Table of Contents
Topicality ....................................................................................................................................................... 4
Definitions: Above................................................................................................................................. 5
Ought: Stock Definitions ....................................................................................................................... 6
Ought implies Consequentialism .......................................................................................................... 7
Ought implies Contractarionism ........................................................................................................... 8
Ought Implies Kantian Ethics ................................................................................................................ 9
Ought Implies Naturalism (Meta Ethics) ............................................................................................. 10
Ought implies Rights ........................................................................................................................... 11
Definition of Pursuit ............................................................................................................................ 12
Definition of “Security Threat” ........................................................................................................... 13
“National Security” is Resisting Hostile Action ................................................................................... 14
National Security is Cybersecurity, terrorism, and nuclear weapons ................................................. 15
National Security includes Human Trafficking .................................................................................... 16
“Digital Privacy” .................................................................................................................................. 17
Citizens ................................................................................................................................................ 18
Aff ................................................................................................................................................................ 19
Privacy ..................................................................................................................................................... 20
No Right to Privacy-Constitution......................................................................................................... 21
Limits In Place Prevent Loss of Digital Privacy .................................................................................... 22
Terrorism................................................................................................................................................. 23
Digital Surveillance Stops Inevitable Terrorist Attack ........................................................................ 24
Digital Surveillance Solves Terrorism .................................................................................................. 25
Terrorists Use the Internet to Plan Attacks (1/2)................................................................................ 28
Terrorists Use the Internet to Plan Attacks (2/2)................................................................................ 29
Terrorist Attack Coming ...................................................................................................................... 30
Hackers.................................................................................................................................................... 38
Prism ....................................................................................................................................................... 40
Espionage ................................................................................................................................................ 42
Espionage-Russia................................................................................................................................. 43
Espionage China .................................................................................................................................. 44
Espionage-Iran .................................................................................................................................... 49
Patriot Act ............................................................................................................................................... 50
Patriot Act Balances National Security and Privacy ............................................................................ 51
A2-“Patriot Act Violates Liberties” ...................................................................................................... 52
Wire Taps ................................................................................................................................................ 54
Wiretaps Solve Terrorism ................................................................................................................... 58
Wiretaps Solve Crime .......................................................................................................................... 59
Human Trafficking ................................................................................................................................... 60
Mobile Phone Searches Solve Human Trafficking .............................................................................. 61
Crime Impacts ......................................................................................................................................... 62
Organized Crime Destroys Rule of Law ............................................................................................... 63
Drug Trade Impacts: Drugs & Crime Destroy Society – Laundry List .................................................. 64
Drug Trade Impacts: Drug Money Fuels Terrorism ............................................................................. 65
Drug Trade Impacts: Drug Trade Causes Latin American Instability .................................................. 67
Gangs Impacts: Gangs Cause Crime .................................................................................................... 68
Gangs Impacts: Gangs Key to Drug Trade ........................................................................................... 69
Wikileaks Harms National Security ......................................................................................................... 70
Wikileaks Threatens National Security ............................................................................................... 71
Wikileaks Threatens National Security ............................................................................................... 73
Wikileaks Helps Terrorists ................................................................................................................... 74
Wikileaks Hurts US-Pakistani Relations .............................................................................................. 75
A2: Wikileaks Solves For Transparency ............................................................................................... 76
A2: Wikileaks Solves For Transparency ............................................................................................... 77
Transparency........................................................................................................................................... 78
Uniqueness: Privacy Decreasing Now ................................................................................................. 79
Uniqueness: Privacy Violations Inevitable .......................................................................................... 81
Now is the Key Time for Transparency ............................................................................................... 83
Link: Pretending Privacy Exists Masks Surveillance (1/2) ................................................................... 85
Link: Pretending Privacy Exists Masks Surveillance (2/2) ................................................................... 87
Alternative Solvency: Transparency Checks Government Oppression (1/2) ...................................... 88
Alternative Solvency: Transparency Checks Government Oppression (2/2) ...................................... 91
Neg .............................................................................................................................................................. 92
Privacy ..................................................................................................................................................... 93
Constitution-Right to Privacy .............................................................................................................. 94
Privacy Impacts: Totalitarianism ......................................................................................................... 99
Privacy Impacts: Autonomy .............................................................................................................. 101
Privacy Impacts: Normalization ........................................................................................................ 103
Browser Fingerprinting ..................................................................................................................... 104
A2: “We Consent to Surveillance” .................................................................................................... 107
Equal Prioritization................................................................................................................................ 108
Surveilance Ineffective-Terrorists ......................................................................................................... 116
Hackers Not A Threat ............................................................................................................................ 117
Cyberattacks ......................................................................................................................................... 120
Tech Bad................................................................................................................................................ 121
Meta-Ethics ............................................................................................................................................... 126
Naturalism............................................................................................................................................. 127
Hardwired For Survival...................................................................................................................... 129
Error Theory .......................................................................................................................................... 130
Quasi- Realism....................................................................................................................................... 132
Legality .................................................................................................................................................. 133
Topicality
Definitions: Above
Above means to have a higher rank
Merriam-webster.2013, “Above-Definition and More from the Merriam Webster Free dictionary.”
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/above
3¶ : in or to a higher rank or number <30 and above>
Ought: Stock Definitions
Ought implies Moral Obligation
Merriuam Webster dictionary, 2013, (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ought)
Ought- used to express obligation
Ought- moral obligation
Reasons to prefer
1. Most common sense definition- First Known Use: 12th century, this tells us that this form of definition
has been appropriate for a long time.
2. Meriam Webster is a total access dicitionairy- everybody can access it meaning that people have the
ability to get the definition.
3. For more than 150 years, in print and now online, Merriam-Webster has been America's leading and
most-trusted provider of language information.
4. All Merriam-Webster products and services are backed by the largest team of professional dictionary
editors and writers in America, and one of the largest in the world.
Ought is defined as mandatory.
Black’s Law Dictionary. http://thelawdictionary.org/ought/
This word, though generally directory only, will be taken as mandatory if the context requires it. Life
Ass’n v. SL Louis County Assessors, 49 Mo. 518.
Ought implies Consequentialism
Ought is a propositional operative that questions if a consequence from an action is
desirable
Wedgwood argues. (Ralph, English prof @ carniege melon, “modern day morals.” No date, http://wwwbcf.usc.edu/~wedgwood/meaningofought.htm)
“We can avoid all these problems if we treat ‘ought’ in as a propositional operator. Grammatically,
‘ought’ in English is an auxiliary verb, like the modal auxiliaries ‘can’ and ‘must.’ When an occurrence of
‘ought’ modifies the main verb of a sentence, it can be taken as a propositional operator applying to the
proposition that would be expressed by the unmodified form of that sentence. Thus, the sentence
drinking water ought to be clean and safe in ‘ought’ is a propositional operator applying to the
proposition that would be expressed by the sentence ‘drinking water is clean and safe’”
Ought implies Contractarionism
The governmental obligation focuses on what the people want
Terrence O. Moore, Professor of History at Hillsdale College, degree from u of Chicago, “What Ought
Government to Do (and Not Do)?: Why We Need to Read John Locke” September 1, 2011,
http://ricochet.com/main-feed/What-Ought-Government-to-Do-and-Not-Do-Why-We-Need-to-ReadJohn-Locke
Locke’s considerable narrowing of the scope of government is famously echoed in the Declaration of
Independence with these words: “That to secure these rights [Life, Liberty and the pursuit of
Happiness], Governments are instituted among Men.” Securing rights is what government is supposed
to do. Whenever government exceeds the scope of its original compact or commission, people’s liberty
is in danger. Now it is true that a people may consent to employ government to do any number of things
which seem legitimate. But watch out! The oldest trick in the democratic playbook is for a larger group
of people to get together and consent to take the smaller group’s property. ¶ The Lockean idea of
limited government compels us to ask the question: what is government for—and what is it not for?
Allowing for the fact that there may be any number of functions for government at the state and local
levels (via the Founders’ invention of federalism), what ought thefederal government to do and what
ought it not to do? Voters on the Right need to be specific about what their candidates should do (and
undo) once elected lest vague promises of reduced government spending go nowhere and further
electoral victories be wasted.
Ought Implies Kantian Ethics
Kant defines ought as requiring an imperative.
Hurford, Peter. Political Science and Psychology Major at Denison University. November 4, 2011. The
Meaning of Ought, Part I. http://www.greatplay.net/essays/the-meaning-of-ought-part-i
Kant described “ought” as referring to an imperative, defining two types: a hypothetical imperative
and a categorical imperative:¶ A hypothetical imperative is in the form “If you desire X, you ought to
preform action Y”. For instance, “If you value the lives of others, you ought to not murder people” or “If
you value freedom, you ought not to restrict the speech of others”. It is an ought statement
characterized by a conditional.¶ A categorical imperative is in the form “You ought to preform action Y
(regardless of what you believe or desire)”. For instance, “You ought not to lie” or “You ought not to
steal”. It is a pure, unconditional ought statement.
Ought Implies Naturalism (Meta Ethics)
Ought does not imply morality, natural ethics are more clear.
Beavers, Anthony F. Written for the International Digital Ethics Symposium, Center for Digital Ethics and
Policy, School of Communication, Loyola University. Chicago, October 28th, 2011. Could and Should the
Ought Disappear from Ethics?
http://www.academia.edu/1011404/Could_and_Should_the_Ought_Disappear_from_Ethics
Terra Firma¶ In 2007, Anderson and Anderson wrote, “As Daniel Dennett (2006) recently stat-ed, AI
‘makes philosophy honest.’ Ethics must be made computable in order to make it clear exactly how
agents ought to behave in ethical dilemmas” (16). To rephrase their sentiment, a computable system or
theory of ethics serves to make ethics honest. As I have observed elsewhere (Beavers 2010), it is
common among machine ethicists to note that research in computational ethics can help us better
understand ethics in the case of human beings. This is because of what we must know about ethics in
general to build machines that operate within normative pa-rameters. Unclear intuitions will not do
where engineering specifications and computational clarity are required. So, machine ethicists are
forced head on to en-gage in moral philosophy. Their effort, of course, hangs on a careful analysis of
ethical theories, the role of affect in making moral decisions, relationships be-tween agents and
patients, and so forth. But this is not all. There are other meta-ethical difficulties that must be addressed
as well concerning, particularly, the nature of the moral ought and the necessary and sufficient
conditions for moral agency. Every moral theory makes assumptions about these issues, but, to date,
without the clarity that real-world, working specifications for practical application require. Thus,
computational ethics provides us with the¶ terra firma¶ needed to get some solid footing in the
otherwise vague and messy domain of ethics and helps us answer the question of whether (and if so, to
what extent) we may have been duped by morality.¶ My conclusion here will be that yes, we have been
duped, at least in part. As such, I am departing from Beavers 2009 & 2011, where I suggested that we¶
might ¶ (another past subjunctive) have been in order to argue for something more definite. This
conclusion will be an unhappy one for many, since it will involve throwing out an age-old distinction
between being good and merely acting so that has been at the heart of ethics (according to the
dominant Western paradigm)from its inception. My argument will unfold in three parts: the first will
address the question of moral agents (MAs) in general, after which I will examine what precisely¶ ought
¶ implies when viewed from a moral perspective to isolate what I will identify as the paradox of
automated moral agency (P-AMA). Next to avoid the paradox we will need to define the¶ ought ¶
technically, not morally, a distinction I am partially borrowing from Kant and will make clear later, with
the result that we are left with the sufficiency argument (SA), which states that moral interiority is a
sufficient but not necessary condition for moral agency. If this argument holds, then the kind of moral
interiority that allows an agent to be culpable for its actions is not necessary for ethics. It is rather a
product of our biology that drives humans to be ethical, but it is not the only way this can be done. My
motive in taking this approach is that the problems we are facing as a world are so great that it is time to
put aside the “blame game” and confront them with some sort of no-fault ethics, the details of which
have largely been worked out by Floridi (1999and 2002) and Floridi and Sanders (2001 and 2004),
though more work needs to be done here to draw out the implications where blame and fault are
concerned.
Ought implies Rights
Ought is derived from our rights, if we have the right, we have an obligation to act.
Gewirth Alan, a professor of philosophy at the University of Chicago, “THE 'IS-OUGHT PROBLEM
RESOLVED.”, Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association, Vol. 47 (1973 -¶
1974), pp. 34-61, jstor)
I have here presented, then, a complex version of what I have ¶ called the internal model of the relation
between 'ought' and 'is'. ¶ I have not directly defined 'ought' in terms of'is'; rather, I have ¶ held that
the application of 'ought' is entailed by the correlative ¶ concept of having a right. The agent's
application of this concept, ¶ in turn, has been derived from the concept of goods which are the ¶
necessary conditions of all his actions, since he necessarily claims ¶ that he has a right to at least
these goods. And the agent's applica- ¶ tion of the concept of good, finally, has been derived from his
¶ acting for purposes. Since the agent's assertion that he acts for ¶ purposes is an empirical, descriptive
statement, I have in this ¶ indirect way derived 'ought' from 'is'. Whether the derivation is at ¶ each
point definitional or is rather of some other non-arbitrary ¶ sort does not materially affect my
argument, so long as its neces- ¶ sary relation to the context of action is recognized.
Definition of Pursuit
Trying to Achieve Something
Oxford Dictionary (2013, Oxford University Press, http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/pursuance?q=pursuance)
the action of trying to achieve something:
Pursuit of Security includes Cost
David A. Baldwin, 1997, Columbia University Department of Political Science, “The Concept of Security”, Review of International
Studies, Jstor, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20097464
The pursuit of security always involves costs, i.e., the sacrifice of other goals that could have been
pursued with the resources devoted to security. Specification of this dimension of security policy is
important because writers sometimes imply that costs do not matter. One writer, for example,
defines national security in terms of the protection of core values, which he describes as 'interests
that are pursued not withstanding the costs incurred'.55 From the standpoint of a rational policymaker, however, there are no such interests. Costs always matter.
Definition of “Security Threat”
Security threats include Natural Disasters.
David A. Baldwin, 1997, Columbia University Department of Political Science, “The Concept of Security”, Review of International
Studies, Jstor, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20097464
In ordinary language, however, one
often finds references to epidemics, floods, earth quakes, or droughts as
'threats' to acquired values. Ullman and others have argued hat the concept of security should be expanded to include such
phenomena. There seems to be no reason not to use this more expansive concept of threats, especially
since it comports with common usage. Those who wish to refer to conditional commitments to punish by social actors as
security threats may make that clear when specifying this dimension of security.
“National Security” is Resisting Hostile Action
“National security” includes activities that threaten society
Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms. No Date (“national
security”. Accessed 17 July 13. http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/data/n/5673.html)
A collective term encompassing both national defense and foreign relations of the United States.
Specifically, the condition provided by: a. a military or defense advantage over any foreign nation or
group of nations; b. a favorable foreign relations position; or c. a defense posture capable of
successfully resisting hostile or destructive action from within or without, overt or covert. See also
security.
National Security is Cybersecurity, terrorism, and nuclear weapons
The 2013 national security strategy highlights security issues as cyber space, terrorism
and nuclear weapons.
NSSA writes 2013 (“National Security Strategy 2013” pg 6, DoP: 2013, DoA: 7/17/13,
http://www.utexas.edu/lbj/sites/default/files/file/news/National%20Security%20Strategy%202013%20(
Final%20Draft).pdf)
This document details the international environment the United States faces ¶ moving forward and depicts how we can navigate a
peaceful and stable order in ¶ the future by leading the global economy, protecting critical global strategic ¶ interests, and maximizing the
disposition and strength of our military. ¶ Furthermore, the
analysis of emerging and persistent national security
issues –¶ cyberspace, terrorism, and nuclear weapons – emphasizes the opportunity of ¶ American leadership.
National Security includes Human Trafficking
National security includes human trafficking
ARTHUR RIZER, Arthur Rizer is a Trial Attorney with the United States Department of Justice. “Breach: The National Security Implications of
Human Trafficking” 2011, http://widenerlawreview.org/files/2011/03/Rizer-Glaser.pdf
Expanding on this concept, former government official
Joseph Romm41¶ argues that national security relates to
events that “(1) threaten drastically and ¶ over a relatively brief span of time to degrade the quality of
life for the ¶ inhabitants of a state, or (2) threaten significantly to narrow the range of policy ¶ choices
available to the government of a state.”42 “Consequently, Romm ¶ includes on the national security agenda issues
of global warming [and] energy ¶ security” 43 and May even include, as this article argues, human trafficking. ¶
Anything could arguably affect the “way of life” of the American people. ¶ However, because President Clinton’s and Mr. Romm’s portrayal of
national ¶ security focuses more on the people of the United States, rather than President ¶ Bush’s general “interests around the globe,” we
believe that President ¶ Clinton’s and, more specifically, Mr. Romm’s definition of national security is ¶ more appropriate for the subject at
hand.
“Digital Privacy”
Digital privacy is defined as a protection of citizens’ privacy
WiseGeek Online. 2013. What Is Digital Privacy? http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-digitalprivacy.htm
The concept of digital privacy can best be described as the protection of the information of private
citizens who use digital mediums. However, when people speak about digital privacy, they often are referring to it in
terms of its relation to Internet usage. Despite it being a popular and often incendiary issue, the obstacle of defining what digital
privacy really is can prevent resolution.¶ Digital privacy centers on the fact that using digital mediums to conduct affairs, whether personal or
professional, can leave digital footprints. For example, many Internet users don't realize that information about them and their Internet usage
habits are constantly being logged and stored. A computer's Internet Protocol (IP) address can be traced back to a specific user and, as such, his
website viewing habits can be monitored. Information such as the date and time of his searches, what browser he used to access websites and
even how long he viewed websites can be retained on a search engine's servers. Servers can vary in the length of time they store this
information before deleting it.
Citizens
A citizen is defined as someone who is either born in the U.S. or is naturalized.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. 01/17/2013. Citizenship.
http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=a
2ec6811264a3210VgnVCM100000b92ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=a2ec6811264a3210VgnVCM100000b
92ca60aRCRD
If you meet certain requirements, you may become a U.S. citizen either at birth or after birth. ¶ To
become a citizen at birth, you must:¶ Have been born in the United States or certain territories or
outlying possessions of the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction of the United States; OR ¶
had a parent or parents who were citizens at the time of your birth (if you were born abroad) and
meet other requirements¶ To become a citizen after birth, you must:¶ Apply for “derived” or
“acquired” citizenship through parents¶ Apply for naturalization¶ For more information, see USCIS
Policy Manual Citizenship and Naturalization Guidance. ¶ The Naturalization Test¶ Most naturalization
applicants are required to take a test on:¶ English¶ Civics (U.S. history and government)
An American citizen is one who constitutionally belongs to the United States.
Smith, Roger M. Alfred ¶ Cowles Professor of ¶ Government at Yale ¶ University. 1985. The Meaning of
American Citizenship. http://www.apsanet.org/imgtest/americancitizenship.pdf
What does it mean to say, "I am an American citizen?" The law supplies ¶ dry technical answers: the
statement means that one falls under a ¶ constitutional or statutory category conferring full
membership in the ¶ American polity. The chief ones are, with minor exceptions, birth within ¶ the
United States, which confers citizenship under the Fourteenth ¶ Amendment, plus birth to American
parents overseas, and ¶ naturalization, categories regulated by federal statutes.
Aff
Privacy
No Right to Privacy-Constitution
There is no constitutional basis for the right to privacy.
Harold R. DEMOSS JR, DeMoss practiced law in Houston for 34 years before being appointed in 1991 by former President George H.W.
Bush to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where he now serves., “Constitutional right to privacy a figment of imagination” DoP:January 15,
2006, DoA: 7/17/13, http://www.chron.com/opinion/outlook/article/Constitutional-right-to-privacy-a-figment-of-1640537.php
In this season of politicized and contentious confirmation hearings to fill vacancies on the U.S. Supreme Court, some of the sharpest
debate
and disagreement concerns
a so-called "right of privacy" in the U.S. Constitution.¶ The
advocates of a constitutional right of privacy speak as though that right were expressly
stated and enumerated in the Constitution. But the text of the Constitution does not
contain the word "privacy" or the phrase "right of privacy."¶ Consequently, in my view, a
constitutional "right of privacy" could only be unenumerated and is therefore a figment
of the imagination of a majority of the justices on the modern Supreme Court. Let me explain why.¶ Webster's Dictionary defines
"enumerate" as "to name or count or specify one by one." Roget's Thesaurus states that the synonyms for "enumerate" are "to itemize, list, or
tick off." Adding the negative prefix "un" reverses the definitions or synonyms so that "unenumerated" means not named, not counted, not
specified, not itemized, or not listed.¶ The right of privacy is unenumerated because neither the word privacy nor the phrase right of privacy
appears anywhere in the Constitution or its amendments. Nor does the text contain any words related to other rights the Supreme Court has
found to derive from that right, including the right to an abortion and rights related to sexual preference. Neither "abortion" nor "sexual
preference" appear anywhere in the text of the Constitution.
Limits In Place Prevent Loss of Digital Privacy
There are restraints placed upon how much digital privacy can be conceded
Palin, Philip J, 9/18/11 , Homeland Security Watch, Brennan: Counterterrorism and the Law,
http://www.hlswatch.com/index.php?s=patriot+act , Date Accessed : 7/17/11
We’ve also worked to uphold our values and the rule of law in a second area—our policies and practices here at home. As I said,
we will
use all lawful tools at our disposal, and that includes authorities under the renewed PATRIOT Act. We
firmly believe that our intelligence gathering tools must enable us to collect the information we need
to protect the American people. At the same time, these tools must be subject to appropriate oversight
and rigorous checks and balances that protect the privacy of innocent individuals.¶ As such, we have ensured
that investigative techniques in the United States are conducted in a manner that is consistent with our laws and subject to the supervision of
our courts. We have also taken administrative steps to institute additional checks and balances, above and beyond what is required by law, in
order to better safeguard the privacy rights of innocent Americans.¶ Our democratic
values also include—and our national
security demands—open and transparent government. Some information obviously needs to be
protected. And since his first days in office, President Obama has worked to strike the proper balance
between the security the American people deserve and the openness our democratic society expects.¶
In one of his first acts, the President issued a new Executive Order on classified information that,
among other things, reestablished the principle that all classified information will ultimately be
declassified. The President also issued a Freedom of Information Act Directive mandating that
agencies adopt a presumption of disclosure when processing requests for information. The President
signed into law the first intelligence authorization act in over five years to ensure better oversight of
intelligence activities. Among other things, the legislation revised the process for reporting sensitive intelligence activities to Congress
and created an Inspector General for the Intelligence Community.¶ For the first time, President Obama released the combined budget of the
intelligence community, and reconstituted the Intelligence Oversight Board, an important check on the government’s intelligence activities. The
President declassified and released legal memos that authorized the use, in early times, of enhanced
interrogation techniques. Understanding that the reasons to keep those memos secret had
evaporated, the President felt it was important for the American people to understand how those
methods came to be authorized and used.¶ The President, through the Attorney General, instituted a new process to consider
invocation of the so-called “state secrets privilege,” where the government can protect information in civil lawsuits. This process ensures that
this privilege is never used simply to hide embarrassing or unlawful government activities. But, it also recognizes that its use is absolutely
necessary in certain cases for the protection of national security. I know there has been some criticism of the Administration on this. But by
applying a stricter internal review process, including a requirement of personal approval by the Attorney General, we are working to ensure
that this extraordinary power is asserted only when there is a strong justification to do so.¶
Terrorism
Digital Surveillance Stops Inevitable Terrorist Attack
Lack of digital surveillance leads to terrorist attacks
Sorcher, Sara. Staff Editor. June 25, 2013. Insiders: NSA's Communications Surveillance Good Way to
Target Terrorists. http://www.nationaljournal.com/nationalsecurity/insiders-nsa-s-communicationssurveillance-good-way-to-target-terrorists-20130624. Accessed 7/16/2013.
