US Intelligence Chief Defends Attempts To Break Tor 411
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Arik Hesseldahl writes that James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, says that the NSA tried to penetrate and compromise Tor, but it was only because terrorists and criminals use it, too and our "interest in online anonymity services and other online communication and networking tools is based on the undeniable fact that these are the tools our adversaries use to communicate and coordinate attacks against the United States and our allies." It was all legal and appropriate, Clapper argues, because, "Within our lawful mission to collect foreign intelligence to protect the United States, we use every intelligence tool available to understand the intent of our foreign adversaries so that we can disrupt their plans and prevent them from bringing harm to innocent Americans. Our adversaries have the ability to hide their messages and discussions among those of innocent people around the world. They use the very same social networking sites, encryption tools and other security features that protect our daily online activities." Clapper concludes that "the reality is that the men and women at the National Security Agency and across the Intelligence Community are abiding by the law, respecting the rights of citizens and doing everything they can to help keep our nation safe.""
Bunch of fucking liars and criminals (Score:4, Insightful)
The people that work in the NSA are a bunch or criminals. From the top leaders down to the last analyst.
They're undermining democracy this is the reality. The few good men that worked there and that tried to expose all the illegal acts going on (including of course Snowden) were ostracized, kicked out and prosecuted.
Fuck them, Osama should have droped a couple of 747s on their HQ instead of the WTC. He'd done a great service to democracy.
US committing hostile acts on the world (Score:5, Insightful)
The rest of the world just sees the US committing hostile acts on every citizen of the planet, and also that the US is undermining freedom and communication across the world. You have to stop what you're doing, because you're wrecking everything, and your "justifications" are hollow.
Stop it.
Now.
Re:Moral dilemma for the IT community (Score:5, Insightful)
What dilemma? Freedom has responsibilities, and so does protection of privacy and rights.
These "justifications" are just B.S. designed to ramp up fear so funding gets extended.
You are all being played as suckers and you really should think about taking your country back.
Also, any so-called "IT" staff that go along to implement this - you are collaborators of the worst kind, shame on you.
WHY SHOULD WE TRUST YOU? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Moral dilemma for the IT community (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Moral dilemma for the IT community (Score:5, Insightful)
To put it another way: free speech means some folks will say things that match your opinion (a "good" thing!), but sometimes, they dare to say stuff you don't agree with! And the latter can't be allowed.
Or, for the mandatory vehicular analogy, a car can be used to bring kittens to an orphanage, or to plow into an orphan on the street and splatter it over the pavement.
That's not a problem with the tool but with the user. And the reason James Clapper here wants to forbid you to use encryption is pretty nefarious, even if he claims to want only "your good". So he and his agency should first learn to behave before telling us what to do.
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There you have it, folks... (Score:5, Insightful)
Our government explicitly says, privacy is a threat to our safety, and it is the duty of our government to prevent privacy from being possible at all costs.
Go ahead, people. Keep voting for the republicans, because at least they are not democrats. Oh, I mean, keep voting for democrats, because at least they are not republicans. NOTHING is going to change that way. They'll keep boning us up the ass with this "oh noooo... can't have privacy.... TARE! Fnord! War on TARE!!!!"
Actually y'know what? Fuck y'all. YOU are responsible for this. Not me. I have not voted for either major party in DECADES. YOU... YOU are responsible for allowing this to happen. YOU have gotten the government you deserve, you half-wits. Sadly, I am the one who has to suffer for you turds voting for the jackasses (Bush, Obama, whatever) who allow and enable shit like this.
I'll start listening to what this guy has to say (Score:5, Insightful)
Rubbish, there's no issue (Score:4, Insightful)
" But on the other horn, there really are people out there who will use these technologies to bring harm to innocent people--for the greater good, of course (or for a profit). These people will use technology against our best wishes."
There's no use for Tor that is against my interests. None. It's just speech going down wires. You may not like the kiddie diddlers discussing their kiddy diddling, or the terrorists discussing.... well nothing, because terrorists have no reason to use it... but its all just speech. Acts are not speech, people like Clapper pretend that saying things terrorists might say is the same as committing an *act* of terrorism.
" are abiding by the law, respecting the rights of citizens and doing everything they can to help keep our nation safe"
No they're not. They hacked domestic communications on Tor too. No political candidate exists now that doesn't have an NSA folder full of their dirty secrets. Which means that liars like Clapper can/have been shaping US politics to be pro-military. They've certainly been interfering in Europe's politics, EU Commission pretending that US spying on Europe is a US *domestic* issue, FFS.
If you accept that democracy is the basis for stable countries, then he's destabilized the US.
