LWN's unreliable 2014 predictions

Posted Jan 3, 2014 5:44 UTC (Fri) by eru (subscriber, #2753)
Parent article: LWN's unreliable 2014 predictions

In 2014, we will learn how bad the situation really is

After the latest revelations just before Christmas, I am not sure this prediction makes sense. The surveillance already seems to be about as comprehensive as it can get.

LWN's unreliable 2014 predictions

Posted Jan 3, 2014 11:15 UTC (Fri) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link] (3 responses)

ahh, but you see they are still claiming that they aren't abusing all this information. we know some low-level abuse is happening, I'm waiting to hear proof that much more significant abuse is happening.

We are also just starting to learn what other governments are doing (so much for the "America is evil, our government would never do something like this" crowd)

LWN's unreliable 2014 predictions

Posted Jan 3, 2014 14:33 UTC (Fri) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link]

I'm pretty sure America's survelance and level of abuse is highest but that's not because NSA is more evil than FSB, but simply because it's so much more successful! Indeed first reaction of many in Russian government to initial Snowden Prism revelations was not “how awful, how could Apple, Google, and Microsoft do that!” but “how awful, Apple, Google, and Microsoft are doing that for US agency, yet they have audacity to refuse giving that information to our agencies!

Later they changed their tune somewhat when people started howling, but at first the reaction was as pictured above.

LWN's unreliable 2014 predictions

Posted Jan 3, 2014 23:48 UTC (Fri) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link] (1 responses)

> so much for the "America is evil, our government would never do something like this" crowd

I assumed reactions outside the US would be more like the exact opposite:

"Wow, if this happens in the US, what must they (try to) do here?"

Granted: on the other hand, they are probably just failing :-)

LWN's unreliable 2014 predictions

Posted Jan 6, 2014 10:06 UTC (Mon) by kleptog (subscriber, #1183) [Link]

For the rest of the world the issue is different, for two reasons I think:

- Many of the major websites (Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc) fall under US jurisdiction which makes it easier for the NSA to get access than it would be elsewhere in the world. Sure, search engines in China probably respond to the Chinese equivalent, but who outside China uses a chinese search engine?

The Belgacom incident was revealing though.

- I would not be surprised if the NSA received more funding than all equivalent agencies in the rest of the world combined. I know in my country the equivalent agency is essentially starved. They do interesting things, but are not capable of anything at the level of the NSA.

Arguably the best way to keep something like the NSA under control would be to starve them of funding.