The National Security Agency's surveillance programs are effective tools for seeking out terrorists, according to 85.5 percent of National
Journal's National Security Insiders.¶ "In
the digital age, when every individual's digital trail increases year by
year, there is no faster way to draw a picture of a network, or a conspiracy, than by piecing together
different data streams," one Insider said. "This capability, in years to come, won't be a nice-to-have; it'll be
critical."¶ Another Insider said that the NSA must have the tools necessary to root out terrorists or another
9/11 becomes not just possible, but certain. "If we eliminate the online- and phone-surveillance
programs and a dirty bomb explodes in an American city, we have only ourselves to blame," the Insider
said. "The days of gentlemen not reading other gentlemen's mail are over."
Digital Surveillance Solves Terrorism
Digital monitoring is useful, empirically has worked and is relatively simple
Tom Gjelten, NPR international correspondent, 6/15/13, The Case For Surveillance: Keeping Up With Terrorist Tactics,
http://www.npr.org/2013/06/15/191694315/high-tech-surveillance-targets-evolving-terrorist-tactics Date accessed 7/17/13
Since public revelations that the National Security Agency is collecting telephone records and reviewing Internet communications in the U.S. and
abroad, officials have been making the case that the programs are vital. They argue that the tactics match the new ways terrorists are planning and
communicating.¶ There was
a time when America's enemies conspired face-to-face, or communicated
through couriers, or by leaving messages for each other somewhere. But in the digital age, that has
changed.¶ FBI Director Robert Mueller made that point back in 2008, as Congress considered whether to amend the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act.¶ "In this day and age, our ability to gain intelligence on the plans, the plots of those who
wish to attack us is dependent on us obtaining information relating to cellphones, Internet, email, wire transfers, all of
these areas," he said.¶ If all the action was in that electronic space five years ago, it's even more so today, as intelligence and security officials
constantly point out.¶ Speaking in February, the NSA's general counsel, Rajesh De, threw out some figures on the explosive growth in
communication data.¶ "More
data crosses the Internet every second today than existed on the Internet 20
years ago. Global mobile traffic grew 70 percent last year alone," he said.¶ Officials say these trends highlight the
challenge facing spy agencies: With so much communication now taking place in the digital world, intelligence officers have to be able to follow
that communication.¶ James Bamford, the author of several books on the NSA, says spies used to focus on getting human sources inside an
organization — agents who could report on what people in the organization were saying and doing. But human sources no longer matter so much,
Bamford says. Intelligence officers use new approaches because their adversaries are interacting in new ways.¶ "During the day, they're on
cellphones, or they're on email, or they're on social-networking sites. By intercepting that information, you develop patterns and look at who these
people might be involved with," he says.¶ To justify the
NSA's collection of telephone records and its selective
monitoring of online communication overseas, U.S. officials cite these "revolutionary" changes in the
information space. John Negroponte was the director of National Intelligence when wiretapping programs were expanded during the
Bush administration. He defends the NSA's new emphasis. ¶ "I'd say it's a testament to how surveillance methods have kept up with the geometric
progression of these communication methods," he says.¶ Congressional critics of the expanded surveillance operations say they're not convinced
that these programs have really proved their value in fighting terrorism. They ask whether other types of intelligence gathering might be just as
effective.¶ Negroponte, who served as U.S. ambassador to Iraq, says no one method is sufficient. He recalls how in 2006, the
combination
of different intelligence sources led the U.S. military to the head of al-Qaida in Iraq, Abu Musab alZarqawi.¶ "I believe his phone number was detected through human intelligence. Somebody gave us his phone number. Then, that phone
number was monitored through signals intelligence. And then his movements were tracked by geo-spatial intelligence — drones and so forth," he
says. "So it's actually the integration of these different methodologies that actually give you the best results."¶ The
expanded use of
telephone and Internet surveillance is in part an adaptation to the information revolution. The NSA, the
CIA and other agencies will defend these programs vigorously on that basis, despite concerns that Americans' privacy has been put at risk. ¶ But
that's not the whole story: It's also clear that the programs are popular in the spy business simply because they're convenient and efficient. They
make intelligence gathering easier.
Digital surveillance thwarted over 50 possible terrorist threats
Kastrenakes, Jacob. Journalist. June 18, 2013. 'Over 50' terrorist plots were stopped by surveillance
efforts, says NSA director. http://www.theverge.com/2013/6/18/4441774/over-50-terrorist-plotsstopped-NSA-surveillance. Accessed 7/16/2013.
Speaking to a congressional committee this morning, General Keith Alexander revealed that government surveillance
efforts have thwarted “over 50” possible terrorist threats since 9/11, including plans to bomb the New
York Stock Exchange and NYC subway system. Alexander, who heads the NSA, specifically noted that
programs like the Verizon metadata collection may have been able to stop 9/11 if they had been in
place at the time. He suggested that this program as well as “other intelligence” — which he did not disclose — assisted in foiling the 50
or so threats.
Terrorists are using the internet to expand, the United States needs to monitor them.
Richard A. Posner, 2008, Senior Lecturer in Law, The University of Chicago. “Privacy, Surveillance, and Law”, The University of Chicago
Law Review, Jstor, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20141907
Privacy is the terrorist's best friend, and the terrorist's privacy has been enhanced by the same
technological developments that have both made data mining feasible and elicited vast quantities of per sonal
information from innocents: the internet, with its anonymity, and the secure encryption of digitized data which, when combined
with that anonymity, make the internet a powerful tool of conspiracy. The government has a compelling
need to exploit digitization in defense of national security. But if it is permitted to do so, intelligence
officers are going to be scrutinizing a mass of personal information about US citizens. And we know that
many people do not like even complete strangers poring over the details of their private lives. But the fewer of these strangers
who have access to those details and the more profes sional their interest in them, the less the affront
to the sense of privacy. One reason people do not much mind having their bodies examined by
doctors is that they know that doctors' interest in bodies is profes sional rather than prurient ; and we
can hope that the same is true of intelligence professionals.
Preventing Terrorism Necessitates Domestic Spying
We need technology that can gather information against terrorists, even if it
necessitates collecting that of US citizens.
Glenn Sulmasy, 2013, Department of Humanities, Professor of Law, U.S. Coast Guard Academy, “Why We Need Government
Surveillance”, Center for National Policy, http://cnponline.org/ht/d/ViewBloggerThread/i/42295
Opinion: Edward Snowden is a hero The
current threat by al Qaeda and jihadists is one that requires aggressive
intelligence collection and efforts. One has to look no further than the disruption of the New York City subway bombers (the one
being touted by DNI Clapper) or the Boston Marathon bombers to know that the war on al Qaeda is coming home to us, to
our citizens, to our students, to our streets and our subways. This 21st century war is different and
requires new ways and methods of gathering information. As technology has increased, so has our
ability to gather valuable, often actionable, intelligence. However, the move toward "home-grown"
terror will necessarily require, by accident or purposefully, collections of U.S. citizens conversations
with potential overseas persons of interest. Where is NSA leaker Edward Snowden? What could authorities do with
Snowden? Snowden's path to top secret clearance Where is Edward Snowden? An open society, such as the United States, ironically
needs to use this technology to protect itself. This truth is naturally uncomfortable for a country with
a Constitution that prevents the federal government from conducting "unreasonable searches and
seizures." American historical resistance towards such activities is a bedrock of our laws, policies and
police procedures. But what might have been reasonable 10 years ago is not the same any longer. The
constant armed struggle against the jihadists has adjusted our beliefs on what we think our government can, and must, do in order to protect
its citizens. However, when we hear of programs such PRISM, or the Department of Justice getting phone records of scores of citizens without
any signs of suspicious activities nor indications of probable cause that they might be involved in terrorist related activities, the American
demand for privacy naturally emerges to challenge such "trolling" measures or data-mining. The
executive branch, although
particularly powerful in this arena, must ensure the Congress is kept abreast of activities such as these
surveillance programs. The need for enhanced intelligence activities is a necessary part of the war on
al Qaeda, but abuse can occur without ensuring the legislative branch has awareness of aggressive tactics such as these. Our Founding
Fathers, aware of the need to have an energetic, vibrant executive branch in foreign affairs, still anticipated checks upon the presidency by the
legislature. Working
together, the two branches can ensure that both legally, and by policy, this is what
the citizens desire of their government -- and that leaks such as Snowden's won't have the impact and damage that his leaks are
likely to cause.
Terrorists Use the Internet to Plan Attacks (1/2)
Terrorists use the internet to plan attacks
Thomas, Timothy L. Lieutenant Colonel of U.S. Army. 2003. Al Qaeda and the Internet:¶ The Danger¶ of
“Cyberplanning”. http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a485810.pdf. Date Accessed: 7/16/13
We can say with some certainty, al Qaeda loves the Internet. When the latter¶ first appeared, it was hailed as an
integrator of cultures and a medium for¶ businesses, consumers, and governments to communicate with one another. It¶ appeared to offer
unparalleled opportunities for the creation of a “global village.” Today the
Internet still offers that promise, but it also has proven in
some¶ respects to be a digital menace. Its use by al Qaeda is only one example. It also has¶ provided a
virtual battlefield for peacetime hostilities between Taiwan and¶ China, Israel and Palestine, Pakistan
and India, and China and the United States¶ (during both the war over Kosovo and in the aftermath of the collision between¶
the Navy EP-3 aircraft and Chinese MiG). In times of actual conflict, the Internet¶ was used as a virtual battleground between NATO’s coalition
forces and elements of the Serbian population. These real tensions from a virtual interface involved not only nation-states but also non-state
individuals and groups either¶ aligned with one side or the other, or acting independently. Evidence strongly suggests that terrorists
used
the Internet to plan their¶ operations for 9/11. Computers seized in Afghanistan reportedly revealed
that¶ al Qaeda was collecting intelligence on targets and sending encrypted messages¶ via the
Internet. As recently as 16 September 2002, al Qaeda cells operating in¶ America reportedly were
using Internet-based phone services to communicate¶ with cells overseas. These incidents indicate
that the Internet is being used as a¶ “cyberplanning” tool for terrorists. It provides terrorists with
anonymity, command and control resources, and a host of other measures to coordinate and
integrate attack options.
Terrorists have access to our digital data
Thomas, Timothy L. 2003. Lieutenant Colonel of U.S. Army. Al Qaeda and the Internet:¶ The Danger¶
of “Cyberplanning”. http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a485810.pdf. Date Accessed: 7/16/13
The Internet is used to gather information on potential targets. The¶ website operated by the Muslim
Hackers Club reportedly featured links to US¶ sites that purport to disclose sensitive information like
code names and radio frequencies used by the US Secret Service. The same website offers tutorials in
viruses, hacking stratagems, network “phreaking” and secret codes, as well as links¶ to other militant
Islamic and cyberprankster web addresses.17Recent targets that¶ terrorists have discussed include the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention¶ in Atlanta; FedWire, the money-movement clearing system maintained by the¶ Federal Reserve Board; and facilities
controlling the flow of information over¶ the Internet.18Attacks on critical infrastructure control systems would be particularly harmful,
especially on a system such as the Supervisory Control and Data¶ Acquisition (SCADA) system. Thus any information on insecure network
architectures or non-enforceable security protocols is potentially very damaging.¶ Terrorists
have access, like many
Americans, to imaging data on potential targets, as well as maps, diagrams, and other crucial data on
important facilities or networks. Imaging data can also allow terrorists to view counterterrorist ¶
activities at a target site. One captured al Qaeda computer contained engineering¶ and structural architecture features of a dam,
enabling al Qaeda engineers and¶ planners to simulate catastrophic failures.19
Terrorists Use the Internet to Plan Attacks (2/2)
Terrorist groups can use the internet to infiltrate vital US networks and explore their
flaws.
Thomas, Timothy L. Lieutenant Colonel of U.S. Army. 2003. Al Qaeda and the Internet:¶ The Danger¶
of “Cyberplanning”. http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a485810.pdf. Date Accessed: 7/16/13
The Internet can be used to divert attention from a real attack scenario. Al Qaeda can plant threats on
the Internet or via cell phones to mislead law¶ enforcement officials. Terrorists study how the United
States collects and analyzes information, and thus how we respond to information.¶ Terrorists know
when their Internet “chatter” or use of telecommunications increases, US officials issue warnings.
Terrorists can thus introduce false¶ information into a net via routine means, measure the response it
garners from the¶ US intelligence community, and then try to figure out where the leaks are in their ¶
systems or what type of technology the United States is using to uncover their¶ plans. For example, if
terrorists use encrypted messages over cell phones to discuss a fake operation against, say, the Golden Gate Bridge, they can then sit back¶ and
watch to see if law enforcement agencies issue warnings regarding that particular landmark. If they do, then the terrorists know their
communications are¶ being listened to by US officials.3
Terrorist Attack Coming
Terrorist attack against the United States is imminent
Jenkins, Brian Michael. senior adviser to the RAND president. July 10, 2013. Could Terrorists Pull Off a
Mumbai-Style Attack in the U.S.? http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/worldreport/2013/07/10/could-terrorists-launch-a-mumbai-style-attack-in-the-united-states. Date Accessed
7/17/13.
The event provided the latest evidence that the means of an armed terrorist attack are certainly
available in the United States. We've seen it over and over again, in Newtown, Connecticut; Aurora, Colorado; on the campus of
Virginia Tech, to name just a few.¶ Although these killings involved a single shooter without a terror agenda,
they demonstrate that one person, with little or no training, can acquire and effectively use firearms
to achieve high body counts. A review of the most deadly mass killings in the United States, going back
to the Columbine High School murders in 1999, show that an average of 15 people died per attack.
That's close to what each of the trained terrorist teams achieved in Mumbai.¶ [Read the U.S. News Debate:
Should People Be Allowed to Carry Guns Openly?]¶ But acquiring the firepower needed to carry out a mass murder is only one part of the
equation. An armed terrorist attack along the lines of that carried out in Mumbai presents a series of logistical challenges, starting with
recruiting and training a willing and able suicide assault force.¶ In Mumbai, there were 10 terrorists, armed with assault rifles, pistols, grenades
and improvised explosives. They carried out coordinated attacks across the city, paralyzing a metropolis of 14 million people for 60 hours while
mesmerizing the world's media. It was a complex operation and likely the culmination of months of training.¶ There are two ways a Mumbaistyle attack could be carried out in the United States. Terrorist
planners could assemble and train a team of attackers
abroad and attempt to infiltrate them into the United States, or homegrown terrorists could assemble
and launch a Mumbai-style attack. So far, neither has happened in the modern history of terrorism in the United States.¶ Bringing
a team of trained terrorists into the United States would be extremely difficult today, an audacious endeavor even by al-Qaida standards.
Improved intelligence worldwide has degraded the operational capabilities of al-Qaida and has made its operating environment more hostile.
And any large mobilization of terrorist personnel would likely be noticed by intelligence gatherers.
Cyber Terror
Cyber Attack Impact: US Retaliation
Security Leader Says U.S. Would Retaliate Against Cyberattacks
Mark Mazzetti and David E. Sanger.(Authors of New York Times.)"Security Leader Says U.S. Would
RetaliateAgainstCyberattacks."March12,2013.NewYorkTimes.http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/13/us/
intelligence-official-warns-congress-that-cyberattacks-pose-threat-to-us.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
The chief of the military’s newly created Cyber Command told Congress on Tuesday that he is
establishing 13 teams of programmers and computer experts who could carry out offensive
cyberattacks on foreign nations if the United States were hit with a major attack on its own networks ,
the first time the Obama administration has publicly admitted to developing such weapons for use in wartime.¶ “I would like to be clear that
this team, this defend-the-nation team, is not a defensive team,” Gen. Keith Alexander, who runs both the National Security Agency and the
new Cyber Command, told the House Armed Services Committee. “This
is an offensive team that the Defense
Department would use to defend the nation if it were attacked in cyberspace. Thirteen of the teams
that we’re creating are for that mission alone.”¶ General Alexander’s testimony came on the same day the nation’s top
intelligence official, James R. Clapper Jr., warned Congress that a major cyberattack on the United States
could cripple the country’s infrastructure and economy, and suggested that such attacks now pose the
most dangerous immediate threat to the United States, even more pressing than an attack by global
terrorist networks.¶
Cyber Attack Impact: Infrastructure
Cyber attack could shut down the US for weeks, us infrastructure relies on data run
systems
Llewellyn King,executive producer and host of "White House Chronicle", 6/10/12, The Devastating Effects of a Cyber-Attack Against a
Country's Energy Grid, http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/The-Devastating-Effects-of-a-Cyberattack-Against-a-Countries-EnergyGrid.html, date of access- 7/21/13
Computer war has grown up. It has moved from the age of the equivalent of black powder to the
equivalent of high-explosive shells -- not yet nuclear devices but close.¶ Enemies with sophisticated computer
technology, money and determination can now contemplate the possibility of taking down the
electrical systems of large swaths of the nation. Just a small interruption in power supply is
devastating; as has been demonstrated by the recent power outages in 10 states, caused by severe
weather.¶ The world as we know it stops when power fails; gasoline cannot be pumped, air
conditioning and all other household appliances cannot be used, plunging us into a dark age without
the tools of a dark age – candles, firewood, horses and carts.¶ At the center of this vulnerability is a device most
of us have never heard of but is an essential part of modern infrastructure. It is the programmable
logic controller (PLC).¶ In appearance the PLC is usually a small, black box about the size of a woman's purse. It came on the scene
in the 1960s, when microprocessors became available and has grown exponentially in application and
deployment ever since. The full computerization of the PLC put it silently but vitally in charge of nearly
every commercial/industrial operation, from assembly lines to power dispatch.¶ These devices are the
brain box of everything from air traffic systems to railroads. They replaced old-fashioned relays and
human commands, and made automation truly automatic.¶ The revolution brought on by the PLC is an “ultra-important part” of the
continuing story of technological progress, according to Ken Ball, an engineering physicist who has written a history of these devices.¶ Now
the PLC -- this quiet workhorse, this silent servant -- is a cause of worry; not so much from computer hackers, out
for a bit of fun through manipulating a single controller, but from the wreckage that can be achieved
in a government-sponsored cyberattack with planning and malice aforethought.¶ Such an attack could be
launched for diverse purposes against many aspects of our society. But the most paralyzing would be an attack on the
electrical system; on the controllers that run power plant operations and the grid, from coal to nuclear
to natural gas to wind turbines and other renewables.¶ Such a coordinated attack could bring the
United States to its knees for days or weeks with traffic jams, abandoned cars, closed airports and
hospitals reliant on emergency generators while fuel supplies last.¶
Cyber attack devastating, it would take out important infrastructure necessary to
prevent deaths.
FRANCIS, DAVID. Staff analyst for the fiscal times,3/11/13, The Coming Cyber Attack That Could Ruin Your Life, The fiscal times,
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2013/03/11/The-Coming-Cyber-Attack-that-Could-Ruin-Your-Life.aspx#page1, date access- 7/21/13
Last month, a private security
firm announced that Chinese military hackers had launched attacks on the
U.S. government and private companies nearly 147 times in the last seven years, a formal declaration
of a secret cyber war that’s been going on for decades.¶ This war has not yet had a major impact on the lives of average
American citizens: Attacks have resulted in minor service disruptions only, such as not being able to log into online accounts. ¶ But experts
warn these kinds of service breaks are just a small symptom of the serious damage cyber terrorists
and hackers can cause. Officials have said that hackers could cause a cyber 9/11 – an attack could
cause widespread turmoil, including the disappearance of money, electrical failure, and even death.
And America could be the battlefield in which these new techniques of war are tested. ¶ “An adversary
looking to cause chaos could pick any part of critical infrastructure, from banking to power to health
care,” said Jeffrey Carr, chief executive officer of Taia Global, a cyber security firm. “All of those are
vulnerable to cyber attack.” ¶ The most harmful cyber attacks have the ability to impact nearly every
part of American life, putting lives and essential privacy at risk. Without increased vigilance, experts say it’s only a matter of time
before a worst-case scenario becomes a reality. ¶ Hackers have attempted to infiltrate critical infrastructure components like mass transit and
power grids, although few Americans are aware of it. Former
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta says they have had
limited success. But all it takes it one breach to cause chaos.¶ “We know of specific instances where
intruders have successfully gained access to these [critical infrastructure] systems," Panetta said last October
in New York. "We also know that they are seeking to create advanced tools to attack these systems and
cause panic and destruction and even the loss of life. Ӧ Attacks like the one Panetta described could
turn off the power to large parts of the country. Public transportation systems could malfunction and
operators to lose control of systems that prevent crashes. Attackers could also take down
communication systems and Internet access.¶ According to Tom Kellermann, vice president of cyber
security for Trend Micro, attacks on infrastructure could also provide false information to people
making life and death decisions. For instance, hackers could target air traffic control systems,
providing false information that could cause planes to crash. “Everyone implicitly trusts his or her
computer,” he said. “A cyber attack can corrupt this information.”¶ So far, cyber attacks have had limited access to
bank accounts for short periods of time, and some personal information has been stolen. But according to Larry Ponemon, founder of the
Ponemon Institute, a think tank that studies data privacy, hackers want to do more than disrupt: they want to make money disappear. ¶ “In
a
successful attack against a bank, credentials and passwords are gone,” he said. “Hackers are trying to
go into accounts to steal large sums of money.” Maybe, but imagine, for example, that cyber thieves
were able to steal just 1 percent or less from JP Morgan’s $2 trillion in assets. ¶ Health care systems are
also vulnerable to these kinds of attacks. Many doctors and hospitals are now keeping electronic
medical records. Hackers can get access to this information, making changes that could potentially
lead to deadly instances where doctors prescribe unnecessary drugs or order irrelevant procedures for
the patient. ¶ “I have never seen an industry with more gaping security holes,” Avi Rubin, a computer scientist
and technical director of the Information Security Institute at Johns Hopkins University, told the Washington Post last year. “If our financial
industry regarded security the way the health-care sector does, I would stuff my cash in a mattress under my bed."¶ According to Ponemon,
hackers can target individuals without the person ever knowing it. “An
attack could be occurring if you computer is
running weird and slow,” he said. “Often times, hackers will attack computers at time when the user
is most likely sleeping.” When the system is shut down, of course, hackers can’t get in. Once a system has been infiltrated, there’s no
limit to what hackers can steal.¶ “Hackers have the ability to capture info from your devices. They can steal your password, your documents and
your spreadsheets,” Ponemon said. “You can buy dozens of antivirus programs that usually stop most of the bad stuff out there. But there are
always some malware programs that have no signature and can bypass security.” Equally troubling is the hacker’s ability to conduct surveillance
on a victim, Ponemon said.¶ “They turn on and off your camera,” Ponemon said, referring to the Web cameras that are standard in today’s
computers. “They can hack into the voice part of your phone and wiretap a real conversation or use your phone to listen in on real-time
conversations.”¶ Or as Taia Global’s Carr said, “I don’t think there is a limit on the imagination on how much harm could be done.”
