
British Spy Agency Considers Journalists a Threat, Vacuums Up Their Emails - guiambros
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/01/british-spy-agency-considers-journalists-threat-vacuums-their-emails
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AdeptusAquinas
To me, this all smacks of weakness. If they were not breaking the law (at
least in spirit), they wouldn't fear journalists. If they were capable of
preventing or at least showing the danger of the acts they claim to fight,
they wouldn't fear journalists.

But because the danger is perhaps not as immediate or as severe as the
political narrative might suggest, or because their intrusions into our
privacy are not as necessary as they claim, their only true threat are people
who can expose such.

~~~
cbd1984
So if the government weren't doing anything wrong, it wouldn't have anything
to hide? ;)

You know, that logic might actually work in this case.

~~~
nitrogen
Yes, the nothing-to-hide-nothing-to-fear logic is reversed. Governments should
be transparent to their people, not the other way around.

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mullingitover
A free press being a bastion of a free society, it's pretty damn troubling
that journalists are being targeted. I'd argue that the press is more
important to the UK's freedom than GCHQ any day of the week.

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xnull4guest
There's been _global_ rise in violence and legal pursuit of journalists. But
as many of the issues outside the US get attention I've compiled material
related to the US:

* The Obama Administration issued a secret surveillance operation against the Associated Press to break their sources [1]

* Journalists like Ibrahim Jassam [2], Laura Poitras [3], Glenn Greenwald [4], James Risen [5], many others are being prosecuted and persecuted

* States are heavily partnered with news media (e.g. Ken Dilanian [6], Judith Miller and Michael Gordon [7])

* Domestic news is manipulated by the state to achieve geopolitical goals (Zarqawi Psyop [8], Fallujah Psyop [9]) - this has recently been anonymously removed from Wikipedia: now [10] before [11]

* The state uses legal pressure to delay and suppress stories (e.g. Risen's NSA story 2004-05 [12])

* On key political issues controversial journalists are pulled (e.g. Ayman Mohyeldin [13])

* Journalism exclusion zones are used to corral media for purposes other than their safety - even at home where exclusion zones were used to stop coverage in Ferguson [14]

* Sources to journalists have had their lives and their families subjugated to death threats [15]

* The state reserves the right to imitate news media outlets [16]

* There is both historical [17] and current [18] use of international cables to manipulate the press

* The White House has been caught using fake journalists during press releases [19]

* The state has been caught buying coverage from journalists (e.g. Armstrong Williams [20], Gallagher and McManus [21])

* The US government has injected (hundreds of) unattributed fake news stories into local news channels by the US through the Office of Broadcasting Services on political issues [22]

* There is current legislation that would legally compel journalists to disclose their sources [23]

* The Army was caught in a scandal where they were sending fake letters from an imaginary soldier to media organizations [24]

* Hero stories are drummed up, attested to, and propelled by state officials when guests of the media (e.g. Jessica Lynch [25])

* Anti-propaganda law have been relaxed this year [26]

* Media outlets have been given evidence from coerced testimony on the grounds it is actionable, even when it is known to have been fabricated [27] [28]

* Propaganda intended for foreigners makes it to American audiences [29] and this has been used on purpose to circumvent anti-propaganda law [30]

* The government has a history of manipulating media and through the Cold War had over 800 American news networks and personel [31] (names you may know such as Austin Goodrich [32] and Frank Kearns [33])

* The United States hires [34] contractors [35] and has software [36] to manipulate social media [37]

* Agencies publish documents compelled of them by law at inconvenient times to discourage large press coverage [38]

* It is also true that the the now president and CEO of the Public Broadcasting Service Patricia Harrison testified before Congress that President Bush considered Office of Broadcasting Services (1/4 billion dollar) state sponsored propaganda powerful strategic tools for swaying public opinion [39]

~~~
guelo
There's been a _global_ rise in violence and legal pursuit of journalists so
brits are apparently going to refuse to take responsibility and are going to
point fingers at the US instead.

~~~
xnull4guest
Are you implying I'm British? (I'm American.)

I don't really get your comment. It sounds important, could you say it again
another way?

~~~
guelo
I was implying you are British, sorry for my mistake. It seemed like a macho
British thing to do to try to deflect attention from this latest scandal by
saying that the US is worse. (the UK is much worse).

