeah but the average person doesn't need to disseminate information to
maintain a free society. It's totally fine to have a community of news mavens
that supplies most of the information. What is not okay is a process of
accreditation, either state-run (or less worrisome) an independent process -
that affords special roadblocks to get protected status.

~~~
sbirchall
Common Sense[1] might disagree with you on that one.

If we are talking about truly "disseminating information" I think we need to
consider any form of broadcast or public proclamation and so as we approach
the 50th anniversary of a certain speech[2] I would say the dissemination of
information by an average person is absolutely fundamental to the checks and
balances required to construct and maintain a free society. But therein lies
the rub - just swamp the channels with noise and you raise the bar for
actually transmitting a meaningful signal. This is what I was alluding to in
my other comment about the way the internet has effected this age old pattern.

It's not clear what your second point is saying - it's okay to have only
experts informing the public, but they cannot be afforded "special...
protected status"? Like parliamentary privilege? "The fourth estate"? Freedom
of speech? The right to protect their sources? I'm genuinely curious about
what you mean, sorry if I've misunderstood completely.

[1:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Sense_%28pamphlet%29](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Sense_%28pamphlet%29)]
[2: MLK - August 28th 1963]

~~~
dnautics
I'm taking a literal view of the word average. Anyone motivated to write a
pamphlet is by definition no longer the average person, unless almost everyone
else is doing so - i don't think we need 50% of the population writing
pamphlets to maintain a free society.

As to your understanding of my second point: Exactly. I am saying it's okay
for only experts to be informing the public, as long as there is no barrier to
anyone becoming an expert. The only way to ensure there is no barrier to
anyone becoming an expert is to have no special protected status. The only way
to have no special protected status is for the protected status to be extended
to everyone.

In summary: Everyone should have the protection of the freedom of the press,
therefore, anyone can become an expert with all the attendant protections
(without having to be special), but it's okay if not everyone is an expert, as
long as anyone COULD be an expert.

------
jacquesm
"Bluntly, we did not have to do our reporting from London. Already most of the
NSA stories were being reported and edited out of New York. And had it
occurred to him that Greenwald lived in Brazil?"

So there is the answer for how the UK/US division was picked for the NSA
stories.

This is an absolutely incredible article. Incredible because I both am shocked
(yes, that's the right word this time) about the contents and incredible
because I'd rather not have to believe it.

Apparently the government of the UK now equates journalism with terrorism and
will use laws instigated to squash terrorism to squash the free press or at a
minimum attempt to intimidate it and to disrupt communications between members
of the press. On top of all that they have spooks that seem incapable of
understanding the first thing about digital communications visit a newspaper
to oversee the physical destruction of a computer holding data of an
investigation in progress.

Incredible... what's next?

I just read about the harassment Laura Poitras has to go through each time she
travels. And all that for just doing your job? It is becoming really hard to
distinguish the good guys from the bad guys.

~~~
eliasmacpherson
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLJUocaDYw0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLJUocaDYw0)
It's getting easier to distinguish.

~~~
jacquesm
"they didn't get to design our uniforms"

------
nicholassmith
The Guardian shifted from a .co.uk to a .com _very_ recently (~10-14 days
ago), now showing content with a /uk subdomain. I wonder how much of that
decision was based around the pressure they've been put under by the UK
government. I imagine it's been a considered change for a while, but if you're
starting to get concerned about journalistic freedom in the UK moving your
reporting outside of it gives you a little wiggle room. Not sure how well
it'll play long term, so we'll see.

It's sickening seeing how far the UK government is going to persecute
journalists for exposing the surveillance state that's been created over the
last decade. Pulling journalists partners in for questioning as a terrorist,
forcing destruction of uncomfortable evidence? All in the name of protecting
us from another round of terrorism, when really there's been significantly
fewer terrorist incidents in the last 10 years than in the 10 before.

Edit: a quick traceroute shows that The Guardian seems to have it's servers
for the .com outside the UK, and guardian.co.uk is/was located in London.

------
ecmendenhall
If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on an encrypted,
backed-up, redundantly distributed hard drive — forever.