Safe? Safe from a free democracy?? That's what General Alexander has done.
You can see it when the ex NSA Chief dresses up in military garb and jokes about killing critics. You can see how far away from a free democracy you've gone.
Re:Moral dilemma for the IT community (Score:4, Insightful)
And that is the price of freedom. Some will abuse it. There is no moral dilemma; you don't compromise others rights for some imaginary sense of security. .
Re:Moral dilemma for the IT community (Score:1, Insightful)
I don't blame IT staff. The human animal is predictable. 99.9999% of them don't want trouble and will do morally shadowy things to avoid it. Saying no to the NSA gets you trouble a la Lavabit. I stand by Ledar Levison, but he has more balls than I ever would. (Of course I don't run a secret email service.) It also teaches us an important lesson. The weakest point in any internet security is the bag of meat responsible for it.
Moral dilemma for Cowards (Score:5, Insightful)
I've got news for you, friend. Information has never harmed a single soul. It takes action to do that. Information doesn't kill people, people do. The NSA does not preempt terrorist threats, and even if they did, the cost to the rest of our lives is too much. They've inundated themselves with data and can't make sense of any of it until after the actions have been performed. Besides, folks could just send post cards with stenographic messages on them, or any other low-tech solution. Tor and darknets wouldn't need to exist if we didn't feel insecure.
More folks die of heart disease every year than over fifty 9/11's... 2,996 died in 9/11. 597,689. [cdc.gov] Two Hundred Times More, Every Year! If the NSA wanted to protect us they'd be making tastier health food. Over six times more Americans take their own lives every year than the Terrorists did in their worst attack against us. The threat is fucking pathetic, and those spreading the fear narrative should be fired. Humans have deep psychological, evolutionarily encoded, desires to protect our lives and those of women and children even more. This is psychological warfare.
I know it sounds cold hearted, but we can put a price on a human life. We can look at the lifespan and the benefit to society that life may contribute, and quantify a life to some degree. This is not to dehumanize people, but to put into perspective the ethics of fearmongering. A few thousand died at the hands of terrorists, but now hundreds of millions suffer every day at their loss of privacy. The aggregate suffering is far greater than that of the worst tortures to the few. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. IMO, It's better not to live in fear of your government for your entire life than to say, lose a limb. I would give up my left leg to end this NSA spying on me, and all Americans. What I really fear that they are turning more people against us every day!
Privacy is worth something. We need private space to be fully human, and as our lives deal more and more online that privacy needs to be extended online as well. Folks wouldn't be encrypting shit if they felt they could trust the networks.
The NSA is wounding us deeply. Their actions make them seem like the other secret police we fought against. We didn't need such a police state since we were brave and good people. Soldiers took up the call to fight for our nation because we had honor. The NSA is stripping away our honor. Many would not fight for us because of it. The NSA is a Threat to National Security. These fearmongers are injecting poison into the veins of our country. They will not ever decrease the dosage, and if we let them continue, they will increase it and destroy our great nation from the inside out.
Think for a second about the lengths we've got to because of the pathetic terrorist attacks. Now, what if the NSA really did try to protect us from real harms we face? The NSA would monitor everything you ate and tax you if you more if you ate "unhealthy" food, whatever they deem that to be. The NSA would be monitoring every vehicle location and remotely shutting folks down cars. They'd be preemptively sending cops into your home to make sure your bad-day didn't turn into a suicide.
We have secret ballots for a reason. The invasion of privacy must end.
Re:Moral dilemma for the IT community (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem isn't that those who wants to harm us communicate in ways we have problems listening to. The problem is that they want to harm us.
Our efforts on listening in on everybody so we can classify more enemies creates more people who hate us.
When followed up with drone strikes on mere suspects not convicted of anything, and people who are guilty of being nearby, we really fuel the fire.
Yes, the thought that possible enemies are communicating without us being able to listen in burns us up. But when listening in creates animosity which grows to hatred, it's counter-productive.
You don't get fewer snakebites by digging every nearby hill to find dens, and poke the snakes to find out whether they're agressive or not. You leave them alone, knowing that they are out there, and some of them may be dangerous. Co-existing works. Paranoia doesn't.
Re:Contradiction (Score:5, Insightful)
He says they are. Now, give me one reason why I should believe him. Where's the oversight? Why should I trust him?
I'm in IT security myself, and "trust" is a big issue. Trust saves you time. If you trust an entity, you put some burden of security on someone else, the entity that you trust. E.g., you trust a CA and its issued certificates so you don't have to verify all the various certs out there yourself. We trust the CAs out of convenience and out of practicality. And in turn CAs are audited and checked constantly to ensure they are up to speed with their security. Still, security blunders happen. But at least there are means and ways to not only detect them but also to remedy them, and most importantly: It is your, and only your, decision whether or not you trust a CA. You can decide unilaterally to declare certs issued by one or even all CAs as untrustworthy for yourself (and yourself alone).