Cyber attack could devastate us- defense secretary agrees. Tapping into infrastructure
would shut down the US and lead to mass death.
ELISABETH BUMILLER, staff analyst, 10/11/12, Panetta Warns of Dire Threat of Cyberattack on U.S., New York times,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/12/world/panetta-warns-of-dire-threat-of-cyberattack.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0, date access- 7/21/13
Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta warned Thursday that the United States was facing the possibility
of a “cyber-Pearl Harbor” and was increasingly vulnerable to foreign computer hackers who could
dismantle the nation’s power grid, transportation system, financial networks and government. In a
speech at the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York, Mr. Panetta painted a dire picture of how such an attack
on the United States might unfold. He said he was reacting to increasing aggressiveness and
technological advances by the nation’s adversaries, which officials identified as China, Russia, Iran and
militant groups. ¶ “An aggressor nation or extremist group could use these kinds of cyber tools to gain
control of critical switches,” Mr. Panetta said. “They could derail passenger trains, or even more
dangerous, derail passenger trains loaded with lethal chemicals. They could contaminate the water
supply in major cities, or shut down the power grid across large parts of the country.” ¶ Defense
officials insisted that Mr. Panetta’s words were not hyperbole, and that he was responding to a recent
wave of cyberattacks on large American financial institutions. He also cited an attack in August on the
state oil company Saudi Aramco, which infected and made useless more than 30,000 computers. ¶ But
Pentagon officials acknowledged that Mr. Panetta was also pushing for legislation on Capitol Hill. It would require new standards
at critical private-sector infrastructure facilities — like power plants, water treatment facilities and gas
pipelines — where a computer breach could cause significant casualties or economic damage. ¶ In August,
a cybersecurity bill that had been one of the administration’s national security priorities was blocked
by a group of Republicans, led by Senator John McCain of Arizona, who took the side of the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce and said it would be too burdensome for corporations. ¶ The most destructive
possibilities, Mr. Panetta said, involve “cyber-actors launching several attacks on our critical
infrastructure at one time, in combination with a physical attack.” He described the collective result as
a “cyber-Pearl Harbor that would cause physical destruction and the loss of life, an attack that would
paralyze and shock the nation and create a profound new sense of vulnerability.” ¶ Mr. Panetta also
argued against the idea that new legislation would be costly for business. “The fact is that to fully
provide the necessary protection in our democracy, cybersecurity must be passed by the Congress,”
he told his audience, Business Executives for National Security. “Without it, we are and we will be
vulnerable.” ¶ With the legislation stalled, Mr. Panetta said President Obama was weighing the option
of issuing an executive order that would promote information sharing on cybersecurity between
government and private industry. But Mr. Panetta made clear that he saw it as a stopgap measure
and that private companies, which are typically reluctant to share internal information with the
government, would cooperate fully only if required to by law. ¶ “We’re not interested in looking at e-mail, we’re not
interested in looking at information in computers, I’m not interested in violating rights or liberties of people,” Mr. Panetta told editors and
reporters at The New York Times earlier on Thursday. “But if there is a code, if there’s a worm that’s being inserted, we need to know when
that’s happening.” ¶
Hackers
Hackers Destroy Privacy
Lack of cyber security turns digital privacy- hackers can steal your private information
otherwise.
Steve Largent and Rick Boucher, congressmen, “Good cybersecurity means better privacy – opinion”
March 2013, DoA: 7/17/13 http://money.cnn.com/2013/03/05/technology/security/cybersecurityprivacy/index.html
Such views are nonsense. Quite simply, digital
privacy cannot exist without cybersecurity. Weak security equals
weak privacy. Want better privacy? Raise your security game to prevent hackers from stealing private
data. Let the experts from the private sector and government communicate with each other so when
they see threats, they can alert others and work together to create a solution.¶ Despite this common-sense
connection, a seemingly never-ending debate drags on about how our nation can improve its cybersecurity. There is lots of talk, but little action
to support privacy's enabler.¶ That could change if Congress passes The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) and the President
signs it into law. CISPA passed the House (248-168) about a year ago, and since then has been the subject of considerable discussion, with no
discernible progress.¶ Critics don't like the fact that CISPA enables information sharing between the federal government and the private sector
in order to prevent cyberattacks and to pursue cybercriminals, hackers, fraudsters and others intent on harm. As they see it, such cooperation
constitutes a potential privacy invasion that is so egregious as to merit no further consideration.¶ Their concerns are, no doubt, well intended.
But they are also out of touch with reality and risk unintended consequences that only serve to allow cybercriminals to operate with impunity.¶
The breadth and scale of the threat of cyberattacks on our
nation's critical infrastructure -- financial institutions, electric and water utilities and air traffic control
systems, to name just a few -- to say nothing of consumers' personal data, is no longer in debate.
Meanwhile, the avenues and opportunities by which hackers have to penetrate our networks are
growing hand in hand with our increasingly mobile communications ecosystem. On the consumer
side, for example, a recent study concludes more than 40% of U.S. smartphone users will click on
unsafe links this year, potentially spreading malware that can steal data and dollars to their friends, family and colleagues.¶
Related story: Wake up, America! China is attacking¶
Hackers destroy Digital Privacy and violate Constitutional liberties.
Rogers, Mike, Member of the House of Representatives and Chairman of the Permanent Select
Committee on Intelligence. Ruppersburg, Dutch, also a member of the House of Reps, andn a ranking
member on Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. 4/16/13 Protecting Internet freedom is a
priority http://thehill.com/special-reports/defense-and-cybersecurity-april-2013/294319-protectinginternet-freedom-is-a-priority Date Accessed; 7/20/13
The privacy and civil liberties rights enshrined in the Constitution that we swore to protect are
threatened daily as foreign hackers steal unfathomable amounts of information from our computer
networks. These networks contain our most important personal information, including our banking,
medical and family records. Secure computer networks are vital to ensuring that the Internet remains
a key and open forum for individual expression — America simply cannot turn a blind eye to this
threat any longer.
Prism
Prism is necessary to search for terrorists
Schmitt, Eric, Sanger, David E., Savage, Charlie. June 7, 2013. Administration Says Mining of Data Is
Crucial to Fight Terror. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/08/us/mining-of-data-is-called-crucial-tofight-terror.html?pagewanted=all. Date Accessed: 7/16/13.
[Obama] argued that “modest encroachments on privacy” — including keeping records of phone numbers called and
the length of calls that can be used to track terrorists, though not listening in to calls — were “worth us doing”
to protect the country. The programs, he said, were authorized by Congress and regularly reviewed by federal courts. ¶ But privacy
advocates questioned the portrayal of the program’s intrusion on Americans’ communications as modest. When Americans
communicate with a targeted person overseas, the program can vacuum up and store for later
searching — without a warrant — their calls and e-mails, too. ¶ Mr. Obama acknowledged that he had hesitations
when he inherited the program from George W. Bush, but told reporters that he soon became convinced of its necessity. “You can’t have 100
percent security and also then have 100 percent privacy and zero inconvenience,” he said. “We’re going to have to make some choices as a
society.” ¶ To defenders of the N.S.A., the Zazi case underscores how the agency’s Internet surveillance system, called
Prism, which
was set up over the past decade to collect data from online providers of e-mail and chat services, has
yielded concrete results. ¶ “We were able to glean critical information,” said a senior intelligence official, who spoke
on the condition of anonymity. “It was through an e-mail correspondence that we had access to only through Prism.” ¶ John Miller, a former
senior intelligence official who now works for CBS News, said on “CBS This Morning,” “That’s how a program like this is supposed to work.” ¶
Veterans of the Obama intelligence agencies say the large collections of digital data are vital in the
search for terrorists. “If you’re looking for a needle in the haystack, you need a haystack,” Jeremy Bash, chief of staff to Leon E. Panetta,
the former C.I.A. director and defense secretary, said on MSNBC on Friday.¶ Under the program, intelligence officials must
present Internet companies with specific requests for information on a case-by-case basis, showing
that the target is a foreigner and located outside the United States, a senior law enforcement official
said Friday. If the N.S.A. comes across information about an American citizen during the search, it
turns over that material to the F.B.I. for an assessment, the official said.
Obama argues there are limits to the surveillance allowed under Prism.
Hennessey, Kathleen. June 19, 2013. Obama defends NSA digital surveillance programs.
http://www.latimes.com/news/world/worldnow/la-fg-wn-obama-defends-nsa-surveillance20130619,0,3630725.story. Date Accessed 7/17/13.
BERLIN -- President Obama tried to reassure skeptical Europeans about sweeping U.S. digital surveillance
programs expanded under his watch, arguing that the programs are circumscribed, overseen by a court and
effective.¶ "What I can say to everybody in Germany and everybody around the world is this applies very narrowly," Obama said
Wednesday after a meeting in which German Chancellor Angela Merkel pressed the president on whether the programs were violating the
privacy rights of German citizens.¶ "This
is not a situation in which we are rifling through the ordinary emails of
is not a situation where we can go
on to the Internet and start searching any way we want."¶ Obama argued that the collection of bulk data on phone
German citizens or American citizens or French citizens or anybody else," he said. "This
records and Internet activity has averted "at least 50 threats," repeating claims made by other administration officials since details about the
programs were disclosed two weeks ago.
Patriot Act and surveillance of citizens enables NSA to thwart dozens of terrorist
attacks
Cohen, Tom, Staff writer cnn, 6/13/13, CNN, NSA director: Data mining follows law, thwarts terror,
http://www.cnn.com/2013/06/12/politics/nsa-terror-hearing, Date Accessed: 7/17/13
Phone records obtained by the government through a secret surveillance program disclosed last week
helped to prevent "dozens" of terrorist acts, the director of the National Security Agency told a Senate hearing on
Wednesday.¶ Army Gen. Keith Alexander provided the most detailed account so far from a government official of the program in which the
agency collects phone records that then can be accessed under federal court permission to investigate suspected terrorists.¶
The scope of
the secret program – potentially [involved] involving phone records of every American -- set off a political
firestorm when details emerged with publication of a leaked document.¶ Further leaks revealed other secret programs that collect computer
activity and other information.¶ Critics on the right and left accused the government of going well beyond the intended reach of the Patriot Act
enacted after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.¶
Questioned by senators from both parties at
a hearing on broader cybersecurity issues, Alexander provided a spirited defense for the programs he
described as critical to counter-terrorism efforts.¶ "I think what we're doing to protect American
citizens here is the right thing," he said. "Our agency takes great pride in protecting this nation and our civil liberties and
privacy, and doing it in partnership with this committee, with this Congress, and with the courts."¶ Alexander added that he welcomed a public
debate over protecting America while preserving civil liberties.¶ "To date, we've not been able to explain it because it's classified, so that issue
is something that we're wrestling with," he said. "... This
isn't something that's just NSA or the administration doing
that and so on. This is what ... our nation expects our government to do for us. So, we ought to have that
debate. We ought to put it out there."¶ In the end, he said, some aspects of the giant surveillance apparatus created after 9/11 would have to
remain classified.¶ "And they should be, because if we tell the terrorists every way that we are going to track them, they will get through and
Americans will die," he said.¶ Alexander also rejected the claim that former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, who admitted leaking the topsecret documents on electronic surveillance programs and is now in hiding, could tap into any American's phone or e-mail.¶ "I know of no way
to do that," he said, calling Snowden's statement "false."¶ In an exchange with Democratic
Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont,
Alexander said he believed the program under Section 215 of the Patriot Act was "critical" in helping
the intelligence community corroborate information on possible threats.¶ "It is dozens of terrorist
events that these have helped prevent," Alexander said of the Section 215 program and another that collects
information on foreign computer use.¶ He would not discuss specific disrupted plots, saying they were classified, but he told Leahy that the
two programs together played a role in helping to stop a planned attack on the New York subway
system.¶ Information developed overseas was passed along to the FBI, which was able to identify suspect
Najibullah Zazi in Colorado and ultimately uncover a plot, he said. Zazi pleaded guilty to terror-related charges in
2010.¶ In response to questions from senators about why the Section 215 program needed to collect
billions of U.S. phone records, Alexander explained that the agency held the records for five years in
the event that an investigation uncovered an overseas terrorist link to a specific area in the United
States.¶ With a database of phone records, the agency can go "back in time" to figure out the number and date that a suspect called, he
said.¶ "We won't search that unless we have some reasonable, articulable suspicion about a terroristrelated organization," Alexander said.¶ Once permission is granted, "we can now look and say, 'who was
this guy talking to in the United States and why?'"¶ "The system just gives us back who he was talking
to," Alexander explained. "But if you didn't collect it, how do you know who he was talking to?"¶
Obtaining further information, such as the content of the call, would require a court order, he said.¶ GOP
Sen. Mike Johanns of Nebraska pressed Alexander on the issue, asking if the search could span "the breadth of telephone records."¶ "The
American public is fearful that in this massive amount of data you get that there's the ability of the federal government to synthesize that data
and learn something more than maybe what was ever contemplated by the Patriot Act," Johanns said.¶ Alexander will return to the panel on
Thursday to give a classified briefing on the programs in order to provide more information, and he pledged to work with the committee to
come up with more detailed explanations for the American public.¶ He explained his caution on Wednesday by saying revelations such as the
classified documents about the secret programs were harmful to national security efforts.¶ "I would rather take a public beating and people
think I am hiding something than to jeopardize the security of this country," Alexander said.¶
Espionage
Espionage-Russia
Russian-US Cold War Espionage still a threat
Ross, Brian (Staff Writer ABC News) Jun 2013 Edward Snowden Steps Into Secret U.S.-Russia Spy
Scuffle http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/edward-snowden-steps-secret-us-russia-spyscuffle/story?id=19495341#.UeViQPlQFZ4 Date Accessed: 7/16/13
An ABC News review of public reports shows that in the past 16 months alone, at least six people have
been accused or convicted of spying for the U.S. in Russia, including two Americans who were kicked out of the country
and four Russians purportedly recruited by U.S. intelligence -- all sent to prison. Another American, a lawyer, was reportedly
expelled from Russia this May because he rebuffed Russian agents' attempt to recruit him to spy for
them.¶ "Espionage is alive and well" between the old Cold War foes, said David Major, a former senior
FBI counter-intelligence officer and now President of the Centre for Counterintelligence and Security
Studies, which tracks spy cases the world over.¶ Some of the cases, like that of blown CIA agent Ryan Fogle, splashed across headlines the
world over. But several others, like the case of a Russian intelligence colonel who worked with the CIA and got 18 years behind bars for it,
barely made a ripple in American media.¶ Prior to 2012,
the whole world took notice in 2010 when the FBI rounded
up 10 undercover Russian agents in America – including the "SoHo Spy" Anna Chapman – but far fewer heard in 2011 when it
was revealed a Russian intelligence official in Moscow had given the spy ring up and then fled to the U.S. That man, Col. Alexander Poteyev,
reportedly had been recruited by the CIA.¶ Now
with Snowden, a former contractor for the National Security
Agency with a head and, reportedly, laptops full of U.S. secrets, Major said the Russians have been
handed a victory, even if Snowden insists he's not working with any governments.¶ "One of the highest
targets [for foreign intelligence agencies] has always been the NSA, one of the hardest targets for them ever to
penetrate," Major said. "[Russian intelligence] is going to look at this case as an opportunity, as a treasure
trove of intelligence that [will be] exploited to the extent that they can, and then when they decide, they'll move
on."
Espionage is a difficult to manage, yet growing problem to the U.S
Lewis, James A(Director of Technology at CSIS) December 2002 Assessing the Risks of Cyber
Terrorism, Cyber War and Other Cyber Threatshttp://www.steptoe.com/publications/231a.pdf Date
Accessed: 7/16/2013
Espionage opportunities created by a greater reliance on internet-accessible computer ¶ networks will
create greater risk for national security than cyber attacks. Terrorist groups ¶ are likely to use the
Internet to collect information on potential targets, and intelligence¶ services can not only benefit
from information openly available on the web but,14 more¶ importantly, can benefit from the ability to
clandestinely penetrate computer networks¶ and collect information that is not publicly available. This is very
different from hacking, ¶ in that in the event of a successful penetration of a hostile network, a terrorist group or an ¶ intelligence
service will want to be as unobtrusive as possible. A sophisticated opponent ¶ might hack into a
system and sit there, collecting intelligence and working to remain ¶ unnoticed. It will not disrupt essential
services or leave embarrassing messages on ¶ websites, but remain quietly in the background collecting information. Collection ¶
techniques for the Internet differ significantly from earlier signals and communications ¶ intercept
techniques, and while different kinds of data will be collected, the overall effect ¶ may be to make
some espionage activities much more rewarding. This topic, the ¶ implications for espionage of the greater use of computer
networks and Internet ¶ protocols, deserves further study.
Espionage-China
Espionage is top threat to the US- China has been accused of espionage
Hosenball, Mark. (Investigative Producer NBC, Staff Writer on Reuters) Mar 2012 Cyber-attacks leading
threat against U.S.: Spy Agencies http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/12/us-usa-threatsidUSBRE92B0LS20130312 Date Accessed: 7/15/13
(Reuters) - Intelligence leaders said for the first time on Tuesday that cyber attacks and cyber espionage
have supplanted terrorism as the top security threat facing the United States. That stark assessment, in an
annual "worldwide threat" briefing that covered concerns as diverse as North Korea's belligerence and Syria's civil war, was
reinforced in remarks by the spy chiefs before the Senate Intelligence Committee. They expressed concern that computer
technology is evolving so quickly it is hard for security experts to keep up. "In some cases, the world is
applying digital technologies faster than our ability to understand the security implications and
mitigate potential risks," James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence, told the committee. In written testimony, Clapper
softened his analysis somewhat, playing down the likelihood of catastrophic attacks on the United States in the near term - either through
digital technologies, or from foreign or domestic militants employing traditional violence. But this year's annual threat briefing underscored
how, a decade after the Iraq war began and nearly two years after the killing of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, digital
assaults on
government and computer networks have supplanted earlier security fears. On Monday, White House
national security adviser Tom Donilon, citing complaints from U.S. businesses about alleged Chinese
cyber espionage, said the issue is a growing challenge to economic relations between the United
States and China.
China cyber attacks are growing and the us needs to actively search for hackers.
David Feith, an editorial page writer for The Wall Street Journal Asia in Hong Kong “Timothy L. Thomas:
Why China Is Reading Your Email” DoP: 2013 March, DoA: 7/17/13 http://stream.wsj.com/story/latestheadlines/SS-2-63399/SS-2-200781/
For several years, Washington has treated China as the Lord Voldemort of geopolitics—the foe who must
not be named, lest all economic and diplomatic hell break loose. That policy seemed to be ending in recent weeks, and
Timothy Thomas thinks it’s about time.¶ The clearest sign of change came in a March 11 speech by Tom Donilon,
President Obama’s national security adviser, who condemned “cyber intrusions emanating from China
on an unprecedented scale” and declared that “the international community cannot tolerate such activity from any country.”
Chinese cyber aggression poses risks “to international trade, to the reputation of Chinese industry and to our overall relations,” Mr. Donilon
said, and Beijing must stop it.¶ “Why did we wait so long?” wonders Mr. Thomas as we sit in the U.S. Army’s Foreign Military Studies Office,
where the 64-year-old retired lieutenant colonel has studied Chinese cyber strategy for two decades. More
than enough evidence
accumulated long ago, he says, for the U.S. to say to Beijing and its denials of responsibility, “Folks, you
don’t have a leg to stand on, sorry.” Beijing's cyber attacks are rooted in military strategy, says one of America's
foremost experts. The best way to combat them is for the U.S. to go on the cyber offensive too.
The US is developing Cyber defense teams to monitor data to protect from cyber
attacks.
Robertson Adi, Adi RobertsonWa is a reporter for The Verge.,“NSA head says 13 'offensive teams' being trained for cyberwarfare” DoP:
3/13/13, DoA: 7/16/13,¶ http://www.theverge.com/2013/3/13/4099958/nsa-head-says-13-offensive-teams-being-trained-for-cyberwarfare
As Director of National Intelligence James Clapper discussed the "remote" threat of a major
cyberattack within the next two years, NSA and US Cyber Command director Gen. Keith Alexander told Congress that the
US was training its own cyberwarriors as well. In yesterday's hearing before the House Armed Services Committee, Alexander
emphasized that "this team, this defend-the-nation team, is not a defensive team... This is an offensive team that the Defense Department
would use to defend the nation if it were attacked in cyberspace. 13 of the teams that we’re creating are for that mission alone."¶ As The New
York Times reports, Alexander says 27 additional
teams are dedicated to training and surveillance, and more will be
able to "defend our networks in cyberspace." He did not go into detail about the projects, but he said that training was the
most important task at hand, and that defense
was best served by monitoring incoming traffic to the US with
systems that could check for attacks. Current fears about cyberwarfare have focused on China, which
is considered responsible for recent attacks on The New York Times and other papers, but Clapper has said that "isolated state
or nonstate actors" are more likely to launch high-stakes campaigns that could take out critical infrastructure.¶
China Espionage Impact: Innovation
China cyber attacks on threaten innovation by top companies
McGarry, Brendan, staff analyst and writer, 5/21/13, China’s Cyber Attacks Threaten Social Order: Analyst, Defense Tech,
http://defensetech.org/2013/05/21/chinas-cyber-attacks-threaten-social-order-analyst/, date access- 7/21/13
China’s communist party that its cyber attacks against Western targets
threaten to undermine the Chinese economy and social order, an analyst said.¶ When asked what President Barack
The U.S. president should tell the leader of
Obama should say to President Xi Jinping at their next meeting in June, James Mulvenon, a vice president at Defense Group Inc., a technology
company in Vienna, Va., was blunt.¶ “This is
imperiling your own economic development, which is imperiling your
social stability, which is your No. 1 priority,” Mulvenon said May 21 during a panel discussion at the Center for Strategic and International
Studies, a think tank in Washington, D.C. “The only message that will get through to a general secretary of the Chinese
communist party is that economic development and social stability are threatened by the brazen scope and scale of
this intrusion.”¶ China was a frequent topic of discussion during the discussion, part of an event called “Threat and Response: Combating
Advanced Attacks and Cyber-Espionage,” which drew a roomful of academics, executives, government and military officials, and reporters.¶
A
Chinese espionage group since 2006 has stolen hundreds of terabytes of information from at least 141
companies across 20 major industries, including aerospace and defense, according to a February report from
Mandiant, a closely held company based in Alexandria, Va., which sells information-security services.¶ Obama should tell Xi that such actions
“are undermining that last remaining pillar of strategic cooperative Sino-U.S. relations,” Mulvenon said. “The
trade and business
community are some of the loudest critics of what’s going on the Chinese side who traditionally have
been the strongest proponents of cooperative Sino-U.S. relations.”¶ Mulvenon also criticized China’s official response
to the report.¶ “The Chinese, in my view, have always been terrible strategic communicators but they
reached a new low recently when their response to the Mandiant report was — and this is an official
spokesman at the Ministry of National Defense said — there is no Unit 61398,” he said. “We have hundreds of pieces of
open-source data identifying that unit is public knowledge,” he added. “Their literally response at the official level is to deny reality.”¶ U.S.
companies are already being hurt by the theft of intellectual property, according to Shawn Henry, president of
CrowdStrike Services, a security technology firm based in San Francisco, and former executive assistant director of the Federal Bureau of
Investigation.
