[discuss] Artificial conflation of issues not helpful. [Was: Digest, Vol 3, Issue 67]

[Barry Shein]

It seems to me that NSA surveillance was an act of opportunity.

Tier 1, the huge pipes much of the internet passes through both w/in
the US and internationally, are largely run by US companies such as
Verizon and AT&T.

NSA had budget to pay these companies for taps into those bit streams.
And these companies seemed pretty cooperative.

And NSA had budget to store and analyze those bits.

Some estimates were that NSA was paying on the order of hundreds of
millions of dollars per year for taps.

The role of the DNS root in all this would be almost inconsequential
-- it helps identify where some of those bits are going but that's all
publicly accessible information, whois etc.

This is eavesdropping, plain and simple, albeit highly organized.

I also doubt it's peculiar to the US, other than perhaps the scope due
to the above-mentioned opportunity and money to invest in the project.

What was peculiar to the US was Edward Snowden spilling those
particular beans.

And, of course, a press able to chat that up, Glenn Greenwald and all
that.


1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tier_1_network

2. http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertlenzner/2013/09/23/attverizonsprint-are-paid-cash-by-nsa-for-your-private-communications/

or

   http://tinyurl.com/q74oa7u

3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenn_Greenwald#Global_surveillance_disclosure

or

   http://tinyurl.com/pqh8nds

-- 
        -Barry Shein

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