I'm sure most of you have heard about the US government's surveillance activities recently:

Documents leaked by NSA contractor Edward Snowden in June 2013 describe the PRISM program as enabling in-depth surveillance on live communications and stored information. It provides for the targeting of any customers of participating corporations who live outside the United States, or American citizens whose communications include web content of people outside the United States. Data which the NSA is able to obtain under PRISM allegedly includes email, video and voice chat, videos, photos, voice over IP conversations, file transfers, login notifications and social networking details.

More details here


What do you guys think? Is this a necessary safety measure against terrorism, or just another step towards the US being a surveillance state? Are we already at that point? Is this an invasion of privacy or is it legally and morally allowable?

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I understood this as a way for the American government to collect and gather information about foreigners from companies without actually having any reason or legal justification, basically giving them the right to watch peoples internet activity as long as it passes through the US. If that is the case they have the possibility of searching for information about everyone(excluding US citizens?) without actually having any reason to collect, forcing it from corporations like Google who would otherwise defend their customer's information. For most people this is a total invasion of privacy and I don't really see how Obama can defend this by telling us that you need to sacrifice some privacy for security. The amount of information collected that actually helps in the search for terrorists is so small compared to the privacy thrown away, like Russ Baker said, they are looking for a needle in a haystack.

In addition the American government has repeatedly proven how near incompetent it is when it comes to handling and ensuring peoples information and privacy and it should definitively not be the one in control of these kind of programs.

Quote from Gunnii

like Russ Baker said, they are looking for a needle in a haystack.

This is exactly why I don't think it's a bad thing. The only practical way to use these powers is to investigate people who there is already good reason to be suspicious of. The average citizen won't be affected. And even if they did look at your data, why is that a problem exactly? People seem to think "privacy" is something sacred and critical to their day-to-day happiness but I don't understand why.

Quote from Exilement

Is this a necessary safety measure against terrorism, or just another step towards the US being a surveillance state?

Well, I'll try to stay on topic here since this is about opinions and what I think, don't be angry if you don't agree.
This would be a safe measure against terrorism if it was actually being used for that. From what I have read and watched, it seems most of this surveillance systems are being used for local use like spy on citizens of the country. If nipping terrorism in the bud is as important as it's being portrayed then the innocent citizens wouldn't matter and they would take all this technology and direct it at the source where all the hostility is coming from.

I believe every good thing can be used for evil or bad purposes. The US was already a police state long before the introduction of all this new technologies. It became a Surveillance state right after the 9/11 events. Although it's totally justifiable to want to keep an eye on the enemy, there is a fine line between paranoia and tyranny. And this is tyranny when you can't have your privacy in your house. So therefore I believe it was a surveillance state before this.

Quote from Exilement

Are we already at that point?

Yes we are already at that point where nothing is private. Just like the web once you've uploaded something it can never be deleted the world is soon becoming like that where you are going to be led to think that spying and grassing on your neighbor is cool just because they are not using something that is government issued. They'll make you believe it's cool and you are like a secret agent when in fact you are just a means to an end. It's all about control if anyone hasn't figured out by now.

Quote from Exilement

Is this an invasion of privacy or is it legally and morally allowable?

On no level or parallel universe is this morally right or legal. Everyone has a right to their privacy and the day that we cower down and pull down our pants in surrender is the day that humanity will lose any shred of hope they have left.

Quote from Apex93

On no level or parallel universe is this morally right or legal. Everyone has a right to their privacy and the day that we cower down and pull down our pants in surrender is the day that humanity will lose any shred of hope they have left.

Why not? What harm does it actually cause?

You really think it's a reasonable amount of power for any one entity to accumulate in secret? What if someone accesses that database with the intent to cause harm?

I'd rather die in an extremely unlikely terrorist attack than live in a surveillance state. It's a slippery slope, sure, but the things Snowden has been saying about the program make it sound like a pretty serious invasion of privacy. He said from his desk he could wiretap anyone in the country without a warrant.

I'd say there's definitely been a failing in the democratic process somewhere. Clearly this is something which upsets people so it should never have been made legal. But as for why it upsets people, that's something I don't understand. You and Apex both keep saying "invasion of privacy" like it's an inherently bad thing but neither of you has made the case for privacy in the first place. The only possible negative thing I can think of is if someone was giving out their online banking password over the phone or something. So long as people know not to do that (and I'll admit it's bad that this was secret) then there's no problem.

I have no problem with a surveillance state. If the government wanted I would let them microchip me.

Actually what is the chance of getting killed in terrorist attack on USA? Probably 1 in a million, literally.
And like Exile said, the surveillance thingy is kinda too over-reactive, and I'd say that this bill was made to investigate any people.
This thing may even able for the government to black-mail someone using the information.

