

Doublespeak Denials Of PRISM Hid The Truth About Participation - seandhi
http://techcrunch.com/2013/06/07/doublespeak-denials-and-broken-hearts/

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austenallred
OK, so the article grossly underestimates the complexities of PRISM and FISA.

But the facts remain the same: Tech CEOs carefully chose their words in order
to make what they said _technically_ true while not addressing the issue as a
whole. What the government said was true and what the tech CEOs said was true,
yet they seemed to contradict each other. This was a case of careful
politicking from all sides.

The thing that confuses me, is did the CEOs really think this contradiction
would go in their favor? In other words, did they think no one would call them
on that and they would be able to get away with it? Their statements attempted
to seem very forward: "Our company 'never' granted 'any' backdoor access" etc.
But as a result of that feeling so contradictory to the statements of the
government, it necessitated further prying.

~~~
kahirsch
> Tech CEOs carefully chose their words in order to make what they said
> technically true while not addressing the issue as a whole.

I don't understand how you come to this conclusion. All the companies issued
_flat-out denials_ , which they are not required to do by law. This is as
opposed to the normal "no comment" or "if such an order existed..."

Google said that they only hand over specific data about specific persons
after valid court orders have been reviewed by Google's lawyers. So far I have
seen nothing to contradict that.

> What the government said was true and what the tech CEOs said was true, yet
> they seemed to contradict each other.

Could you be very specific about "what the government said"? Are you referring
to an actual quote from a specific government official or to some anonymous
source?

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onedev
Why do I keep clicking on TechCrunch links when the content is all just
clickbait?

Seriously, I think the person writing this article is actually literally
retarded....

~~~
hamburglar
I couldn't get through the first paragraph without getting angry about the
writing style. closebox

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tawgs
Could someone explain to me why the "mailbox" is so scandalous? The government
makes a legal, valid request for data on a specific individual. Now the tech
company has to relay that information to the government somehow. How would you
prefer they do that? Email? FTP? Postcard?

No, they use a secure electronic dead drop. So what? How does that make the
various CEOs' statements in any way misleading? The statements were about the
government not having the ability to go on unsupervised fishing expeditions.
And that seems to be perfectly true and not in any way misleading.

~~~
siddboots
The secure "mailbox" from the NYT article isn't even news. I'm sure I read
articles more than a year ago that described Google and others using exactly
this type of set up as a way of streamlining subpoenas, search warrants, and
court orders.

It is unsettling, but it isn't anything like what was detailed in the PRISM
leak.

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danso
This article seems to misinterpret the (admittedly complicated) facts for the
sake of the instant gratification of conclusion-jumping.

From the OP:

> _The New York Times says you knowingly participated in the NSA’s PRISM data
> monitoring program. In some cases, you were asked to create ”a locked
> mailbox and give the government the key”, to allow it to peer into our
> private communications and web activity. Even if the exact words of your
> denials were accurate, they were false in spirit._

This is the article that the OP refers to:
[http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/08/technology/tech-
companies-...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/08/technology/tech-companies-
bristling-concede-to-government-surveillance-
efforts.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&amp);

Do a Ctrl-F and see if "PRISM" shows up. It didn't for me (not even with case-
sensitive option turned off).

OK, now read the passage in the NYT article about ”a locked mailbox and give
the government the key”...and then read the paragraph immediately after it:

"The data shared in these ways, the people said, is shared after company
lawyers have reviewed the _FISA request according to company practice_. It is
not sent automatically or in bulk, and the government does not have full
access to company servers. Instead, they said, it is a more secure and
efficient way to hand over the data."

FISA != PRISM (or at least, as PRISM has been reported initially), not in
acronyms or in spirit.

~~~
dchichkov
That complicated? Really? The original Google blog post have a feel of being
written by a lawyer. I guess a pass through an authorship identification tool
can confirm it. So I guess the story of that post on Google blog was actually
a pretty simple one and close to the following: "David Drummond wrote the
text, Larry got it as an e-mail, added the subject "What the ...?" ;) and
published it".

~~~
danso
What about the post reads like it came directly from a lawyer?

I don't disagree that a lawyer vetted it -- lawyers generally vet anything
legal related that comes out of an organization. All of the major news stories
on this topic have likely been vetted by lawyers.

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potAndKettle
> © 2013 AOL Inc. All rights reserved.

TechCrunch = AOL

AOL = Program Participant

I mean, okay, so at least the editor and the writer for this article can be
sort of credited with promoting discussion of some paper thin lip service, but
what about including AOL as part of their list of villains in this narrative.

...or at least offer a "full disclosure" disclaimer at the end of the article,
right?

Obviously the same goes for huffington post articles, since they were absorbed
by AOL too, after all.

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edwardunknown
Techcrunch knows nothing, if this is really going on it will be confirmed by
someone within one of the companies forced to implement it within days. As of
now I doubt that it is, I think the Washington Post got it wrong. Does anybody
think Google and Apple would bend over for the federal government because of
some semi-legal secret court order? Give me a break.

