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[+] -55 points 4 months ago (23 children)
  • [–] 21 points 4 months ago (6 children)

    made us more vulnerable to threats

    How so?

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  • [+] -35 points 4 months ago (5 children)
  • [–] 19 points 4 months ago (2 children)

    Is there any particular piece of information that he revealed which could have been used by anyone really to... I dunno... bypass defenses or take advantage of people or whatever in some a way that could actually hurt people?

    I dunno. Everything I've heard is that everything that he leaked that has been released was super innocuous militarily (not that the military is a bunch of knights in shining armor or anything) or national-defense-wise. It is (or at least should be) very embarrassing to the U.S. "intelligence apparatus". And it's clearly good reason to believe that Uncle Sam clearly doesn't have our (American's) best interests at heart. But what could possibly have even hypothetically been used to cause any harm?

    (And, I don't know, maybe you know something I'm unaware of, but it really seemed like he went out of his way to avoid any harm to anything but the reputation of the intelligence industrial complex. And maybe a few presidents.)

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (1 child)

    He didn't sanitize names, addresses, or active locations of the individuals involved in the work he was exposing. He made each of them a direct target.

    Most people who are critical of him from an educated place instead of one based on feels do so because of that. That wasn't necessary to get his point across, it was sloppy and reckless, and completely unnecessary. People who call him a terrorist usually are the ones who believe there's no way you could be so reckless and instead attribute it to malicious ulterior motives of trying to get people killed.

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  • [–] 21 points 4 months ago

    Every other nation's intelligence services already know all of that stuff. All he did was reveal it to the American people. Intelligence classifications are meant to keep YOU from knowing

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  • [–] 20 points 4 months ago

    It may seem like not much changed, but it was one of the motivating factors for the big push for TLS everywhere after it was revealed that PRISM was tapped into and mirroring unencrypted communications. Also Signal probably wouldn't be as popular as it now, with people still using unencrypted communications.

    One of the NSA's missions is to protect all of the federal government's computer networks from cyber-terrorism. You could argue that in light of what Snowden revealed, the increased focus of security and encryption did more to protect all of the federal government's computer networks from cyber-terrorism than any other NSA initiative ever.

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  • [+] [S] 24 points 4 months ago* (12 children)
  • [–] -2 points 4 months ago (11 children)

    So you were fishing for confirmation rather than looking for opinions? Don't ask a polarizing question if you can't stomach the answers you don't agree with.

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  • [–] 9 points 4 months ago (3 children)
  • [+] [S] 17 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (6 children)
  • [+] -6 points 4 months ago (5 children)

    It wasn't my comment. And if it was, my point still stands. Don't ask questions if you don't want to hear opposing answers.

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  • [+] [S] 11 points 4 months ago* (4 children)
  • [+] -11 points 4 months ago (3 children)

    You didn't just respond. You immediately went feral. Like I said, you weren't looking for responses, you were looking for confirmation of your views. When you didn't get it, you lashed out like a child.

    You can respond however you want, but actions have reactions, and this is that.

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