I should say that this bill isn't a defensive system, it's rather a system to take all information to the government.

Really? You're asking me to give a case for privacy?

This is a program being conducted in secret to farm data about the taxpayers that are funding its operation, without their consent or knowledge, and it's possible that the extent of this program is an overreach of political, legal or constitutional powers granted to the ones in charge of it.

I'm not so much concerned about my own personal privacy, as much as I'm concerned about our government doing anything this widespread. They have a database full of information about US citizens, and I simply don't trust our political system enough to manage something like this. Especially if they feel it necessary to keep it a secret. Obama campaigned against warrentless wiretapping and kept insisting on a more "transparent" government, so as someone who supported him in both campaigns, this is pretty fucking upsetting to hear.

Quote from Exilement

This is a program being conducted in secret

which I said was bad

to farm data

I prefer "gather information"

about the taxpayers that are funding its operation,

not really relevant

without their consent or knowledge,

bad again

and it's possible that the extent of this program is an overreach of political, legal or constitutional powers granted to the ones in charge of it.

bad, if in fact it was an overreach, which your government denies.

It seems like the main problem is the fact that they did it quietly, which we're in agreement on. Breaking a campaign promise is pretty bad too, but if you're going to impose limits of two terms for presidents then there's no way to hold them accountable. Sorry, that's just a jab at America rather than anything to do with the point. Covert surveillance on your own citizens without any kind of safeguards is not exactly what I'd call ideal, but the issue isn't the privacy so much as the secrecy.

You say that you don't trust the government to manage something like this database. What would constitute mismanaging it?

Quote from Zed

Covert surveillance on your own citizens without any kind of safeguards is not exactly what I'd call ideal, but the issue isn't the privacy so much as the secrecy.

I guess we're largely in agreement then. I'm not necessarily worried about my own privacy, but what might happen in the future is still concerning. I don't know what they'd possibly use it for that's against my interests, but I'd rather not wait to find out.

I'm not sure what constitutes mismanagement because we don't have a lot of details about it yet. I just don't think anyone can be trusted to handle this kind of thing. Widespread surveillance is just.. I dunno, it's a difficult topic to think about without picturing Big Brother. I just can't imagine a justification for it. The potential for harm seems like it outweighs the merits. But again, we don't know a lot of the details yet.

Quote from Zed

This is exactly why I don't think it's a bad thing. The only practical way to use these powers is to investigate people who there is already good reason to be suspicious of. The average citizen won't be affected. And even if they did look at your data, why is that a problem exactly? People seem to think "privacy" is something sacred and critical to their day-to-day happiness but I don't understand why.

I hate to say it but I find this mentality immoral, and I don't think you're thinking critically enough about the situation. There are many many reasons why I believe this, so I'll try to keep this short. To start, you say the only practical way to use these powers is to investigate people who there is already a good reason to be suspicious of. Ignoring that it's NOT the only practical way for now, who defines what is a good reason? Where is the line drawn? Does searching for al qaeda on google target me as suspicious? They WERE hiding this entire operation from us, so I high doubt we'll ever find out specifically what the criteria would be for this. Given the best situation where there are no corrupt people abusing their power with this, there's no way to be certain they wouldn't start reading all your shit and snooping on you for stupid reasons.

The reality is that this system has infinite potential for abuse, and if history is any indicator this can and will eventually affect every citizen. For example, NSA employees have already been caught listening in on private phone calls they had no right or reason to be listening in on. Did they think that someone having phone sex was reasonable suspicion of terrorism? I think not. That's a naive viewpoint. But wait, what if by doing this they increase the potential to catch some motherfuckin' terrorists? Well, that would be great except like the TSA, they've never once caught anyone. Hell, this PRISM shit has been going on since 2007 and it still didn't prevent things like the Boston bombing. That event was caused by two of the dumbest kids, at least one of whom had been in this country for years before hand going to school here. All their spying and data mining didn't do shit. It's a flawed system and doesn't work.

