NSA Hacks Entire Internet! Film at 11

We use an open source system with technology we don't understand, where anyone with a computer and an Internet connection can enter. We place valuable and embarrassing information in unlocked places. We download gleefully free content, not wondering for a moment why it is there. We write obscen and nasty flames and post embarrassing photos on public sites.

And we wonder "Why are there so many crooks on the Internet"

Am I missing something here?

A 'little' correction on your article.

The Guardian is a respected Left wing Newspaper in the UK.

It regularly sides with Right wing Socialists here.

Americans often make the mistake of equating our political parties as Republican = Conservative and Labour = Democrat. This is a real misconception.

The Conservative Party is more like the Benedict Arnold Party or even Tea Party in the USA. Just check on the Private School backgrounds of most prominent members.....

We also have a Liberal Democrat Party which covers the 'middle ground' - a bit like American Democrats with Green issues (on steroids).

The Labour Party is now almost like what the Democrats would be if it wasn't for Republican control of your parliament. BUT used to be Socialist (that's not Reds under the beds). Think Trade Unions without organised crime.

That being absorbed if you are still following me the Guardian is a Respected Newspaper IF you are Labour, Liberal Democrat, Wholefood and Sandals Vegan etc. It is not for anyone from the Sensible Middle or Right.

WE have a simple way of telling if journalists are 'being economical with the truth' here, we just check if their mouths are open.....

Well done!

Your doubt about the NSA documents and their meaning as interpreted by Greenwald et al is understandable until you realize that the NSA has not invalidated any of the information they have revealed. Until the NSA and its cohort stop lying about what they are doing, I'll believe the worst of the agency which chooses to lie to congress and opposes any attempt by congress to exert effective oversight on the spy agency's lawbreaking which has never been demonstrated to do anything to improve our 'security'.

Your only beef seems to be that Greenwald is able to earn a living as a reporter. Concentrate on what he is telling you, don't savage the messenger.

Thanks for the reassurance.

I would hope that the NSA is sufficiently sophisticated that its malware doesn't slow my computer. If so, and as long as no rogue employee uses my credit card to buy blow-up dolls, I don't really care what they do.

I'm over it. We demand that our government keep us safe, and then we scream like children when it gets caught invading our so-called privacy to do so. Pick one. You can't have both.

Remember people who have nothing to hide, hide nothing.

I also hold NSA 100% responsible for all those odd numbered socks (w/o matching pairs) so many people seem to have amassed!
But (unlike you) I still can't make up my mind how Snowden will be portrayed in the history books of the future!

Bob, I was at Black Hat last year and saw Gen. Alexander when he flat-out lied about the surveillance program. I watched Snowden's SXSW interview online. If he were alive and had participated in the American Revolution, he would now be in the history books as a patriot.

Don't let the fact that someone in the media is trying to make a story juicy, distract from the good that Snowden did.

As you say, it's too easy to post the unlikely, making it appear factual and believable. Taking a step back from sensational stories like that, we've simply gotta ask the obvious: If true, the NSA would be swimming in an ocean of data, that would require hiring everyone tapped to sort through it all... kind of a self-defeating plan, I would think.

Dear Bob
I have also read the article and followed the links. Yes, it is a slightly breathless bit of reporting, and yes, the references are slides which "anyone could have created". But the terms (names, actions, &c.) in those slides often fit with those acknowledged to be used by the NSA; and generally the aims outlined certainly fit with what I would be trying to do if I worked for them and shared their outlook. The objectives of capturing choke points or introducing code into messages are undoubtedly part of the NSA's work. The "botnets" are perhaps a little excessive - but if one is adopting the methods of internet bad hats, why would one not go all the way?

I am not wholly persuaded but I am pretty sure that something like the article describes is indeed going on. Your attempt to ridicule the double slashes rather falls down when one notices the conventions employed even in genuine NSA documents.

Have you perhaps over-reacted somewhat, in a natural wish to defend the honour of your country? Perhaps you would like to rethink in view of the immense efforts taken by the NSa to achieve very little ( http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-13/nsa-data-has-no-discernible-impact-on-terrorism-report.html ) which would only make them more eager to go further - to the kind of operations here described; and in view of the CIA's attempts to bug and attack Congress as Senator Feinstein recently described ( http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/feinstein-cia-searched-intelligence-committee-computers/2014/03/11/982cbc2c-a923-11e3-8599-ce7295b6851c_story.html ).

As a Briton who is deeply ashamed of his country's behaviour, I write more in sorrow than in anger about what is happening to my American friends - and indeed to the rest of the world.

Thanks Bob, for bringing me back to my senses. Follow this for more, and better paranoia: http://newsletters.technologyreview.com/email/daily/all/20140318/

Name two people who have been innocently harmed by the NSA? I really think the American public (some) are mentally ill with suspicion. They just love the idea that the government is spying on them. It is a case of grandiose ego. Folks the NSA nor any computer could possible spy on the 300 million people. This is the fact. You, that's YOU, do not live lives to be spied on. You are nothing. No one cares about your life and what you are doing.

Why all the fuss? These two freelance writers are simply using the old proverbial tactic of telling the big lie loud enough and long enough, and the believers will line up in droves. Seems to work for the political parties.

It does do your heart good to know that so many people are concerned with the privacy rights of sleeper cell terrorists. Why should the government be permitted to know they are communicating with the known terrorists for instructions. I certainly don't want them to know how often I call out for pizza or that I'm looking for a new car. Who are all these complaining people calling that they don't want the government to find out about. If they are in a homegrown terrorist group training in the wilderness or if they're calling their buddies wife all the time, then they probably should be worried.

Are these the same people that think the moon landings were faked?

As for Snowden being considered a patriot if this were the American Revolutionary, so was Benedict Arnold, for a time.

I believe every word about the NSA malware. I came home early one day and found it in bed with my wife.

Bob! I think the problem starts with pop-up ADS. that grain access to your machine when you click on them to get rid of them. I just saw one but left it alone and it went away hopefully with out any information. I am paranoid about using my name so I use a pen name.

Bob, I've always wondered why the black helicopters circle my house when I'm on Facebook. Now since I've been reading your posts I've noticed they have been moving in closer and closer and there are more of them.

This thread contains many examples of John Kenneth Galbraith's somewhat convoluted aphorism:

"When faced with the choice of changing their minds or proving that it is unnecessary to do so, most people immediately get busy on the proof."

If you believe that the NSA is spying on you, what can you do about it? Worry; that is all.

If you don't believe it, you can be happy.

Choose wisely.

Given the battles they fought with the British Government and the right-wing press in persevering with the Snowden revelations,I would trust The Guardian more than I would trust ANY American newspaper.

May I suggest everyone watch the movie, Enemy of the State with Will Smith and Gene Hackman released in 1998.

Mr Snowden wasn't the first whistleblower of the NSA's shenanigans.

Quote:
Enemy of the State is a 1998 American spy-thriller about a group of rogue NSA agents who kill a US Congressman and try to cover up the murder. It was written by David Marconi, directed by Tony Scott, and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer.

As we now find out, the bad guys are anything BUT rogue but the NORM.

See more about how the movie came about, here.

http://nymag.com/news/frank-rich/enemy-of-the-state-2013-7/