------
prteja11
With the NSA debate, I keep wondering if there is something people in
positions in the government and security agencies know that makes them keep
doing what they're doing.

I mean some of these people are really smart and understand how this spying
can be abused. There must be something they know that makes them build or
support these programs.

~~~
jorgeortiz85
I had a similar thought, in 2003, when the US invaded Iraq. At the time, I was
a bit of a UN nerd, and I had been following the weapons inspector reports and
the Security Council debates. I was angry at how belligerent the Bush
administration was getting, given that the publicly available evidence did not
corroborate their claims that we might wake up to a "mushroom cloud". Iraq was
maybe dragging its feet, but the weapons inspectors all agreed that
inspections were working and should continue.

When the the US invaded Iraq, I started to doubt my own firmly held beliefs.
Did they possess some classified evidence that I did not? Going to war without
the authorization of the Security Council was such a grave breach of precedent
and international law that I didn't believe the Bush administration would take
such a drastic action if they didn't fully expect to find WMDs.

It turns out they didn't secretly have reliable information the rest of us
didn't. They were blinded by conviction and ideology.

I'm sure these people in government and at the intelligence agencies truly
believe these programs are vital to protect the US from terrorism. They know
spying can be abused, but in their minds any abuse is unintentional and minor
relative to the purported benefits of spying on terrorists.

~~~
bostik
> _It turns out they didn 't secretly have reliable information_

And more to the point, they knew exactly what their information was worth. A
document known as the "Downing Street Memo" is pretty blunt on that:
"intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." (From:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downing_Street_memo](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downing_Street_memo)
,
[http://downingstreetmemo.com/memos.html](http://downingstreetmemo.com/memos.html))

We're not talking about any random document either. It was, in effect, the
executive summary of the pre-Iraq war situation, given to the prime minister
of UK by his private secretary.

------
revelation
There is a bizarre jump in this story. How did they go from phone calls and
meetings to incinerating MacBooks?

(Obviously, as a journalist, you need to start recording these conversations
and publishing names. There can be no privacy for government employees.)

~~~
lostlogin
The modern equivalent of burning books?

~~~
astrodust
Fahrenheit 4566: The temperature at which your MacBook Pro's aluminum casing
boils.

------
foobarqux
In the comments Rudsbridger, in all sincerity, is asking why a newspaper
should have fought a government request to destroy source material.

I mean this is the strongest position the Guardian could have challenged the
government from: No risk to the story, public visibility, government has
nothing to directly gain from having the material destroyed. What is being
fought over is purely principle and a demonstration of obedience: Gov asks and
Guardian rolls over.

I presume we can expect the Guardian to routinely delete source material upon
gov request if it hasn't been doing so already?

~~~
lostlogin
Or is it just complying because of the stupidity of the request? Because
nothing was actually lost and nothing was deleted as such. A copy got wrecked,
so what?

~~~
foobarqux
Both parties knew there were copies elsewhere. The act was a demonstration of
compliance which has reinforced a relationship of subservience to the
government.

------
c16
What infuriates me is that not enough people care for them to demand change.

It goes on the news one day then the next it's gone. Information-overload.
That's their card and they'll keep playing it.

~~~
ekidd
_What infuriates me is that not enough people care for them to demand change._

This is a common theme on Hacker News, and an understandable one: You see a
situation that seems unjust, and you want other people to be upset about it.
But they're not, because people don't work that way.

People will become upset when they have social proof that they ought to be
upset. This takes a long time, which means that politics, metaphorically
speaking, has massive momentum and takes a long to change direction.

At this stage, watch the decision makers, the influencers, and the people who
pride themselves on being "middle of the road" above all else. When they start
to flip, it means a larger political shift has started. And sure enough,
obsessively middle-of-the-road writers like Andrew Sullivan are starting to
doubt the government's arguments.

If the government keeps raiding newspapers, detaining spouses, and otherwise
getting caught, public opinion will continue to shift. But it will do so
slowly.

~~~
bostik
> _This takes a long time, which means that politics, metaphorically speaking,
> has massive momentum and takes a long to change direction._

I've said for a very long time that Newton's First Law (conservation of
momentum, or inertia) applies for all masses. Including masses of people.