But then, why is it a problem? If I'm not doing anything wrong why should I care? Ignoring that that is the wrong way to approach this situation (It should be, "If I'm not doing anything wrong, why is the government snooping on me?"), the definition for "what's wrong" is a moving goalpost, and one set by the same people spying on me. Not only that, but you're going to fuck up eventually. Have you ever pirated anything? Have you ever downloaded or shared music? Have you ever done drugs like smoke weed? Have you ever stolen anything of ANY value? If the government knows, that can easily come back to bite you in the ass. Say in a few years time you're up for a big job interview. You've aced the application process and your resume is impressive as fuck. The last thing is a background check to make sure you aren't a piece of shit in disguise. You think to yourself, "I've never done anything wrong, I'm in the clear!" Then the next day you're told that you didn't get the job, and also you're a scumbag. What went wrong? Well thanks to the constant data mining of your personal life, maybe your weird-ass personal sexual fetish has been noted and is available to the company that was looking to hire you. Or maybe they see that when you were younger you did a lot of drugs, and they don't trust you not to slip back in to it. This information you think would be trivial has come to light and fucked you over. What about if you were in a lawsuit and you had a good defense, but then the opposition bought your history from the NSA and started smearing your name so that the jury would vote against you? This shit can and DOES happen. This is a reddit post from someone who lived in a country that did the same thing the NSA is doing now. I highly suggest you read it, because it recounts actual events that anyone in their right might would be appalled at. The argument, "If you aren't doing anything wrong, why should you care if someone is spying on you?" Is absolutely retarded. I don't care how blunt I'm being, but if you legitimately think that you need to check yourself back in to reality. There's no legitimate reason for it, and there's no way to opt out. It's not even for JUST the people in the US. PRISM monitors EVERYTHING it possibly can from any country, and what's worse is that they don't have control over it. The fucking Dutch have access to it, due to moles they have inside. Who's to say other countries couldn't get people inside? Or even buy out an existing employee? Suddenly North Korea or China or Somalia has access to PRISM and then what?

There's so much that can go wrong, that the tiny, minuscule SLIVER of good it has the potential for is no where near worth the risks and invasion of privacy and the general fucking bullshit that the US government is pulling.

I've never been able to argue in threads like this against Zed, because you always question why invasion of privacy is wrong, and I honestly can't rationally reason why. All I can say is that, firstly, I disagree with it on a fundamental level, in the same way that I disagree with murder on a fundamental level. Morals are subjective, as you know, so if someone asks "why is murder wrong?" the most I can say is "well it's taking someone's life away, they'll never get to live and experience ever again", but then someone can respond with "why is that a bad thing?". Practicality isn't a good tool to argue with in things like this, because it's a more visceral, fundamental level that I disagree with it on. I can't say why someone secretly watching me getting dressed is a bad thing, it has no adverse effects on me or anything else, but it is wrong in my opinion. In the same way as this, most people find invasion of privacy wrong. If you don't, then fair enough, but most people that I've spoken to do, and asking for reasons as to why it's wrong isn't understanding the level upon which people believe it to be wrong.

You can say why fairly easily. It's a violation of human rights:

Article 12.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

UN Declaration on Human Rights

As soon as your action encroaches or impedes the rights of others, especially basic human rights, it is a bad thing.

Edit: I won't argue with that ^. What the US government has done may well be illegal (I don't know) and certainly shouldn't have been done in secret. I'm just arguing right-to-privacy.

Quote from Jeff

I hate to say it but I find this mentality immoral, and I don't think you're thinking critically enough about the situation. There are many many reasons why I believe this, so I'll try to keep this short. To start, you say the only practical way to use these powers is to investigate people who there is already a good reason to be suspicious of. Ignoring that it's NOT the only practical way for now, who defines what is a good reason? Where is the line drawn? Does searching for al qaeda on google target me as suspicious? They WERE hiding this entire operation from us, so I high doubt we'll ever find out specifically what the criteria would be for this. Given the best situation where there are no corrupt people abusing their power with this, there's no way to be certain they wouldn't start reading all your shit and snooping on you for stupid reasons.

How many people google "Al Quaeda" on a daily basis? My guess is that it's too many to realistically follow up on. What defines a good reason will be whatever works. The simple economics of it ensures that they won't use it to target people for stupid reasons.

The reality is that this system has infinite potential for abuse, and if history is any indicator this can and will eventually affect every citizen. For example, NSA employees have already been caught listening in on private phone calls they had no right or reason to be listening in on. Did they think that someone having phone sex was reasonable suspicion of terrorism?

Using it to listen in on phone sex is quite clearly gross misconduct on the part of the NSA employees and therefore grounds for dismissal. I never said the system doesn't need to be monitored.

I think not. That's a naive viewpoint. But wait, what if by doing this they increase the potential to catch some motherfuckin' terrorists? Well, that would be great except like the TSA, they've never once caught anyone. Hell, this PRISM shit has been going on since 2007 and it still didn't prevent things like the Boston bombing. That event was caused by two of the dumbest kids, at least one of whom had been in this country for years before hand going to school here. All their spying and data mining didn't do shit. It's a flawed system and doesn't work.

"Your theory of gravity doesn't address the issue of why there are no unicorns so it must be false."

