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Comment by streetnigga | Hacker News Reader

How on Earth are you parsing my comment where highlighting a Chinese hardware maker's US arm is stating that 100% of the hardware has been backdoored by the NSA? I didn't even mention the agency. Just US domestic operations of a Chinese hardware maker.

I was nice enough to cite the persons and companies involved in that previous thread, including the detained Barret Brown. You addressed his drug use without the topic at hand that he reported on? I mention an article written by Michael Hastings that referenced Brown, and you insert bullcrap as if I said intel agencies killed him? You went on further to bring up Monsanto and Nickelback?

I ask you to not engage me anymore for a reason. You are a prick, tptacek. You are a prick.

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I think the misunderstanding is this: targeted compromise of individual units, post-installation (tptacek), vs. compromise of all units of one or more models in the factory (you).

"compromise of all units of one or more models in the factory (you)"

_What_

I never mentioned anything like that. tptacek suggested that is what I meant, I directly said that was not. I've said I think subverting or weakening hardware/software for surveillance would be bad thing, not that the NSA has backdoored 100% of Huawei's products. I asked tptacek to stop making distortions because of this right here. I am running out of different ways to state this, why is is tptacek a primary source for what others say?

Back onto the comment I responded to initially, Chinese hardware makers do sell to the US so methods to subvert their devices do have US domestic ramifications. This would be contrary to what parent comment suggested.

Sorry, I didn't mean to put words in your mouth. I did say "one or more models in the factory," i.e. not 100%, because you clearly stated you didn't mean that. I just thought it wasn't completely clear that you weren't both talking about compromise in the factory. I guess I misunderstood you.

No problemo. On the topic of TAO I highly doubt subversion at the factory. Though I do believe the monolithic designs of the day from Samsung and Apple surely delight intel agencies like the NSA. Must shorten delays in redirecting shipments substantially!

This exchange is pretty hilarious...

It's not the most positive exchange but I have yet to have one with him that didn't result in the insertion of distortions or focus on the people carrying a message instead of the message. This was made clear with Hastings and Brown themselves being focused upon instead of the content of their articles.

After things like Nickelback started to be brought up.. I stopped believing responses were being made in good faith. Fast forward to now and apparently I am saying 100% of that maker's devices are backdoored by the NSA, any other interpretation "doesn't make sense."

While I acknowledge this is a public forum I would hope tptacek would also acknowledge I asked him not to engage me anymore previously, before he announces the forum's open presence as his mandate to respond.

He does seem to have a habit of only engaging when he can nitpick or twist the argument, which is the definition of bad faith.

So weird that I never seem to engage with the arguments I don't see issues with. What mental illness must cause that, I wonder?

It's the difference in mindset between having a discussion versus an argument.

In one case you are more likely to work for a mutually beneficial outcome, in the other it's a zero sum game where distorting your opponent's views becomes a common rhetorical tactic.

I'm not going to make grand claims, I just saw a lot of the latter from you recently.

No, that's not accurate. If you and others are having a discussion based on false premises, correcting those premises does in fact move the discussion forward.

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