Hell, I've even joked that it may actually apply _better_ to masses of people.

The silly thing is, I had arrived at that conclusion before I had ever read
Asimov's Foundation.

------
suprgeek
The British Public are the (ideological) descendents of people who had the
"Magna Carta Libertatum" as a cornerstone of their civil society. Now from
everything that comes out it looks like Britain is closest to becoming the
Orwellian nightmare - constant surveillance of citizenry, arbitrary
detentions, suppression of the press and an uncaring bureaucracy.

British folk ..."Remember remember the fifth of November". Speak out against
this at every forum possible and kick out these enemies of freedom ASAP.

~~~
gregsq
The developmental history of what might be called loosely the British
Establishment is indeed interesting.

If you're interested in a previous example of the relationship between MI5,
the Home Office and the 'Press', you could look at the publication of the
biography 'Spycatcher', by ex MI5 officer Peter Wright.

[http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spycatcher](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spycatcher)

------
jmadsen
I'm sure the main point of grabbing Miranda (ironic name) was to get at
whatever files he was carrying, but...

Any thoughts that someone might use this as a way to "expose" Greenwald as
being gay? Sorry, but there are a tremendous number of people for whom that
will change their mind about the whole thing

------
nilved
What's up with HN and these shitty titles lately? This says literally nothing.
It isn't rhetorical or helpful at all. Tell me about the article.

~~~
seiji
The original title was: "You've had your debate. There's no need to write
anymore." (theguardian.com)

The new title is: David Miranda, schedule 7 and the danger that all reporters
now face (theguardian.com)

I prefer the first one.

~~~
ra
Once again the posters title was overruled despite the fact that it was on top
of page 1, the posters title was a quote taken directly from the article, and
the post was generating good discussion.

~~~
nilved
None of those things matter at all. The second title is objectively more
descriptive and that's what titles should be.

~~~
AnthonyMouse
> The second title is objectively more descriptive

Is it? Probably most people who haven't yet read the story don't know who
David Mirdanda is, since the story they haven't read yet is the thing they
would most likely know him for. "Schedule 7" is meaningless without context.
"The danger that all reporters now face" is meaningless without context --
they could just as well be talking about libel laws or piracy or some news
about the Apple antitrust case.

The new title is objectively _less_ descriptive because it gives the reader no
clue as to what the article is actually about before reading it. The original
title tells you _exactly_ what the article is about. "You've had your debate.
There's no need to write anymore." That's what the article is about.

~~~
nilved
No, second person "you" is less telling than third person "David Miranda."
"Your debate" is not descriptive in the least. I chose the word "objectively"
deliberately.

~~~
goblin89
The first title doesn't correctly translate what the article is about. The
quote might well be taken from a ranty essay, and without context hints at
empty sensationalism.

This doesn't make the second title ‘objectively’ more descriptive, though. A
person who happens to miss Miranda's name in news and isn't familiar with
Schedule 7 term, such as myself, wouldn't find it descriptive at all.

Still, second title looks subjectively better to me. I'd say ‘all reporters’
is bad phrasing for HN (the article doesn't imply that _every_ reporter,
regardless of their country or what they write about, now faces danger), and
HDD destruction may deserve mentioning (it seems central to the story), but
overall this headline does better job at translating the spirit of the article
and sets correct expectations for the reader.

------
leokun
Our governments have lost a great deal of good faith as a result of the manner
in which they've handled this. They're applying tactics from the 1950's in the
modern age, and it's just blowing up in their faces and they're not coming out
looking so well. I just wish there was more introspection and less of whatever
you want to call this madness.

------
AJ007
A good measure of how free a country is: are its own journalists safe putting
their feet there.

------
epo
Many of these comments are touchingly naive. Governments have always
maintained absolute control over what they will permit to be said within thir
own borders about matters affecting state security, whether this is about home
or abroad.

Nothing has changed, just because you have a web browser hasn't given you any
more 'freedom'. In the UK we still have D-notices (now DA-notices) and the
media still has to abide by their guidelines or discover the consequences.

It is sad though that the "land of the free" needs an English newspaper to
tell them what is going on. Your state control of the media must be even
stronger than ours.

