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23 comments
Getting information out of a top secret system and walking with it? Not that difficult.
Getting information out of a top secret system without being logged, tracked, and identified? Damn near impossible. I'd bet money it was only a matter of time (hours?) from the disclosure of the info until the feds were onto him anyway. There was no way he could have kept this quiet for 30 minutes let alone years.
What's he supposed to do? Go into work the next day? To have access to the kind of info Snowden did, you have to pass a polygraph. The kind where they specifically ask you if you've mishandled classified documents.
Snowden's got balls of steel.
Getting information out of a top secret system without being logged, tracked, and identified? Damn near impossible. I'd bet money it was only a matter of time (hours?) from the disclosure of the info until the feds were onto him anyway. There was no way he could have kept this quiet for 30 minutes let alone years.
What's he supposed to do? Go into work the next day? To have access to the kind of info Snowden did, you have to pass a polygraph. The kind where they specifically ask you if you've mishandled classified documents.
Snowden's got balls of steel.
Do they actually still use polygraphs in government?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygraph#Validity
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygraph#Validity
Two sections later on the very WP page you link to the lead paragraph for "Usage" reads:
"Law enforcement agencies and intelligence agencies in the United States are by far the biggest users of polygraph technology. In the United States alone all federal law enforcement agencies either employ their own polygraph examiners or use the services of examiners employed in other agencies. This is despite their unreliability."[1]
Or if you don't want to take WP's word for it: CIA Open Position for Poly Examiner[2], NSA Brochure on polygraph tips/FAQS for employees[3] and/or NSA Whistleblower Revelas How To Beat Poly [4].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygraph#Usage
[2] https://www.cia.gov/careers/opportunities/support-profession...
[3] http://www.nsa.gov/careers/_files/poly_brochure.pdf
[4] http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2012/09...
"Law enforcement agencies and intelligence agencies in the United States are by far the biggest users of polygraph technology. In the United States alone all federal law enforcement agencies either employ their own polygraph examiners or use the services of examiners employed in other agencies. This is despite their unreliability."[1]
Or if you don't want to take WP's word for it: CIA Open Position for Poly Examiner[2], NSA Brochure on polygraph tips/FAQS for employees[3] and/or NSA Whistleblower Revelas How To Beat Poly [4].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygraph#Usage
[2] https://www.cia.gov/careers/opportunities/support-profession...
[3] http://www.nsa.gov/careers/_files/poly_brochure.pdf
[4] http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2012/09...
There is an assumption here that our capabilities for mole-hunting haven't increased in the past 40 years. A situation where the government knows you are the leak and no one else does may be more dangerous than when everyone knows. I don't know that Snowden handled things optimally, but it's not clear that he is a "putz" for not attempting to do it the same way Felt did.
The author does say that Snowden was an NSA admin and should know how to be anonymous.
Except the moment you know there's a leak, you can start to monitor network access closely and vary certain bits and pieces in documents etc., and see who has/had access to whatever leaks next to relatively quickly pinpoint the source.
He might have been able to stay anonymous if he did a one time dump of data (as he did) and leaked that and then kept his mouth shut. He'd be caught relatively quickly if he kept leaking documents over time.
And it's one thing to have access, another thing to have sufficient access to delete all your tracks. If the NSA are serious about their security, there will be certain audit logs of activity that goes to printers in locked rooms.
He might have been able to stay anonymous if he did a one time dump of data (as he did) and leaked that and then kept his mouth shut. He'd be caught relatively quickly if he kept leaking documents over time.
And it's one thing to have access, another thing to have sufficient access to delete all your tracks. If the NSA are serious about their security, there will be certain audit logs of activity that goes to printers in locked rooms.
Yes, and maybe he knew it could not be done with sufficient reliability.
And the author knows more than Snowden did on the feasibility of this, why?
Because he is also an admin? In a totally unrelated business?
As if any network admin knows all about security, secret services and such just as good as an NSA contractor, just because they can also read their users mail and su as them!
I call BS.
Because he is also an admin? In a totally unrelated business?
As if any network admin knows all about security, secret services and such just as good as an NSA contractor, just because they can also read their users mail and su as them!
I call BS.
Odd that this sneering piece, which says very little (and nothing original), got upvoted.
TLDR: OP thinks Snowden is bad for revealing his identity (and doesn't consider the possibility that Snowden revealed his identity to gain protection, through visibility, from extrajudicial measures).
TLDR: OP thinks Snowden is bad for revealing his identity (and doesn't consider the possibility that Snowden revealed his identity to gain protection, through visibility, from extrajudicial measures).