So we have oversight, security audition, breach discovery and unilateral opt-out (or even opt-in).
NONE of these features apply to the NSA. Hence there is exactly ZERO reason for me to trust that entity AT ALL, from a security point of view. I cannot audit them, I cannot determine the security of their setup, I cannot determine the actual scope of their work and most of all I cannot decide against trusting them.
Sorry, but there is no reason to trust him. On what? His word? Well, great, here's my word that I won't do anything stupid, dangerous or illegal. It's just as good as his. So he can stop spying on me now.
Re:I feel safer... (Score:5, Insightful)
Considering that a lot of countries consider you a pedo if you fuck a 17 year old, I stick with 18, just to be safe.
Yes, I know, common sense would say you're right... but then again, common sense has no room in laws concerning sex, drugs or copyright.
Re:US committing hostile acts on the world (Score:2, Insightful)
Well, growing up, I kept hearing about how wonderful and free the US is, so much more than the rest of the world. I kept hearing about the Second Amendment, but it only seems to be used in cases of killing a whole bunch of innocent people instead of being used to take back the government.
Frankly, enough of you weren't paying attention, or were caught up in partisan politics to see that you've been duped.
Now that it's time to do something, no one seems willing to step up. I don't think the "Founding Fathers" would appreciate what a nation of cowards your once great nation has become. Get fat, bitch on Facebook, and just complain until the next atrocity comes down the pipe. Don't worry, your talking heads will justify this all on your "News" broadcasts.
Re:OK, maybe I'll buy that... (Score:5, Insightful)
What does citizenship have to do with anything? The rights not to have your privacy trampled by any government should be universal, and not dependent on citizenship.
Re:I feel safer... (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally I don't quite get the idea of it entirely. You're unfit for ... well, pretty much everything the day before your 18th birthday, but you're completely responsible for anything and everything the very next day.
What a difference a day makes...
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News Flash! Spy agency wants to spy! (Score:4, Insightful)
Gee, an organization tasked with intercepting and interpreting electronic communications wants to intercept and interpret electronic communications! Who woulda thunk it?
The NSA has certainly done a poor job keeping it's nose clean, but personally, I'd be rather disappointed if they weren't trying to de-anonymize Tor! Figuring out who is talking to who, and how often, called Signals Intelligence, is the bedrock of intelligence analysis (and has been even before the NSA existed), and in many ways is more important than knowing what they are saying.
In addition, if the NSA were to suddenly be hit with a clue-by-four by federal judges actually doing their job, they would need the de-anonymizing information to perform proper filtering of domestic communications.
Re:I feel safer... (Score:5, Insightful)
And then there's good evidence (National Institute of Health study among others) that the part of our brain that inhibits risky behavior doesn't fully develop until about 25.
Re:I feel safer... (Score:4, Insightful)
and I don't even live in the states
well then you're "lucky" that he doesn't think he even needs to defend breaking laws of your country - because he thinks that's totally legal(fbi thinks so too).
hack usa sites, or just break usa law while staying out of the whole country or just write shit on the internet that american government should be bombed with predator clones since due to rules of engagement it would be totally just-> get extradited to usa if lucky, bombed from the sky along with your family if unlucky.
get hacked by usa-> can't do jack shit about it while usa shows the finger and spins bullshit about how it's legal.
Re:I feel safer... (Score:5, Insightful)
“Power always thinks it has a great soul and vast views beyond the comprehension of the weak; and that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws.” - John Adams
Re:I feel safer... (Score:5, Insightful)
"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross."
Re:I feel safer... (Score:5, Insightful)
You have to draw a line somewhere
Why? Right now we basically toss anyone in prison who has sex with a person below a certain age whether or not they raped anyone. I would rather lines like that not exist at all, and that prosecutors and police be forced to prove that actual rape took place.
Not drawing that line at all would be even sillier.
After seeing the laws in place today, no one with a brain would draw such a conclusion.
Re:Moral dilemma for the IT community (Score:4, Insightful)
While I have no intention to collaborate with finding out private communications between US citizens, I don't see why the NSA would not try and break TOR. TOR is a communication system that would allow terrorists to communicate without being monitored, it is a job of a spy agency to get into those communication methods. It's like telling James Bond to not try to break into the safe of the bad guy to get the secret papers because, "breaking and entering is illegal and not nice".
