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We have become Big Brother


Fidcal

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If the CIA director can be brought down for digging into his private life, what hope do the rest of us have? I was actually more worried about the state collecting private info to hold against people than his specific case anyway. [...] normal Joe users shouldn't have to worry about this for their mid-management jobs.

mechanisms of public control and mechanisms of public office accountability are separate issues. I think its good that someone is watching these guys. As I mentioned in my previous post, he was a "person of interest". We are not. I don't think that this is going to spark some crazy "we did it to him, so we're gonna do it to you" type of deal.

Granted, there's privacy issues freakin' abound everywhere on every corner of the globe these days, with Big Govt at the center of it all, but this specific case should not be a huge cause for concern with respect to those problems.

As for the subject matter that caused this whole thing, the sexual bla bla whatever happened, is probably the most irrelevant part of the whole thing, and i'm not even going to comment on the merits or lack-there-of.

Edited by ungoliant
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As for the subject matter that caused this whole thing, the sexual bla bla whatever happened, is probably the most irrelevant part of the whole thing, and i'm not even going to comment on the merits or lack-there-of.

 

Cause -> effect.

We are discussing both the cause and the effect. How it is possible to make the claim that the cause irrelevant to the effect? :wacko::blink:

Clipper

-The mapper's best friend.

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I have no intention myself to ever do anything behind the back of my wife if I ever get married.

I think so do everybody. Opportunity makes the thief: opportunistic degradation of moral backbone. Opportunistic degradation of judgement. Opportunistic foolishness.

 

But I'm on the libertarian end on this and think that there are a lot of different life situations out there. People value all sorts of things and have all sorts of living situations -- some people marry out of mad love, some cohabitate out of friendship or convenience, some are whatever nBohr's situation is... And none of them are "right" or "wrong" (in an "official" sense) if they personally tolerate it. This too is probably a very American pluralist perspective.

 

Generally, by ordinary moral standards it is 'wrong' to lie, break oaths, betray and cheat. This cannot be disputed. If there is a mutual agreement that satisfies everyone, the situation is, of course, completely different. Note that I said generally: sometimes a lie can produce something good.

 

I mean women make men do stupid things; it's practically a truism of life.

Aye. And a price must be paid for the transgressions. It is fair as everything in life comes with price tag attached: be the price time, money, prestige, benefits or something else.

 

 

This guy had one of the most solid reputations in the military over like 30 years, and one of the highest decorated careers you could get ... and suddenly all that's tossed out like it was nothing. Seems like what's important is skewed IMO. His public record speaks louder than his private secrets on his character, I think, in this case anyway. But interesting to see the difference in values on this.

 

....And the price of the transgression is the interesting part. Was it reasonable or too harsh? In the highest echelons of society, the positions are windy. You'll get blown away/down by relatively simple mistakes. Is it just or not? If you work in a position that high, surely you know and accept the stakes. That would mean that getting dirty in a secret relationship carries a very strong penalty for such a vain affair. Simply by taking this risk, I think, the person indicates his judgement is folly, which in turn indicates he should not probably be in the position he is in. If he cannot handle even his own life appropriately, how can he be let, as a leader, to control the lives of others?

 

 

Thanks for posting your thoughts.

My pleasure. I always like these little chats.

 

 

 

Edit: In any event, actually my original point wasn't about this general at all, but that quote. If the CIA director can be brought down after digging into his private life, what hope do the rest of us have? I was actually more worried about the state collecting private info to hold against people than his specific case anyway. It might have been this guy couldn't have stayed in his job even if people had been tolerant. It would have just opened up too many problems down the road. But normal Joe users shouldn't have to worry about this for their mid-management jobs.

 

Like said by others here, ordinary people are safe. It is the high positions where the wind blows mercilessly hard and for a valid reasons.

Clipper

-The mapper's best friend.

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Are you speaking seriously? He was director of the CIA. Do you know what the CIA actually does?? Their whole modus operandi is deception. They probably use deceptive sex all the time to get information. Also, if it's true this woman would have gotten secrets for bad ends (his biographer & greatest admirer? hard sell), but isn't Lewinsky's affair with President Clinton 100,000 times worse. He was the president. He should have been hung as a traitor if *this* is bad.

