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Edward Snowden interview: 'Smartphones can be taken over' by GCHQ using activation programs (www.bbc.co.uk)
submitted 3 months ago by to c/privacy@lemmy.ml
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[–] 29 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (34 children)

All smartphones can be infected, and surveilled/controlled without pressing/downloading anything malicious. Israeli "security" companies (NSO among others) have been selling this malware for many years, to intelligence depts. Around the globe. Probably what got Khashoggi back when.

https://bdsmovement.net/Global-Day-Action-Against-Spyware (I don't have any dog in the Palestine/Israel conflict, and am very poorly informed on the matter).

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  • [–] 25 points 3 months ago (11 children)

    no dog in the "conflict"

    very poorly informed on the matter

    I somehow struggle to believe that you can possibly be poorly informed on the most livestreamed genocide in the history of humanity

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  • [+] -17 points 3 months ago (9 children)

    And we instantly switch to political bullshit. I also have no fucking clue about the Palestine situation. Yeah, I hear people mention it, and I find stuff about it while going over completely unrelated stuff, and I choose to remain ignorant in the topic because I refuse to add more stress to my life unless there is no other option. You choose to care/follow the topic? Good for you, enjoy OT, I don't.

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  • [–] 20 points 3 months ago (8 children)

    Imagine calling a genocide simply political bullshit, lol. How privileged you must be.

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  • [+] -12 points 3 months ago (5 children)

    I am privileged, with a will that allows me to remain away from bullshit if I choose to without caring if anyone gets offended by choices I make that happen to mine to make anyway.

    I feel sorry for the crowd that has to ne policing anything different than what they think because their lives are so empty they have nothing to fill them with so that is all they can try.

    That's a very sad way to live, so yeah, I guess I am privileged to not live like that.

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  • [–] 12 points 3 months ago (1 child)

    Our ability to think twice about an ongoing genocide is exactly the privilege being pointed out.

    This comment makes me think you might not be aware of that, but I get you probably feel attacked by people's reactions. Just know that everyone giving backlash is thinking that if you were well informed on the matter, you would think very differently.

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  • [–] 9 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    I feel sorry for most of the people in your life. Willful ignorance and selfishness sounds like they're a running theme in your existence.

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  • [–] 4 points 3 months ago (1 child)

    I upvoted you for one simple reason, you're onto something, in my opinion. While I don't think I'm selfish, because I do care and help when and where I can, I am extremely mindful of my self-preservation. Those things happening around the world which I mostly don't get (honestly, it's So complicated that I see no reason to even look that way) are super exhausting emotionally, as well as mentally taxing. Never mind what we're seeing here where everyone seems to have an opinion about me, my life and those that are part of it, without stopping to think if I have reasons for those choices or if I'm just a selfish prick that actually enjoys watching the world burn. Judgment has been passed on me already, as well as on anyone mildly in agreement with me. Think about it, does all that sound like a healthy way to spend time, risking more stress, potential emotional and/or mental consequences of any level? I honestly don't think so. If I can do something for someone, as long as it is not the least not detrimental to any part of my life, finances, family etc, I absolutely will, otherwise, I'm content with living my life to its fullest until it ends ignoring as much detrimental stuff as humanly possible. If that makes me look like the bad guy, I'm just thankful that none of the people that think so have any power to male my life better or worse.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 months ago

    Thank you for engaging in some self reflection, I really appreciate your response. Eventually world events, due to how interconnected we all are, will affect you. You might as well try and get as informed as you can (ignorance is bliss, but knowledge is power) before its on your door step. Think of how happy the Germans who ignored the holocaust were, until their country was literally firebombed into submission.

    Have a good weekend.

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  • [–] 9 points 3 months ago (21 children)

    I'm conflicted whether I should up vote or down vote your comment

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  • [–] 18 points 3 months ago (8 children)

    Downvote

    Dude is oblivious to a genocide and has no sides on the matter

    This is as evil as one can be

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  • [+] -14 points 3 months ago* (6 children)

    How the fuck did you come to that conclusion??!

    Time and place, this wasn't it. Bibi needs to face the ICC and Israel are commiting genocide.

    But don't forget that Hamas are a terrorist organization, and the Palestinian state oppress their own people by social control.

    Does that validate oppression and crimes against gumanity,? Of course not.

