[grey-area]

Having Merkle's cell phone? During the Eurozone crisis? It would have been awful (financially) for the United States not to have that information.

The cost of this sort of machiavellian policy is of course the opprobrium of former allies and friends, and a loss of moral standing.

The US loses a lot of soft power if it chooses this route, and the consequences will be felt for decades in mistrust and distance from her allies. A dangerous course both for the US and for the world.

[xnull2guest]

I fluxuate with how I feel about it (it = 'machiavellian policy'). I'm not going to defend US policy in this case, nor claim to understand all of the nuances required to make global strategic geopolitical decisions.

But I will say that the NSA's perspective is that: it is only because of the Snowden leaks if we have lost face with allies. To the NSA, the secrets were kept well enough until Snowden and friends disclosed them.

This is my basic issue with this article. America and the NSA ate mud pie for the actions disclosed in the leaks. This article has the very real possibility of doing a lot more damage. One could say it is good because justice has been served, but one could also suggest that it is bad because similar disclosures of German surveillance programs (a touchy subject given the history), Chinese capabilities, Russian objectives etc haven't been disclosed by a Snowden-like actor.

Really the whole situation is bad. I don't like being at war, cyber or otherwise.

[grey-area]

This is my basic issue with this article. America and the NSA ate mud pie for the actions disclosed in the leaks. This article has the very real possibility of doing a lot more damage.

Not because of the leaks, but because of their actions. That's an important distinction.

If you take actions like this, you should be prepared for them to be exposed, and if you use the argument the NSA and you yourself have made here (it would be ok if we were evil and no-one knew about it), you should expect no one to trust you. You've just declared yourself untrustworthy and a bad ally in perpetuity, because you think this is ok as long as no-one knew about it.

[xnull2guest]

> Not because of the leaks, but because of their actions. That's an important distinction.

Right. I agree with that. There's actually sort of a boolean AND. Because we did them AND we got caught.

My guess is that all major players are doing the same stuff and that if the US doesn't participate it loses. I doubt the US hacked Germany on a whim - I bet it was a pretty labored decision with cost-benefit analysis (one being chance of getting caught).

[meowface]

>But I will say that the NSA's perspective is that: it is only because of the Snowden leaks if we have lost face with allies. To the NSA, the secrets were kept well enough until Snowden and friends disclosed them.

Of course that's their perspective, as is the perspective of anyone committing an embarrassing or morally unscrupulous act.

"The thing I regret most is getting caught."

Secrets of this nature have a tendency to leak. If it wasn't Snowden, it could've been anyone else.

I don't think all of the NSA's capabilities or actions should be leaked, but reporting of confirmed infiltrations of US and allied companies and systems is fine by my book. All's fair in love and war, but we are not at war with Germany or Brazil or, hopefully, ourselves.

[xnull2guest]

> the perspective of anyone committing an embarrassing or morally unscrupulous act

In this instance it was embarrassing because it brought into question how well the US would be able to keep secret strategic information.

And yeah hacking into allies is pretty unscrupulous. A bunch of the Snowden leaks showed that Israel, France, Germany and others have hacked into us.

It's the way it all works.

> Secrets of this nature have a tendency to leak. If it wasn't Snowden, it could've been anyone else

There were many such leaks, e.g. Binney.

> reporting of confirmed infiltrations of US and allied companies and systems is fine by my book

I agree wholeheartedly with this.

[MisterWebz]

> ... Germany and others have hacked into us.

Could you elaborate? As far as I know, Germany has some kind of agreement to not spy on the US.

[xnull]

Found the reference to Israel/France, looking for Germany references.

http://hbpub.vo.llnwd.net/o16/video/olmk/holt/greenwald/NoPl... (pg 40/125)

Why the downvote here? The comment contributes to the conversation...

[meowface]

This PDF does not appear to have searchable text.

Could you provide direct citations or quotes of allied countries infiltrating our government or private infrastructure? Excluding Israel, because they have the same mindset as the NSA/CIA (in which case I also don't take issue with us hacking Israel).