 

In the case of 'intellegence' agencies, it's because it's a security risk; secrets lead to blackmail.

He would have been fine had he disclosed the affair(s) to the agency (a bit weird, since he's the boss).

Edited by i30817
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  • 6 months later...

Why the hell is everybody so surprised by this?

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/06/07/intelligence_director_admits_phone_internet_data_gathering/

 

Not that they shouldn't be upset, but if they had been paying attention, they would have originally known about this.

http://www.internetnews.com/ent-news/article.php/3582226/EFF+Sues+ATT+Over+NSA+Wiretaps.htm

--- War does not decide who is right, war decides who is left.

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I dont think everybody is, but I imagine people are surprised these intelligence agencies were stupid enough to be caught out publicly. Either these agencies are insipidly myopic and stupid lazy (which in itself is scary as they purport to be keeping thier relevant countries safe.. read into that what you will) or there is also something else going on...

 

I think its good that this stuff is out in the open as we have been hoodwinked for far too long, by capitalist governments that have up until now only being paying lip service the democracy.

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That's the big problem with secrecy though. If you keep doing something that you don't want the public to know about, they will eventually find out about it one way or another. I'm guessing these logging/spying operations require cooperation from the large service providers whose networks this data travels over. Now, not only does an agency keeping a secret have to prevent any of the internal agents from leaking information, but they also have to worry about people who work for said company leaking information. It could be anybody from a technician who notices anomolies in the data system, to a supervisor who knows about the situation but has a change of heart and decides to go public.

--- War does not decide who is right, war decides who is left.

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Chances are they give 0 fucks at this point, and are just weening the people into getting used to being spied on and treated like criminals. TSA anyone? its right out there in the open. The publics reaction to this sort of junk is just a benchmark to gauge what can be gotten away with to what degree. Things will continue to get worse until the 'million man march' or something similar, where a line in the sand is drawn. Worst case 1984 style everyone keeps their mouths shut and starts giving up their neighbors and family for owning firearms, or holding private yardsales and selling a rocking chair. blah.

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It is really sad in a way. This Snowden case I mean.

 

A man of principle, obviously, wanted to point out what the govt is doing wrong. Big Brother business.

 

In a sense, he just confirmed something everyone knew at some level, goverment spying on people's net activity. It is so easy, it is was probable they are doing it. The guy ruined his life pointing out that US govt REALLY secretly monitors people. And the majority of US citizens thinks it is okay in order to avoid terrorism. The guy threw his life out of the window for.... Nothing.

 

Let's still wait and see what happens, somehow I doubt Big Brother policies aren't hampered and privacy is still declining. Maybe privacy, in the future, will be a commodity you can buy from goverments for a annual fee?

 

Sad thing, really.

 

PS. I wonder how many tracking flags this post will generate?

Clipper

-The mapper's best friend.

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Someone here deserves a medal. How about a Nobel peace prize?

Come the time of peril, did the ground gape, and did the dead rest unquiet 'gainst us. Our bands of iron and hammers of stone prevailed not, and some did doubt the Builder's plan. But the seals held strong, and the few did triumph, and the doubters were lain into the foundations of the new sanctum. -- Collected letters of the Smith-in-Exile, Civitas Approved

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  • 1 month later...

Dear "powers that be",

 

A few months ago, I downloaded a music file from a website (www.modarchive.org). I enjoyed listening to it, but now I can't find it. I have a huge collection of music, so I figured you can help me by telling me the name of the song. Thanks!

Edited by lost_soul

--- War does not decide who is right, war decides who is left.

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  • 3 months later...

http://grahamcluley....-update-spy-tv/

 

What the fuck!? Seriously, its not that I'm all that surprised, I'm just disgusted as all hell about this. I understand that as an American, those at the top have a right to log, data-mine, and harvest everything I do. I mean, they need to be able to tell whose a terrorist based on what kinds of music we listen to or videos we watch. but this is going too far. I will never look at another LG product the same way again.