A biotechnology company that typically takes five years to take an idea to market has
noticed Chinese competitors churning out similar products in 18 months, Henry said.¶ “It’s not because they’ve
come up with some newfangled manufacturing process,” he said during the panel. It’s because concept and engineering
resources are “being stolen, and they’re going right from manufacturing and to market.”¶ Chief executive
officers must be responsible for the security of their companies’ networks, according to Chris Inglis, deputy director of the National Security
Agency, the Pentagon’s code-breaking wing.¶ “We need to hold CEOs or the appropriate parties accountable for the resilience, the security,
integrity of those things that generate revenue or generate whatever the business is of that particular organization,” he said in separate
remarks at the event.¶ Similar to the way they pay attention to finances under Sarbanes-Oxley, the 2002 legislation designed to protect
investors from fraudulent accounting practices, executives may “spend an equal amount of time to the integrity and the resilience of their
networks because it’s not just a commodity whose fate may have an effect on their bottom line, it’s a foundation for their business,” Inglis
said.¶ A bill sponsored by Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, would make it easier for intelligence
agencies to share information with the private sector. The legislation, Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, H.R. 624, has been referred
to the Senate Intelligence Committee.¶ The U.S. Defense Department in a report released May 5 for the first time blamed China directly for
targeting its computer networks. The attacks
were focused on extracting information, including sensitive defense
technology.¶ “In 2012, numerous computer systems around the world, including those owned by the
U.S. government, continued to be targeted for intrusions, some of which appear to be attributable
directly to the Chinese government and military,” it states. “The accesses and skills required for these
intrusions are similar to those necessary to conduct computer network attacks.Ӧ China called the accusations
“groundless” and “not in line with the efforts made by both sides to strengthen mutual trust and cooperation,” according to a May 9 article
published on the state-run website, “People’s Daily Online.” The country is a “victim itself of cyberattacks,” it states.¶ The
U.S. faces a
dilemma in talks with China because the U.S. has tried to make a distinction between types of spying
in cyberspace, including traditional espionage, which it says cannot be legislated or governed through
treaty, and commercial espionage, which it says can, Mulvenon said.¶ “This has been a real clangor with the Chinese because they
don’t see the distinction because in their system the same people are doing both,” he said. China has single, large-scale, state-owned
companies in each sector of the economy, making it easy for government spies to pass intelligence to corporate executives, he said.¶ “They
don’t believe us when we tell them we are statutorily precluded from doing commercial espionage and we even give them a very practical
reason: We say if the United States conducted commercial espionage on behalf of its companies, we wouldn’t know how to share the proceeds
without somebody who didn’t get it suing us in the U.S. government for anti-trust violations,” Mulvenon said.¶ Russia is much stealthier than
China when it comes to cyberspace espionage, Mulvenon said. “They use a lot more crypto,” he said, referring to cryptography.
China Espionage Impact-Media
The Chinese Govermennt is hacking into American computers to try to intimidate the
media.
Rogers, Mike, Member of the House of Representatives and Chairman of the Permanent Select
Committee on Intelligence. Ruppersburg, Dutch, also a member of the House of Reps, andn a ranking
member on Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. 4/16/13 Protecting Internet freedom is a
priority http://thehill.com/special-reports/defense-and-cybersecurity-april-2013/294319-protectinginternet-freedom-is-a-priority Date Accessed; 7/20/13
Most associate cybersecurity with the protection of government, utility, transportation and financial
systems. But cybersecurity is not limited to military information and energy grids. National news
organizations including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post
recently all reported that they were subject to cyberattacks. The recent cyberattacks on media outlets
were an attempt to intimidate and harass newspapers that dared publish information critical of the
Chinese government. Cyberattackers have hacked into American think tanks that have published
papers critical of the Chinese government, in an attempt to squash any dissent. The Chinese are very
good at squashing internal political dissent, and they are now attempting to bring those threats across
the ocean to our shores.
Espionage-Iran
Iran is a serious cyber threat
J. Nicholas Hoover.Senior editor for InformationWeek Government.April 26, 2012.Congress
RaisesAlarmOnIranianCyberThreat.
InformationWeek.http://www.informationweek.com/government/security/congress-raises-alarm-oniranian-cyber-t/232901044.DateRetrieved: July 17, 2013
The Iranian cyber threat to the United States is on the rise, lawmakers and foreign policy observers warned in a House
Homeland Security Committee hearing Thursday. "There should be little doubt that a country that kills innocent
people around the world, guns down its own people, and threatens Israel would not hesitate to carry
out a cyber-attack against the U.S.," said counterterrorism and intelligence subcommittee chairman
Patrick Meehan, R-Pa., whose subcommittee held a joint hearing with the cybersecurity, infrastructure protection, and security
technologies subcommittee. Warnings about the threat of an Iranian attack came from all angles during the hearing,
but the hearing did not include participation by a single intelligence or military official. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper recently
testified to Iran's improvement in the cyber arena. Meehan
called Iran's growing cyber capabilities a "real and
genuine challenge and threat to the United States and its interests," noting the recent attack of a proIranian group called the Iranian Cyber Army on the government news agency Voice Of America. A
Meehan-penned op-ed titled "Iranian Cyber Threat Cannot Be Underestimated" appeared on the website of Congressional
news site The Hill on Thursday. Panelists called to attention recent media reports about Iranian diplomats involved in planned cyber-attacks
against nuclear power plants and other targets. The country also recently claimed that the downing of a drone inside the country was thanks to
a hack of the drone's GPS signals. "They're taking their gloves off right now in the cyber environment," said Frank Cilluffo, associate VP and
director of the Homeland Security Policy Institute and a former Bush administration homeland security official. Panelists at the session
were quick to point out that Iran does not yet pose the same level of technical threat as Russia and
China, but said that Iran's intentions help make it dangerous. "As yet, Iran has not shown itself to be a
similarly advanced or persistent threat" as Russia and China, Cilluffo said. "The bad news is that what they
lack in capability, they make up for in intent and are not as hesitant as other countries may be." Ilya
Berman, VP of the hawkish and conservative American Foreign Policy Council, agreed with Cilluffo's assessment, adding that Iran poses a
potentially significant threat in the asymmetric world of cyberspace. "Cyberspace
is a field that advantages asymmetric
actors," he said. "As a result, the capabilities are an issue, but intent is even more of an issue. Unlike in
Russian and China, where conflicts exist but at least we have diplomatic relations with those
countries, there are a number of threats on the table with Iran." Berman recommended that the
United States government create a stronger deterrence strategy against Iranian cyber-attacks. "We
have had an abject lack of a deterrent strategy in facing Iran, and [the cyber world] is crying out for a
deterrence strategy so that the Iranian regime recognizes that there are redlines that they can't cross,"
he said.
Patriot Act
Patriot Act Balances National Security and Privacy
Homeland Security says it prioritizes national security at the expense of Privacy while
preserving both – States Secret Privilege proves
Palin, Philip J, 9/18/11, Homeland Security Watch, Brennan: Counterterrorism and the Law,
http://www.hlswatch.com/index.php?s=patriot+act , Date Accessed : 7/17/11
We’ve also worked to uphold our values and the rule of law in a second area—our policies and practices
here at home. As I said, we will use all lawful tools at our disposal, and that includes authorities under
the renewed PATRIOT Act. We firmly believe that our intelligence gathering tools must enable us to
collect the information we need to protect the American people. At the same time, these tools must
be subject to appropriate oversight and rigorous checks and balances that protect the privacy of
innocent individuals.¶ As such, we have ensured that investigative techniques in the United States are
conducted in a manner that is consistent with our laws and subject to the supervision of our courts. We
have also taken administrative steps to institute additional checks and balances, above and beyond what
is required by law, in order to better safeguard the privacy rights of innocent Americans.¶ Our
democratic values also include—and our national security demands—open and transparent
government. Some information obviously needs to be protected. And since his first days in office,
President Obama has worked to strike the proper balance between the security the American people
deserve and the openness our democratic society expects.¶ In one of his first acts, the President
issued a new Executive Order on classified information that, among other things, reestablished the
principle that all classified information will ultimately be declassified. The President also issued a
Freedom of Information Act Directive mandating that agencies adopt a presumption of disclosure
when processing requests for information. The President signed into law the first intelligence
authorization act in over five years to ensure better oversight of intelligence activities. Among other
things, the legislation revised the process for reporting sensitive intelligence activities to Congress and
created an Inspector General for the Intelligence Community.¶ For the first time, President Obama
released the combined budget of the intelligence community, and reconstituted the Intelligence
Oversight Board, an important check on the government’s intelligence activities. The President
declassified and released legal memos that authorized the use, in early times, of enhanced
interrogation techniques. Understanding that the reasons to keep those memos secret had
evaporated, the President felt it was important for the American people to understand how those
methods came to be authorized and used.¶ The President, through the Attorney General, instituted a
new process to consider invocation of the so-called “state secrets privilege,” where the government
can protect information in civil lawsuits. This process ensures that this privilege is never used simply
to hide embarrassing or unlawful government activities. But, it also recognizes that its use is
absolutely necessary in certain cases for the protection of national security. I know there has been
some criticism of the Administration on this. But by applying a stricter internal review process, including
a requirement of personal approval by the Attorney General, we are working to ensure that this
extraordinary power is asserted only when there is a strong justification to do so.¶
A2-“Patriot Act Violates Liberties”
Patriot Act vital; safeguards in place to protect liberties
Sales, Nathan A. SEPTEMBER 8, 2011. A Vital Weapon. http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/09/07/do-we-still-need-thepatriot-act/the-patriot-act-is-a-vital-weapon-in-fighting-terrorism. Date Accessed 7/17/13.
America needs the Patriot Act because it helps prevent terrorism while posing little risk to civil
liberties. The law simply lets counterterrorism agents use tools that police officers have used for
decades. And it contains elaborate safeguards against abuse.¶ Consider the three provisions Congress renewed last
May.¶ 1. Congress authorized “roving wiretaps” back in 1986 -- court orders that allow police to monitor criminals even if they switch phones.
The Patriot Act allows the same thing in terrorism investigations. The law levels the playing field: If a roving wiretap is good enough for Tony
Soprano, it’s good enough for Mohamed Atta.¶ The
Patriot Act features strict safeguards. Agents can’t eavesdrop
unless they get a judge’s permission. They must demonstrate that the suspect is a terrorist. And they
must notify the judge when they go up on a new phone.¶ 2. Grand juries in criminal cases routinely
subpoena “business records” from companies like banks and retailers. The Patriot Act lets
counterterrorism agents get the same documents.¶ The law simply lets counterterrorism agents use
tools that police officers have used for decades.¶ The act’s protections are even stronger than the
grand jury rules. Prosecutors issue subpoenas unilaterally, but the Patriot Act requires the F.B.I. to get a judge’s approval. Americans
can’t be investigated on the basis of First Amendment activities, and special limits apply to sensitive materials like medical or library records.¶ 3.
Before 9/11, it was difficult for authorities to monitor “lone wolves” with murky ties to overseas
terrorist groups. The F.B.I. suspected that Zacarias Moussaoui was a terrorist, but agents hadn’t
connected him to Al Qaeda, so it wasn’t clear they could search his apartment. Congress fixed that
problem. Now, agents can monitor a terrorist even if they haven’t yet found evidence he belongs to a
foreign terrorist organization.¶ Again, the Patriot Act has robust safeguards. Agents have to convince a judge to
let them track a lone wolf. This tool can only be used to investigate international terrorism, not domestic. And it doesn’t apply to Americans,
only to temporary visitors like tourists.
Citizens trade off digital privacy for security to prevent terror under the patriot act
Zarka, Heater, Staff writer, 5/8/07, Yahoo, How the Patriot Act Helps United States Citizens, http://voices.yahoo.com/how-patriot-acthelps-united-states-citizens-326827.html, Date accessed: 7/17/13
Many people believe that most terrorist attacks are spontaneous and random. However, the attacks
are methodical and wellplanned. Generally, the terrorists commit numerous crimes before an attack actually occurs. For
example, they may use false student visas to obtain entry, trafficking of drugs, provide material
support to terrorist organizations, and steal weapons and explosives prior to the attack. When all this
activity is going on is when officials need to "pounce" on the terrorists.¶ The PATRIOT Act was established to "deter and
punish terrorist acts in the United States and around the world, to enhance law enforcement
investigatory tools, and for other purposes" (Bullock, Haddow, & Coppola, 2006, pg.519). And in order
to deter terrorist acts, the PATRIOT Act allows the government a variety of "tools". Some of the tools
are as follows: permits the seizure of voicemails, permits execution of a search warrant with delayed
notification (sneak and peek warrants), as well as other procedures.¶ Creates new laws regarding the
financing of terrorist organizations. Permits detention of suspected terrorists for up to seven days
without charges or without initiating deportation. Relaxes the restrictions on information sharing
between agencies. Grants access to internet and computer information. The government can check
medical records, student records, and credit records secretly and without permission. They are also
able to monitor financial activities and records (Bullock, Haddow, & Coppola, 2006). The above is a list of only a few of the
tools available for law enforcement officials concerning terrorism. Most if not all of the above list, will actually allow
officials to notice terrorist activity before an attack occurs. Some of the terrorist activities include
false visas, theft, money laundering, extortion, financial support to terrorist organizations, and selling
drugs. The terrorists commit those activities in order to support themselves, their group, and their
mission (the attack). As mentioned above a terrorist attack is well planned out. With the Patriot Act, we are able to monitor suspected terrorists
without many prior restrictions. The Patriot Act also created new legislation as well as strengthened some penalties for terrorist related crimes, so
instead of 10 years imprisonment they get 15 (example). According to Howard & Sawyer, 2006, "The radicals conclude that the United States has
strategically killed Muslims to terrorize the Islamic nation" (Sawyer, & Howard, 2006, pg.221). Therefore, Al-Qaeda justifies the killing of as
many American citizens as possible as Bin Laden declared war on the U.S. and her allies. That
means that the United States
should be granted extensive authority to monitor terrorist activity. However, as the years have passed
since 9/11 many people are in an uproar about constitutional freedoms and rights concerning the
Patriot Act. It seems like another devastating attack will have to occur on U.S. soil before they realize
the severity of terrorism.¶
CIPSA
A2: Endless Invasion of Privacy
Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act has limitations in place to place to
prevent it from invading your privacy.
Rogers, Mike, Member of the House of Representatives and Chairman of the Permanent Select
Committee on Intelligence. Ruppersburg, Dutch, also a member of the House of Reps, andn a ranking
member on Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. 4/16/13 Protecting Internet freedom is a
priority http://thehill.com/special-reports/defense-and-cybersecurity-april-2013/294319-protectinginternet-freedom-is-a-priority Date Accessed; 7/20/13
These attackers have stolen Americans’ most personal information, including banking and health
records, which can be used for identity theft or blackmail purposes. Using sophisticated distributed denial of service
attacks, foreign cyberattackers are also shutting down websites critical to Americans’ everyday lives,
such as banking websites — compromising not only your bank account, but also the freedom of the
Internet. CISPA was drafted to protect individuals’ privacy and civil liberties while still enabling
effective cyber threat information-sharing. At the suggestion of several privacy and civil liberties groups, we made
numerous changes to the act to further narrow its scope and purpose to ensure protection of these liberties. CISPA does not
allow the federal government to read your email or your Facebook posts or monitor your Internet
activity. The definitions in the bill were narrowed on the House floor to better ensure the bill’s authorities could not be
misinterpreted or misused for broader purposes. CISPA was also amended to restrict how the government can
use the threat information shared by industry to four narrow categories: cybersecurity; investigation
and prosecution of cybersecurity crimes; protection of individuals from the danger of death or
physical injury; and protection of minors from physical or psychological harm such as child pornography.
CISPA can keep the government in check
Rogers, Mike. Ruppersburg, Dutch.(House of Representatives). 4/16/13 Protecting Internet freedom is a
priority http://thehill.com/special-reports/defense-and-cybersecurity-april-2013/294319-protectinginternet-freedom-is-a-priority Date Accessed; 7/20/13
Contrary to some assertions, CISPA does not provide any new authorities for the government to
monitor private networks. Moreover, a private company can restrict the information it shares, to
minimize or anonymize any personal information before sharing the cyber threat information. CISPA is
also designed to prevent companies from sharing information about an individual customer or
subscriber. Finally, the bill also requires an annual report from the intelligence community’s inspector
general to ensure that none of the information provided to government is mishandled or misused.
Making the Internet more secure will itself protect Americans’ privacy, civil liberties and Internet
freedoms, which are presently being whittled away with each successful foreign cyberattack.
Few of us can imagine life without the Internet. We believe this bill is necessary to protect the very
freedom and openness that created the immeasurable benefits the Internet has provided to the
world.
Wire Taps
Wiretaps Solve Terrorism
Wire Tapping has been instrumental in preventing terrorist attacks
Michael Hewitt, Liberty University, 2008, Running head: WIRETAPPING: A NECESSITY, Wiretapping: A Necessity for Effectively Combating
Terrorism in the 21st Century, http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1040&context=honors
In analyzing post 9-11 wiretapping, it is necessary to analyze the effects that its¶ use has had on national security and domestic society in the
realm of National Security,¶ wiretapping has
proven to be instrumental in the identification and prosecution
of terrorists, effectively helping to diminish this threat. In the domestic realm, wiretapping¶ has
proven to be an effective means of preventing terrorist attacks in the U.S., and of¶ putting Americans
at ease. The most obvious evidence that the use of wiretapping has been successful in¶ protecting
American national security is the "fact that there has been no serious terrorist¶ incident on American
shores since its passage in 2001" (Spangler, 2005, para. 13).¶ Senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and a staunch defender of the Patriot
Act and its¶ wiretapping provisions, has pointed out that “because of necessary secrecy laws, we may¶ never know the full positive effects the
Patriot Act is having on terrorism” (Spangler,¶ 2005, para. 13). Hatch did however note that the Justice Department has credited key¶
provisions of the Patriot Act with playing a role in the terrorism-related convictions of¶ hundreds of suspects.
It has largely been the
tools of wiretapping and other forms of¶ electronic surveillance, which have received the credit for the
success of hundreds of¶ anti-terrorism operations since 2001. Most notable among these operations
was the¶ "recent apprehension in England of scores of suspects, who were charged with making¶ plans
to blow up as many as ten airliners traveling to the United States" (Criminal, 2006,¶ para. 24). In this operation,
electronic surveillance played an instrumental part in¶ allowing British agents to monitor the activities of a terrorist cell. "'We have been¶
looking at meetings, movement, travel, spending and the aspirations of a large group of¶ people' said Peter Clarke, head of Scotland Yard's antiterrorism branch" (ABCNews,¶ 2006, para. 2). In this case, British agents substantially monitored the terrorist cell before ¶ making the arrests.
(ABCNews, 2006, para. 24) Another such situation was the¶ uncovering of "evidence indicating that a Pakistani charity was diverting funds
originally contributed for earthquake relief to finance the planned terrorism attacks on these jumbo¶ jets" (Criminal, 2006, para. 16). It is,
however, difficult to attain the exact details of the¶ results of these operations, because in these investigations, "details leading up to the¶ filing
of formal charges is not usually revealed" (Criminal, 2006, para. 16). It is known¶ however, that since September 11, 2001 thousands of
individuals classified as terrorists¶ have been subjected to electronic surveillance procedures. The surveillance, specifically¶ wiretapping, of
individuals suspected of terrorist activities, has resulted in nearly a 20%¶ conviction rate (Criminal 2006).
Wiretaps Solve Crime
Wiretaps are instrumental in taking down domestic drug trafficking operations
Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. 2012 (“Wiretap Report 2012”. Accessed 17 July 13.
http://www.uscourts.gov/Statistics/WiretapReports/wiretap-report-2012.aspx)
Federal and state prosecutors often discuss the importance of wiretap surveillance as an investigative
tool. A wiretap in the Eastern District of California uncovered incriminating cellular telephone
communications and text messages that led to the arrest of 32 individuals and the seizure of 19
vehicles, 35 firearms, $650,000 in cash, approximately 5,000 marijuana plants, and about 200 pounds
of processed marijuana. At the state level, a wiretap in Orange County, California, was instrumental in
solving a cold homicide case that occurred in 1988. Without the interceptions, the targeted subjects
probably would not have been arrested and would have escaped prosecution. A wiretap reported for a
previous year in a larceny investigation in Queens County, New York, revealed that a "sophisticated"
group of individuals were counterfeiting checks, money orders, and credit cards that were then used to
commit grand larceny and fraud. Credit-card making machines and counterfeit credit cards were seized,
and 12 individuals were apprehended. Several separate state jurisdictions reported that interceptions
were instrumental in uncovering drug-trafficking organizations operating in the United States.
Wiretaps are key to getting criminals to cooperate with law enforcement
Chang, Alisa. 2012 (Congressional reporter for NPR. “Wall Street Wiretaps: Investigators Use Insiders’
Own Words To Convict Them”. 26 Dec. Accessed 17 Dec 13.
http://www.npr.org/2012/12/26/168021457/wall-street-wiretaps-investigators-use-insiders-ownwords-to-convict-them)
But the problem was, most of these people they confronted would just lawyer up and resist. What the
feds needed was something to make people cooperate. And in early 2008, they decided, let's do a
wiretap. Many of them, like Carroll, were longtime organized crime and narcotics investigators. They
knew, in those worlds, when you needed leverage to make someone cooperate, you recorded them
planning something criminal.
Human Trafficking
Mobile Phone Searches Solve Human Trafficking
Mobile phones searches solve Human trafficking.
Mark Latonero, The Research Director at the University of southern California on Communication Leadership & Policy., “Rise of phones in
human trafficking” DoP: 2012 DoA: 7/17/13, https://technologyandtrafficking.usc.edu/the-rise-of-mobile-phones-in-human-trafficking/
Based on the evidence gathered in the previous section, a key finding of this report is that mobile
phones play a central role in
facilitating potential cases of DMST [ Domestic Minor Sexual Trafficking]. Online advertisements for potential
DMST victims commonly contain a mobile phone contact number. Logistical information such as time, place, pricing, and
types of services are communicated through phone calls or text messages on mobile phones. As an
increasing number of websites develop mobile applications, posting of advertisements can be done
primarily via mobile phone, as can viewing and responding to these advertisements.¶ Because the
social actors involved in trafficking can use mobile phones to communicate, coordinate, organize,
advertise, etc., the information transmitted across mobile networks could serve multiple evidentiary
and investigatory purposes. The widespread use of mobile phones can also be utilized for social outreach and interventions.¶ Scant
research or policy attention to date has focused on the issue of mobile phone use in DMST. The intersection of mobility, digital
technologies, and minor sex trafficking brings new challenges and opportunities that require careful research and
analysis.¶ For example, technology-facilitated sex trafficking networks often rely upon the anonymity or contrived identities of victims and
traffickers in order to operate.[1] According to Samantha Doerr, public affairs manager at Microsoft’s Digital Crimes Unit:¶ “Child sex trafficking
is simply a very different problem than other technology-facilitated child sexual exploitation … We need to look at the methods and language
used for advertising—how johns go about searching, the use of mobile phones in child sex trafficking, and how a transaction is
coordinated.”[2]¶ Although the
field of technology forensics is exploring ways to disrupt human trafficking
online by using trace data to identify perpetrators, mobile technology is already shifting the spaces
from which we can collect those traces.¶
Crime Impacts
Organized Crime Destroys Rule of Law
Organized crime undermines rule of law
United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime. 2013 (“Transnational organized crime threat
assessments”. Accessed 17 July 13. http://www.unodc.org/unodc/data-and-analysis/TOC-threatassessments.html)
The world population grows every year, and so does the volume of exchanges among people. The vast
majority of these exchanges are legitimate and beneficial, but a significant share is not. Transnational
criminal markets crisscross the planet, conveying drugs, arms, trafficked women, toxic waste, stolen
natural resources or protected animals' parts. Hundreds of billions of dollars of dirty money flow
through the world every year, distorting local economies, corrupting institutions and fuelling conflict.
