
The flawed psychology of government mass surveillance - Libertatea
http://www.theguardian.com/science/head-quarters/2013/aug/26/nsa-gchq-psychology-government-mass-surveillance
======
Homunculiheaded
"This is despite the fact that science, alone, can lay claim to a wealth of
empirical evidence on the psychological effects of surveillance."

Why do people ever expect reason to be a part of this? This quote shows
exactly the point of surveillance (and torture for that matter). In a
reasonable world, science and reason hold the greatest possible power. To
perform surveillance despite the fact that it doesn't make sense is to exert
one's power over reason itself. You cannot argue with an entity wielding such
power, they have empirically shown that they are more powerful than reason.
Follow this line and the only reasoning you are left with as an individual is
submit or...

I've pasted this a million times but I strongly believe this is the absolutely
most important quote from 1984 (from O'Brien torturing Winston Part 3, Chapter
3):

"We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it.
Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in
order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to
establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The
object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin
to understand me?' "

We could easily add to that 'the object of surveillance is surveillance'.
There is no end game in any of these assertions of power other than expression
and confirmation of power: not security, not prosperity, not even the welfare
of the nation.

~~~
einhverfr
> We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing
> it.

I am not entirely sure of this btw. We've seen a number of very short-lived
successful coup de'etats in Ecuador which can only be under the assumption
that the military seized power to make a political statement on behalf of
protesters, and then quickly relinquished power. Additionally I have to wonder
about Felix Sulla's restoration of the Roman republic near the end of his
rule. I think it is likely that these are exceptions that prove the rule but
"no one ever" is way too broad to be true on its face.

I think the larger problem is that organizations have a will to live
independent of their members, and killing an organization is hard. What is the
object of surveillance? It depends on who you ask. For the government agencies
involved, this is a matter of extending their territory and so your view may
hold some water there, but for a wider class, the object of surveillance is
money, and they are the ones calling the shots I think.

~~~
djjose
One could argue the fact there's been so many coup d'etats by the military
shows the military continues to hold the power.

~~~
einhverfr
I don't think that is the case. I think it is more likely that because of the
banking crisis, people lost faith in their political institutions because the
moneyed interests controlled everything and that even the army knew they could
not really stand up to them. In other words, I think it is more likely that
the army never had power than that they always had it.

------
logn
I see the NSA as filling the traditional role of god in the human psyche. In
the same way that people have subscribed to atheism, I think there will be
people who just decide to live without fear of the NSA and ignore the
surveillance or embrace it in a rebellious way (such as innovating in ways to
combat surveillance or trolling agents who are presumed to be watching). I'd
like to see more research into that.

~~~
lukifer
I think this is an important observation. Those who support the surveillance
state are likely doing so for similar psychological reasons as the desire to
believe in God: the reassurance that someone somewhere is watching, and meting
out justice. And unlike with God, there is no disputing the existence of NSA;
whether you have faith in their integrity and supposed mission is another
matter.

See also this excellent Venkatesh piece on the relationship between
observation and authority: [http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2013/03/22/social-dark-
matter-on-s...](http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2013/03/22/social-dark-matter-on-
seeing-and-being-seen/)

~~~
speeder
I am.Christian and believe God surveillance to be important. The difference is
that I believe God won't do evil with it, since.God is perfect.

