Reading your email..

[MikeGTi]

To be fair, a lot worse has happened to Brazillian citizens transiting through London.

[Cupramax]

MikeGTi said:

To be fair, a lot worse has happened to Brazillian citizens transiting through London.

I'm not sure the one you're referring to was "transiting".

[Tonsko]

Er...
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-08-19/uk-govern...

Edited by Tonsko on Tuesday 20th August 07:49

[TonyRPH]

article said:

Miranda, a Brazilian citizen in transit from Berlin to Brazil, said he was released without charge after nine hours of questioning but minus his laptop, cellphone and memory sticks.

Surely the NSA will know that Miranda had already transferred any data he had via other means, so confiscating his laptop and memory sticks was a futile act?

[scorp]

TonyRPH said:

Surely the NSA will know that Miranda had already transferred any data he had via other means, so confiscating his laptop and memory sticks was a futile act?

I'd like to think our intelligence services actually possess some intelligence so would put this down to making an example for future journalists.

[Justin Cyder]

What this boils down to is an already questionable law - questionable as in it seeks to deny basic rights such as access to legal representation, the right to silence - being abused. This, as George Orwell would have had it, is literally double bad. A bad law, abused.

It strikes me as a clumsy attempt to stick it to someone perceived as an anti establishment figure and an abuse of power rolled into one. Let's hope there's a few sweaty palms in Whitehall & Scotland Yard this morning as there sure ought to be.

[anonymous-user]

Tonsko said:

Er...
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-08-19/uk-govern...

Edited by Tonsko on Tuesday 20th August 07:49

If that is true then it is extremely disturbing.

[RealSquirrels]

it is true, it was reported in a guardian editorial.

[MikeGTi]

RealSquirrels said:

it is true, it was reported in a guardian editorial.

Also reported by The New York Times.

[anonymous-user]

I doubt The Guardian have been put off by this tactic.

[Tonsko]

scorp said:

I'd like to think our intelligence services actually possess some intelligence so would put this down to making an example for future journalists.

I don't think that's as evident as you may think: exhibit 1: Making the Graun smash all it's machines up in the basement, despite it being pointed out to them that the Snowden reporting is done out of the New York office.

Unless they knew that, and it was more of a warning.

[anonymous-user]

See also

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

[Mr_B]

Cupramax said:

MikeGTi said:

To be fair, a lot worse has happened to Brazillian citizens transiting through London.

I'm not sure the one you're referring to was "transiting".

It loses something when you say illegal immigrant.

[RealSquirrels]

NinjaPower said:

I doubt The Guardian have been put off by this tactic.

as their editor pointed out, it makes no sense: most of the coverage was published from new york. the journalist who wrote it lives in brazil. the company has legal entities in several different countries worldwide. the information is stored in many different places around the world.

[raftom]

Well the Guardian and NYT just released the hounds:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/05/nsa-g...
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/06/us/nsa-foils-muc...

Some awkward moments waiting for Obama tomorrow at G20

[Art0ir]

raftom said:

Well the Guardian and NYT just released the hounds:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/05/nsa-g...
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/06/us/nsa-foils-muc...

Some awkward moments waiting for Obama tomorrow at G20

Suspected for a long time by a lot of people as soon as they started playing with supercomputers, good to see it confirmed though.

I'm very interested to see the technological implications of all of this and what direction things will go.

[0000]

I can't see there being many technological implications.

It underlines that the maths behind the cryptography is essentially sound but that where there are weaknesses they can exploit them and where they can use a back door they will. Mitigations are to not use hosting companies you can't trust, choose long password lengths, large key sizes, implementations that have passed years of review, private keys kept securely, CSPRNGs, etc. But none of that is new.

I can imagine the few people concerned enough will stop using SaaS implementations from Google, Facebook, Microsoft et al. though.

[Tonsko]

I think the main issue is that they've put the backdoors in there, working with vendors. It was tried with the clipper chip back in the mid 90s iirc and there was a massive outcry. Looks like they learned and did it anyway, but more quietly and with software, rather than hardware.

[XCP]

I am slightly ashamed that I understand virtually nothing of that paragraph! However, GCHQ and others snooping? I thought that was what they were there for.

[RealSquirrels]

on people suspected of something, not on everyone.