Transnational organized crime has become a central issue in international affairs, an important factor
in the global economy, and an immediate reality for people around the world. Aside from the direct
effects - drug addiction, sexual exploitation, environmental damage and a host of other scourges organized crime has the capacity to undermine the rule of law and good governance, without which
there can be no sustainable development.
Drug Trade Impacts: Drugs & Crime Destroy Society – Laundry List
Drugs and crime destroy economies, erode social relations, undermine democracy,
and result in vigilantism
Office of the President of the United Nations General Assembly’s 66th Session. 2012
(“Thematic Debate of the 66th session of the United Nations General Assembly on Drugs and Crime as a
Threat to Development On the occasion of the UN International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit
Trafficking”. 26 Jun. Accessed 17 July 13. http://www.un.org/en/ga/president/66/Issues/drugs/drugscrime.shtml)
Drugs and crime undermine[s] development by eroding social and human capital. This degrades
quality of life and can force skilled workers to leave, while the direct impacts of victimisation, as well as fear of crime, may
impede the development of those that remain. By limiting movement, crime impedes access to possible employment and
educational opportunities, and it discourages the accumulation of assets. Crime is also more “expensive” for poor
people in poor countries, and disadvantaged households may struggle to cope with the shock of victimisation .
Drugs and crime also undermine[s] development by driving away business. Both foreign and domestic
investors see crime as a sign of social instability, and crime drives up the cost of doing business. Tourism is a sector
especially sensitive to crime issues. Drugs and crime, moreover, undermine[s] the ability of the state to promote
development by destroying the trust relationship between the people and the state, and undermining
democracy and confidence in the criminal justice system. When people lose confidence in the
criminal justice system, they may engage in vigilantism, which further undermines the state.
Drug Trade Impacts: Drug Money Fuels Terrorism
The drug trade is a major source of terrorist income
McCraw, Steven C. 2003 (Assistant Director of the FBI Office of Intelligence. Testimony given before
the Senate Judiciary Committee. 20 May. Accessed 17 July 13.
http://www.fbi.gov/news/testimony/international-drug-trafficking-and-terrorism)
In framing the issue, the Committee astutely recognizes these links and the threat they present to the American people. That is why all
aspects of the terrorist enterprise including funding and support must be attacked. The criminal nexus to
terrorism including drug trafficking is why our local, state, and federal law enforcement partners throughout the
U.S. and the world are essential to combating global terrorism. They constitute an army of dedicated professionals who bring
tremendous resources and capabilities to the war on terrorism. In fact, the successes of the Joint Terrorism Task Forces are in large part to their
unwavering commitment to the safety of our nation and its citizens.¶ Today's Committee meeting focuses on the ties of drug trafficking and
international terrorism which is clearly a problem. Drug
trafficking is a highly lucrative enterprise generating billions
of dollars in profit that terrorist organizations can easily tap into. The ties between international terrorist
organizations and drug trafficking varies greatly from organization to organization. For example, the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de
Colombia (FARC), aka the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, is strongly tied to drug trafficking in Colombia. The
objective of the FARC is to overthrow the established order in Colombia and replace it with a socialist
dictatorship. In its attempts to destabilize the Government of Colombia, the FARC conducts bombings, extortions,
selective assassinations, kidnappings, and armed confrontations with Colombian police and military forces. In an
effort to finance its agenda, the FARC has conducted countless kidnappings for ransom of Colombian and foreign nationals, including the most
recent kidnaping/capture of American citizens in Colombia. They have also forced businesses to pay "war taxes" in exchange for FARC
protection. However, drug
trafficking profits are the FARC's principal source of funding. Moreover, it appears
much of their agenda is based upon protecting and exploiting drug trafficking operations in Colombia and
the region.¶ Historically, Afghanistan has been a major source of heroin throughout the world. Recently, al-Qa'ida
and Sunni extremists have been associated through a number of investigations with drug trafficking. We have
observed elements of the Taliban shipping and selling illegal drugs into the US. A recent joint FBI and DEA
investigation resulted in the arrests of 16 Afghan and Pakistani subjects for involvement in a drug ring that was possibly linked to Al-Qa'ida and
the Taliban. The investigation determined that heroin, grown and processed in Afghanistan and Pakistan, was being shipped to the U.S.
Profits from the sale of the heroin were laundered through Afghan and Pakistani owned businesses and then sent back to
associates of terrorist organizations. Criminal and financial links to the Taliban regime and their involvement with Al-Qa'ida were
established. The subjects were also involved in a number of other criminal activities including document/mail fraud, operating an illegal money
transmitting business, and other white collar crimes.¶ Historically, Hizballah's direct involvement in narcotics trafficking has been limited, and
the group's leaders have condemned the drug trade on religious grounds. However, we
have seen individuals with suspected
Hizballah ties involved in drug related activities and we believe that funds from these activities eventually
make their way to Hizballah coffers in Lebanon. The FBI has investigated and continues to investigate, efforts by individuals and
entities associated with Hizballah to traffic illegal drugs in the U.S. Acts of terrorism attributed to Hizballah have little or no
connection to narcotic issues. Rather, these acts were intended to further their political and terrorist
agendas. Hizballah utilizes funds from drug trafficking as one of many methods to fund these agendas.¶ By way of
example, the FBI conducted an investigation which employed an undercover operation to target Hizballah cells in the U.S. ¶ The investigation
has focused on distinct, but related, criminal enterprises which have participated in a host of criminal activity from fraud schemes to drug
trafficking to fund their activities and provide funds to the overall Hizballah organization. A number of the subjects have been indicted and the
investigation is continuing.¶ The Al-Ittihad al-Islami, or AIAI, Somalia's
largest militant Islamic organization, is suspected
of smuggling an illegal narcotic leaf known as Khat ("cot") into the United States. Arrests and shipment seizures indicate a sharp
increase in demand for the drug. Proceeds from East African Khat sales are likely remitted to Middle Eastern banks via Hawala network
and wire services. It is likely that these funds pass through the hands of suspected AIAI members and other persons
with possible ties to terrorist groups.¶ The bottom line is that terrorists and terrorist groups will resort to any method or means to
fund and facilitate their terrorist agendas. As state sponsorship of terrorism has come under greater international
condemnation, the tremendous profit potential associated with drug trafficking make it an attractive
from the perspective of terrorist groups. This is further evidence that the
prospect of terrorist-related drug trafficking
represents a continuing and significant threat to our national security.
Drug Trade Impacts: Drug Trade Causes Latin American Instability
Drug trafficking breeds instability in Latin America
Williams, Phil. Felbab-Brown, Vanda. 2012 (Phil Williams is the Director of the Matthew B. Ridgway
Center for International Security Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, and Vanda Felbab-Brown is a
fellow at the Latin American Initiative and 21st Century Defense Initiative in Foreign Policy at the
Brookings Institute. April. Accessed 17 July 13.
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/people.cfm?authorID=850)
Burgeoning and unconstrained drug production and other illicit economies thus have profound negative consequences
for states and local stability. Most fundamentally, illicit economies provide an opportunity for belligerent
groups to increase their power along multiple dimensions not simply by gaining control of physical resources,
but also [and] by obtaining support from local populations. Such belligerents hence pose a serious security
threat to local governments and, depending on the objectives of the group, to regional and global security and U.S.
interests as well. With large financial profits, the belligerent groups improve their fighting capabilities by
increasing their physical resources, hiring greater numbers of better paid combatants, providing them with better weapons, and simplifying
their logistical and procurement chains. Crucially and frequently neglected in policy considerations, such
belligerents derive
significant political capital—legitimacy with and support from local populations—from their sponsorship of the drug
economy. They do so by protecting the local population’s reliable (and frequently sole source of) livelihood from the efforts of the
government to repress the illicit economy. They also derive political capital by protecting the farmers from brutal and unreliable traffickers, by
bargaining with traffickers for better prices on behalf of the farmers, by mobilizing the revenues from the illicit economies to provide otherwise
absent social services such as clinics and infrastructure, as well as other public goods, and by being able to claim nationalist credit if a foreign
power threatens the local illicit economy. In short, sponsorship
of illicit economies allows nonstate armed groups to
function as security providers and economic and political regulators. They are thus able to transform
themselves from mere violent actors to actors that take on proto-state functions.
Gangs Impacts: Gangs Cause Crime
Gangs are a major source of crime within the United States
Federal Bureau of Investigation. 2011 (“2011 National Gang Threat Assesment”. Acessed 17 July
13. http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/2011-national-gang-threat-assessment)
There are approximately 1.4 million active street, prison, and OMG gang members comprising more than
33,000 gangs in the United States. Gang membership increased most significantly in the Northeast and Southeast regions, although the West and Great
Lakes regions boast the highest number of gang members. Neighborhood-based gangs, hybrid gang members, and national-level gangs such as the Sureños are
rapidly expanding in many jurisdictions. Many communities are also experiencing an increase in ethnic-based gangs such as African, Asian, Caribbean,
and Eurasian gangs.¶ Gangs are responsible for an average of 48 percent of violent crime in most jurisdictions
and up to 90 percent in several others, according to NGIC analysis. Major cities and suburban areas experience the most gang-related
violence. Local neighborhood-based gangs and drug crews continue to pose the most significant criminal threat in most communities. Aggressive
recruitment of juveniles and immigrants, alliances and conflict between gangs, the release of
incarcerated gang members from prison, advancements in technology and communication, and Mexican
Drug Trafficking Organization (MDTO) involvement in drug distribution have resulted in gang expansion and violence in a
number of jurisdictions.¶ Gangs are increasingly engaging in non-traditional gang-related crime, such as alien smuggling, human
trafficking, and prostitution. Gangs are also engaging in white-collar crime such as counterfeiting, identity theft, and
mortgage fraud, primarily due to the high profitability and much lower visibility and risk of detection and punishment than drug and weapons trafficking. ¶
US-based gangs have established strong working relationships with Central American and MDTOs to
perpetrate illicit cross-border activity, as well as with some organized crime groups in some regions of the United States. US-based gangs and
MDTOs are establishing wide-reaching drug networks; assisting in the smuggling of drugs, weapons, and illegal immigrants along the Southwest Border; and serving
as enforcers for MDTO interests on the US side of the border.¶ Many gang members continue to engage in gang activity while incarcerated. Family members play
pivotal roles in assisting or facilitating gang activities and recruitment during a gang members’ incarceration. Gang members in some correctional facilities are
adopting radical religious views while incarcerated. ¶ Gangs encourage members, associates, and relatives to obtain
law enforcement,
judiciary, or legal employment in order to gather information on rival gangs and law enforcement
operations. Gang infiltration of the military continues to pose a significant criminal threat , as members
of at least 53 gangs have been identified on both domestic and international military installations. Gang members
who learn advanced weaponry and combat techniques in the military are at risk of employing these skills on the street when
they return to their communities.¶ Gang members are acquiring high-powered, military-style weapons and equipment
which poses a significant threat because of the potential to engage in lethal encounters with law enforcement officers and civilians. Typically firearms are acquired
through illegal purchases; straw purchases via surrogates or middle-men, and thefts from individuals, vehicles, residences and commercial establishments. Gang
members also target military and law enforcement officials, facilities, and vehicles to obtain weapons,
ammunition, body armor, police gear, badges, uniforms, and official identification.¶ Gangs on Indian Reservations often emulate
national-level gangs and adopt names and identifiers from nationally recognized urban gangs. Gang members on some Indian Reservations are associating with gang
members in the community to commit crime. ¶ Gangs
are becoming increasingly adaptable and sophisticated, employing new and
to facilitate criminal activity discreetly, enhance their criminal operations, and connect
with other gang members, criminal organizations, and potential recruits nationwide and even worldwide.
advanced technology
Gangs Impacts: Gangs Key to Drug Trade
U.S.-based gangs are integral to international drug trade operations
Schmidt, Mark. 2012 (Staff writer for the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point. “U.S. Gang
Alignment with Mexican Drug Trafficking Organizations”. 22 Mar. Accessed 17 July 13.
http://www.ctc.usma.edu/posts/u-s-gang-alignment-with-mexican-drug-trafficking-organizations)
MDTOs were in search of U.S.-based partners who would not cooperate with law enforcement. Accordingly, the loyalty and discipline
attributes of gangs made them ideal partners. Theoretically, the loyalty and discipline of U.S. gangs would hinder
cooperation with law enforcement, and thus better protect the drug trafficking operation. The success
of their working relationship is, in part, because gangs and Drug Trafficking Organizations (DTOs) are likeminded organizations. As criminal enterprises, loyalty, discipline, and territoriality are cornerstone philosophies
on how gangs and MDTOs manage their respective organizations. This is because criminal enterprises must
function in a covert capacity if they wish to survive law enforcement intervention and rival criminal
takeover. Without loyalty to the organization, whether a gang or a DTO, rivals and law enforcement could easily infiltrate and dismantle the
organization from the inside. Discipline is paramount to keep members inline so that their actions do not disrupt the organization or its
operations. Controlling and expanding one’s territory is also important to the survivability of the organization as it protects the economic area
of operation from competitors.
Drug Trade
Wikileaks Harms National Security
Wikileaks Threatens National Security
Wikileaks is a threat to national security and it is necessary to find the anonymous
sources posting classified information
Montabalno, Elizabeth (Staff Writer Information Weekly)Mar 2010 Army: Wikileaks A National Security
Threat http://www.informationweek.com/government/security/army-wikileaks-a-national-securitythrea/223900094 Date Accessed: 7/16/13
Wikileaks.org is considered a threat to national security because it posts classified intelligence
information, according to a 2008 U.S. Army document Wikileaks posted Monday.¶ The document,
attributed to the Army Counterintelligence Center and titled "Wikileaks.org -- An Online Reference to
Foreign Intelligence Services, Insurgents, or Terrorist Groups?", cited the leaking of classified Army
materials as the chief reason Wikileaks is harmful to national security.¶ "Such information could be of
value to foreign intelligence and security services (FISS), foreign military forces, foreign insurgents, and
foreign terrorist groups for collecting information or for planning attacks against U.S. force, both
within the United States and abroad," the document says.¶ The Army has tried to sniff out a possible
mole within its own ranks who might be leaking materials to Wikileaks, doubting the site's assertion that
it receives classified materials from former government agency employees, according to the
document.¶ "These claims are highly suspect, however, since Wikileaks.org states that the anonymity
and protection of the leakers or whistleblowers is one of its primary goals," according to the
document.¶ Because anyone can post to the site and there is no editorial oversight, the public may use
Wikileaks as a source of misinformation, or to create lies or propaganda to promote a positive or
negative image of a targeted audience, according to the document.
¶ The Army has sought not only to identify anyone within its own ranks leaking documents to the site,
but also to encourage other organizations to do the same to try to take the site down.¶ "Web sites
such as Wikileaks.org have trust as their most important center of gravity by protecting the anonymity
and identity of the insider, leaker, or whistleblower," the document stated. "Successful identification,
prosecution, termination of employment, and exposure of persons leaking the information by the
governments and businesses affected by information posted to Wikileaks.org would damage and
potentially destroy this center of gravity and deter others from taking similar actions."
Wikileaks harms national security and caused the death of foreign intelligence officers
Hoth, Jim (Author of Gateway Pundit, and Washington Post) May 2012 Horrible… Wikileaks Document
Led to Hanging Death of Western Spy This Week in Tehran
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2012/05/horrible-wikileaks-document-led-to-hanging-death-ofwestern-spy-this-week-in-tehran/
The leaked US documents by far left hero Bradley Manning and Wikileaks website led to the hanging
death this week of Western spy Majid Jamali Fashi in Tehran. The Wikileaks scandal led to the hanging
death of Western spy Majid Jamali Fashi in Tehran Times of Israel reported, via OrbusMax: WikiLeaks
may have been responsible for exposing Majid Jamali Fashi, the 24-year-old kickboxer who was hanged
in Tehran on Tuesday morning after “confessing” to assassinating a nuclear scientist on behalf of Israel,
a British media report said. The Times of London reported Wednesday that a document from the US
Embassy in Baku, Azerbaijan, seemingly drew attention to Fashi. The September 2009 US diplomatic
document — identified by the code 09BAKU687 — quotes an Iranian source who was a licensed martial
arts coach and trainer as describing to his American contacts pressure from the Iranian regime to train
soldiers and militiamen in martial arts. Fashi was reportedly in Baku for an international martial arts
competition only days before the US Embassy document was written. The suggestion is that the Iranian
authorities identified Fashi as someone who was in illicit contact with the West on the basis of the
document. He was arrested days after the publication of the document by WikiLeaks in December of
2010 and charged with carrying out the January 2010 assassination of nuclear scientist Masoud AliMohammadi on behalf of the Mossad.
Wikileaks is a specific threat to national security and is only the tip of the iceberg –
more groups and people will follow their example
Eric Sterner,
Fellow, The George C. Marshall Institute, February 2011, Date Accessed July 16,2013,
“Wikileaks and Cyberspace Cultures in Conflict”, The George C. Marshall Institute,
http://www.marshall.org/pdf/materials/931.pdf
Wikileaks and Assange represent a mindset as much as a specific security threat to the United States.
The mindset raises long-term challenges for U.S. national security. Even should the United States
successfully deny Wikileaks access to cyberspace and punish it in some fashion for harming U.S.
national security, other individuals and organizations will spring up and perform the same function.
Indeed, multiple mirror websites sprung up with archived Wikileaks data when the latter’s web
presence declined. Former Wikileaks associates have already started a new entity under the moniker
“OpenSecrets.Org.” Writing in The Washington Post, Tim Hwang calls them expansionists, “who hold
that the Web should remake the rest of the world in its own image. They believe that decentralized,
transparent and radically open networks should be the organizing principle for all things in society, big
and small.”9 One often finds a belief that cyberspace also liberates the individual, that it empowers
people to rise above the artificial constraints that social institutions place upon them. Thus, for
expansionists, it becomes essential to the spread of human liberty. Expansionists subscribe to a
certain worldview and often ascribe to themselves some higher responsibility to a principle that
should exempt them from state authority.10 Thus, some give little thought to “hacktivism” against
entities that do not share their worldview, ranging from corporations to governments. In other words,
Wikileaks only represents a surge in the tide of an expansionist worldview. Of course, it is not possible
to define a group that calls itself “expansionist” and subscribes to a specific doctrine. Rather,
expansionism as used here reflects a strain of loosely consistent thought when it comes to discussions of
cyberspace and its relation to society.
Wikileaks Threatens National Security
Wikileaks hurts diplomacy efforts, while justifying weapons proliferation and war
HEATHER HURLBURT, Executive Director of the National Security Network, November 30th, 2010, Date
Accessed July 16, 2013, “Why Wikileaks Is Bad for Progressive Foreign Policy”,
http://www.newrepublic.com/blog/jonathan-cohn/79483/wikileaks-round-iii-will-it-matter-much#
But underlying all those discrete policy positions is a common set of assumptions and values: that we
live in a complex world where posturing, rigid ideology, and indiscriminate use of force will not get us,
as a society or a global commons, to where we need to go; that quiet talk is much more effective than
loud threats; that, in the long run, America’s national interests will be best served if we see and act on
them as inextricably linked with the interests of others. I’ve called them progressive, because they are.
They’re also, with a bit less emphasis on the global good, realist. Or you might simply say they are sane
and reasonable. But if we can’t conduct quiet diplomacy and have it stay quiet, it’s a lot harder to
make this approach work. Could Sadat and Begin have gotten to Camp David without months of quiet
preparation? Could Nixon have gone to China?
And back here within the U.S., you can count upon the opponents of progressive policies to use the
Wikileaks dumps to advance their agenda. They'll take items out of context and use them to justify
ideas like bombing Iran, rejecting the START treaty, and god-knows-what to North Korea. The
Wikileakers claim to promote the politics of peace and moderation. But this latest dump could very
easily have the opposite effect, by giving the absolutists a chance to spread their stereotypes and
illusions of a black and white world.
Wikileaks Helps Terrorists
Wikileaks is detrimental to the government and helps terrorists plan and coordinate
attacks
Leanord, Tom (Staff writer The Telegraph) Mar 2010 Pentagon deems Wikileaks National Security
Threat http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/7475050/Pentagon-deems-Wikileaks-a-nationalsecurity-threat.html
WikiLeaks, a non-profit organization which tries to offer a means of anonymously exposing
confidential documents, has become a thorn in the side of governments and private corporations. Its
latest revelation concerns itself, namely a 2008 document attributed to the Army Counterintelligence
Centre which concluded that the site constitutes a threat to military operations and US security. The
information could be used by foreign intelligence, insurgents or terrorists for "planning attacks", the
report added. Its authors warned that the lack of editorial oversight over what could be posted could
lead to it being used to spread lies and propaganda. Their report also revealed that the army had tried
to discover the identity of a possible mole leaking information to the site. An army spokesman
confirmed to the New York Times that the document, which provided no specific evidence to support its
fears, was genuine. Leaks to the site that might have alarmed military chiefs include details of military
equipment, troop strengths and its publication in 2007 of almost the entire order of battle for US
forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Wikileaks also published a copy of "standard operating procedures" at
the Guantánamo Bay detention centre which purportedly revealed the use of "extreme psychological
stress" on detainees. The website, which relies on donations, almost closed down this year because it
ran out of money. It has also faced attempts by governments such as those of North Korea and Thailand
to block access to its site.
Wikileaks Places Lives at Risk; Gives Terrorists a ‘hit list’.
Robert Winnett, Political Editor for the Daily Telegraph, July 30, 2010, Date Accessed July 16, 2013, The
Telegraph (UK), , “Wikileaks Afghanistan: Taliban ‘hunting down informants,”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/7917955/Wikileaks-AfghanistanTaliban-hunting-down-informants.html
More dire, the most recent release included information that identified critical infrastructure
vulnerabilities. Earlier mass releases of classified information and unfiltered military reports from Iraq
and Afghanistan placed the lives of U.S. allies and pro-democracy forces at risk by, among other things,
giving terrorist groups a “hit list.”2
Wikileaks Hurts US-Pakistani Relations
Wikileaks hurts U.S. Pakistani Relations; Released Information Fuels Anti-American
sentiment
Jayshree Bajoria, South Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch, December 6, 2010, Date Accessed July
16th,2013, How WikiLeaks Hurts U.S.-Pakistan Ties, Council on Foreign Relations (CFR),
http://www.cfr.org/pakistan/wikileaks-hurts-us-pakistan-ties/p23565,
The release of thousands of U.S. diplomatic cables (NYT) by WikiLeaks.org has further shaken
Washington's already strained relations with Pakistan, a strategic ally central to any success in
Afghanistan and the fight against terrorism. The cables discuss U.S. concerns over Pakistan's
continued support for certain militant groups, its nuclear program, the country's fragile civil-military
relations, human rights abuses by Pakistan's security services, and more. Pakistani media has been
covering the cable leaks extensively, and some stories have further fueled anti-U.S. sentiment
(Reuters), with Pakistan's right-wing Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami staging a rally Dec. 5 to protest
Pakistan's alliance (AFP) with the United States.