~~~
pigscantfly
What constitutes doing evil with it? Presumably you hope that God will exalt
righteous believers and punish misbehavior, since you believe that his
surveillance of people is important. I can't think of any motive for
surveillance that does not involve acting on the collected information.
Therefore, my question to you is, why do you care if your God punishes or
exalts other people? Most of us don't believe in your God and are unlikely to
change our behavior to conform to his norms, so even if God is watching and
taking notes, at best he's meting out post-facto punishment for our sins,
which is not going to make anyone act any nicer towards you in life. If you
just hope that 'sinners' are going to 'hell,' I ask, why is another person's
destination important to you? If your God is truly benevolent, shouldn't
everyone just go to 'heaven' after they die? If your God is not benevolent,
why do you worship him?

~~~
lukifer
Even believers must admit that God is essentially mysterious; if there was a
creator who wanted its presence known unambiguously, then it wouldn't be a
frequent point of contention.

Rather, I think this an issue with the human psyche, which is complex, but
unambiguously real. Whether or not there's a God, there are many who clearly
want to believe in _something_ which is omni-present, and I'm guessing that
for those with no faith, or for whom their faith doesn't scratch that itch,
they fill that gap with a fictional Good Guy Government that protects you
while you sleep.

~~~
krichman
I think due to evolving as a social animal we necessarily have a sense of
justice and a notion that bad behaviour must be punished or corrected. The
notion that all bad behaviour is logged by a mysterious being that will
present you with whatever comeuppance you deserve after life is a beautiful
fiction. It makes one feel much better to believe that over thinking the more
powerful person who took your things by force is going to get away with it.

I think it's more a desire to see justice than a desire for something omni-
present. People that believe in neither religion nor good government will
sometimes make claims like, "yeah one day I'm going to be that guy's boss,"
which is just saying, "I feel bad now but he'll get his comeuppance later and
balance will be restored."

------
a3n
"An alternative is to put an end to mass surveillance, forcing the security
services to fall in line with the parts of government that value liberty."

Which parts of the government are those?

~~~
devb
The speechwriters.

------
sitkack
| "A government that engages in mass surveillance cannot claim to value
innovation, critical thinking, or originality."

Isn't that the point of surveillance?

~~~
alephnil
I know you intended to be sarcastic, but anyway.

Governments want innovation, originality and critical thinking for its ability
to foster wealth and a rich culture. At the same time they are afraid of the
disruptive changes that is results of it, so they set up mass surveillance for
the fear that is coming out of control.

At the same time they probably know that this have a bad effect on the
society. That is why it was taken enormous measures to keep it secret,
including gag orders on anything that could reveal its existence, likely in a
hope that the bad effect won't happen if people don't know about it. Now the
people know.

~~~
sitkack
Bureaucracies don't like originality and critical thinking, but most people
don't exhibit those behaviors anyway. And those that do, will do so regardless
of reward or risk. Any hierarchy of control will calcify as it gets larger
otherwise it would collapse under its own weight, so a surveillance state that
aims to keep artistic endeavors in check makes sense.

While we do need a small number of elites to improve and think up new ideas
(see Lenin's New Economic Policy of infusing innovation into Communism through
temporary small scale Capitalism), it would be dangerous if everyone had free
time or capacity of enlightened intellect to be as creative and critical as
they are capable. The 60s are great existence proof of that.

As we are seeing with a general lack of outrage in the population over the
snowden released information, people are more cautious, saying less and
policing themselves. It is a small minority, maybe to their own peril who are
speaking their minds.

The cynic would say that maybe Snowden's release was a planned move by the
Administration. Think of how much more effective the system will be if it is
in "the open." A bold move, but if successful, forever changes what the notion
of liberty means in the US.

~~~
spin
"...those that do [show creativity and original thinking], will do so
regardless of reward or risk."

I disagree. I think that there will be some people who will be creative no
matter what. There will some people who won't be creative no matter what. And
there will be some people in the middle who could swing either way.

As an example: I think that Steve Jobs would've been creative and ambitious no
matter what. But I don't think that Wozniak would've been ambitious if it
wasn't for Jobs pushing him.

Certain environments foster creativity and experimenting. US colleges are full
of weird intellectuals with crazy ideas. OTOH, Your typical, say, police
department (or most government agencies...) is not.

