
Obama Expands Surveillance Powers on His Way Out - doener
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/01/obama-expands-surveillance-powers-his-way-out
======
artursapek
> However—and this is especially troubling—“if analysts stumble across
> evidence that an American has committed any crime, they will send it to the
> Justice Department,” the Times wrote. So information that was collected
> without a warrant—or indeed any involvement by a court at all—for foreign
> intelligence purposes with little to no privacy protections, can be accessed
> raw and unfiltered by domestic law enforcement agencies to prosecute
> Americans with no involvement in threats to national security.

Sweet, Thanks Obama.

~~~
javiramos
I feel like we are a living example of history repeating itself. 9/11 ->
hysteria -> implement fear-driven tactics -> suppress rights -> profit.

I believe Obama has a created a fantastic movement based on his image and
figure - classic American self-superation story. But when you dig into the
details of the Obama years you can quickly see that he has been a gigantic
letdown in a lot of basic things that I feel are important to the long-term
well-being of the country (e.g. privacy rights, drone foreign policy etc.). In
the end, I think Obama didn't end up being too different from any other
politician.

~~~
braveo
I've felt like that for a long time, and I think Obama is partially to blame
for Trump getting elected.

When he made the compromise he did with Hilary during his first election I
knew then he was going to be a political creature (and I was behind him).

I don't think Obama will be noteworthy in history outside of being the first
black president. Obamacare will not be noteworthy either unless it transforms
into something more meaningful.

If you think about it, the praise he gets so often is that he's a "classy
guy", that should say something. 8 years in office and him being classy is the
thing people think of most when considering him?

~~~
webXL
Classy guy? Anyone is compared to the pres-elect. In his personal life
perhaps. Every time he weighed in during an isolated racial incident before
the public had all the information really did a disservice to the office. So
much so that the current guy thinks it's fine to tweet about every little
political gripe. Both have no problem being arrogant and divisive, so long as
the base is happy. There's absolutely nothing classy about this cult of
personality we're witnessing.

~~~
randcraw
Obama must be compared to other presidents as well as to the popular notion of
what a black man would/should be like as President.

It's pointless to compare Obama to Trump because Trump is not yet a President.
That job changes you, and if there is a god, it will change Trump too.

~~~
boredprogrammer
There is no god.

------
benmcnelly
This is a bad time to be a liberal. Let me explain.

On nearly the eve of handing over the country to Trump, Obama is laying the
groundwork for policy that has huge potential to be abused. I am confused,
because if anything you would think he would do the opposite, but I refuse to
believe it was done to give him a noose to hang himself, but why?

Why is it a bad time to be a liberal? Because there is a good chance you will
disagree with a lot of upcoming policy. But with this in place, criticizing
your government or standing against tyranny could make you a target, one that
is now easier than ever to trudge through an archive of your online life for
anything remotely wrong, and prosecute you, retroactively, for it.

~~~
piffey
This is a thought exercise, not my opinion as it's too complex/conspiracy
theory-ish and more the plot of a Tom Clancy novel, but what if Obama is
expanding the power and handing the reins over to intelligence groups that
Trump has sidelined? The NSA/CIA are fantastic at collapsing and running
foreign governments -- why not ours?

~~~
rudolf0
That is an interesting thought.

We do know Obama (like most presidents) is pretty cozy with the Intelligence
Community. We know Trump isn't. I think a coup d'etat or shadow government is
too much of a stretch, but this may at least let them work around Trump to an
extent.

Also, we're living in interesting times where thoughts like "the intelligence
agencies are covertly trying to work around the President!" are actually
considered a neutral or good thing by many.

~~~
chris11
I've heard rumors that a decent number of people will resign from their jobs
in the Intelligence Community. This will allow Trump to appoint more political
employees. I don't know if this is true or not, but Trump's relationship with
those agencies might get less hostile.

~~~
rudolf0
Well, if the people who stick around are constantly clashing with the
political appointments, things might get even more hostile.

------
jessaustin
I guess we should have voted harder? 'Cause voting is the answer to problems
with elected governments, right?

Right?

~~~
rayiner
That's a bit of a straw man. Nobody says voting will get you the government
_you_ want. I can't get any of my liberal friends (core Hilary voters) to care
about surveillance. To the extent they're nervous about surveillance as a
general concept, they trust Obama has struck the balance necessitated by what
he knows about threats to the country.