A2: Wikileaks Solves For Transparency
Wikileaks does not increase transparency – Bypassing the legal framework creates a
governmental backlash that leads to even more secrecy
Fenster, Mark. (Professor at the University of Florida) March 2012. Disclosure's Effects: WikiLeaks and
Transparency. http://works.bepress.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1009&context=mark_fenster Date
Accessed: 7/17/2013
First, WikiLeaks’ ability to receive and distribute leaked information cheaply, quickly, and seemingly
unstoppably allows it to bypass the legal framework that would otherwise permit courts and officials
to consider and balance disclosure’s effects. For this reason, WikiLeaks threatens to make
transparency’s balance irrelevant.238 Second, its recent massive disclosures of U.S. military and
diplomatic documents, and the uneven and unpredictable effects they have had to date, should force
us to reconsider and test the assumption that disclosure produces effects that can serve as the basis
for judicial and administrative prediction, calculation, and balancing. For this reason, WikiLeaks
threatens transparency’s balance by disproving its assumption that disclosure guarantees measurable
consequences that can be estimated ex ante.
Turn: Wikileaks decreases transparency by creating a government backlash and
increased digital surveillance
Päivikki Karhula. (Staff Writer for International Federation of Libraries Association) Jan 2011 What is
the effect of WikiLeaksfor Freedom of Information?
http://www.ifla.org/files/assets/faife/publications/spotlights/wikileaks-karhula.pdf Date Accesed:
7/17/13
What is the possible impact of WikiLeaks? Is it going to increase or restore the space of free speech or
advance transparency of public documents? Or is it going to have the opposite effect and make
governments strengthen their restrictions and increase different forms of Internet censorship? There
are several valid concerns and evident signs about stricter legislation and more in depth surveillance
practices which may find their grounds on WikiLeaks. Shortly after cable leaks three US senators
(Ensign, Lieberman, Brown) introduced a bill aimed at stopping WikiLeaks by making it illegal to
publish the names of military or intelligence community informants. According to Brown, The Securing
Human Intelligence and Enforcing Lawful Dissemination Act (SHIELD) would prevent anyone from
compromising national security in the future in a similar manner to WikiLeaks.17 Another bill under
discussion would give the US government extended rights to wiretap all online communication and
Internet traffic including foreign-based service providers. The wiretapping bill would also require
software developers which enable peer-to-peer communication to redesign their service to allow
interception.18 Concerns have been raised if WikiLeaks is used to gain support for this legislation.19
A2: Wikileaks Solves For Transparency
Wikileaks hurts national security; slows declassification and openness in Gov’t
HEATHER HURLBURT, Executive Director of the National Security Network, November 30th, 2010, Date
Accessed July 16, 2013, “Why Wikileaks Is Bad for Progressive Foreign Policy”,
http://www.newrepublic.com/blog/jonathan-cohn/79483/wikileaks-round-iii-will-it-matter-much#
In the last few years, there has been some progress toward classifying fewer documents and using the
more rarefied classifications less frequently. This series of leaks will almost surely reverse that
progress. A top-secret classification would have kept any of these documents off the shared network
from which they were allegedly downloaded by a very junior soldier.
You can bet that the intelligence community will make that point—not only to justify stronger
classification of new documents but also to slow the declassification of old ones. Civilian
administrations at least since Clinton’s have been trying to speed up those efforts. Now they will go
even more slowly, making it harder to learn the whole story of how our government analyzed an
issue, treated an individual, or reacted to a crisis.
And make no mistake: You can't get the comprehensive history of a diplomatic episode from Wikileaks
any more than someone could learn the comprehensive truth about you by downloading the top 20 emails from your inbox right now.
Transparency
Uniqueness: Privacy Decreasing Now
No Privacy Now-Social Media
Palmer, Shelly. 06/16/2013. PRISM: There Simply is No Privacy... None.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/shelly-palmer/prism-there-simply-is-no_b_3451721.html
Being an active member of a social networking community - whether it's Facebook, Twitter, or
anything else - means ceding a fair amount of privacy. The information, photos and check-ins you
share are already public information (to an extent), even if your security settings are maxed out.
Nothing you do on the Internet is truly private, and nothing you put on the Internet will ever really be
deleted. Surrendering your right to privacy is the price of living an Internet-based "connected" life.
There is an immense lack of digital privacy protection regarding mobile phones
Hubert A.-M. Moik. CEO of MobiDigger, a cell phone digital privacy company. August 2012. Protect
your privacy:¶ Mobile & Digital Privacy and Awareness.
http://www.mobidigger.com/2012/Privacy_Study_MobiDigger_2012.pdf. Date Accessed 7/17/13.
Contrary to conventional wisdom, privacy concerns are not limited to the Internet. It also ¶ encloses
mobile phones, which penetration in America reached 104.6% in 2011 (totaling 331.6 ¶ million subscribers) therefore exceeding the US
population1¶ . Even one-third of American ¶ households now have wireless device only2¶ . Users are largely unaware that cell
phone ¶ messages -even simple text messages- ultimately can end up in the hands of strangers and ¶
even on the Internet. Worse, for example, new “smart phones” send information about the ¶ phone’s
location to databases. Though such databases usually are not public, they also are not ¶ private; this information,
then can pose a danger to the person who uses their phone to ¶ communicate with strangers or other acquaintances, to whom they
normally would not reveal ¶ their locations. Private cell-phone information can also be revealed through a “reverse
search,” ¶ in which anyone can search a cell phone number to find the owner’s name and address.
Digital privacy has largely dissappeared
Amy Joi O'Donoghue. Writer for Deseret news.June 7 2013."Addressing the illusion of digital
privacy."Deseret News.http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865581375/Addressing-the-illusion-ofdigital-privacy.html?pg=all. Date Retrieved: July 17, 2013.
“You
can’t have 100 percent security and then also have 100 percent privacy and zero inconvenience,”
President Barack Obama said. “You know, we’re going to have to make some choices as a society.”¶
Some say that choice has already been made in the aftermath of 9/11, with the approval of the Patriot
Act that followed, and the pursuit of security at a time of free-flowing information of all types that
gives the nation's enemies — from individuals to organizations to nations — the ability to cause
catastrophic harm.¶ But it's a choice and policy being assessed this week in the halls of Washington, D.C., as well as in the burgs and
hamlets of the nation by individuals and families who increasingly use technology to navigate their lives.¶ "Digital privacy is an
illusion," said Eric Swedin, a professor at Weber State University who teaches history, particularly the history of technology. Swedin has also
taught computer science and has specialized in information security — such as how hacking works and how to defend a system against
hackers.¶ "When
you do something digitally, it can be monitored and copied. Corporations do this all the
time," Swedin said.¶ He said Google, for example, keeps track of searches.¶ "Google cares not about you as an individual, they care
about you as a marketing category … and this gives you ads that are discerned from your personal searches."¶ Swedin said digital
eavesdropping into cellphone records should not be a surprise given the wide-open nature of the Internet and the domestic security urgency
that gripped the nation in the wake of 9/11.¶ "You
can learn a lot really fast about a person just from looking at that
information," he said. "My suspicion, and it is just a suspicion, is that the intelligence community since
9/11 has been totally enamored with something called 'total information awareness.' It is this belief
that if you have enough data and the right kind of computer programs, you can find criminal behavior
before it happens."
Surveillance happening now, and Citizens like it
James Vlahos Contributing writer at The New York Times Contributing Editor at Popular Mechanics Contributing Editor at Popular Science
October 1, 2009. “Surveillance Society: New High-Tech Cameras Are Watching You Popular mechanics”,
http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/military/4236865
Most Americans would probably welcome such technology at what clearly is a marquee terrorist target. An
ABC News/Washington
Post poll in July 2007 found that 71 percent of Americans favor increased video surveillance. What people
may not realize, however, is that advanced monitoring systems such as the one at the Statue of Liberty are proliferating
around the country. High-profile national security efforts make the news—wiretapping phone conversations,
Internet moniÂtoring—but state-of-the-art surveillance is increasingly being used in more every-day settings.
By local police and businesses. In banks, schools and stores. There are an estimated 30 million
surveillance cameras now deployed in the United States shooting 4 billion hours of footage a week.
Americans are being watched, all of us, almost everywhere. We have arrived at a unique moment in the history of surveillance.
The price of both megapixels and gigabytes has plummeted, making it possible to collect a previously
unimaginable quantity and quality of data. Advances in processing power and software, meanwhile, are beginning to allow
computers to surmount the greatest limitation of traditional surveillance—the ability of eyeballs to effectively observe the activity on dozens of
video screens simultaneously. Computers can't do all the work by themselves, but they can expand the capabilities of humans exponentially. ¶
Uniqueness: Privacy Violations Inevitable
Violations of our privacy are inevitable, the proliferation of security technology is
increasing rapidly.
Brin, David. Doctor of Philosophy in space science, 2010 fellow at the Institute of Ethics. 1998. The
Transparent Society. “Chapter One: The Challenge of an Open Society.”
http://www.davidbrin.com/transparentsociety1.html
Alas, they do appear to be our only options. For the cameras are on their way, along with data networks that will send a myriad
images flashing back and forth, faster than thought. ¶ In fact, the future has already arrived. The trend began in Britain a decade ago, in the town
of King's Lynn, where sixty remote-controlled video cameras were installed to scan known "trouble spots," reporting directly to police headquarters. The resulting
reduction in street crime exceeded all predictions; in or near zones covered by surveillance, crime dropped to one seventieth of the former amount. The savings in
patrol costs alone paid for the equipment in a few months. Dozens of cities and towns soon followed the example of King's Lynn. Glasgow, Scotland, reported a 68
percent drop in crime citywide, while police in Newcastle fingered over 1,500 perpetrators with taped evidence. (All but seven pleaded guilty, and those seven were
later convicted.) In May 1997, a thousand Newcastle soccer fans rampaged through downtown streets. Detectives studying the video reels picked out 152 faces and
published 80 photographs in local newspapers. In days, all were identified. ¶ Today over
300,000 cameras are in place throughout the
United Kingdom, transmitting round-the-clock images to a hundred constabularies, all of them reporting decreases in public misconduct. Polls
report that the cameras are extremely popular with citizens, though British civil libertarian John Wadham and others have
bemoaned this proliferation of snoop technology, claiming, "It could be used for any other purpose, and of course it could be abused." ¶ Visitors to Japan, Thailand,
and Singapore will see that other countries are rapidly following the British example, using closed circuit television (CCTV) to supervise innumerable public areas.*¶
This trend was slower coming to North America, but it appears to be taking off. After initial experiments garnered
widespread public approval, the City of Baltimore put police cameras to work scanning all 106 downtown intersections. In 1997, New York City began its own
program to set up twenty-four-hour remote surveillance in Central Park, subway stations and other public places. ¶ No
one denies the obvious
and dramatic short-term benefits derived from this early proliferation of surveillance technology. That is not
the real issue. Over the long run, the sovereign folk of Baltimore and countless other communities will have to make the same choices as the inhabitants of
our two mythical cities. Who will ultimately control the cameras?¶ Consider a few more examples:¶ How many parents have
wanted to be a fly on the wall while their child was at day care? This is now possible with a new video monitoring system known as
Kindercam, linked to high-speed telephone lines and a central Internet server. Parents can log on, type "www.kindercam.com," enter their password, and access a
live view of their child in day care at any time, from anywhere in the world. Kindercam will be installed in two thousand daycare facilities nationwide by the end of
1998. Mothers on business trips, fathers who live out of state, as well as distant grandparents can "drop in" on their child daily. Drawbacks? Overprotective parents
may check compulsively. And now other parents can observe your child misbehaving! ¶ Some of the same parents are less happy about the lensed pickups that are
sprouting in their own workplaces, enabling supervisors to tune in on them the same way they use Kindercam to check up on their kids.¶ That is, if they notice the
cameras at all.
At present, engineers can squeeze the electronics for a video unit into a package smaller
than a sugar cube. Complete sets half the size of a pack of cigarettes were recently offered for sale by the Spy Shop, a little store in New York City located
two blocks from the United Nations. Meanwhile, units with radio transmitters are being disguised in clock radios, telephones
and toasters, as part of the burgeoning "nannycam" trend. So high is demand for these pickups, largely by parents eager to check on their babysitters, that just one
firm in Orange County, California, has recently been selling from five hundred to one thousand disguised cameras a month. By the end of 1997, prices had dropped
from $2,500 to $399.¶ Cameras
aren't the only surveillance devices proliferating in our cities. Starting with Redwood City, near
San Francisco, several police departments have begun lacing neighborhoods with sound pickups that transmit directly
back to headquarters. Using triangulation techniques, officials can now pinpoint bursts of gunfire and send patrol units swiftly to the scene, without having to wait
for vague phone reports from neighbors. In 1995 the Defense Department awarded a $1.7 million contract to Alliant Techsystems for its prototype system SECURES,
which tests more advanced sound pickup networks in Washington and other cities. The hope is to distinguish not only types of gunfire but also human voices crying
for help.¶ So far, so good. But from there, engineers say it would be simple to upgrade the equipment, enabling bored monitors
to eavesdrop through open bedroom windows on cries of passion, or family arguments. "Of course we would never go that far," one official said, reassuringly.¶
Consider another piece of James Bond apparatus now available to anyone with ready cash. Today, almost
any electronics store will sell you
night vision goggles using state-of-the-art infrared optics equal to those issued by the military, for less than
the price of a video camera. AGEMA Systems, of Syracuse, New York, has sold several police departments imaging devices that can peer into houses from the street,
discriminate the heat given off by indoor marijuana cultivators, and sometimes tell if a person inside moves from one room to the next. Military and civilian
enhanced-vision technologies now move in lockstep, as they have in the computer field for years.¶ In other words, even
darkness no longer
guarantees privacy.¶ Nor does your garden wall. In 1995, Admiral William A. Owens, then Vice-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
described a sensor system that he expected to be operational within a few years: a pilotless drone, equipped to provide airborne surveillance for soldiers
in the field. While camera robots in the $1 million range have been flying in the military for some time, the new system will be
extraordinarily cheap and simple. Instead of requiring a large support crew, it will be controlled by one semi-skilled soldier and will fit in the palm of a hand.
Minuscule and quiet, such remote-piloted vehicles, or RPVs, may flit among trees to survey threats near a rifle platoon. When mass-produced in huge quantities,
unit prices will fall.¶ Can
civilian models be far behind? No law or regulation will keep them from our cities for
contraptions will get smaller,
very long. The rich, the powerful, and figures of authority will have them, whether legally or surreptitiously. The
cheaper, and smarter with each passing year.¶ So much for the supposed privacy enjoyed by sunbathers in their own back yards.¶ Moreover,
surveillance cameras are the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Other entrancing and invasive innovations of the vaunted information age abound. Will a paper envelope
protect the correspondence you send by old-fashioned surface mail when new-style scanners can trace the patterns of ink inside without ever breaking the seal? ¶
say you correspond with others by email and use a computerized encryption program to ensure that your messages
good will all the ciphers and codes do, if some adversary has bought a "back
door" password to your encoding program? Or if a wasp-sized camera-drone flits into your room, sticks to
Let's
are only read by the intended recipient. What
the ceiling above your desk, inflates a bubble lens and watches every key-stroke that you type? (A number of unnerving techno-possibilities will be discussed in
chapter 8.)¶ In late 1997 it was revealed that Swiss police had secretly tracked the whereabouts of mobile phone users via
a telephone company computer that records billions of movements per year. Swisscom was able to locate its mobile subscribers within a few hundred meters. This
aided several police investigations. But civil libertarians expressed heated concern, especially since identical
technology is used worldwide.¶
The same issues arise when we contemplate the proliferation of vast databases containing information about our
lives, habits, tastes and personal histories. As we shall see in chapter 3, the cash register scanners in a million supermarkets, video stores, and pharmacies
already pour forth a flood of statistical data about customers and their purchases, ready to be correlated. (Are you stocking up on
hemorrhoid cream? Renting a daytime motel room? The database knows.) Corporations claim this information helps them serve us more efficiently. Critics respond
that it gives big companies an unfair advantage, enabling them to know vastly more about us than we do about them. Soon,
computers will hold
all your financial and educational records, legal documents, and medical analyses that parse you all the way down
to your genes. Any of this might be examined by strangers without your knowledge, or even against your stated
will.
Now is the Key Time for Transparency
The rise of Technological Surveillance Era is among us, and the result will determine
our future.
Brooke, Heather (Campaigning Journalist and Writer for The Guardian) Nov 2010 WikiLeaks: the
revolution has begun – and it will be digitized.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/nov/29/the-revolution-will-be-digitised Date
Accessed: 7/17/13
But data has a habit of spreading. It slips past military security and it can also leak from WikiLeaks, which is how I
came to obtain the data. It even slipped past the embargoes of the Guardian and other media organizations involved in this story when a rogue
copy of Der Spiegel accidentally went on sale in Basle, Switzerland, on Sunday. Someone bought it, realised what they had, and began scanning
the pages, translating them from German to English and posting updates on Twitter. It would seem digital data respects no authority,
be it the Pentagon, WikiLeaks or a newspaper editor.¶ Individually, we have all already experienced the massive
changes resulting from digitisation. Events or information that we once considered ephemeral and private are
now aggregated, permanent, public. If these cables seem large, think about the 500 million users of Facebook or
the millions of records kept by Google. Governments hold our personal data in huge databases. It used to cost
money to disclose and distribute information. In the digital age it costs money not to.¶ But when data breaches
happen to the public, politicians don't care much. Our privacy is expendable. It is no surprise that the reaction to
these leaks is different. What has changed the dynamic of power in a revolutionary way isn't just the scale of the
databases being kept, but that individuals can upload a copy and present it to the world . In paper form, these cables
equate, on the Guardian's estimate, to some 213,969 pages of A4 paper, which would stack about 25m high – not something that one could
have easily slipped past security in the paper age.¶ To some this marks a crisis, to others an opportunity. Technology is
breaking down traditional social barriers of status, class, power, wealth and geography – replacing them with an
ethos of collaboration and transparency.¶ The former US ambassador to Russia James Collins told CNN the
disclosure of the cables, "will impede doing things in a normal, civilised way". Too often what is normal and
civilised in diplomacy means turning a blind eye to large-scale social injustices, corruption and abuse of power.
Having read through several hundred cables, much of the "harm" is embarrassment and the highlighting of
inconvenient truths. For the sake of a military base in a country, our leaders accept a brutal dictator who
oppresses his population. This may be convenient in the short term for politicians, but the long-term
consequences for the world's citizens can be catastrophic.¶ Leaks are not the problem; they are the symptom.
They reveal a disconnect between what people want and need to know and what they actually do know. The
greater the secrecy, the more likely a leak. The way to move beyond leaks is to ensure a robust regime for the
public to access important information.¶ Thanks to the internet, we have come to expect a greater level of
knowledge and participation in most areas of our lives. Politics, however, has remained resolutely
unreconstructed. Politicians, see themselves as parents to a public they view as children – a public that cannot
be trusted with the truth, nor with the real power that knowledge brings.¶ Much of the outrage about WikiLeaks is not
over the content of the leaks but from the audacity of breaching previously inviolable strongholds of authority. In the past, we deferred
to authority and if an official told us something would damage national security we took that as true. Now the
raw data behind these claims is increasingly getting into the public domain. What we have seen from disclosures
like MPs' expenses or revelations about the complicity of government in torture is that when politicians speak of
a threat to "national security", often what they mean is that the security of their own position is threatened.¶
We are at a pivotal moment where the visionaries at the vanguard of a global digital age are clashing with those
who are desperate to control what we know. WikiLeaks is the guerrilla front in a global movement for greater
transparency and participation. There are projects like Ushahidi that use social networking to create maps
where locals can report incidents of violence that challenge the official version of events. There are activists
seeking to free official data so that citizens can see, for example, government spending in detail .¶ Ironically, the US
state department has been one of the biggest cheerleaders for technical innovation as a means of bringing democracy to places like Iran and
China. President Obama has urged repressive regimes to stop censoring the internet, yet a bill before Congress would allow the attorney
general to create a blacklist of websites. Is robust democracy only good when it's not at home?¶ It used to be that a leader controlled
citizens by controlling information. Now it's harder than ever for the powerful to control what people read, see
and hear. Technology gives people the ability to band together and challenge authority. The powerful have long
spied on citizens (surveillance) as a means of control, now citizens are turning their collected eyes back upon the
powerful (sousveillance).¶ This is a revolution, and all revolutions create fear and uncertainty. Will we move to a
New Information Enlightenment or will the backlash from those who seek to maintain control no matter the
cost lead us to a new totalitarianism? What happens in the next five years will define the future of democracy
for the next century, so it would be well if our leaders responded to the current challenge with an eye on the
future.
Link: Pretending Privacy Exists Masks Surveillance (1/2)
We can never go back to an age with complete privacy, governments that claim to do
so are simply making surveillance more hidden. The only option is to encourage
accountability through complete transparency.
Brin, David. Doctor of Philosophy in space science, 2010 fellow at the Institute of Ethics. 1998. The
Transparent Society. “Chapter One: The Challenge of an Open Society.”
http://www.davidbrin.com/transparentsociety1.html
The issue of threatened privacy has spawned a flood of books, articles and media exposés — from Janna Malamud
Smith's thoughtful Private Matters, and Ellen Alderman and Caroline Kennedy's erudite Right to Privacy all the way to shrill, paranoiac
rants by conspiracy fetishists who see Big Brother lurking around every corner. Spanning this spectrum, however,
there appears to be one common theme. Often the author has responded with a call to arms, proclaiming that
we must become more vigilant to protect traditional privacy against intrusions by faceless (take your pick) government
bureaucrats, corporations, criminals, or just plain busybodies.¶ That is the usual conclusion — but not the one taken here.¶ For in fact, it is
already far too late to prevent the invasion of cameras and databases. The djinn cannot be crammed
back into its bottle. No matter how many laws are passed, it will prove quite impossible to legislate
away the new surveillance tools and databases. They are here to stay.¶ Light is going to shine into nearly
every corner of our lives.¶ The real issue facing citizens of a new century will be how mature adults choose to live
— how they might compete, cooperate and thrive — in such a world. A transparent society.¶ Regarding those cameras for instance —
the ones topping every lamppost in both city one and city two — we can see that very different styles of urban life resulted from just one
decision, based on how people in each town answered the following question.¶ Will average citizens share, along with the mighty, the right to
access these universal monitors? Will common folk have, and exercise, a sovereign power to watch the watchers?¶ Back in
city number
one, Joe and Jane Doe may walk through an average day never thinking about those microcameras overhead.