    Are you happy?

    When you grow up, you will realize the world is not black and white.

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  • [–] 9 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    Would you call the Warsaw ghetto uprising a terrorist organization?

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  • [–] 6 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (2 children)

    Hamas has many problems but that's all they have. Israel helped to create Hamas.

    There, your so beloved nuanced take. But one that doesn't disarm the oppresed people being systematically erased by evil colonizers and their critical supporters like you.

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  • [+] -4 points 3 months ago (2 children)
    [removed by mod]
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  • [–] -1 points 3 months ago (9 children)

    Why?

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  • [–] 9 points 3 months ago (1 child)

    Probably this bit:

    (I don’t have any dog in the Palestine/Israel conflict, and am very poorly informed on the matter).

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago

    I see that now. Maybe my bar for decency is too low because as non-ideal ignorance may be, at least they admitted it and just focused on Israeli spyware.

    Had it stopped there, I would have said the other initial responses were a tad unnecessarily harsh, but then the OP commenter dropped some real shitter takes.

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  • [–] 7 points 3 months ago* (6 children)

    a genocide was being live streamed on social media to millions of people and you're one of the people who somehow can't recognize it.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago (3 children)

    I am not the original commenter. This comment asking "why" was before the OP commenter "both-sides" the genocide with "muh khamas".

    At the time, OP commenter was just talking about Israeli spyware using BDS as a source while also letting us know they are uninformed about the genocide and thus don't have a stance. My understanding was that this was to deflect any criticism or accusations from Zionists for being biased.

    While it is not ideal, there are a million reasons why someone may be ignorant on a conflict, atrocity, phenomenon, etc. It could be willfull ignorance, it could be that their environment does everything possible to keep them ignorant; regardless, until I know the reason, I cannot judge them.

    What matters to me more is how they act with said ignorance. In this case, they initially said they are very poorly informed aka "I don't know". Instead of talking about what they don't know (genocide, settler-colonial conflict, Zionism, etc), they only spoke about what they do know (Israeli spyware).

    I think this is fine, especially since those who know they are ignorant and refuse to speak on what they don't know are generally open to learn or have any misconceptions corrected. I also have very low expectations of Amerikkkans from the land of the burger, home of the fries.

    This all is to say, this is why I was asking "why". My mind was focused on the spyware, and I was wondering why another commenter didn't like it. Was the information inaccurate?

    Since then, a lot of other commenters responded--I now understand why they take issue with the OP comment, though I believed the initial responses were unnecessarily harsh. However, the OP commenter, despite knowing full well their ignorance, dropped the "muh khamas" shitter nuke, so...

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago (2 children)

    i can't speak for the others who responded, but for me it's the i-don't-have-a-dog-in-this-fight perspective that they have because it's undeniable that the people they're enabling are causing this fight; but they're completely dismissive of the pain and suffering that their behavior is causing as if it didn't matter.

    it's a bit like how liberals become upset at conservatives for not giving af about something until it effects them. people who hold the not-my-problem attitude that op holds will eventually feel the effects; but they're such an overwhelmingly large portion of western society that iwe're all going to feel the effects when it happens.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago (1 child)

    That makes sense. It definitely takes a certain kind of privilege to be able to live with and afford such a blissfully ignorant stance.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago

    Privilege definitely plays a part and it's not blissful ignorance , it's willful ignorance -- they're choosing to ignore it and calling the people who won't ignore it tankies.

    And the smugness that the willful ignorance creates isn't helping anything either.

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  • [–] -3 points 3 months ago (1 child)

    How about "you're one of the few people that took it as yet another fucked up thing going on in the world, together with RAM chip shortages and kids with cancer, and decided to go on with your life?" Or is that an entirely infeasible event in your mind?

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  • [–] 4 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

    The foundational problem seems to be the willful ignorance in refusing to learn why we have RAM shortages and learn why we haven't cured cancer because it's all dismissed as "tankie nonsense" and instead ignored because "too stressful" or "too complicated".

    Then the doubling down makes it worse because the smugness about how well brainwormed they are by the global north echo chamber -- an echo chamber that's officially refuted by the government that's causing those RAM shortages and hasn't cured cancer because it's sending those resources to Israel to maximize oil an AI profits for the Epstein class.

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