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Comment by rdl | Hacker News Reader

Interesting that he now calls Snowden a traitor for the China-specific intel turned over, while supporting him broadly otherwise. Pretty much the same line I'd draw (although I think he should have gone to IG/Congress rather than the media, but with the threat of going to media if no action taken. It's possible he went to IG/Congress already, but I don't think so.)

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Giving up British intelligence for the G20 surveillance is also probably crossing the line.

If developed countries can't trust each other not to spy on their diplomats where does that leave us?

I guess they should all assume they are being spied on at all times while on foreign soil, but airing that in public is likely to worsen his chance of avoiding jail time—or worse.

I have ~no problem with gov on gov spying. I actually have more problem with China's spying on US companies for commercial reasons than China's spying on the USG. USG spying on private individuals might be worse than China spying on USG from an abstract moral perspective.

I'd argue that US v USSR spying during the Cold War, particularly PHOTOINT and SIGINT and other forms of technical intelligence, largely averted a global thermonuclear war. Gov v Gov spying is just another form of transparency. (obviously as a US citizen I'd prefer the US to have an edge there, but generally for something like Brazil v Argentina I don't particularly care)

It's worth noting that, with "gov on gov spying", identifying enemy agents isn't all that easy and effectively requires well... a surveillance state spying on its own citizens.

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It doesn't require anything. The government didn't need Big Brother powers to play the spy game during the Cold War.

Intelligence and counterintelligence are two different things.

HN loves wikipedia pages lately. If anyone is interested in a fascinating example of this blurry line between spying and transparency that rdl brings up check out:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_on_Open_Skies

This has long been recognised, and sometimes even codified. For example there is the Treaty on Open Skies, under which member states allow each other unarmed surveillance flights over their territories.

If developed countries can't trust each other not to spy on their diplomats where does that leave us?

It leaves us precisely where we are - developed countries have been spying on each others' diplomats and using their diplomats for spying for, well, just about ever.

US Secretary of State Henry Simpson famously said "Gentlemen don't read each other's mail" some 80 odd years ago. A quaint attitude, even back then.

There's a difference in knowing how the sausage is made. I'm certainly not naive enough to think that governments aren't always spying on each other's diplomats, however the appearance that the UK and US went to pretty crazy lengths to keylog and tricks G20 diplomats into giving up intel out in the public could have some pretty negative implications for diplomatic discourse down the road.

Oh, agreed that it's quite unhelpful and Snowden revealing details about such activities is a pretty terrible idea. On the other hand, such revelations in general aren't all that new or rare - the most recent one probably being about US spying on UN diplomats just a couple of years ago. Beside light spattering of egg on some faces and a bit of ritualized indignant posturing, though, this sort of thing doesn't seem to cause much lasting damage to the global system of international diplomacy, probably because everyone knows everyone is doing it.

First, I suspect that Snowden revealing these details is not that harmful. The fact is, I think everyone would expect that everyone keeps track of everyone's diplomats. That's just the way the world works. Additionally, hacking into network backbones in China? Is there anybody out there that was aware of the NSA's activities over the last few decades that doesn't immediately assume that they do? Or is this news to those who didn't read about the NSA tapping into undersea cables back in the 1990's?

In other words, the details Snowden has given are largely harmless affirmations of what everyone probably knows already. They don't cause significant harm to our diplomatic relations. They don't cause significant harm to our intelligence.

I suspect given his moves so far, he agrees with my assessment above, so the question is, what is he doing with them? I don't think that is a hard question to answer. He's making public what those in power have assumed is the case for a long time in order to send signals to all sides that he knows a lot more than he is saying. In essence he's upping the ante regarding any indictment and extradition request.

He's sending a threat to the US: Try to extradite me and maybe I will spill your secrets, real ones, not the ones hidden in plain view I have been talking about so far.

He's also sending a message to China: I know enough to be valuable.

Time will tell what happens. However this follows on "I chose Hong Kong because of their tradition of free speech and rule of law."

This totally follows his strategy of pitting the US against China, and Hong Kong against both.

Well, I think I already agreed in the post you're replying to that these sort of revelations are not particularly harmful to any of the state actors involved.

They are, though, tremendously harmful to him and his purported cause - to the point that I have a very difficult time seeing this as some part of an intelligent, well-considered strategy. Should he ever end up in a US court, any hope of lenient treatment or something like an eventual presidential commutation or pardon is well out the window - you can't be both a principled defender of civil liberties and a low-grade spy. Worse is the damage to his credibility as a person acting out of conscience - he's handing his detractors a complete gimme and even giving his potential supporters serious pause. In the interview linked, William Binney straight up calls him a traitor and it's pretty tough to portray William Binney as some pliant NSA stooge.

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