~~~
vidarh
Compliance with D-notices are voluntary. They are notices that indicate
concern and puts the press on notice that some of what they report _may_ lead
to lawsuits if they go ahead. They're intimidation of sorts, but they don't in
themselves stop publication or make publication illegal.

You'll notice that a lot of US media has to a decent extent chosen to ignore
the latest DA-Notice relating to PRISM.

------
JonFish85
I don't see what everyone is so shocked by. Sensitive government information
is in the wild. The government is using laws in place to try to limit the
exposure of said sensitive data. Personally I don't think that journalists are
the ones who should have final say over what information should and should not
be exposed.

Regardless of which side of the argument you fall on, I don't see what is so
revolting about this whole development. Journalist is thought to have very
sensitive information about leading world powers. Leading world powers want
information on who has the data, where it's been released, and want to limit
further exposure. You want to be a journalist involved in releasing government
top secret information? This is what you have to be ready to deal with. As a
journalist, you're not above the law either.

To be clear, I'm not saying the government is always right either, I'm saying
that the government is just doing what it's job is: keep top secret
information from reaching sensitive hands.

~~~
sophacles
And therein lies the real problem. Very few (possibly none) people think "I
will subvert and subjugate the entire populace in evil oppressive ways for my
own power". Rather they think "I truly believe my job is important and this is
what's best".

The SWAT teams that destroy a peaceful organic farm in Texas are just doing
their job to collect evidence according to a warrant. There may be a little
petty "fucking hippies attitude" in there, but they aren't thinking "lets
scare everyone from ever trying to have a nice big garden again". The police
commander/cheif/whatever isn't thinking "lets make sure to cause as much
damage as possible", they are thinking "lets do this safely and decisively,
criminals need to be shown there is no point in crime". The prosecutor and
judge aren't thinking "hey oppressing is fun!" they are thinking "we need to
live under the rule of law, lets make sure that happens", and that is just
their job. Hell even the people who vote for laws and representatives are
thinking "this really is the best way to keep crime down and keep people from
trashing the nice places we're trying to make here.

The intelligence apparatus is the same. Sure they are just doing their job to
get material labeled as sensitive back under control. They really think it's
dangerous for it to be out there. The people who label it such are truly under
the impression that it is dangerous to the country they protect for it to be
widely known. The people who build the gathering apparatus truly believe it
won't be abused.

The abusers themselves aren't looking at it and saying "oh subjugate subjugate
subjugate!" They are saying "I know my motives are pure - a little abuse of
means is less important than the noble end.". The bad ones are not saying
"fuck the people, they are an impediment". They are saying "I can get my own
position bettered by ignoring one little rule". They say " My primary goal is
personal gain, this twisty interpretation gives me that, and besides - it's
legal in that light, so why is it bad?"

It's a death by a thousand cuts - the slow erosion of OK action by a large
number of distributed players playing for their own gain. The agency of a
group (a conspiracy) is not needed - and in fact would be better - it's easier
to target and stop. The people who aren't abusers can't imagine the little
abuses that would arise - they say "but it won't be used that way, it's
absurd!"

Think of it like engineering a system: the security people fight their own
engineering teams as much as they fight the "bad guys". They hear regularly
"why would anyone think to do that?" "how could someone know that to abuse
it?" "I can't imagine anyone going to such trouble for my little bit" and on
and on. It's difficult to make people who aren't used to thinking and seeing
it realize that such things happen all the time. Human systems and rules
aren't any different.

This is what we need to focus on - closing the holes, fighting the little
abuses, and generally making things overall better, rather than looking for
the big conspiracies that may not even exist (because they don't actually need
to).

------
marcamillion
Wow....I can't quite understand the actions of governments these days.

Did they really think that they could literally destroy the hard drives of the
journalists working on these NSA scandals and that story wouldn't become a
major story?

As in....really now. Any amount of legitimacy that the Snowden leaks didn't
have before, just got significantly bolstered with this type of action.

How is this government still in power?