 

Personally, I suspect the reason they're releasing an update for this is because they got caught out. If nobody had raised a stink about this, things would have hummed along as normal. For anybody else who tries a stunt like this, they can always pack the user data, encrypt it, and send it in the requests to check for firmware updates. Then no security researchers will be able to save us from stuff like this because they won't be able to find that its going on in the first place.

 

I have another innovative idea. Imagine a TV that has no net connection. What if the manufacturer embeds your viewing habits into the EDID code, which is passed to your computer at boot time. The drivers on your computer then extract this information from the EDID and send it along your computer's net connection. FYI: EDID is how your monitor tells the computer what resolutions it can support.

Edited by lost_soul

--- War does not decide who is right, war decides who is left.

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  • 4 weeks later...

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/19/researchers-hack-webcam-while-disabling-warning-lights/?_r=0

 

I always just figured the power leads for these cameras were wired in parallel with the indicator LEDs. This would mean that ANY TIME you put power to the camera, the LED will receive power too, and there's NOTHING you can do about it as an attacker via remote code exploits or firmware backdoors (if there are any). However, I suppose this sort of solution is too cheap and too secure. I'm getting closer to taping the cameras on my laptops now.

Edited by lost_soul

--- War does not decide who is right, war decides who is left.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Sorry, I'm just posting because my subscription to this thread disappeared months ago and the 'follow this topic' button above doesn't work for me at all anymore! Clicking the button does nothing. So, what can I say...

 

Clinton? Untrustworthy by definition. Untrustworthy president = bad.

 

LG? Mental note not to buy any of their smart tvs. In fact, I've long since made a note to avoid anything with the word 'smart' attached because it really means 'will control you because we know best' My Samsung smart tv is an example of dreadful non-standard menu navigation which is still counter-intutive even after four years use.

 

Webcam: Not got one but if I did I would make sure it's a separate unpluggable.

 

I had this idea for a spring-loaded widget which holds your read-only (by pc) security data. When buying something on-line, or logging in somewhere, or voting, a standard form pops up saying website is requesting following info: (form) Push in your widget to agree. You push in widget, it uploads to form only the items requested that you see and agreed to, then the spring pops the widget out again (or you can always pull it.) To edit your own secure data you push the widget into a stand-alone, unconnected black box. That's the only way to write to it. Nothing's 100% secure of course so maybe a false website url and false form might retrieve more than you want to give but perhaps web browsers could be made to prevent that? Then of course, a virus could hack the browser...

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The silver lining to this turd cloud is that it seems some tech companies have started seeing hits to their revenues based on the Snowden leaks.... Good. Maybe some concentrated BDS (boycott, divest, sanction) actions can have enough of an impact on some companies beyond merely bad press, that they will actually act in the consumer's best interests to avoid committing financial suicide... then again, looking at how much the Agency paid RSA to use that faulty encryption, who knows how deep the rabbit hole goes? As long as you can print money you can buy anyone who's for sale..

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The first step should be having a headset (if you own one) with a microphone that you can switch off or even pull out. I bought mine exactly for this purpose. While this might sound a little paranoid at first, recent events have shown us that it's not.

My Eigenvalue is bigger than your Eigenvalue.

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Smart Phone data scooping:

http://www.theguardi...onal-data/print

NSA's Golden Nugget: "Target uploading photo to a social media site taken with a mobile device. What can we get?"

 

GCHQ's targeted tools against individual smartphones are named after characters in the TV series The Smurfs. An ability to make the phone's microphone 'hot', to listen in to conversations, is named "Nosey Smurf". High-precision geolocation is called "Tracker Smurf", power management – an ability to stealthily activate an a phone that is apparently turned off – is "Dreamy Smurf", while the spyware's self-hiding capabilities are codenamed "Paranoid Smurf".

 

Freaky.

 

Meanwhile in Europe...

http://www.statewatc...ets-wp-2020.htm

 

Remote vehicle stopping technology for police.

Clipper

-The mapper's best friend.

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Smart Phone data scooping:

 

I wonder if software publishers are getting kickbacks for forcing users into an online relationship, so that our data can be harvested and mined? It wouldn't surprise me at all. These people expect kickbacks from second-hand sales for god's sake!