Not everyone should vote. If your views are substantially outside the
mainstream there is no point in voting.

~~~
ptero
I wonder if it would be better if voting cost a small amount of money, say $50
(everyone can easily afford to save $50 once every two years). That would
encourage those who choose to vote to research the issue (if they care enough
to pay $50 they likely care about the choices).

~~~
lostcolony
That's a poll tax, and in implementation is what is known as "regressive".
That $50 is far, far more dear to some minimum wage single mom, than a CEO.
That in fact is the objection to many of the voter IDs GOP states keep
pressing for; the goal, as stated, is simply to prevent voting fraud, but the
actually results are to disenfranchise the poor, who can't necessarily afford
the $25-50 cost, nor can they afford the time off work to take public transit
to a DMV (or similar) during the times they're open. Effectively, you're
setting the bar higher for the poor than for the rich to vote.

~~~
3131s
> _That in fact is the objection to many of the voter IDs GOP states keep
> pressing for_

Tangential, but this is a great example of a fabricated wedge issue in
American politics. The solution is so simple, just issue everyone a free
national ID card. Passports should be free too and could also double for this
purpose. Then the Republicans can stop complaining about voter fraud and
Democrats can stop complaining about voter disenfranchisement (the latter of
these I am legitimately concerned about, I just wish someone would actually
follow through and do something about it).

Also, it's ridiculous that there isn't a national holiday at least on the day
of the presidential elections.

------
jimnotgym
Welcome to our dystopian future

In the UK Teresa May just passed the 'Snoopers Charter'(Data Retention and
Investigatory Powers Act) which is at least as bad as this. Agencies like the
'Food standards agency', and 'Health and safety executive' now have powers to
read your browsing history without a warrant. Somehow this is supposed to stop
terrorism?

Now we have the 'Digital Economy bill' which is where the UK's 'Great
Firewall' begins under the guise of protecting our children from porn.

Its Orwellian and it is disgusting. What is worst is how the press ignored it
and the Corbyn opposition abstained from voting on it! I will never vote for a
politician who did not vote against it, and that is a very small number!

~~~
angry-hacker
Who were the brave ones? Small players? UKIP?

~~~
nvarsj
LibDems and SNP.

------
outlace
As an ordinary citizen, I'm definitely wary and suspicious of government
surveillance. I probably prefer a slightly increased risk of terrorism vs an
increase in government surveillance powers. But I wonder if I was the
president and faced with a constant threat and paranoia of a terrorist attack
under my watch if I would compromise my own usual ideals to protect the
country. It's definitely a rock and a hard place situation.

~~~
K0SM0S
Honestly, given the near-unanimous stance, towards surveillance, of most
governments in most developed countries (NA, EU, etc.) it's becoming
increasingly difficult to dismiss their motivations as simply "stupid" or
"misguided" or "power-hungry". I mean, it's impossible that all of them are
uneducated about history (how surveillance is a double-edged sword that never
fails to backfire), or just plain authoritarian at heart. "Because we can"
isn't satisfactory either.

So there must be another explanation. I don't know what the Presidents / Prime
Ministers / Intelligence Agencies of this world know, but if they all respond
to current threats in the same inexplicable way, there must be some 'logical
enough' underlying motivation.

Definitely pointing at a "rock and a hard place" indeed.

The other cold reality is that, for all the horror, terrorism isn't a threat
to civilization, we're talking ~25k deaths/year worldwide (DoD/UN figures, cf.
Wiki), which is orders of magnitude less than other threats like cancer or
alcoholism or smoking tobacco (~2.5m deaths/year _each_). Terrorism is
emotionally horrific, but demographically it doesn't even register. Nowadays
it doesn't even really affect stock markets that much (e.g. in France, despite
everything that happened in recent years). So based on the data we have as
citizens, it doesn't make sense to spend so much (money, political capital,
loss of freedom) to avoid so 'little' demographic/economic risk. Not saying we
shouldn't fight against it, or protect citizens, but A) mass surveillance is a
bad means to fight terrorism, good ol'fashionned spying is the way and B) the
huge means (CIA etc.) are totally not proportional to the very risk we're
trying to avoid.

