[SEJeff]

and much of the EU internet traffic, including to/from germany, goes through the UK. I'm not sure why I'm being downvoted for pointing out a relevant fact on US and western allies who share intel and basically have tapped most all of the fiber in the world via legal or illegal methods (per the snowden docs).

[wolfgke]

> and much of the EU internet traffic, including to/from germany, goes through the UK.

Indeed - and many German citizens who are interested in such topics find this concerning exactly because of Five Eyes.

My comment that Germany is not part of Five Eyes

> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19399560

refers to its grandparent

> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19398858

which I requote here:

"Western governments have historically been allied with and have had intelligence sharing and cooperation arrangements with the U.S.

There is a general alignment of Western intelligence agencies as a cooperative group against the antagonism of China (and Russia, NK, etc)

It isn't just "everybody spies" - it's "we are actively engaged in an adversarial relationship together against this other group"".

[SEJeff]

bingo. The BND and NSA work very closely together even if they aren't in FVEY. This is quite well known, but it makes a lot of sense in the face of Russian/NK/Chinese aggressions. As much as our president wants you to not believe, we are stronger together.