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Comment by dombili

12 years ago

It's not just that either. They seem to enjoy it and think that this is a game. If you're going to violate our basic rights, at least take it seriously, guys.

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dombili

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brown9-2  12 years ago

This presumes that those developers are building these systems to go after "our basic rights", instead of believing that they are helping to target terrorists and enemy states.

What gets lost in a lot of the (justifiable) NSA outrage is the fact that they want all of this technology to enable surveillance of terrorists who use the Internet just like ordinary Americans do. There is really no evidence so far that this massive surveillance apparatus is being used in a widespread way to abusively target Americans.

Being able to intercept online communication between terrorists and foreign governments in a way that collects zero communications of Americans seems like a really, really hard task.

  • a3n  12 years ago

    > There is really no evidence so far that this massive surveillance apparatus is being used in a widespread way to abusively target Americans.

    Widespread? Maybe not strictly widespread, but it is being abused. There was that guy recently, I forget the beef the government had with him, they couldn't justify a warrant to search his laptop, so they just waited for him to travel. They put a flag on him, and when he came up registered to fly out of the country they seized and searched his laptop when he crossed back in through the no rights zone, AKA the border.

    Everything accelerates, and if it isn't yet "widespread," it will be. It's certainly being done more than zero times.

  • swalkergibson  12 years ago

    The terrorism threat is simply a convenient bogeyman. The probabilities of dying in a random terrorist attack are so infinitesimally small that it is not even worth considering. Ordinary Americans are simply too stupid to really comprehend exactly what is happening here and subscribe to the "well, I don't have anything to hide" type logic. The fact is that the terrorists have won. The American public, due to indifference, is so irrationally afraid of dying in a terrorist attack that our own government is watching our every move under the guise of protecting us from that threat.

    • brown9-2  12 years ago

      So, what types of widespread abusive things is the government doing to American citizens with all this surveillance?

      When you say "convenient bogeyman" it implies that all of this surveillance was built with the express purpose of spying on Americans. I personally believe that to be false, and instead that the massive and overbearing surveillance was built because public officials are so afraid of another massive terrorist attack because the voters are so afraid.

      In other words I agree with your basic observations but not the malicious motives.

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