So what's the _real_ reason for surveillance? What is it about Big Brother-ing
citizens that is so necessary that the public does not know about? How is it
even possible that after a decade and a half post 9/11 no official in any
country ever talked about the _real_ reasons behind this apparent unbalance
between counter-terrorist means and terrorism consequences?

I am everything but a conspiracy lunatic, so I don't accept the idea that
people in power are organizing, all together, a dystopian reality a la 1984
--doesn't make sense to me.

So what gives? What are this rock and this hard place, exactly?

~~~
burkaman
How is it inexplicable? When you're tasked with stopping individual suicidal
extremists hiding within your citizenry, the obvious first step is "I need
more information". There doesn't need to be any conspiracy or hidden threat,
it is a natural and logical response.

Politicians aren't robots, obviously they care more about terrorism than
tobacco. And they aren't spending political capital by setting up
surveillance, they're gaining it. Obama took huge hits every time he said
"ISIS is the JV", "terrorism isn't an existential threat", "chill out
everyone". Imagine if he said he was diverting NSA funding to fight the
tobacco industry.

Basically, if you don't understand politicians, talk to the people voting for
them. The NSA exists because people want it to.

~~~
CaptSpify
> When you're tasked with stopping individual suicidal extremists hiding
> within your citizenry, the obvious first step is "I need more information".

How about using the information that they have in the first place instead?
They knew about a few of the attacks in recent years and didn't do anything to
stop them. It's obviously a power-grab rather than an attempt to actually
solve the problem.

------
gumby
> "if analysts stumble across evidence that an American has committed any
> crime, they will send it to the Justice Department"

This is troubling on many levels, but the one that concerns me the most is
game theory.

We want people to pay taxes on criminal activity (because it's economic
activity and uses services taxes pay for) without the tax authorities
"narcing" on the source. IRS is doing the right think by not leaking Trump's
tax info even if people within the IRS think the public have a legitimate
right to know.

You are required to look after your kids yet you can drop off a baby you can't
look after, no questions asked.

Hospitals have to treat patients no matter if they can pay or not, and no
matter if they became ill due to criminal behavior because we don't want
people with tuberculosis or Hep C wandering around (not to mention presumption
of innocence).

Every time we add a "mandatory reporter" rule we actually endanger ourselves,
so we should tread carefully.

------
adam12
I voted for Obama twice. I feel duped.

~~~
acjohnson55
I'm pissed, but I don't feel duped. But that's simply because no serious
presidential contender, save maybe Bernie Sanders, would have done otherwise.

Well, maybe Trump. But I believe his distrust of the intelligence community is
only due to the fact that he thinks their findings regarding Russia undermine
his legitimacy. Once that blows over, I expect he'll be more than happy having
the authoritarian tools of the intelligence community, if he's smart enough to
heal the rift.

What blows my mind a bit is that the rise of Trump should make it crystal
clear just how dangerous these powers could be in the wrong hands. Obama
should understand this more than anyone.

~~~
talmand
There were many people pointing out the dangers of consolidating so much power
into the Presidency over the last few years but most of them were told to shut
up with their paranoia conspiracies and racist rhetoric.

~~~
edc117
It also didn't help that Congress is more and more doing absolutely nothing of
substance. The last 8 years have been nonstop obstructionism, and the next 4
appear to be headed the same way. (note: this is not to say I agree with
overuse of executive powers, I do not.)

~~~
zaroth
Not sure why you think next 4 years will be the same... I think the next 4
years will be markedly different due to Trump leadership and Republican
majorities in the House and Senate.

We're hearing about Repeal & Replace in January, maybe as late as March and
voting has already started to lay the framework to allow passage with 51 votes
in the Senate.

~~~
dmix
Regardless Obama expanded executive power more than any president in history.
So even if Trump doesn't plan to expand it he has plenty to work with already.
I doubt he'll reverse it other than streamlining bloated intel agencies.

~~~
krapp
He's pledged to reverse all of Obama's "illegal" executive orders... and I
assume that, being a Republican, he considers all of them to be illegal.

Trump may not do so, but the Republicans seem to want to dismantle Obama's
legacy as thoroughly as possible, and blot him and the effect of his
presidency from history like Akhenaten. There would probably be a political
cost to pay if Trump didn't reverse it, just on principle.