The Boston bombings happened so clearly PRISM isn't 100% effective. You can't use that to conclude that it is 0% effective. Right now we do not know enough about it to say anything about whether or not it's been useful. "Didn't prevent things like the Boston bombing"? What things? How many other terrorist attacks have hit mainland US in the last five years? (I'm actually not sure what the answer is to that. I have a short memory for other countries' suffering. I'm hoping it's a low number.)

Furthermore, if you had the data of half a billion people dropped on you how long do you think it would take to use it effectively? You need something like the Boston bombing to happen before you can even begin to look at what trends indicate a threat.

But then, why is it a problem? If I'm not doing anything wrong why should I care? Ignoring that that is the wrong way to approach this situation (It should be, "If I'm not doing anything wrong, why is the government snooping on me?"), the definition for "what's wrong" is a moving goalpost, and one set by the same people spying on me. Not only that, but you're going to fuck up eventually. Have you ever pirated anything? Have you ever downloaded or shared music? Have you ever done drugs like smoke weed? Have you ever stolen anything of ANY value?

You are talking about problems with the law and then pinning the blame on the law enforcement. You need to draw a distinction there. Crucially, punishments for breaking the law have to take into account the probability of getting caught, otherwise the deterrent doesn't work properly. Take speeding for example. The fine for speeding in the UK is £100 (or it will be once the law is updated in a couple of months) but the odds of getting caught are low (say, one time in a hundred). If law enforcement was perfect then you could charge £1 for every offence and achieve exactly the same effect.

In the same way, once it becomes possible to police piracy 100% we would no longer need big fines. You could literally set the fine at 70p per song and have that fine transferred straight to the artist. 100% enforcement doesn't end by making everyone a criminal - it ends by making every download legal.

Now, we can debate whether or not the government would actually bring in those measures. Historically I think sentences may have gotten tougher even though law-enforcement has improved. But this is not a problem with PRISM. Law enforcement is never the problem. The problem is the laws about what punishment goes with what crime, and that is an entirely separate debate.

If the government knows, that can easily come back to bite you in the ass. Say in a few years time you're up for a big job interview. You've aced the application process and your resume is impressive as fuck. The last thing is a background check to make sure you aren't a piece of shit in disguise. You think to yourself, "I've never done anything wrong, I'm in the clear!" Then the next day you're told that you didn't get the job, and also you're a scumbag. What went wrong? Well thanks to the constant data mining of your personal life, maybe your weird-ass personal sexual fetish has been noted and is available to the company that was looking to hire you.

A company which discriminates against people with strange sexual fetishes is a company which is severely limiting its choice of workers. Again, the economics says they won't do it.

Or maybe they see that when you were younger you did a lot of drugs, and they don't trust you not to slip back in to it.

Information like this is absolutely relevant to the company doing the hiring and probably should be available to them. If the data show that ex-drug addicts are worse workers then the company has a right not to hire you on that basis. Same as how companies have a right to know if you have a criminal record.

I know you're just picking out examples, but I think these last two responses are generalisable. Either the company is using unnecessary information to hurt themselves, or they are using information which frankly probably should be available. And once again we come back to the fact that if no one is truly innocent then "guilty" loses its meaning. Everyone has fetishes or used weed once or is a bad driver, etc., etc., so it becomes impossible to discriminate on these grounds.

This information you think would be trivial has come to light and fucked you over. What about if you were in a lawsuit and you had a good defense, but then the opposition bought your history from the NSA and started smearing your name so that the jury would vote against you? This shit can and DOES happen. This is a reddit post from someone who lived in a country that did the same thing the NSA is doing now. I highly suggest you read it, because it recounts actual events that anyone in their right might would be appalled at.

Once again, the problem here isn't the law enforcement, it's the law itself. It's just that the laws were oppressive. You live in a democracy, the entire point of which is to prevent oppressive laws. It's the only real advantage you have over authoritarianism so don't marginalise it. But even if you lived under Saddam Hussein you couldn't argue with the surveillance. Surveillance worked. It's the system behind it that needs looking at, and that is a separate debate. Otherwise you might as well be throwing in your lot with the people who think they need the right to bear arms so that they can rebel against the government if they want to.

The argument, "If you aren't doing anything wrong, why should you care if someone is spying on you?" Is absolutely retarded. I don't care how blunt I'm being, but if you legitimately think that you need to check yourself back in to reality. There's no legitimate reason for it, and there's no way to opt out. It's not even for JUST the people in the US. PRISM monitors EVERYTHING it possibly can from any country, and what's worse is that they don't have control over it. The fucking Dutch have access to it, due to moles they have inside. Who's to say other countries couldn't get people inside? Or even buy out an existing employee? Suddenly North Korea or China or Somalia has access to PRISM and then what?

And then what exactly? Am I going to be denied my dream job in North Korea?