The people I'm around in real life are convinced the government is recording everything

[Fumesucker]

It's not hard to work the conversation around to Affaire Snowden, I can be garrulous if I wish and I'm interested in what people think.

Not yet have I found someone who does or will categorically deny that the government would do such a thing and then lie about doing it.

The majority of them accept it as fait accompli; "Really, you have to ask?" <shrug>.

Not that everyone gives a damn mind you, even people you would think should care quite a bit just due to the nature of their occupation, people who should be professional paranoids.

The "gives a damn" people cut across the usual political lines I've noticed though.

[Turbineguy]

1. OK.....

The NSA spends about $10 billion per year on its operations. Let's say they spend half of it recording your telephone conversations. I conservatively estimate the number of phone lines and internet lines in the US at 1 billion.

So, the question is, can they record an entire year's phone conversations from you for 5 bucks per year?

[MineralMan]

2. No. And they're not recording phone calls, anyhow.

Anyone with half a brain would immediately see that would be a useless activity. The government has at least half a brain.

It costs much, much less to simple log all calls, since the telephone companies already do that for billing purposes. Then, if some connection to nefarious activity is found and connected to certain phone numbers, they can tap those phone lines to collect evidence, after receiving a warrant.

And that's exactly what they do. Nobody is taping every phone call made. All it takes is a little thought to understand why that is so.

[Fumesucker]

4. You are speaking to a point I did not make

My OP had nothing to do with the facts of the matter at all, it had to do with what people believe to be true.

You are usually more perceptive than this.

[MineralMan]

5. Someone posts. I reply.

If my post is not of use to you, then it is not of use to you.

You may wish to note that my reply was not to you in the first place. It was to another DUer. I replied to what that DUer posted, not to what you posted.

[Fumesucker]

14. Someone posts. I reply

Interesting how that works.

[Fumesucker]

3. My post wasn't about what is or isn't, it's about what people *believe* is so

I wasn't attempting to convince anyone of anything really, just reporting what I've heard.

There are plenty of other threads for arguing technical details but a terabyte hard drive is probably less than $50 in quantities and will hold 100,000 hours of phone conversation at 24 kbps MP3 which is fine for 300 Hz - 3 kHz phone bandwidth.

You can figure it out yourself here..


http://www.theaudioarchive.com/TAA_Resources_File_Size.htm

[Turbineguy]

6. I understood that.

People believe strange things.

[CakeGrrl]

7. They may or may not be. Snowden did not PROVE that NSA USES personal data

That seems to be taken here as a fait accompli by many people just because he implied they had the capability.

And some of those who support him are doing so to an almost fanatical degree, charging "McCarthyist" tactics if anyone dares question if he's actually on the up-and-up.

But back to topic, I'm sure the capabilities exist. People have been abusing powers at their disposal for a long time.

Now just because it CAN happen, DOES it?

Sometimes. Another post yesterday used MLK surveillance as an example. But the point is, he was a very high-profile target.

I believe lots of high-profile individuals or organizations have or are monitored.

I just don't think they're abusing the power to make mine or any other Joe Schmoe's life miserable or to mess with us at random just for shits and giggles.

[HardTimes99]

9. I think you raise a very important distinction: the government may well be capable of recording

every domestic phone call (I've seen arguments for and against the possibility of that capability), but that does not necessarily mean the government is using that capability. Now rogue agents within that government or working for private contractors . . .

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

10. They are harvesting, storing, and analyzing all of it

According to the top secret docs and the whistle blowers who used to work with the data.

[HardTimes99]

20. "harvesting, storing and analyzing all of it" - that's quite a mouthful and I suppose

one agrees or disagrees with you, depending upon how you define your terms, starting with that pesky little pronoun 'it'.

Thus far, it seems to me, we have Snowden's assertions and, to a lesser extent, the assertions of the other NSA leakers\whistleblowers. We do not have hard and fast evidence that those assertions are 'true' in any meaningful sense of the term. Or, rather, the things Snowden has asserted that we know are true (like FISA warrants for telephony metadata), we already knew to be true and so Snowden has told us nothing 'new.' And the things Snowden asserts or suggests that we do not know to be true (like whether NSA analysts can tap into any phone call they wish) we have to rely on our common sense and, to a lesser but significant extent, those experts we can trust.

Having worked in both IT and telecom and knowing the history of our government with regard to spying on its own population, I tend to give Snowden the benefit of the doubt, make no mistake. But I would never go so far as to say that any of these nefarious assertions have been proven in any meaningful way.

If you have links or information that I need in order to adjust my thinking on these issues, I would dearly love to see them and will respond politely and respectfully.

[CakeGrrl]

15. Exactly.

Snowden IS a rogue element who abused the access privileges he was given. And he's dealing this data to foreign countries - NOT muckracking or whistleblowing.

[HardTimes99]

19. We have no evidence that Snowden is 'dealing this data' to anyone other

than Greenwald. Unless you are privy to information I have not seen.

