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Comment by mysterydip | Hacker News Reader

This is well known but often ignored for convenience. Go to any restaurant in the DC area around lunchtime and you'd be amazed at what you can learn from the table next to you.

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Also true for the Caltrain, coffee shops, and nicer restaurants between SF and SJ. And SFO, SJC, and SEA airports; I think I hear some salesman loudly talking about a deal almost every time I fly out of those places on weekdays.

Yep. One of the first things I learned early in my careers is, when you're having lunch at a venue with your coworkers, if the subject turns to client work, do not ever mention the client's name out loud. You never know who might be sitting nearby.

So how about that fruit company’s new phone?

Yup, and I guarantee you foreign states send nosey-nellies to all these venues to do nothing but snoop on this stuff.

So, the guy at the end of the bar that everyone just passes off as the town drunk might actually just be a very cleverly disguised spy? I want that as my cover when I join a spy agency.

Usually it means you can't actually drink that much, so, watch what you wish for.

Fun fact: Using knowledge gained in this way isn't insider trading[1]. Conceivably a person could even sell tips based on information heard in public places to traders. During the golden age of Wall Street, this was extremely common. Traders or their lackeys would visit businesses (or the bars near them) and pump employees for info.

[1] Not a lawyer, not legal advice.

generally speaking it seems like it is insider trading in Europe and is not in the US.

It is insider trading if you get it by soliciting the information.

It is not insider trading if you get it by simply overhearing a public conversation.

It's insider trading if it's material and non-public. Solicitation has nothing to do with it.

In France, at least some authorities think it is insider trading:

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-03-29/deals-...

This is a pretty grey area. Would not recommend trading on the info.

How in the world would anyone prove that you traded on insider information that you overheard at a restaurant?

Just keep it to yourself. You might be investigated, but not a chance they will find enough to even think about prosecution.

What's even wackier is that in commodities trading, insider information was allowed.

The loophole was a key plot point in the movie "Trading Places" and when the 2010 financial overhaul rules were passed, this section was nicknamed "The Eddie Murphy Rule".

https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2013/07/09/200401407/epis...

Only wacky if you think insider trading is a bad thing. There's a pretty vocal minority of economist who thinks it does more harm than good.

One of the most objective summaries I've seen is from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta (1).

Subjectively: intentional or not, insider trading laws drastically protect and enhances wallstreet's information asymmetry advantage.

(1) https://www.frbatlanta.org/-/media/documents/research/public...

"insider trading" is one of funniest many exceptions to the rules of capitalism. Like someone said "The financial system works! you support companies you think will do good for profit! it's great, it will regulate itself! Only, you can only bet with bad information and we'll make great expense into regulating you are not using good info!.

My fiance worked for a movie theater in the DC area for a while. Once she found, left on the floor, a packet for an Afghanistan diplomat program put on by the US State department. Big itinerary with lots of names, dates, contact information, not just for the various stops and talks but for the people selected for the program. Nothing classified or obviously sensitive, but I'm sure someone with the interest could run through those contacts and come to a lot of conclusions about the US's foreign policy goals in the region. Or to follow these up-and-coming Afghanistan diplomats around on their trip to the US and maybe grab some blackmail.

That was a drop waiting to be picked up

Back in my Portland days I got the DL on some of Nike’s soon to be announced Jordan’s when an obviously high ranking Nike designer popped open his MacBook and proceeded to have a design review at a local coffee shop! Maybe not the most actionable information but kind of fun to see.

This is—no joke—one of the main reasons why tech companies feed their employees on campus.

I don't get that. I don't bring my laptop to lunch even in the office. Prior to this job, I had neither a laptop nor (paid) on-site lunch.

The GP is pointing out that companies may improve security by providing employees food on-site which reduces the exposure of business information to people who do not work for the company (insofar as people with access to the on-site food are a proxy for people employed by the company).

Probably helps with the IRS audits: oh, it’s not an employee benefit, it’s an employer benefit!

Awesome, did you work at Nike or Intel?

I worked for New Relic, although, no joke, probably 90% of the people on my block worked at Intel or Nike!

Years ago--as you would judge by the names--we were walking along 14th or 15th NW and my wife overheard the following snippet:

woman a: .... Anyway, that's what Bill said. woman b: But what did Hillary say?

A co-worker to whom I mentioned this suggested that perhaps the business improvement district hired actors to walk about and hold such conversations.

I watched a documentary once that described how corporations will hire people to eat Subway in public places or to talk loudly about things as a form of marketing. It’s profoundly dishonest

This has been done in Poland by Marek Falenta - private businessman. He did bribed waiters and wired popular restaurants in Warsaw to get material on businessman and politicians. It made a lot of noise - nothing top secret but enough of what politicians really say in private stuff to impact elections.

[1] https://kafkadesk.org/2019/06/13/polands-most-wanted-man-thr...

[2] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-10/polish-bu...

https://thefederalist.com/2018/11/07/incoming-democrat-chair...

Overheard on Amtrak in some cases (strange since Amtrak does offer roomettes).

No roomettes on the Acela. The NYC -> DC route only takes like ~4 hours

Hey don't undersell the one fast train in the USA: it's only ~3 hours! Plus there are now a handful of nonstop trips that take 2 hr, 35 mins [1].

[1] https://wamu.org/story/19/07/25/amtrak-launches-nonstop-acel...

A friend works in the city of London, he told me taxi drivers always have details about business deals that aren't yet public for the very same reason.

This is very much in the security training government and military have to take annually as well.

It’s even in corporate training to prevent revealing trade secrets accidentally.

It is, but people are terrible about it anyway. At a minimum, it is a field day for social engineering attacks because you can learn to speak in the languages / abstractions of that specific organization which automatically leads to trust-building.

can confirm that defense people are terrible about spilling a lot of details in public, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard an actual classified piece of info spoken in public

How would you know if the information you heard was classified or not ?

I’d imagine that if you happen to work in the industry, then you would know if what you were hearing was a problem.

From what I’ve read, those with clearances that hear something outside of a secure area are obligated to report it immediately.

I once sat at a bar next to a drunk guy who told me he was a Boeing engineer. He proceeded to describe to me how jet engines work, one limitation of common designs, and a way to work around it. I didn’t understand any of it. I got the impression he was very interested in his work and didn’t have people he could discuss this stuff with.

He then told me about a limitation with the SR-71 Blackbird (Apparently the panels of the body expand at high speed, so they have to be designed in a way where they have gaps and are leaky on the ground, until they reach sufficient speed.)

He said solving this problem would be a big deal. Then he wrote the word, “Aurora” on a napkin and immediately crumpled it.

Works in SF too

Reminds me of the nytimes journalist who overheard Ty Cobb (Trump's former lawyer) talking about the Russia investigation at a restaurant in DC: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/19/us/politics/isnt-that-the...

Airport lounges for sure

Except Founding Farmers.

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