They might even believe official statements claiming that all the spy eyes were banished and dismantled a year
or two ago, when in fact they were only made smaller, harder to detect. Jane and Joe stroll secure that
their neighbors cannot spy on them (except the old-fashioned way, from overlooking windows). In other words, Jane and Joe
blissfully believe they have privacy.¶ The inhabitants of city number two know better. They realize that, out of
doors at least, privacy has always been an illusion. They know anyone can tune in to that camera on the
lamppost — and they don't much care. They perceive what really matters: that they live in a town
where the police are efficient, respectful, and above all accountable. Homes are sacrosanct, but out on the street
any citizen, from the richest to the poorest, can walk both safely and use the godlike power to zoom at will from vantage point to vantage
point, viewing all the lively wonders of the vast but easily spanned village their metropolis has become, as if by some magic it had turned into a
city not of people but of birds.¶ Sometimes, citizens of city number two find it tempting to wax nostalgic about the old days, before there were
so many cameras, or before television invaded the home, or before the telephone and automobile. But for the most part, city number two's
denizens know those times are gone, never to return. Above all, one
thing makes life bearable: the surety that each
person knows what is going on, with a say in what will happen next. And has rights equal to those of any
billionaire or chief of police
Link: Pretending Privacy Exists Masks Surveillance (2/2)
People have been calling for individuals to retain absolute privacy online, but these
merely cover up the inevitability of surveillance.
Brin, David. Doctor of Philosophy in space science, 2010 fellow at the Institute of Ethics. 1998. The
Transparent Society. “Chapter One: The Challenge of an Open Society.”
http://www.davidbrin.com/transparentsociety1.html
Recent years have witnessed widespread calls to "empower" citizens and corporations with tools of
encryption — the creation of ciphers and secret codes — so that the Internet and telephone lines may soon fill with a
blinding fog of static and concealed messages, a haze of habitual masks and routine anonymity. Some of society's best
and brightest minds have begun extolling a coming "golden age of privacy," when no one need ever
again fear snooping by bureaucrats, federal agents, or in-laws. The prominent iconoclast John Gilmore, who "favors law 'n' chaos over
law 'n' order," recently proclaimed that computers are literally extensions of our minds, and that their contents should remain as private as our
inner thoughts. Another activist, John Perry Barlow, published a widely discussed "A Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace" proclaiming
that the mundane jurisdictions of nations and their archaic laws are essentially powerless and irrelevant to the Internet and its denizens (or
"netizens"). Among the loose clan of self-proclaimed "cypherpunks," a
central goal is that citizens should be armed with
broad new powers to conceal their words, actions, and identities. The alternative, they claim, will be
for all our freedoms to succumb to a looming tyranny.¶ In opposing this modern passion for personal and corporate
secrecy, I should first emphasize that I like privacy! Outspoken eccentrics need it, probably as much or more than those who are reserved. I
would find it hard to get used to living in either of the cities described in the example at the beginning of this chapter. But a few voices out
there have begun pointing out the obvious. Those
cameras on every street corner are coming, as surely as the new
"privacy laws" really prevent hidden eyes from getting tinier,
more mobile and clever? In software form they will cruise the data highways . "Antibug" technologies will arise, but the
resulting surveillance arms race can hardly favor the "little guy." The rich, the powerful, police
agencies, and a technologically skilled elite will always have an advantage.
millennium.¶ Oh, we may agitate and legislate. But can
Alternative Solvency: Transparency Checks Government Oppression
(1/2)
Transparency solves-only by instilling the need for openness can we adequately be
aware of what’s going on to adequately criticize the government and make them
accountable
Brin, David. Doctor of Philosophy in space science, 2010 fellow at the Institute of Ethics. 1998. The
Transparent Society. “Chapter One: The Challenge of an Open Society.”
http://www.davidbrin.com/transparentsociety1.html
What distinguishes society today is not only the pace of events but also the nature of our tool kit for facing the future. Above all, what has
marked our civilization as different is its knack for applying two extremely hard-won lessons from the past.¶ In all of history, we
have
found just one cure for error — a partial antidote against making and repeating grand, foolish mistakes, a remedy
against self-deception. That antidote is criticism.¶ Scientists have known this for a long time. It is the keystone of their success.
A scientific theory gains respect only by surviving repeated attempts to demolish it. Only after platoons of
clever critics have striven to come up with refuting evidence, forcing changes, do a few hypotheses eventually graduate from mere theories to
accepted models of the world.¶ Another
example is capitalism. When it works, under just and impartial rules, the free market
rewards agility, hard work and innovation, just as it punishes the stock prices of companies that make too many mistakes. Likewise, any
believer in evolution knows that death is the ultimate form of criticism, a merciless driver,
transforming species over time.¶ Even in our private and professional lives, mature people realize that improvement
comes only when we open ourselves to learn from our mistakes, no matter how hard we have to grit our teeth, when
others tell us we were wrong. Which brings up a second observation.¶ Alas, criticism has always been what human beings,
especially leaders, most hate to hear.¶ This ironic contradiction, which I will later refer to as the "Paradox of the Peacock," has had
profound and tragic effects on human culture for centuries. Accounts left by past ages are filled with woeful events in
which societies and peoples suffered largely because openness and free speech were suppressed,
leaving the powerful at liberty to make devastating blunders without comment or consent from below.¶ If neo-Western
civilization* has one great trick in its repertoire, a technique more responsible than any other for its success, that trick is
accountability. Especially the knack — which no other culture ever mastered — of making accountability apply to the
mighty. True, we still don't manage it perfectly. Gaffes, bungles and inanities still get covered up. And yet, one can look
at any newspaper or television news program and see an eager press corps at work, supplemented by hordes of righteously indignant
individuals (and their lawyers), all baying for waste or corruption to be exposed, secrets to be unveiled, and nefarious schemes to be nipped in
the bud. Disclosure is a watchword of the age, and politicians have grudgingly responded by passing the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA),
truth-in-lending laws, open-meeting rules, then codes to enforce candor in real estate, in the nutritional content of foodstuffs, in the expense
accounts of lobbyists, and so on.¶ Although this process
of stripping off veils has been uneven, and continues to be a source
of contention, the underlying moral force can be clearly seen pervading our popular culture, in which nearly every
modern film or novel seems to preach the same message — suspicion of authority. The phenomenon is not new to our generation.
Schoolbooks teach that freedom is guarded by constitutional "checks and balances," but those same legal
provisions were copied, early in the nineteenth century, by nearly every new nation of Latin America, and not
one of them remained consistently free. In North America, constitutional balances worked only because
they were supplemented by a powerful mythic tradition, expounded in story, song, and now virtually every Hollywood
film, that any undue accumulation of power should be looked on with concern.¶ Above all, we are encouraged to distrust
government.¶ The late Karl Popper pointed out the importance of this mythology in the dark days during and after World War II, in The
Open Society and its Enemies. Only by insisting on accountability, he concluded, can we constantly remind public
servants that they are servants. It is also how we maintain some confidence that merchants aren't cheating us, or that factories
aren't poisoning the water. As inefficient and irascibly noisy as it seems at times, this habit of questioning authority ensures
freedom far more effectively than any of the older social systems that were based on reverence or
trust.¶ And yet, another paradox rears up every time one interest group tries to hold another accountable in today's society.¶ Whenever
a conflict appears between privacy and accountability, people demand the former for themselves and
the latter for everybody else.¶ The rule seems to hold in almost every realm of modern life, from special prosecutors investigating
the finances of political figures to worried parents demanding that lists of sex offenders be made public. From merchants anxious to see their
customers' credit reports to clients who resent such snooping. From people who "need" caller ID to screen their calls to those worried that their
lives might be threatened if they lose telephone anonymity. From activists demanding greater access to computerized government records in
order to hunt patterns of corruption or incompetence in office to other citizens who worry about release of personal information contained in
those very same records.
Alternative Solvency: Transparency Checks Government Oppression
(2/2)
Transparency is key to government accountability when it comes to digital privacy
Notley, Tanya. Journalist. 4 August 2011. Why digital privacy and security are important for
development. http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/aug/04/digitaltechnology-development-tool. Date Accessed 7/17/13.
If you believe an over-arching ambition of development should be to ensure the benefits of progress and plenty are shared fairly among
citizens, then you will likely agree
it's important to have a government willing to create policies that attempt
to remedy existing inequities. To do this in a democratic way, these policies, and the practices to
implement them, need to be transparent to ensure people can assess how government and
development money is being spent, where it is being distributed and if it achieves what was
intended.¶ Access to information technologies – such as mobile phones, the internet, social
networking sites and video – can play a critical role in helping people hold governments and
development agencies accountable. When used to collect, monitor and assess information about needs, spending, activities and
impacts, technologies support not only accountability but also – by allowing people to participate in their own governance – freedom of
expression and civic participation.
Neg
Privacy
Constitution-Right to Privacy
The constitution has the right to privacy engrained inside of it.
Ralph F. Gaebler, professor of law at Indiana state university, “Is There a Natural Law Right to Privacy?”
DoP: 1992, THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF JURISPRUDENCE,
http://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1659&context=facpub
Walter Murphy has recently argued that "the nature of the American¶ Constitution requires recognition of a thick
and powerful right to be¶ let alone."' What is more, he believes this right is so deeply embedded¶ in the
Constitution that society cannot remove it, even through¶ formally permissible means, such as
amendment, without abrogating¶ the Constitution altogether.¶ In general, there is nothing particularly
surprising about the claim¶ that the Constitution includes a right of privacy. And in Murphy's¶ case, in particular,
the claim rests upon thirty years of scholarship.¶ Viewed as a whole, this body of work looms as one of the more¶
passionate, and at the same time formidably coherent contributions¶ to the literature of judicial
politics. 2 As developed in his many articles¶ and books, Murphy's claim for the existence of a right of privacy¶
emerges from his conviction that, since all Constitutional decision makers must adopt a judicial
philosophy with substantive¶ consequences, academic critics, in judging the judges, must in fairness
do the same.' His is essentially a pragmatic claim, justified on the¶ ground that it constitutes the best constitutional policy in a world of¶
judicial politics where many legitimate and contradictory claims are¶ possible
The constitution implies the right to privacy through the as citizens bring in the natural
right for a zone of autonomy
Ralph F. Gaebler, professor of law at Indiana state university, “Is There a Natural Law Right to Privacy?”
DoP: 1992, THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF JURISPRUDENCE,
http://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1659&context=facpub
Murphy makes two distinct arguments to support his conclusion¶ that the Constitution must be interpreted to include a
broad right of¶ privacy. He describes the first argument as based on "constitutional¶ content." It begins
with the assertion that the American Constitution¶ rests upon, or possibly even includes, two political theories, which¶
he calls "constitutionalism" and "representational democracy."¶ Constitutionalism denotes the view
that the Constitution primarily¶ embodies personal liberties. Representational democracy denotes
the¶ view that the Constitution primarily embodies a structure of¶ government based on popular
sovereignty. Although poised in¶ opposition to each other, both of these sub-texts are necessary to¶ make sense of the Constitution, or as
Murphy puts it, to render the¶ document more than "the political version of a seed catalogue." In¶ other words, the Constitution is a
balancing act; it employs the device of checks and counter-checks not only in its provisions for the¶
structure of government, but even in its philosophical outlook. However, constitutionalism is clearly the
more important philosophy¶ of the two, at least for the purpose of establishing the right of¶ privacy.' 2 "The essence
of constitutionalism," according to Murphy,¶ "is that citizens bring rights with them into society." These rights¶
comprise a "zone of autonomy," within which "each individual¶ should be immune from
governmental regulation, even regulation¶ that an overwhelming majority of society considers wise
and just."¶ Thus, the right to privacy is implied by the political theory of¶ constitutionalism, which in turn is
part of the Constitution. Murphy¶ also argues that the right of privacy is implied by the theory of¶ representational democracy, a claim that I
will take up later.
The constitution provides a right to privacy by the use of wording such as free and
autonomous
Ralph F. Gaebler, professor of law at Indiana state university, “Is There a Natural Law Right to Privacy?”
DoP: 1992, THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF JURISPRUDENCE,
http://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1659&context=facpub
Murphy's second argument, which he describes as based on¶ "constitutional function," is equally direct. It begins with his¶ commitment to the
ideas that the
Constitution is a "binding statement¶ of a people's aspirations for themselves and their nation." In
Constitution is not merely a charter for government, but¶ serves as the foundation of a
moral community as well. From this¶ premise Murphy argues that the Constitution must include a right of¶
privacy because "the notion of a people as free and autonomous as¶ they can be in an
interdependent world is and has been among the¶ values, goals, and aspirations of U.S. society."¶
other¶ words, the
.Murphy finds evidence of the Constitution's "aspirational" character¶ in its Preamble and in the Declaration of Independence, which he¶ also
regards as a foundational document. Thus, Murphy really regards¶ the U.S. as bound by a constitution, that includes the
Constitution¶ of 1787, as amended, the Declaration of Independence, the two¶ political philosophies already mentioned, and possibly other¶
foundational documents or ideas as well.' 3 This is not to say that we can understand Murphy's argument simply by reading, phrase by¶ phrase,
his admittedly expanded constitution. In a sense, this argument¶ denies that the Constitution can be read at all; rather, it is a¶ continuing
compact, some of whose evidence is composed of written¶ documents.
Privacy Viewed As A Societal Good
We ought to protect Privacy as a Social good rather than an individual right.
DANIEL J. SOLOVE, 2002, Assistant Professor, Seton Hall Law School, DIGITAL DOSSIERS AND THE DISSIPATION OF FOURTH
AMENDMENT PRIVACY, http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~usclrev/pdf/075502.pdf
Protecting privacy through an architecture of power differs from protecting it as an individual right .
Privacy is often viewed as an individual right.185 It is seen as an individual possession, and its value is defined in
terms of its worth to the individual. This view is severely flawed. John Dewey astutely critiqued the “conception of
the individual as something given, complete in itself, and of liberty as a ready-made possession of the individual, only needing the removal of
external restrictions in order to manifest itself.”186 According to Dewey, the
individual is inextricably connected to
society,187 and rights are not immutable possessions of individuals, but are instrumental in light of
“the contribution they make to the welfare of the community.”188 The problem with viewing rights in
purely individualistic terms is that it pits individual rights against the greater good of the community,
with the interests of society often winning out because of their paramount importance when measured against
one individual’s freedom In contrast, an architecture of power protects privacy differently and is based on
a different conception of privacy. Privacy is not merely a right possessed by individuals, but is a form of freedom
built into the social structure. It is thus an issue about the common good as much as it is about individual rights. It is an issue
about social architecture, about the relationships that form the structure of our society.
Privacy Must Be Preferred
We should promote supporting privacy over the national security interests, or a hybrid
of both. We must err on the side of privacy because governments are likely to abuse
their power.
Lisa Nelson, 2004, University of Pittsburg, Privacy and Technology: Reconsidering a Crucial Public Policy Debate in the Post-September
11 Era, Public Administration Review,
The origin of liberty in democratic theory is best de- scribed by John Stuart Mill as "the civil or social
liberty which exists within the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by
society over the individual" (Mill 1956, 2). As Mill explains, the balance between lib- erty and authority is struck
by guaranteeing certain immu- nities that cannot be violated by those holding political authority. If
violated, those in positions of authority have breached their duty as leaders. As a secondary check on political
authority, constitutional checks that are established by the consent of the community are a necessary condition of the acts of governing power
(Mill 1956, 4). In
practice, this means the exercise of political authority is mediated by the immunities of
the citizenry and the consent of the governed. The liberty interest in privacy is construed similarly. To paraphrase Justice
Robert H. Jackson in his concurring opinion on the 1952 Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co. v. Sawyer (343 U.S. 579) decision, "the Fourth
Amendment protects more than privacy; it ensures that governmental invasions of individual privacy
are based upon rules estab- lished by the people, rules our rulers must follow in order to engage in
surveillance." Jackson's description of pri- vacy mirrors that of Mill. The conditions of our liberty interest in privacy are
created by the immunities of the citizenry and the consent of the governed. Each serves as a limit on political
authority. Yet, the analysis is not quite so simple. The equilibrium of this balance between political authority and the liberty
interests of individuals is changed in the face of harm. As Mill explains, government should be established on the
harm principle: "That the sole end for which mankind is warranted, individually or collec- tively, in interfering with the liberty of action of
any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over
any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others" (Mill 1956, 4). The
authority to interfere with a member of a civilized community in defense of liberty occurs when there is a need to prevent harm. In fact, as Mill
argues, "it is
one of the undisputed functions of government to take precau- tions against crime before it
has been committed, as well as to detect and punish it afterwards" (Mill 1956, 116). Liberty, augmented in
our constitutional framework by the principles of privacy, is mediated by the exercise of political
authority to protect against harm. What is left unanswered is the type and form of political authority that is ideal for preserving
our liberty interests in privacy. In theory, the answer seems quite simple: The exercise of political authority is
justified when the political will nec- essary for the prevention of harm is warranted. Yet, as a practical matter,
the perception of harm-and the justifi- cation of political authority necessary to combat it-is often problematic. As Mill warns, "the
preventative func- tion of government, however, is far more liable to be abused, at the prejudice of
liberty, than the punitive func- tion" (Mill 1956, 116). This concern is particularly acute in the post-September 11 environment
because it is not only the assertion of political authority, but also the architecture of it that potentially threatens our liberty interest in privacy.
Far-reach- ing regulations that enable the gathering and sharing of information, the concentration of
power in the hands of the intelligence community, and the extensive power granted to the executive
branch in the name of the "war on terrorism" is seen as altering the structural balance between
political authority and social and civil liberties at the expense of democratic principles. The call for increased
political authority to protect privacy in the wake of the information age, however, faces similar criticisms. Here, it is argued that under the limits
of the Constitution, there is insufficient legal basis for the exercise of political author- ity to protect privacy. In
this sense, protective
legislation is seen as potentially overstepping the appropriate constitu- tional boundaries of political
authority and squelching free enterprise and innovation in the information age. Though it seems to be at the
other end of the spectrum, the question of whether the Constitution allows for the power of government to adopt and enforce laws to protect
private information from intrusion by the private sector is not unlike the question of whether the events of Septem- ber 11 justify increased
intelligence gathering and surveil- lance. Each is a question of enhanced political authority and its relationship to the liberty interests of privacy.
Yet, the answer is not so easily discerned from either constitu- tional doctrine or public sentiments.
Rather, the public policy debate must account for the interplay between each, because one is not
separate from the other. Interestingly, the war on terror coincides with the ac- celeration of the information age and, as a result,
affects the direction of policy debates regarding each. Perhaps the war on terror seems less intrusive and less
threatening to our privacy because our notions of privacy have been al- tered in an unprecedented
age of information. Surveillance is becoming commonplace, frequent, and innocuous. More- over, the
information age has altered the traditional physi- cal divide between the public and the private with the age of the Interet and other
technologies. Physical locale is no longer the definitional quality of privacy, and, as a re- sult, the traditional demarcation of privacy is no longer
apt in either legal doctrine or societal perceptions. Similarly, the events of September 11 and the subsequent prominence of surveillance and
information gathering may have caused us to be overly sensitized to information sharing in both the government and private sectors. The
events of September 11 and the rise of the informa- tion age challenge the previous balance between political authority and liberty, but it does
not follow that a new bal- ance cannot be struck. Yet,
it is necessary to move the de- bate beyond its current
dichotomy, which tends to view the rise of technology and the information age as intruding on
privacy. The dichotomy is not helpful because it is im- possible to eliminate the specter of terrorism and turn back the clock on the
information age. Instead, each is a new factor to be weighed in the quest for a balance between liberty and
the exercise of political authority. For this, let us return to Mill. As Mill advocates, the balance is
secured by the guar- antee of certain immunities that cannot be violated by those holding political
authority. As a secondary check on po- litical authority, constitutional checks that are established by
the consent of the community are a necessary condition for the acts of governing power. Thus, as a point of
depar- ture, the proper course of policy development to protect privacy while fostering the appropriate exercise of politi- cal authority requires
us to turn to the necessary immuni- ties, which cannot be trammeled, and to the constitutional checks that must remain intact
Privacy Impacts: Totalitarianism
Violations of privacy are the basis for governmental totalitarianism- the German
Democratic Republic proves.
Ron Watson, Department of Political Science, Washington University., “The Ethics of Domestic Government Spying” March 2013¶
http://rewatson.wustl.edu/The%20Ethics%20of%20Domestic%20Government%20Spying.pdf
Although states can hardly do without spies if they wish to remain secure, there is, of¶ course, a darker, more sinister picture of government
spying. This darker picture is one of¶ the
government using spying to control every aspect of people's lives,
compelling them to¶ act and think only in ways sanctioned by the state. Nowhere is this picture
painted more¶ vividly than in Orwell's 1984. Winston, the protagonist, remarks:¶ There was of course no way of
knowing whether you were being watched at any¶ given moment. How often, or on what system, the
Thought Police plugged in on¶ any wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched
everybody¶ all the time . . . You had to live { did live, from habit that became instinct { in the¶
assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness,¶ every movement
scrutinized. (Orwell 2007, 3)¶ This darker picture of spying cannot be dismissed as unrealistic, merely a
dystopian night-¶ mare. States have often controlled and continue to control their citizens with
spying.¶ Nowhere was this kind of control more complete than in the German Democratic Republic ¶
(GDR) during the Cold War, however. Historian Hubertus Knabe summarizes the control¶ exacted by the GDR's secret
police (Stasi) as follows: \Precisely the hidden, but for every¶ citizen tangible omni-presence of the Stasi, damaged
the very basic conditions for individual¶ and societal creativity and development: sense of one's self,
trust, spontaneity." (Bruce¶ 2010, 12)
Violation of privacy leads to a totalitarian state
Daniel J. Solove. Associate professor of law at the George Washington University Law School."The
Digital Person: Technology And Privacy In The Information Age"New York: New York University
Press, 2004.
Orwell's Totalitarian World. Journalists, politicians, and jurists often describe the
problem created by databases with the
metaphor of Big Brother--the harrowing totalitarian government portrayed in George Orwell's 1984. Big Brother is an allknowing, constantly vigilant government that regulates every aspect of one's existence. In every corner are
posters of an enormous face, with "eyes [that] follow you about when you move" and the caption "BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU." ¶ Big
Brother demands complete obedience from its citizens and controls all aspects of their lives. It constructs
the language, rewrites the history, purges its critics, indoctrinates the population, burns books, and obliterates all disagreeable relics from
the past. Big Brother's
goal is uniformity and complete discipline, and it attempts to police people to an
innermost thoughts. Any trace of individualism is quickly suffocated.¶ This
terrifying totalitarian state achieves its control by targeting the private life, employing various techniques of power to
eliminate any sense of privacy. Big Brother views solitude as dangerous. Its techniques of power are
predominantly methods of surveillance. Big Brother is constantly monitoring and spying; uniformed patrols linger on
street corners; helicopters hover in the skies, poised to peer into windows. The primary surveillance tool is a device
unrelenting degree--even their
called a "telescreen" which is installed into each house and apartment. The telescreen is a bilateral television--individuals can watch it, but it
also enables Big Brother to watch them.¶
Privacy needs to be protected in order to retain a balance of power between parties
DANIEL J. SOLOVE, 2002, Assistant Professor, Seton Hall Law School, DIGITAL DOSSIERS AND THE DISSIPATION OF FOURTH
AMENDMENT PRIVACY, http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~usclrev/pdf/075502.pdf
The dangers discussed above illustrate why privacy is integral to freedom in the modern state. Privacy
must be protected by
establishing an architecture of power. The word “architecture” emphasizes that the protection of privacy must be
achieved through establishing a particular social structure that distributes power in our various
relationships. Certain kinds of legal regulation can be readily analogized to architecture. Typically, we view architecture as the design of
buildings and edifices. Buildings structure the way people feel and interact; they form and shape human relationships.182 Neal Kumar Katyal
provides a fascinating account of how physical architecture—the way that neighborhoods and buildings are designed—can affect criminal
behavior.183 Law
resembles architecture in many respects, especially in the way that certain forms of
regulation affect social practices. If we think of law as creating a structure, we can better understand the different forms that
modern regulation must take to protect liberty in the modern state. We have freedom not simply because we have rights.