------
blauditore
But why? I don't think Trump has a more privacy-oriented stance on
surveillance, so what motivation does Obama have to still rush this in?

~~~
rayiner
Obama is pro surveillance. Being President got rid of a lot of his initial
idealism. Key was killing Osama, which probably cinched him a second term.

~~~
jballanc
Except that, as I understand it, Osama was tracked down using "good ol'
fashion HumInt", not surveillance. Obama's attitude toward intelligence
gathering has been one of the more perplexing contradictions of his entire
administration. All I can figure is there is some trusted figure advising him
on these matters who has an agenda of some sort.

~~~
Pxtl
Remember that Obama has access to privileged information we don't. This could
go beyond advising. There may be threats that are unsafe to discuss that he
sees an urgent need to track down. I've seen many politicians describe the
same thing - once they get security clearance, they see all these horrible
threats... and it becomes very hard to explain the situation to the public, so
they just give up on justifying it.

~~~
Eephas2o
> There may be threats that are unsafe to discuss

Fear porn. Point to the scary unknown as a justification for X.

I tend to think our math teachers were right. If you can't show your work,
then didn't do any. (Not an absolute but I lean heavily that way.)

> once they get security clearance

Or it could be that once they get authority, the intelligence community tries
harder to scare the shit out of them. There's no way to know if Obama, for
example, is getting more legitimate info. I don't buy off on it being safe to
assume that he is. If you listened to the intelligence community they'd have
you believing that everyone on your block is a lone wolf, bomb wielding, child
porn collector. Or that the only reason we haven't had another 9/11 was
because of the NSA's phenomenal cosmic power.

Is Obama getting more honesty from the NSA or is he getting more bullshit? We
don't know. We only know that he's getting more something. Do you expect the
NSA to say something other than "Boss, I'm doing good work"? Are they going to
say "um, yeah, so, that big spy network we built... um... it basically doesn't
do shit for us"?

The TL;DR is that it's not just the scary details he's getting access to but
the high level political shenanigans too.

------
HugoDaniel
"We kill people based on metadata"[0]

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdQiz0Vavmc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdQiz0Vavmc)

~~~
thatwebdude
The first time I heard this, it really struck me.

Still gives me chills a bit thinking how inexplicably I could have matched
meta data to people on a list they're actively seeking.

------
pjc50
It sounds fourth amendment activists need to learn from second amendment
activists and develop a bloc of voters for whom this is a key issue.

~~~
vibrio
I completely agree with your sentiment, but privacy is a bit harder to sell--
guns are badass and cool to collect, privacy is geeky and suspicious. Another
key difference is that the second amendment is big business (Smith Ruger & co
stock went up >500% during Obama). There are big businesses that could get
behind anti-encryption, but mass appeal is more difficult- perhaps at least
until something spectacular happens.

~~~
jff
Second Amendment supporters are often interested in the Fourth as well; I
think you would find a very solid group of them (particularly those who
concealed-carry, rather than just hunters) are strongly opposed to this sort
of thing.

~~~
xaa
Right. I live in Oklahoma which has...a strong 2nd Amendment contingent. The
OK state government is taking a lot of heat from the federal government for
refusing to implement the Real ID requirements for state DLs.

I'm not a conservative, but I can see the reasoning behind it: they know very
well that this is one important step towards building a national database of
personal information (or more likely, augmenting one that already exists).
Actually, I have found more on the right concerned about privacy, government
surveillance, etc, than on the left because this concern naturally meshes with
the right's "small federal government" stance.

Remember how Social Security numbers were "just for Social Security -- not any
kind of personal identifier"?

But perhaps the left, which has just as much ability to be hypocritical as the
right, will see the light starting...oh, say, 12pm on January 20.

------
throw7
He didn't care on the way in, why would he care on the way out? He voted for
warrantless wiretapping.

------
throw2016
if it doesn't ensure accountability to the people its not democracy. There is
now enough evidence that democracy is not serving the people and is
increasingly looking like posturing and tokenism every 4 or 5 years while
vested and special interests lobby everyday and capture the regulatory
framework to further their interests. It has all the underpinnings of a ruling
class.