~~~
marcuspovey
Because when they failed to be not elected (the vast majority of those who
voted voted for some other guy, but _somehow_ these guys got to be in charge -
first past the post, joy), they thought "stability" was the most important
thing, and passed a law that said that there wouldn't be another election for
at least 5 years.

------
cmsmith
>That work is immensely complicated by the certainty that it would be highly
unadvisable for Greenwald (or any other journalist) to regard any electronic
means of communication as safe.

Can anyone comment on how accurate that statement is? I would imagine that two
people (Greenwald and Poitras) who frequently meet face-to-face could set up a
secure way of transferring data.

~~~
wpietri
I wouldn't imagine that. All we really know about the NSA's cryptographic
powers are that they have a shit-ton of money and a lot of very smart people.
And even if your cryptography is actually as secure as you think, the power
that can be brought to bear here is immense.

Could they, from a distance, read the EM emissions of your computer? Could
they compromise some physical object on which you set your computer and read
the EM emissions from there? Can you afford to have somebody watching your
computer every second of the day? Is there some possible attack that you
haven't thought of but they, having devoted lifetimes of thought to the
problem, have?

Of course, they could also be bumbling idiots, so there may be no need to
worry. Certainly, this sort of ham-fisted pressure suggests that there are, at
least, idiots involved. But if you have gotten to the sort of prominence where
somebody might be willing to burn a billion dollars to cause you trouble, it's
really hard to say what's safe and what isn't.

~~~
marcuspovey
No need: Using a Mac? Compromised, the NSA has root access via the Patriot
act. Ditto windows. And that's before you get to the idea of remote updates to
the microcode supported by modern PCs (and not even running Linux keeps you
safe from that, unless you recompile your kernel to turn it off).

Lets also not forget that even the strongest crypto is vulnerable to cartel
attacks and the rubber hose technique.

~~~
dTal
Use a one-time pad, run Linux, don't connect to the net a machine with access
to the keys or the plaintext. Encrypt your message, copy the file to a
formatted flash drive, and send it to your communication partner however you
like. Hell, stick it on pastebin, it won't matter.

I'm confused at the perspective being espoused here - "encryption is pointless
because the NSA can break anything, and failing that they can always beat you
up". Encryption is not pointless, they probably can't even break standard open
source crypto, they definitely can't break one-time pads which are trivially
easy to make nowadays, and they can always beat you up anyway so you might as
well encrypt.

There's no plausible way any of that is less safe than running the gauntlet of
border security with the data in your pocket.

~~~
wpietri
I think you've exaggerated the perspective being espoused, so your reply is
equally exaggerated.

Encryption only solves the problem of a suspicious link with perfectly
trustworthy endpoints and a perfectly trustworthy side channel (for keys).
Nobody is saying, "don't encrypt." But people are saying, "don't assume
encryption is perfectly safe."

Also, the plausible way that physical carriage is safer is that you know when
interception happens. If you encrypt everything and then use your husband's
pocket as a transport medium rather than a wire, that's better data security
because interception is harder, and can't be done in secret.

------
monsterix
I think it's quite important to share the names of the men from Whitehall to
the world. I mean we all _know_ names of only the people defending public
interest so far: aka Greenwald, Snowden, Miranda and a few others.

We should be told about everyone from the other side too.

Like we learned about Keith Alexander of NSA, you know. It is of utmost
importance to make names of public servants well - _truly public_ \- because
they're the ones using tax-payers money and should have been defending public
interest instead.

~~~
rolux
Agree. But, FWIW, Alan Rusbridger, the author of the article, explains in the
comments that in this case, this would not be legal, as the conversations he
is quoting from took place after he had agreed to keep names off the record.

~~~
angersock
When the bastards make the rules at whim, there is nothing to be gained from
playing by those same rules.

~~~
westicle
That rule is actually made by journalists, not governments.

------
mpyne
Wow, a Guardian article that had something positive to say about the U.S. My
jaw has also hit the floor!

FWIW, I also agree that shredding hard disks is far overstepping the bounds of
what is proper.