 

Remember folks... people who do not want to be "always connected to the cloud" must obviously have something to hide.

Edited by lost_soul
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--- War does not decide who is right, war decides who is left.

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Someone here deserves a medal. How about a Nobel peace prize?

 

Well this ended up being prophetic didn't it?

(Referring to the fact Snowden just got nominated.)

 

I don't like political nobel prizes though. I didn't like Obama getting one either. I could think of people that have been working insane hours every week for decades fighting for peace. Snowden clicked a few mouse buttons that anyone in his position could have clicked -- it's not like he even did any research & wrote a book, or even a 2 page article FTM -- and he's been hiding in a ditch ever since to give details on what everyone already knew, which while brave (/foolhardy) of him, doesn't make me think of what the prize should be for... I think it should be like a life-time achievement award, or for people taking the lead in a real movement, or doing some monumental work that took real expertise and a mountain of effort, and their role really mattered ... People like Mandela, MLK, Maathai, Aung San Suu Kyi...

What do you see when you turn out the light? I can't tell you but I know that it's mine.

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Perhaps, but doesn't it say something that no one in his position performed those mouse clicks, despite many people being uncomfortable with what they were doing? Sure a bunch of it was known already (and pooh-poohed as being more crazy conspiracy nonsense), but some of it wasn't. Tapping phones and email makes sense, sending agents into MMO's to "look for terrorists" (I mean come on, really?) I hadn't heard said anywhere. The actions Snowden performed were hardly backbreaking labour in the pursuit of transparency/freedom/public knowledge, however you want to look at it, but what he has released has been quite important.

 

To dismiss that as being unworthy would be like dismissing the people who broke into the FBI office 40 years ago and liberated documents showing the FBI infiltrating and spying on activists and anti-war protestors as being unworthy, since all they did was pick a lock and take some paper. Unlike the FBI office break-in, which mainly dealt with internal problems, the "Snowden revelations" deal with the entire world, and I imagine some people aren't too happy about their countries being members of the 5 or 9 eyes.

Edited by Xarg

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Coincidentally there's a new book just out on the 1971 FBI break in & a review just went up on NYTimes today -- http://www.nytimes.c...ty-medsger.html

 

I don't deny the information itself has value in both cases, only that the act of releasing it by itself is worthy of a Nobel prize. It's not to put down what they did per se, but to privilege other things. I mean on a philosophical level, I think it should reward talents like diplomacy, mediation, savvy, a deep understanding of society, and to not only know what needs to be done to create peace but working tirelessly to do it, things like publishing 100s of articles, countless meetings with 100s of people, organizing 100s of events, and then have solid results that improve the well being of 10Ks of people. That kind of thing... Snowden always struck me as somebody gunning on vitriol to find a way to first embarrass the US & release the papers, then if something good comes out of it, sure, great or whatever, but we don't hear from him again except for a few garbled statements... no substantive articles, no meetings, no diplomacy, no savvy, no real action. From that point, it's the journalists or academics writing on the releases that are doing all the work for him. Maybe some of them should get the Nobel Prize. This is just my personal idea of what the prize means though. Obviously people have varying interpretations of what the Prize is for... I mean Kissinger won it, so obviously it can't be taken all that seriously. =V

What do you see when you turn out the light? I can't tell you but I know that it's mine.

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  • 2 weeks later...

This issue of constantly spying on everyone is the way it will be from now on.

Every single lawbreaker will be punished, either now or at some future date as your 'crime' is electronically detected.

America has led the way and will soon have all it's populace under control.

There will be no way to move around or find electronic shelter in the new order AND everyone has been groomed to want and welcome it.

If you don't then you must toss your cellphones, don't drive an auto and avoid cameras and computers.... and never tell your friends anything that they may eventually repeat on-line.

That may give you a few more years of relative privacy but there is NOTHING you can do about it and so you just carry on and let them have their way with you.

And just to see how you are being monitored for copyright infringements check out the us gov's ICE site. Search for it - but don't use google anymore - try DuckDuckGo.com

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