The environment that we live in will tend to sway people in one direction or
the other. (... just look at the environment of S.V. or YCombinator...)

~~~
ahomescu1
It's funny, I was just thinking of what would have happened if Steve Jobs
lived in a Soviet communist country (there's a discussion about communism in
another thread). I don't think he would have succeeded, considering he would
have had to get approval from the Party/current leaders for every little thing
he did (or even just the big things).

------
dwd
Orwell summed up the psychological effect of total surveillance with Winston's
insightful diary entry:

"Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime is death"

It starts with outward self-censorship and ends with the internal...

"He set to work to exercise himself in crimestop. He presented himself with
propositions —'the Party says the earth is flat', 'the party says that ice is
heavier than water'— and trained himself in not seeing or not understanding
the arguments that contradicted them." \- Chapter 4.

------
McUsr
Hello.

One observation in all of this: It is really the aim of at least some
terrorists, to provoke the authorities so much so they will take measures that
their subjects revolts againss. That was Baader Meinhof, and Rote Arme
Fraktione ideology.

So when the authorities has failed, since they bought into the game, we are
the last line of defense in not letting Osama Bin Laden win this.

Terrorists really don't deserve to win.

------
bsbechtel
Anyone else feel like this article was describing what Facebook has become
over the past few years?

~~~
samstave
Been talking about it for some time:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6248251](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6248251)

------
toddnessa
Totalitarianism is on the rise and the mass surveillance age is proof of it.
It could also be an observation that we the public bought the lies of safety
and security that was being fed to us in erecting all of these government
programs.

I guess now many of us are seeing the light that it seems much more likely
that this is really all about controlling the masses to the benefit of the
state and not about security at all. However, those being given such powers
may very well have figured that we would later figure this out but by then it
would be too late for us to do anything about it. I would like to believe that
we the people will prove them wrong.

------
cLeEOGPw
"There are two ways to resolve this conflict between the motivations of
elected representatives and security services. One is to embrace
totalitarianism, breaking all bonds of social identity between politicians and
the electorate. In this (unpalatable) scenario, democracy converts to a police
state in which all parts of government are seen by the populace as an
outgroup."

This is the case in at least some EU nations, like Lithuania. I am not even
sure which is better between this and the US-like or UK-like alternative.

------
walshemj
I seem to recall that not that long ago the Guardian was in favor of
compulsory ID cards - I remember a Polly Toynbee leader about we had nothing
to worry about.

~~~
moocowduckquack
You are probably referring to this -
[http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/nov/07/comment...](http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/nov/07/comment.politics2)

Although that is in the comment section rather than the leader, which I would
expect as she is a columnist. But it is certainly funny in retrospect. Polly
has always been something of a statist however, and is someone who seems
generally ready to give government the benefit of the doubt on first
principles.

~~~
contingencies
I remember that, and the No2ID campaign. Later on, randomly, I met one of its
founders at a conference in Cambridge and congratulated them on their work:
regular people objecting to irregular government - that's what it takes.

------
infocollector
Perhaps there is a way to make a technically sound platform that governments
have a hard time doing mass surveillance?

~~~
wavefunction
This has been discussed before, but a political problem requires a political
solution (cessation of surveillance through legislation and holding violators
to account with imprisonment and fines.)

~~~
ctdonath
The problem is that political solutions become a political problem to those in
power, who then impose their own political solution thereto.

The USA Constitution makes it completely clear: " _The right of the people to
be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable
searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but
upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly
describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized._
" This became a political problem for the powerful, so they concocted a legal
notion amounting to the suffix " _unless the search is imposed on everyone
without particular cause_ " which has proven surprisingly effective and
acceptable to the general public.

When all branches of government conspire to ignore the rules, more rules won't
stop them.

------
oneandoneis2
Somebody needs to sit all the politicians down in a room somewhere and quietly
point out to them that, historically, people have far, far more to fear from
their own government than from any terrorist threat.

"Our surveillance is justified because terrorists!" rather misses the point..

------
tpainton
We told them they cant profile, so they just spy on everyone and call it fair.
Careful what you complain about.