There is nothing wrong with breaking TOR, because TOR doesn't deserve it's reputation if it can be broken. I'm glad that they've broken it and we know about it. I've always known that, while it had certain benefits, it has always been very susceptible to being compromised if you have enough assets and the will to do so. All they've done is proven it. Now we move on to something else, or we accept the caveats that working with TOR constrains us with.
I'm not worried about what they can do, I'm worried about what they do with their capabilities. The fact is that someone is going to be able to do what the NSA is doing, sooner or later. Let's make sure that it is the good guys who are doing it, and that those people who go into that field are responsible and honest people who understand the need for privacy in the course of normal events.
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Re:Moral dilemma for the IT community (Score:3, Insightful)
There's a difference between being a part of a system that you have no objective control over, and being complicit in specific activities that we have no way of having oversight over.
If I was a roofer on the Death Star, I might have no idea what the big crater looking thing was for. I'd think I was building a big battlestation, at best. Is it my fault that I didn't walk over to the other side of what was the size of a small moon and ask what they were building over there? Would I know a superlaser if I saw one? Hell no. I'm a roofer, not a turbolaser technician. I wouldn't know a superlaser from a thermal exhaust port.
Re:I feel safer... (Score:2, Insightful)
"These people (Clapper, et all) don't even comprehend that what they are doing is wrong. They genuinely believe they are doing good! These people are far more dangerous than all of the terrorists combined because they are slowly and surely handing our country to a future tyrant who will commit more atrocities than all of the terrorists combined. In spite of that they believe they are on the side of righteousness."
Guess what? That's part of living in a democracy: living peacefully with people who's viewpoints are different from yours in exchange for a compromise that makes society as a whole stronger. The worst development in American democracy lately is this attitude "anyone who disagrees with me is evil and a threat to the country". Guess what else? There is a large double digit percentage of American's (presumably also your countrymen) who disagree with your viewpoint that government activities such as this are wrong. Calling people who disagree the "unwashed masses" and making melodramatic prophecies of bloodshed and revolution isn't going to change anyone's opinion. In fact, it likely will have the opposite effect and entrench the viewpoints of people who think this is ok.
This extreme "it's my way or else" attitude in America undermines rational, serious debates on topics such as this.
Re:I feel safer... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:There you have it, folks... (Score:2, Insightful)
You've just paraphrased an old anarchist aphorism: "If voting could REALLY change anything, they'd make it illegal."
A related one is "no matter who you vote for, the government always gets in."
The anarchist project ais eventually to make them irrelevant, unnecessary, and obsolete. Back in the 19th century, we figured a few well placed bombs and bullets could do it, but it turned out that was just for Russia -- every country is different, and you need different tactics for each. Now we have an array of strategies, but just not enough people to do it.
I kind of like the agorist idea - start a small grey-market business*, make money for yourself, and if enough people (~10-20%) do likewise, you can hire your security firms to suppress the government like they would any other criminal enterprise. It's nice because it appeals to the struggling middle class' work ethic and seems a very All-American way to do away with the big G.
* grey market as in, you sell legal goods, but don't deal with the government. You risk tax evasion charges, but any attempt to undermine the government will have risks. Our founding fathers risked hanging for what they did, but I think we can convince some chunk of modern americans that it's worth taking a small personal risk for freedom. If they get to make cash doing it, all the better.
Re:Rubbish, there's no issue (Score:4, Insightful)
There's no use for Tor that is against my interests. None. It's just speech going down wires. You may not like the kiddie diddlers discussing their kiddy diddling, or the terrorists discussing.... well nothing, because terrorists have no reason to use it... but its all just speech. Acts are not speech, people like Clapper pretend that saying things terrorists might say is the same as committing an *act* of terrorism.
Sorry to have to Godwin this thread, but as far as I know Hitler never personally killed a jew. So since acts are not speech, he's a totally innocent guy right? Or can speech be orders, threats, fraud, slander, conspiracy and a host of other illegal things... never mind that bits can be many other things like botnet controls, money (Bitcoins) and so on. I'm assuming you know, since you went out of your way to pretend kiddie diddlers use TOR just for discussion and nothing else. But seriously mods, that's +5 Insightful? More like smoking crack...
Re:I feel safer... (Score:4, Insightful)
That the NSA/CIA/FBI think it is appropriate to break every other countries laws and treat their citizens as sub-human is not really their fault but directly tied back to the Imperialistic and exploitative attitude of the US Government and the Corporations that run it. Now this is bad enough but the truth is American exceptionalism based upon ego and ignorance means the majority of Americans agree with it including the sub-human and the subsequent have no rights part. So it is a core problem the United States of America and it's threat to the rest of the world.