Inspite of the Snowden revelations nothing has changed, no one is punished and
folks like Clapper lie and get promoted. Obama may posture differently but he
is the biggest supporter of security services and given his behavior against
Syria and Russia an unrepentant warmonger.

Bankers tank the economy and are rewarded with bailouts in a country that
worships capitalism and hates unearned benefits. And they get away lightly
with attorney generals in one state after another unwilling to prosecute and
more keen on fines which do not ensure any kind of proportional
accountability.

This is not democracy as we understand it. 4 or 5 years is too long and there
must be multiple processes along the way to ensure things are on track. Things
like lobbying, revolving doors, political corruption and abuse of power,
corporate interests over public interest and critical decisions around
fundamental rights and war must be strongly secured with laws and processes
that work.

------
enlightenedfool
Question: In the last few years, how many such online petitions have resulted
in some positive, effective action?

~~~
cwiggs
I would love to see some data on this. A lot of times people tell me that one
way to solve social issues to get start some type of activism (march to the
capital, start a rally in your town, etc). However, I haven't seen much data
on the effectiveness of those things.

~~~
SomeStupidPoint
I would guess actually marching or attending a rally is much more effective
than online petitions, because it shows people are already across the
mobilization threshold.

Implicit in a march at the capital is "This many people could be _here_ with
torches and guns". By contrast, people clicking online aren't very active.

------
_greim_
The effect of an attack like 9/11 is primarily nationalistic outrage, and a
subsequent power-grab by whichever parties or individuals conduct their
politics accordingly. Now ask yourself, which parties and/or individuals in
American politics stand to benefit most from being handed a Mount-Everest-
sized pile of nationalistic outrage, should another 9/11 level event occur?
How much power would they try to grab? What would be the outcome for the US,
and the world for that matter? Obama isn't acting on ideals, he's choosing a
path in an ugly world.

------
fixxer
Well, are we surprised?

------
random_upvoter
Is there anyone left who actually believes that it's Obama who makes these
decisions?

I find it amazing that nobody looks at Obama's insipid presidency as the main
explanation for Trump's election. When Trump says "Russia? Everybody spies on
us!", that resonates with people because they know it is the truth and no
other politician says it so openly and so bluntly.

------
didibus
Everybody in this thread should explain why they think what they are saying. I
don't really know much about what Obama did or did not, but I'm not saying
anyone providing me that information, just a bunch of people taking about
their opinions. So I'd really appreciate if people could share their reasons
for them.

------
pawadu
So same amount of information gathered but distributed among a larger group?

Can't decide if this is good or bad.

~~~
choward
I honestly can't tell if this is supposed to be sarcasm or not.

~~~
pawadu
its not :)

from what I understand intelligence agencies in some other countries work in
this fashion: one agency does the "data gathering" and provides other agencies
with information upon request. in theory, this means fewer agencies snooping
in your private life and that there is some sort of gate keeper that limits
circulation of data based on need-to-know.

so back to my not sarcastic questions: is this a good or bad thing?

~~~
tekism
I don't know but this sounds scary to me, we just went from threats to
national security to any crime.

However—and this is especially troubling—“if analysts stumble across evidence
that an American has committed any crime, they will send it to the Justice
Department,” the Times wrote. So information that was collected without a
warrant—or indeed any involvement by a court at all—for foreign intelligence
purposes with little to no privacy protections, can be accessed raw and
unfiltered by domestic law enforcement agencies to prosecute Americans with no
involvement in threats to national security."

~~~
pawadu
okay, fair point.

I assume they still cant use the information in court but that really doesn't
make it much better.

~~~
HalcyonicStorm
I'm sure this is where parallel construction will come into play.

------
beenshadowbnd
My comments are systemically removed from hacker news because they are
critical or the government.

~~~
sctb
I'm sorry, but creating new accounts just to violate the guidelines isn't OK.
The bar for participation on Hacker News is civility and substantiveness.
We've detached this comment from
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13392542](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13392542).

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
intralizee
Too bad there isn't a focus on expanding the openness of how many rights are
being violated by surveillance.

I can understand why Obama is so pro surveillance. When you belong to the
minority spectrum that has already made it past the point where surveillance
will only help.

I just wonder what minority is going to face more of a struggle to get to the
point where Obama's minority now is in history.

