I think we have to accept that these intelligence agencies are effectively untouchable and here to stay. With that in mind I think it boils down to: who can do the most harm by spying on you:
- a country thousands of miles away which you probably have no connection to and don't visit
- the country you live in
I said in another comment but it bears repeating - I don't want anyone spying on me, but I am losing no sleep over Chinese intelligence, I am an extremely uninteresting target for them. If a Chinese agent is watching me die repeatedly in Elden Ring, looking at webcam footage of me gawping at my monitor while I scroll HN, or checking the stupid FB messages I send to my friends they'll realise pretty quickly I'm not worth the bandwidth or the storage space. A local agency might be interested in those FB messages, especially if I was politically active, vocally against the government and I was trying to organize protests or strike action.
Democracy. Vote. Free expression. Tell the people what is happening and why privacy is important.
> Were either reined in at all after the Snowden leaks,
Yes.
> or was it business as usual after things calmed down a bit?
No.
> I think we have to accept that these intelligence agencies are effectively untouchable and here to stay.
We do not. They are not. Apathy is toxic. The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good to do nothing.
> With that in mind I think it boils down to: who can do the most harm by spying on you: - a country thousands of miles away which you probably have no connection to and don't visit - the country you live in
China is our single greatest geopolitical adversary. Psyops are real. The ability to influence the public opinion of a geopolitical adversary supports the Chinese salami slicer strategy. It’s reinforced by understanding their adversaries electorate.
> I said in another comment but it bears repeating - I don't want anyone spying on me,
Same.
> but I am losing no sleep over Chinese intelligence,
You probably should be.
> I am an extremely uninteresting target for them.
We are all interesting targets. They may not assassinate, extort, or disappear you in the middle of the night but they can change your opinions without you even noticing.
> If a Chinese agent is watching me die repeatedly in Elden Ring, looking at webcam footage of me gawping at my monitor while I scroll HN, or checking the stupid FB messages I send to my friends they'll realise pretty quickly I'm not worth the bandwidth or the storage space.
Why would an individual agent need to look at anything? People aren’t interesting. We’re all basically the same. But if they know you play Elden Ring and browse HN they can tailor an effective message to you and everyone like you.
> A local agency might be interested in those FB messages, especially if I was politically active, vocally against the government and I was trying to organize protests or strike action.
Yes and that’s an illegal abuse of power. One that can be remedied in a court of law.
edit: you deleted your reply before I could post mine. It seemed like I pissed you off a bit so I was trying to clarify and apologise a bit. Here's what I wrote:
> You did though
Well I said that they're untouchable and was then trying to clarify that we should still be pretty pissed off about it. I wrote the original at half-past midnight, it was a little clumsily worded. But you do have to accept that they are currently nearly untouchable and effectively operate outside the law and that right now you can do very little at all about what data is being collected on you.
> I don’t think that is a favorable interpretation
I don't think it is unfavourable at all, the only thing you've really stated there about why you'd be worried about any Chinese intelligence is that they can manipulate your beliefs without your knowing. You have to admit that there's at least a bit of a similarity with the hysteria around communist brainwashing.
I'm sorry for causing any offence, I know it's not nice to feel like someone's accusing you of being a fervent nationalist (not my intent) but as an outsider your last couple of comments do have that air of "America is just ... better" and contained a slightly naive belief that you'd have any kind of hope taking on NSA or any other big TLA. I'll grant that what China would do with the data it collects on its citizens is likely far more severe than what the USA would (e.g. I don't think you're gonna be locked up for posting a an anti-Biden meme in USA, but sharing Xi Jinping as Winnie the Pooh in China will get you in a lot of hot water) so if that's what you meant then fair enough. I still don't think Chinese spying should be higher up on your list of worries than NSA spying - and in the grand scheme of things there are things you can worry about that you can actually change.
Give me an example of Americans who have been materially harmed by those agencies? And what was the damage?
Have Americans been oppressed, slandered for political gain, wrongly imprisoned, illegally targeted by police because of NSA activity?
I think it's doubtful for anything other than a few incidents; the proportionality of these tradeoffs does matter as these agencies do actually go after bad people. Like people selling sanctioned gear to Russia, money laundering, sex trafficking, etc. you know - 'bad things'.
I don't see professors disappearing because they said something on campus Biden didn't like.
Naively, one might say "ah but that ended in 1971!" - but let me put it this way: if you spotted a cockroach in your house, you'd be a fool to think that was the only one.
Also: the oversight/limits you're protected by could disappear some day, they're imaginary and socially constructed. Sure, you trust our current government to handle these powers responsibly, (though you really shouldn't, see above), but why are you so confident you can trust _tomorrow's_ government?
~ Senator Chuck Schumer on why publicly criticizing the intelligence community is a poor choice for a politician
> but there's still better mechanisms for reigning them
If we learned anything from the last half-century, it's that this predicate is just comically wrong.
Why? What has china done that's worse? Did they nuke a country? Wipe out entire races of people? Did those nasty chinese invade dozens of countries? There is nothing inherent in a western democracy that makes it good.
> Our intelligence agencies are out of control but there's still better mechanisms for reigning them in than China.
There are no mechanisms for controlling any intelligence agencies. All intelligence agencies around the world are state actors. No law applies to them. Ask the people the intelligence agencies murdered, drugged, experimented on, etc.
Unless you are chinese, you are far better off being "spied on" by the chinese than a western democracy because the chinese don't have any jurisdiction over you. This is all common sense. China isn't going to arrest you and put you in jail. A western democracy will though.
Unless you’re Chinese. Now that we know China has secret police stations all round the world.