~~~
xnull2guest
My guess is that the UK is much worse than America based on their track
record, history and handing of the Guardian documents. I don't live there or
follow their politics as closely, so I don't have a list compiled for them.

It should also be said that there are many other countries that assuredly ARE
worse than America with regard to the treatment of journalists. I have never
been interested in 'lesser of two evil' false dilemmas, and don't find such
comparisons very informative or important, but it should be said to make clear
(if it was not) that this indictment of the Americas is similarly not a
comparison with the British, with Egypt, with Belarus or anywhere else.

I would be _very_ interested to see heavily sourced lists like this for modern
day Britian (or essentially anywhere else).

~~~
nitrogen
A bit OT: what is the connection between the various xnull _n_ guest accounts?

~~~
xnull4guest
Apologies, just getting to this now.

The various accounts are a bit flippant of me. I tend to accumulate downvote
brigades. After some time I'll notice that immediately after I post something
(as in under 20 seconds) it will be downvoted several times or if a post has
two digit 'karma' I will come back after some time with significantly less
(though usually no new comments/discussion). In addition sometimes an account
will "act oddly" \- like refuse to update comments even when it is witnin the
correction window or my HN tab in Chrome will be subject to regular crashes,
requiring me to edit comments elsewhere and post them into HN for fear of
losing edits.

Real or perceived, so far rotating accounts has seemed to deal with it fairly
well. I also don't link credentials across machines (well, I try) - so you
sometimes see two accounts active during the same week (never simultaneously
posting however).

I've been thinking a lot about this rotation policy (solving the problem
another way). Dunno.

So far as I know nobody has ever tried impersonating one.

~~~
Phlarp
Please keep posting. I really enjoy your thoroughly sourced breakdowns and
well thought out remarks.

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guelo
What can you expect from a country that still has a functioning monarchy.
There's a reason America revolted against England, you can see many of the
reasons listed in our Bill of Rights.

~~~
louthy
So the NSA isn't doing this also? They're totally above board?

~~~
deciplex
Honestly, the GCHQ does seem a lot more brazenly nefarious than the NSA. A lot
of the shit that comes out of the mouths of GCHQ spokespersons, shows open
contempt and disdain for civil liberties and due process. At the NSA, it's
more like they just don't respect those things, or think fighting
terrorism/drug cartels/flavor of the month, is more important.

If I could choose to dismantle one or the other, I'd go with the NSA, but only
because it has more capability. I definitely wouldn't want the sons-of-bitches
in charge of the GCHQ, running the NSA.

~~~
DanBC
They show contempt for civil liberties but claim to operate within the law.
Since GCHQ is specifically mentioned (and pretty much exempted) in most
surveilance related laws this seems plausible.

There is weakness in the oversight that GCHQ is supposed to have.

~~~
deciplex
"We operate according to the law, because we are not governed by laws."

~~~
DanBC
No, they are governed by laws and they appear to be obeying those laws.

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nbevans
After all the stuff the Guardian published, and which has directly resulted in
a massive reduction in Europe-wide security from terrorism, it's easy to see
why.

The Paris terror attacks probably would have been stopped if Snowden/Guardian
never happened or was better controlled in how the specific details were
announced. UK's spy agency has more powers than the NSA can dream of; and is
largely responsible for protecting not just the UK, but the rest of western
Europe and even some of the USA.

~~~
mercurial
> The Paris terror attacks probably would have been stopped if
> Snowden/Guardian never happened or was better controlled in how the specific
> details were announced.

Citation needed. What do you know of their electronic communications?

The thing is, even if it was true, which I frankly doubt... would it be worth
it? The direction many US and EU politicians, especially David Cameron [1],
want to go in, is a world without privacy, except for the governments (which
means, in practice, a world where every government and cybercriminal can spy
on your communications at any time). Even if it could prevent all terrorist
attacks (which it won't, because drowning the security services in more data
human analysts can process in a lifetime is a ridiculously bad idea...), this
wouldn't be a society I would want to live in.

1: Who, at this point, appears to be either raving mad, a complete idiot, or
O'Brien from _1984_ in disguise.

~~~
dublinclontarf
To add to this, the security services in France already knew about the threat
from the Paris attackers and did nothing.

