Edward Snowden's New Job: Tech Support 328
Nerval's Lobster writes "Government whistleblower Edward Snowden, exiled in Russia after releasing top-secret documents about the National Security Agency's surveillance activities to the press, has a new job: tech support. Snowden's lawyer, Anatoly Kucherena, told the Associated Press that his client starts work Nov. 1 for a "major" Russian Website, which he declined to name. In June, Snowden—a former CIA employee who worked as a contractor for the NSA—began feeding an enormous pile of classified charts and documents about federal surveillance programs to The Guardian and other newspapers. Many of those documents suggested that the NSA, ordinarily tasked with intercepting communications from terrorists and foreign governments, collects massive amounts of information on ordinary Americans, which in turn ignited a firestorm of controversy. The Snowden revelations have continued into this week, with The Washington Post reporting that the NSA has aggressively targeted Google and Yahoo servers. Snowden's documents suggest that the agency has figured out how to tap the links connecting the two tech giants' datacenters to the broader Web. Google told the Post that it was "troubled" by the report. A Yahoo spokesperson insisted that the company had "strict controls in place to protect the security of our datacenters" and that "we have not given access to our data centers to the NSA or to any other government agency.""
idiot (Score:5, Insightful)
since the u.s. claims global jurisdiction over its citizens regardless of where they travel to or reside, and he is still one, now he's gonna have to file taxes.... that means if they don't know it yet, by april 15th, the feds will know his address... and if he doesn't file, he can then be arrested on tax evasion.. even if what he's done already ends up being legal whistleblowing.
Re:Thanks to him (Score:5, Insightful)
He's just the messenger. Whether it gets safer or not is up to us now.
Re:SNOWDEN !! DOUBLE-AGENT ?? (Score:5, Insightful)
But answer this: if he WERE a double agent, SO WHAT? Does that make the data he got wrong? No. Does it make what the documents say a good thing for the NSA to do? No.
So *even if* you're right and Snowden is a double agent, that has no bearing WHATSOEVER about the crimes the revelations have documented.
You don't get it. It is not about the data. At this moment the global attention is aimed at the NSA, and it says: "NSA = bad" and "Snowden = good". Some people just want to turn that around, and make it "Snowden = bad", and make people forget about the NSA.
It's really that simple.
Re:Thanks to him (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:permissions (Score:5, Insightful)
If your data's are completely legitimate and show no wrongdoing from the company part, I don't think you should be afraid of him working for your company. A whist-blower is not someone who like to share your data, it is someone who can't bear all the wrongdoing you/your company are doing that he don't see other way to make you stop doing it than showing it to the world hoping that you will change. Generally they are people who have a high level of moral integrity.
You merkins. (Score:2, Insightful)
When China wiretaps and cracks US systems, it's an act of war.
When the USA wiretaps and cracks soverign states like Germany, it's "Well, they're spies! Whadayuhexpect?".
Re:IT support (Score:5, Insightful)
Much more likely it is an NSA/GCHQ malware USB stick given they have been caught red handed spying at the G20 [theguardian.com]. Even going as far as setting up dummy internet cafes which are a lot more expensive than distributing a few USB sticks.
Accusing Russia at this point of a few malware USB sticks without presenting any hard evidence is really just lame and shows how desperate they are to divert media attention off their own despicable actions (i.e. spying for industrial and economic espionage purposes, G20 has nothing to do with terrorism).
Step forward with the hard evidence if your trying to justify your own criminal actions by accusing others of what you have been caught doing... and even if true it hardly excuses the fact.
Re:Hell Desk (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:SNOWDEN !! DOUBLE-AGENT ?? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry you love the Federal Government so much, but Snowden is a patriot standing up for the ideals on which the USA was founded. Deal with it.
Re:A bunch of lying liars who lie (Score:5, Insightful)
What I took away from the Yahoo comment was how it was worded vs the Snowden revelation. "We have not given access to our data centers to the NSA or to any other government agency." However, the Snowden leak said that the cables to the data centers were tapped. The NSA wouldn't need access to the physical servers if they could just grab a copy of all data heading into and out of the data center. Now, this could have been done without Yahoo knowing or it could have been done with their help (but without giving access to the data center to allow for plausible deniability should the story get out).
Re:IT support (Score:1, Insightful)
You're an idiot if you feel like the outrage being expressed here is somehow the result of ignorance. You're even more of an idiot if you think your cynical-by-default position makes you not an idiot.
Re:permissions (Score:4, Insightful)
THIS a thousand times.
IF the internet had a "punch in face" button, I'd be pressing it a few times for the next person who tries to debate torture, spying and why we shouldn't be pushing green tech yesterday. There's debatable points, but some things aren't up for debate.
The NSA is doing the wrong thing, and it isn't even after bad guys -- it's clear they were on the path of control and a lot of their data was going to be used for Corporate Espionage. Stop pretending that the CIA and these other three-letter companies haven't gone well past their original purpose and into the deep end. The number of people doing the wrong thing doesn't justify doing the wrong thing -- they just have a lot of cover and finger pointing exercises.
Re:No. He did not (Score:3, Insightful)
"Snowden did transition from a whistle blower to a spy though"
No. He did not.
He was a whistleblower and remains a whistleblower.
He did. Initially the U.S. media were supportive of him as a whistleblower. Their owners and editors then had their briefing, and suddenly actions that were pro-american whistleblowing were anti-american spying.
So yes, he didn't change, but the media's portrayal of him did, and that's what's important.
Yes, the U.S. media, now there is a group that sticks up for the rights of the people over the government & corporations. And yes, I am being really fucking sarcastic when I say that. Who the fuck do you think the U.S. Media works for, and why the fuck do you think Snowden ignored them and went to the Guardian?