While the evidence is still out on whether he is a 'whistleblower' as the statutes define it, I think it is fair at this point to call Snowden a 'leaker' in the same way that Ellsberg was a 'leaker' of the Pentagon Papers.

What I heard Snowden say was that analysts could, i.e., were able to, tap into any call they desired, not that the NSA as a policy was so doing. One thing to come out of Snowden's leaks is the need for way more robust oversight. If what Snowden alleges is true.

I take it you clearly disapprove of Snowden's leaking, as is your right. I have mixed feelings, but right now I would have to say that I approve of Snowden's leaks, based on what I have read and seen thus far. There's simply no such thing as too much oversight when potential invasions of people's privacy are at stake.

[Fumesucker]

17. I read recently that Target can tell when a customer is pregnant very early in the gestation

There's a great many Americans whose lives have been deliberately ruined by the government for trivial and completely wrongheaded reasons.

Watching the savagery of a certain plurality of our politicians I'm by no means assured that government is even mostly benign.

[Electric Monk]

22. Ah yes, analytics. When you know what patterns of patterns to look for, it makes a huge difference.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/magazine/shopping-habits.html

[treestar]

21. True

What can the government even get from tapping the phones of Joe Schmoe? It's silly. If abusing their powers, it would be Muslims. Maybe white supremacists. And some of those would be good cause for wiretapping.

[HardTimes99]

8. It's not so much whether the government can or is recording every telephone call, it's more

that L'affaire Snowden is providing a portal for people's latent and not-so-latent distrust of government to find expression.

To anyone who says, "I have nothing to fear because I have nothing to hide," you might try asking them for their email username and password. My guess is that they take their right to privacy a lot more seriously than their cavalier dismissal of concerns about its violation would seem to suggest.

Definitely reccing your OP; I hope it prompts a robust and fascinating conversation here.

[On the Road]

11. It Is Adopting a Pose of False Sophistication

which they may feel is necessary due to their not actually knowing much about the issue. To be fair, it's been extremely difficult even for political junkies to translate the hyperbole and understand what is being done. And most people just remember a sound bite or political cartoon.

[Fumesucker]

16. Is true sophistication then to believe that government would never, ever spy and lie?

Or is true sophistication to wait and see for evidence that may never be definitive either way?

[On the Road]

23. Yes, That is Exactly the Argument You Hear:

"Oh, I don't want to be naive or unsophisticated. It's all corrupt. They're all a bunch of criminals."

Now you can't blame anyone for being suspicious. The problem occurs when suspicions based on ignorance and insecurity are given the weight of belief, adopted as a worldview, and provided as an answer for any question to which the answer is not known and cannot be observed.

As a reality test, when you hear some version of this argument ("they're all liars&quot , does it usually come from the most or the least knowledgable people in the discussion?

[RobertEarl]

12. Indeed

What you have found is that, inherently, the mass of people are not stupid.

They KNOW.

They also know that it is a numbers game. Meaning the more numbers there are, the harder it is to get to the bottom where most of us reside.

What they don't know is that computers - massive computers and whiz-kid geeks who run those computers - are working to find the bottom and be able to detail just what the bottom, from the top down, is doing, day in and day out.

BTW: I love government. Just have a few questions about how it operates.

[Rex]

13. We got use to being spied upon illegally by the BFEE.

Now that it is legal to do so, people are just shrugging their shoulders and admiting we live in a Big Brother nation like it was matter of fact and no big deal.

[Whiskeytide]

18. /Priority Message/ Alert:

... /hijack account - Code 441//delete cookies//Post message/:

Tell Tom and Gloria that we're not listening to them at all. Talk about boring lives. Suzy, Chris and Curtis - we're keeping an eye on them, but doesn't look like much is happening there either, except that Suzy has been sending a lot of texts to Curtis after hours, and /agent ID deleted/ is seeing a communication signature that her husband is catching on. You could mention to Sam that he needs to drop a few lbs and cut down on the sweets - Dr. Wisenhunt told him that at his last check-up. His sugar levels are getting too high. Stay away from Burt.

Thanks,
Your personal NSA operative.
"We Hear the Voice of the People - Everyday"

/End message//Restore Account/

[shneepsen]

24. Re: The people I'm around in real life are convinced the government is recording everything

I'm almost certain the government keeps tabs on the stories in lives of criminals and people of that nature. Anyone who's committed an offense of some sort is a criminal in the eyes of the government, who are thus given any reason to watch over the people.

What comes to mind is the media-driven ideal of living in a constant dream-like state, where recurrent and lucid dreams are more possible and more common. Think Alice in Wonderland and mind control. This is where I want to know more -- how they've been able to hide fact of surveillance from us for so long, and in a joking manner. Now people are left dumbfounded and those of us that know are seemingly helpless. It's all a big charade..

Anyone on the same wavelength??

[shneepsen]

25. Is there any evidence of this?

Would be interesting to learn more about how they do that.