Recent Posts
Holy crap man ... Now that's a bad day!-Stoic Joker (June 13, 2013, 06:57 PM)
But as you mention it was only after suffering through the entire protracted spiel that this little detail was "clarified". None of the official 6 O'clock news (hand feedings...) ever mentioned the existence of anything other than the ~mostly harmless~ metadata.-Stoic Joker (June 13, 2013, 06:57 PM)
Sorry about chopping this up so much. I just wanted to share what went through my head as I read it.-Stoic Joker (June 13, 2013, 06:27 PM)
The problem isn't in that. The problem is in the policing, i.e. who watches the watchers? How can we know that they can't get access without a court order. The court order isn't an encryption key- it's a standard court order. So they *always* have access... we just have to trust them not to use it unless due process has been followed.
...
I got nothing. I don't trust human nature that much. And once you do have oversight to that extent, more people have access. I just don't trust the checks and balances.-wraith808 (June 13, 2013, 12:36 PM)
Now all of a sudden this (allegedly) non-existent content just magically appears out of thin air.-Stoic Joker (June 13, 2013, 06:27 PM)
“If we didn’t collect that ahead of time, we couldn’t make these connections, so what we create is a set of data and we put it out here and then only under specific times can we query that data.”
That was National Security Agency (NSA) head Gen. Keith Alexander in testimony to the Senate Appropriations Committee on June 12 admitting that phone metadata on everybody is in fact being collected in real-time.
why did they make it top secret and deny (lie) everything up til the end?-Tinman57 (June 13, 2013, 05:37 PM)
Maybe instead of The Basement, we need a new section called "Head in the Sand" for isolating serious political topics that might disturb some people - and probably *should* disturb them?-40hz (June 12, 2013, 01:14 PM)
Basement? Doesn't belong there.-barney (June 11, 2013, 08:17 PM)
Whatever works best for the user I always say.-40hz (June 01, 2013, 03:47 PM)
Would you stop aiming for the basement...we'll lose 40hz when it goes there.-Stoic Joker (June 11, 2013, 03:52 PM)
So I guess it's going in the basement.
Have you read the commercial software's shrink-wrapped agreements lately? Just taking the shrink-wrap off the CD/DVD prevents you from getting a refund, so once you buy the software it's not like you can just move on.-Tinman57 (June 09, 2013, 06:43 PM)
But you are right, I don't have to accept sucky development, which is why I'm headed for Linuxville.....-Tinman57 (June 09, 2013, 06:43 PM)
Mr. Snowden attributed his access to documents seemingly beyond the purview of his job to his work in network security, which would allow him to access a wide variety of secret files. Some large companies are currently lobbying the federal government to grant more of their employees security clearances, in part to fend off hackers from Iran, China and elsewhere.
Snowden claimed vast powers to both initiate surveillance and shut down the U.S. programs.
“I had full access to the full rosters of everyone working at the NSA, the entire intelligence community, and undercover assets all around the world,” he told The Guardian. In a video posted on the website, Snowden claimed that “Any analyst at any time can target anyone … I, sitting at my desk, certainly have the authorities to wiretap anyone — from you or your accountant, to a federal judge, to even the President.”
Additionally he claimed he said he could shut down the entire system in an afternoon if he wanted to. The revelation that Snowden was a contractor with that wide-ranging access to some of the most closely guarded U.S. government programs is sure to provoke a reexamination of the explosion of contractors filling traditional government jobs in defense and intelligence agencies.
"A lot of people in 2008 voted for Obama. I did not vote for him. I voted for a third party. But I believed in Obama's promises. I was going to disclose it [but waited because of his election]. He continued with the policies of his predecessor."
For those suffering some form of "outrage amnesia", I'll just leave this old Bush era news story right here, so in about 7-8 years from now, when all this hits the headlines for a 3rd time (as breaking news), maybe someone with deja vu will point out the fact that it's old news and that this database of information was set up shortly after the 9-11 attacks and news of it was made public in 2006.-app103 (June 09, 2013, 05:34 PM)
I was listening to NPR yesterday. They were talking about the information the NSA was collecting on phone records. In the course of the conversation, there was an offhand remark to the following effect: “Obama is doing the same thing Bush did, although now it may be legal.”
<snip />
How far have we come? Think about it. A major news organization mentions in passing that a President has committed a crime, and it isn’t even worth a pause in the conversation.
Are you angry yet? Disgusted? Appalled? I am.