Just plain lazy. OP clearly hasn't even gone to the trouble of reading up on recent examples of whistleblowers, like all of the past NSA ones who had their lives systematically dismantled and careers ruined. For what? Not much, as it turns out - many of those NSA whistleblowers are on the record as saying that Snowden did the right thing here.
Oh, and the author's Watergate example?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/08/daniel-ellsberg-edw...
Whoops.
Oh, and the author's Watergate example?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/08/daniel-ellsberg-edw...
Whoops.
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Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers, not Watergate.
Otherwise I agree with you.
Otherwise I agree with you.
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This article is also not about the underlying issue. It's about Snowden. Not Snowden himself even, but OP's opinion of Snowden. It also reads like a rant.
I agree. There will always be someone who comes along and says that the people who have actively done something to make the world a better place don't count because the doers don't live up to some arbitrary standard of that critic.
I am the first person to say that you don't have to be a baker to know when the bread is stale, but I'm also not one to ignore the price that any whistleblower ends up paying. The day Snowden is wealthy, healthy and staring in a hit reality tv show -- then we can have a talk about if he did his whistleblowing the "right" way or not.
I am the first person to say that you don't have to be a baker to know when the bread is stale, but I'm also not one to ignore the price that any whistleblower ends up paying. The day Snowden is wealthy, healthy and staring in a hit reality tv show -- then we can have a talk about if he did his whistleblowing the "right" way or not.
Snowden went public with his identity in order to protect his life. Best place to hide is in plain sight. Tech nowadays is way different than during Nixon era. Snowden knew if he leaked anonymously they would find him in days. They have the internet router level data for chrissakes!
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Ok then. After the author has employed his own strategy for defying and embarrassing the most militaristic and far-reaching government on earth I'll be happy to hear about how it all worked out for him.
Its easy to think about coulda, shoulda, woulda when fear for your life is removed from the equation. Snowden must have balls of some unimaginably dense substance. Personally, I'd rather put on a bright red shirt and beam down to to the surface in search of tritanium than do what he did. I'd have better odds I think.
Its easy to think about coulda, shoulda, woulda when fear for your life is removed from the equation. Snowden must have balls of some unimaginably dense substance. Personally, I'd rather put on a bright red shirt and beam down to to the surface in search of tritanium than do what he did. I'd have better odds I think.
Snowden was honest about it. He didn't try to hide his identity. That takes more strength.
As far as I'm concerned, the strategy of a whistleblower is their own decision. Leak quietly and you may go quietly. Do it loudly and you may be martyred without political gain. There is no risk-free formula here.
>The President resigned and Bad guys in government went to jail. And maybe it’s because Deep Throat Kept His Mouth Shut. He never talked.
That's a pretty massive assumption. I'd say Nixon resigned because he would have been impeached based of the evidence, regardless of whether the whistleblower was outed or not. In the same way, I suspect the numerous NSA programs will come under scrutiny of the true supreme court, regardless of whether we know Snowden's name or not.
If anyone is to blame for the story's focus vacillating between Snowden and the various programs or allegiances exposed, it is the media outlets that cannot maintain their own integrity in the face of advertising revenue. I'd suspect that was part of the point of his coming out publicly. That and the fact that, in appropriating the data he did, I'd say it's a reasonable assumption that he left a massive access trail that the authorities wouldn't be far behind in tracing.
We still would have heard about Mr. Snowden. We'd just be getting the story from an amalgamation of corporations and governments that, as the series of leaks has proven, just can't keep its story straight.
That's a pretty massive assumption. I'd say Nixon resigned because he would have been impeached based of the evidence, regardless of whether the whistleblower was outed or not. In the same way, I suspect the numerous NSA programs will come under scrutiny of the true supreme court, regardless of whether we know Snowden's name or not.
If anyone is to blame for the story's focus vacillating between Snowden and the various programs or allegiances exposed, it is the media outlets that cannot maintain their own integrity in the face of advertising revenue. I'd suspect that was part of the point of his coming out publicly. That and the fact that, in appropriating the data he did, I'd say it's a reasonable assumption that he left a massive access trail that the authorities wouldn't be far behind in tracing.
We still would have heard about Mr. Snowden. We'd just be getting the story from an amalgamation of corporations and governments that, as the series of leaks has proven, just can't keep its story straight.
If he's still alive years from now, Snowden will be holding his head high. At that time, the author of this thing will be hoping nobody reads his blog.