Our liberty is constructed by various regulatory structures that regulate the safety of the products we buy, the
conditions of the apartments we live in, the way that companies must interact with us, and the sanctity of the environment, among others. An
architecture of power protects a number of social practices of which privacy forms a significant part . It
protects privacy by providing a regulatory structure that shapes relationships and safeguards
individual liberties. At the center of my view is the fact that privacy is an aspect of social practices, which involve relationships with
other people and entities.184 The need for privacy emerges from within a society, from the various social relationships that people form with
each other, with private sector institutions, and with the government. We do not need privacy on a deserted island; rather, the
need for
privacy is engendered by the existence of society, from the fact that we must live together.
Relationships involve some balance of power between the parties. Power is not necessarily a zerosum good, where more power to one party necessarily means less to another. However, certain
configurations of power in these relationships have profound effects on the scope and extent of
freedom, democracy, equality, and other important values. In the modern world, we are increasingly finding ourselves
in a new type of relationship with public and private institutions. These relationships are different because our institutions are more
bureaucratic in nature. Bureaucracies
use more information and often exercise power over people through
the use of personal data. Collecting and using personal information are having an intensifying
influence on the effects of power in our social relationships. Therefore, protecting privacy is critical to
governing these relationships, and consequently, to regulating the tone and tenor of life in the
Information Age.
Privacy Impacts: Autonomy
In a world with spying we damage autonomy.
Ron Watson, Department of Political Science, Washington University., “The Ethics of Domestic Government Spying” March 2013¶
http://rewatson.wustl.edu/The%20Ethics%20of%20Domestic%20Government%20Spying.pdf
So widespread intuitions support the principle of just cause for DGS. Let us turn to the¶
consequentialist case for just cause. The sophisticated consequentialist, I suggested in the ¶
introduction, would endorse a simple set of principles for DGS. But which principles would¶ she
endorse? She obviously could not endorse a principle permitting all DGS, since the con-¶ sequences
would be dire. If government agents were always at liberty to spy, people could¶ not develop stable expectations about where, when, and by
whom they are being observed¶ without expending considerable resources on countermeasures, nor could they conceal their¶ personal
information. People's enjoyment of goods requiring even a modicum of privacy¶ would rapidly diminish. People's autonomy
would be
gravely threatened, since the pressures¶ to conform to social norms would be virtually unchecked. The
liberal democratic culture of¶ free thought, free speech, and free action would be stifled.¶ Further, the
bene ts of such a permissive policy would be minimal. Some grave harms¶ might be prevented. But
permitting all spying is more likely to lead to ineffective and even¶ harmful spying. Spying for political
gain and to protect bureaucratic turfs, for example,¶ would likely be rampant.
Privacy hinges on autonomy- it focuses on the control over limitations and
confidentiality
Casman Susanne, professor at UNLV “The Right to Privacy in Light of the Patriot Act and Social Contract Theory”, DoP: 5-1-2011 DoA:
7/15/13 http://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu Pg 17-18
It is differentiated from the total field by virtue of the fact the self is in ¶ some degree involved in excluding in some (or possibly all)
circumstances, some (or ¶ possibly all), other persons from knowledge of the person’s possession. (Bates, 1964). ¶ Ruth
Gavison’s
into three personal basic elements: Solitude: ¶ control over one’s interpersonal
interactions with other people, Confidentiality: control ¶ over other people’s access to information
about oneself, and Autonomy: control over ¶ what one does, i.e. freedom of will. (Boyle, 2003). ¶ What all
of these definitions have in agreement is that privacy is about control, ¶ the amount we wish to
divulge to those around us. They also have as part of their ¶ definition that privacy is both a moral and legal right.
There is a fundamental aspect to ¶ human nature that defines privacy as a basic component. We
assume that privacy is a ¶ moral right, rather than simply a constitutional or legal right. We assume that
decomposition of privacy
privacy is a 18¶ fundamental right, rather than a right that can be explicated in terms of other fundamental ¶ rights (e.g. life, liberty, or
property). (Alfino and Mayes, 2002). Privacy
is an elastic ¶ concept. The limited-access view proposes that privacy
represents control over unwanted ¶ access, or alternatively, the regulation of, limitations on, or
exemption from scrutiny, ¶ surveillance, or unwanted access. Privacy, as a whole or in part, represents
control over ¶ transactions between person (s) and other(s), the ultimate aim of which is to enhance ¶
autonomy and /or minimize vulnerability. (Margulis, 2005).
Privacy protects Autonomy and individuality.
Michael R. Curry, 1997, Department of Geography, University of California, “The Digital Individual and the Private Realm”, Annals of the
Association of American Geographers, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2564405
Yet a bit of reflection suggests the difficulty with all of these positions. The difficulty is, put- ting the matter simply, that the
private
realm performs important functions in the life of the individual and the group. It is in private that
people have the opportunity to become individu- als in the sense that we think of the term. People,
after all, become individuals in the public realm just by selectively making public certain things about
themselves. Whether this is a matter of being selective about one's religious or political views, work history, education, income, or complexion, the important point is this: in a complex society, people adjust their public identities in ways
that they believe best, and they develop those identities in more private settings.
Privacy Impacts: Autonomy (2/2)
Invasions of privacy causes loss of autonomy.
Ron Watson, Department of Political Science, Washington University., “The Ethics of Domestic Government Spying” March 2013¶
http://rewatson.wustl.edu/The%20Ethics%20of%20Domestic%20Government%20Spying.pdf
This line of argument is supported by a further set of responses that people
might have¶ to learning how their
government regulates domestic spying. When principles unfairly or¶ unequally target certain groups,
they can demean, humiliate, and disrespect members of¶ those groups when they become public.
Principles can also have these e ects if they signal¶ to people their chosen pursuits are unworthy,
shameful, or depraved. People's self-respect¶ often depends on the existence of spaces for action free
from government intrusion. Further,¶ when citizens worry that they are under covert observation by
their government, there are a¶ range of activities that can become less enjoyable because they are
less private. Finally, when¶ citizens suspect that the government spies on them, they may lose trust in their government¶ and its
institutions
Privacy is needed in order to retain autonomy
DANIEL J. SOLOVE, 2002, Assistant Professor, Seton Hall Law School, DIGITAL DOSSIERS AND THE DISSIPATION OF FOURTH
AMENDMENT PRIVACY, http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~usclrev/pdf/075502.pdf
government information-gathering can severely constrain democracy and individual selfdetermination. Paul Schwartz illustrates this with his theory of “constitutive privacy.”99 According to Schwartz, privacy is essential
to both individuals and communities: “[C]onstitutive privacy seeks to create boundaries about
personal information to help the individual and define terms of life within the community.”100 As a form
of regulation of information flow, privacy shapes “the extent to which certain actions or expressions of identity
are encouraged or discouraged.”101 Schwartz contends that extensive government oversight over an
individual’s activities can “corrupt individual decision making about the elements of one’s identity.”
Further, inadequate protection of privacy threatens deliberative democracy by inhibiting people from
engaging in democratic activities. This can occur unintentionally; even if government entities are not
attempting to engage in social control, their activities can have collateral effects that harm democracy
and self-determination.
Privacy Impacts: Normalization
Invasions of privacy causes a normalizing effect on society.
Ron Watson, Department of Political Science, Washington University., “The Ethics of Domestic Government Spying” March 2013¶
http://rewatson.wustl.edu/The%20Ethics%20of%20Domestic%20Government%20Spying.pdf
Notice that the dragnet case could plausibly meet all of the four principles discussed¶ above. The problem with cases like Dragnet is that
ordinary people reasonably fear abuse¶ when their personal information is collected in droves; they
also worry that their harmless¶ counter-normative activities will be exposed, punished, or leveraged
against them. They¶ want law enforcement oficials and intelligence agents to possess thick les on
suspected terrorists and criminals, but they worry about these same government agents having
dossiers on¶ law abiding citizens. The temptations to misuse information for prudential or political
gain,¶ they think, are too high. So too are the temptations to police norms prohibiting harmless or¶ even beneficial behavior.
Indeed, the more innocents believe that the government possesses¶ detailed dossiers on them, the more
likely they will be to self-censor, especially when the¶ conduct challenges the government or its
officials. Principles that permit operations like¶ Dragnet, then, are not strategic, since they discourage
people from engaging in a range of¶ harmless or beneficial behaviors. They further risk humiliating or
disrespecting those who¶ engage in harmless but counternormative activities, fomenting paranoia,
undermining trust¶ in the government, and diminishing people's enjoyment of a range of private activities.
Electronic Surveillance
Electronic surveillance is inconsistent with a free society
ACLU.A nonpartisan non-profit organization whose stated mission is "to defend and preserve the
individual rights.March 1, 1998."Electronic surveillance is inconsistent with a free society."American Civil
Liberties Union.http://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/big-brother-wires-wiretapping-digital-age.
Date Retrieved: July 7, 2013.
The cryptography debate offers the nation an opportunity to confront the issue of electronic surveillance anew. If we do not do so in a
fully informed and careful way, there will be no limit to the sweep of new technological opportunities
for total surveillance potential. Without the right to strong, non-key recovery encryption, the black strips on the backs of our credit,
cash and identity cards, the electronic keys being distributed by gasoline companies to enable the purchase of gas with the wave of a wand, the
E-Z passes for paying tolls electronically, and the imminent arrival of compact digital cell phones that also function as computers, e-mailers and
pagers, will all be vulnerable to both governmental and nongovernmental spying, both authorized and unauthorized. The American Civil
Liberties Union has historically opposed all forms of electronic surveillance by the government, and therefore supports the free and unfettered
development, production and distribution of the strongest possible encryption technology.
Electronic surveillance, whether
through bugging devices, wiretaps, or ready access to encryption keys, is fundamentally at odds with
personal privacy. It is the worst sort of general search, which necessarily captures not only the
communications of its specific targets, but those of countless others who happen to come in contact
with the targets or use the same lines. Free citizens must have the ability to conduct direct,
instantaneous, spontaneous and private communication using whatever technology is available.
Without the knowledge and assurance that private communications are, indeed, private, habits based
upon fear and insecurity will gradually replace habits of freedom. The right to privacy has already been severely
compromised in this country. Telephones have been tapped by police at least since 1895, and in the past
century there has been a constant tug of war between the government's impulse to eavesdrop and
the public's desire to resist further encroachments. Although its powers have been limited by both statute and court
decision, for all practical purposes the government has prevailed in this struggle. According to statistics compiled
by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, surreptitious government surveillance is now at record levels.5 From 1985 to 1995, more than
12 million conversations were intercepted through law enforcement wiretaps, and all but a relative handful were completely innocent (in 1995
alone, nearly two million innocent conversations were intercepted). Although
government agents must obtain a warrant,
their requests for wiretaps are almost never turned down by judges or magistrates. In fact, only one
request by law enforcement for an intercept has been rejected in the last eight years. As will be explained
below, all of this wiretapping has produced little in the way of results for law enforcement and yet the expansive surveillance capabilities being
sought today through the control of encryption and digital telephony will give the government unprecedented access to all communications -with or without a warrant.
Browser Fingerprinting
Browser fingerprinting infringes on digital privacy
Larkin, Erik. Mar 26, 2010. Browser Fingerprints: A Big Privacy Threat.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/192648/browser_fingerprints.html
Forget cookies--even the ultrasneaky, Flash-based "super cookies." A new type of tracking may
identify you far more accurately than any cookie--and you may never know it was there.¶ The method
pulls together innocuous data about your browser, such as plug-ins, system fonts, and your operating
system. Alone, they don't identify you. Together, they're a digital fingerprint. ¶ It's like describing a person. Just saying "brown hair"
won't identify anyone. But add in "5 feet, 10 inches tall," "chipped right front tooth," "size 12 shoes," and so on, and soon you have enough information to pull someone out of a crowd, even without their name, Social Security
number, or any other of the usual identifiers.¶ Test your browser for unique identifiers without the risk: The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy advocacy group, has set up an interesting online experiment at
Panopticlick.eff.org. Panopticlick gathers little details about your browser and computer, mostly using Javascript. In my case, the information it gathered about my browser was enough to uniquely identify my surfing software out
of more than 650,000 visitors. Peter Eckersley, a staff technologist with the EFF, says he and his colleagues de--cided to create the site when he heard rumors about this kind of tracking. He wanted to see how accurate it might
. Browser fingerprinting was developed for banks to employ to
prevent fraud. But now one company, Scout Analytics, offers it as a service to Web sites, and it
collects not just browser data but also data about how you type--things like your typing speed and
typing patterns.¶ This biometric signature, like the identifiers collected from the browser and the
computer, can be gathered using JavaScript alone, making this form of tracking hard to block. Matt Shanahan,
be.¶ Well, it's pretty accurate. And as it turns out, its use is more than a rumor ¶
senior vice president of strategy at Scout Analytics, says that the company sells its service primarily to paid subscription sites, such as those offering real estate listings, and that it is keen to expand into marketing and advertising by
helping sites track visitors in a way that, as he notes, is more accurate than using cookies. (Cookies can be deleted, which makes a repeat visit look like a new.
Collecting Information
There are wide sweeping programs to collect our information; this is a violation of
privacy in a new technological age.
Daniel J. Solove. Associate professor of law at the George Washington University Law School."The
Digital Person: Technology And Privacy In The Information Age"New York: New York University Press,
2004.
The government has recently been exploring ways to develop technology to detect patterns of behavior based
on dossiers. In 2002, it was revealed that the Department of Defense was developing a program called Total Information Awareness
(since renamed Terrorism Information Awareness). The program begins with the government amassing
personal information from private-sector sources into a massive database of dossiers on individuals.
Profiling technology is then used to detect those who are likely to be engaged ¶ in criminal activity. When
Congress learned of Total Information Awareness, it halted the program because of its threat to privacy. However, the same
type of collection and use of data envisioned by those who dreamed up Total Information Awareness is already being
carried out by the government. The digital dossiers that continue to grow in the private sector and in
public records are now becoming a tool for the government to monitor and investigate people. The
Secret Paradigm. In another way of understanding privacy that I refer to as the "secrecy paradigm," privacy is invaded by
uncovering one's hidden world, by surveillance, and by the disclosure of concealed information. The
harm such invasions cause consists of inhibition, self-censorship, embarrassment, and damage to one's reputation. The law is heavily influenced
by this paradigm. As
a result, if the information isn't secret, then courts often conclude that the
information can't be private. However, this conception of privacy is not responsive to life in the
modern Information Age, where most personal information exists in the record systems of hundreds of
entities. Life today is fueled by information, and it is virtually impossible to live as an Information Age ghost,
leaving no trail or residue. ¶ The Invasion Conception. Under the traditional view, privacy is violated by the invasive actions of
particular wrongdoers who cause direct injury to victims. Victims experience embarrassment, mental distress, or harm to their reputations. The
law responds when a person's deepest secrets are exposed, reputation is tarnished, or home is invaded. This view, which I call the "invasion
conception," understands privacy to be a kind of invasion in which somebody invades and somebody is invaded. However, digital
dossiers
often do not result in any overt invasion. People frequently don't experience any direct injury when
data about them is aggregated or transferred form one company to another. Moreover, many of the problems of
digital dossiers emerge from the collaboration of a multitude of different actors with different purposes. Each step along the way is
relatively small and innocuous, failing to cause harm that the invasion conception would recognize as
substantial.
A2: “We Consent to Surveillance”
Even giving consent to surveillance doesn’t solve the violation, you don’t know when
where or how they will spy on you.
Ron Watson, Department of Political Science, Washington University., “The Ethics of Domestic Government Spying” March 2013¶
http://rewatson.wustl.edu/The%20Ethics%20of%20Domestic%20Government%20Spying.pdf
The conclusion that we cannot assent to being spied upon might strike some as counterintuitive,
however. They might point to cases in which someone agrees in advance to¶ be spied on, but the
agreement does not specify when, where, or how the spying will take¶ place, thereby leaving open
the possibility that the spy can in particular instances conceal¶ her observation from her target.
Suppose, for example, a homeowner in crime ridden¶ neighborhood consents to being spied on by his
local police department. One can, he agrees,¶ can observe him and his property and conceal this fact
from him and others. This case and¶ others like it suggest that one can assent to be spied upon.
Autonomy
Necessary for Morality
Autonomy is necessary for morality, autonomy gives us the power to self determine
morals
Daniel Callahan, Senior Research Scholar and President Emeritus of the Center, Senior Lecturer at the Harvard Medical School and is now
a Senior Scholar at Yale. He received his B.A. from Yale and a Ph.D in philosophy from Harvard. 10/1986, A Moral Good, Not a Moral
Obsession, The Hastings Center, Vol. 14, No. 5, Autonomy, Paternalism, and Community, Date Accessed- 7/21/2013
A major attraction of the concept of autonomy is that it helps to establish moral independence. Not
only does it entail that, as an individual, I am to be treated by others as a moral end rather than a
moral means, it also requires that they allow me to pursue my own moral goods. Autonomy can
thus be understood as the basis for moral enfranchisement, establishing my standing as an equal in
the community and my liberty to pursue my own ends. In the context of medicine, it is a value that has served to
establish the rights of patients over physicians, and the right to be spared the paternalistic interventions of those who think they understand
my welfare better than I do. The
purpose of autonomy is to make me my own moral master. But if autonomy
may serve me in some fundamental ways, what would it be like to live in a community for which
autonomy was the central value? What kind of a medical practice might emerge with patient autonomy as the sole goal? Let me
try to answer that question by first reviewing some of the benefits of giving moral priority to autonomy. Among them are a
recognition of the rights of individuals and of their personal dignity; the erection of a powerful
bulwark against moral and political despotism; a becoming humility about the sources or certainty
of moral claims and demands; and a foundation for the protection of unpopular people and causes
against majoritarian domination. Those are powerful benefits, to be meddled with only at our peril. Nonetheless, I believe that
if autonomy is made the moral goal of a society, or of medical care within that society, then we are equally at
peril in our common life together.
Autonomy-Protects Free Speech
Autonomy recognizes and preserves free speech.
Daniel J. Solove, 2003, Associate Professor, Seton Hall Law School, The Virtues of Knowing Less: Justifying Privacy Protections against
Disclosure, Duke Law Journal, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1373222
One of the most frequently articulated rationales for the value of free speech is that it promotes
individual autonomy.94 As one commentator observes, the "value of free expression..,. rests on its deep relation
to self-respect arising from autonomous self-determination."95 The disclosure of personal information about others
certainly falls within the autonomy of the speaker. Respect for autonomy requires recognition of strong rights of selfexpression. Disclosure protections thus impair the autonomy of speakers who desire to speak about
others. Additionally, free speech can be justified in terms of the autonomy of the listener.96 Under this
view, free speech protects people's freedom of information consumption. Disclosure protections
prevent people from hearing information that they want to know.
Autonomy-Individual
Autonomy is to be preferred in an individual sense, societal autonomy goals are
problematic
Daniel Callahan, Senior Research Scholar and President Emeritus of the Center, Senior Lecturer at the Harvard Medical School and is now
a Senior Scholar at Yale. He received his B.A. from Yale and a Ph.D in philosophy from Harvard. 10/1986, A Moral Good, Not a Moral
Obsession, The Hastings Center, Vol. 14, No. 5, Autonomy, Paternalism, and Community, Date Accessed- 7/21/2013
If we ask what system of values might be best for our individual welfare and desires, then autonomy
is a prime candidate. But if we ask what system of values might be best for our life in community, for
sustaining a viable society and culture, then autonomy may fare less well. We need to give some thought to that
latter question. Yet, in doing so, we may well grant that the notion of autonomy, especially patient autonomy, has hardly become triumphant
in the daily life of medicine; in fact, it is probably still more curtailed or denied than honored. We may also grant the powerful tendency of
technological medicine to dehumanize and depersonalize, to efface or erase individuality, to attend to our organs and parts rather than our
persons. Nor need we deny that, faced with budget pressures and cuts, individual welfare and freedom of choice are likely to be the first
victims. In short, it
may seem churlish or precious to question the value of autonomy in a medical system that only
precisely because autonomy has so often been
held up as the value of the future, the ideal yet to be achieved, it is well to ask what that future might
look like. The trouble with wanting one's dreams to come true is that they may come true.
yesterday first heard of the idea and even today tends to neglect it. Yet
Autonomy-Consent Necessary for Morality
Moral obligations can only be self accepted
Daniel Callahan, Senior Research Scholar and President Emeritus of the Center, Senior Lecturer at the Harvard Medical School and is now
a Senior Scholar at Yale. He received his B.A. from Yale and a Ph.D in philosophy from Harvard. 10/1986, A Moral Good, Not a Moral
Obsession, The Hastings Center, Vol. 14, No. 5, Autonomy, Paternalism, and Community, Date Accessed- 7/21/2013
Let us¶ grant that others should honor my¶ autonomy and that I should honor theirs.¶ Yet if I should
have (or believe I have)¶ moral¶ obligations toward others, could I be¶ relieved of them¶ by their
declaration of au-¶ tonomy in the face of my obligations? If,¶ for example, a physician believes that he¶
or she has an obligation to save the life of¶ another, but that person wants to die, is¶ that¶ obligation
nullified or overridden by¶ the¶ patient's declaration? The common autonomy doctrine would say it is. For if
patients are to be their own moral¶ agents,¶ choosing their own moral good, then no¶ one, it would
seem, could have moral obligations to them that they did not choose to¶ allow. If that is the case, we are still
left¶ with a troubling puzzle. Are we to under-¶ stand that the physician's obligation vanishes once autonomy has been declared, or¶ that it
continues to exist but has been over-¶ ridden by a higher value? If the former is¶ the case, the¶ obligation seems to have no¶ basis whatsoever;
if the latter is the case,¶ then the conscience of the¶ physician seems¶ a fragile, disposable matter.¶
There is no absolute morality, rather it is determined by ourselves with our autonomy.
Further, only a consenting agreement can create moral obligations outside of
respecting others autonomy.
Daniel Callahan, Senior Research Scholar and President Emeritus of the Center, Senior Lecturer at the Harvard Medical School and is now
a Senior Scholar at Yale. He received his B.A. from Yale and a Ph.D in philosophy from Harvard. 10/1986, A Moral Good, Not a Moral
Obsession, The Hastings Center, Vol. 14, No. 5, Autonomy, Paternalism, and Community, Date Accessed- 7/21/2013
If (to be reminded of Wittgenstein) we look not for the meaning of autonomy but for its social uses, what do
we see? 1. As moral agents, we are essentially independent of each other and isolated; we are not
social animals, but morally self-en- closed, self-encompassing animals. 2. There can be no moral
truth or wisdom about individual moral goods and goals and few if any about communal ends;
morality is inherently subjective and relativistic. 3. The ideal relationship among human beings is
the voluntary, contractual relationship of consenting adults; the community has no standing to say
what is good or bad in such relationships. 4. In any weighing of the relative interests of individual
and community, the bur- den of proof is always upon the community to prove its case for restricting
the liberty of individuals. 5. The only moral obligations I have toward others are those I voluntarily
under- take; there can be no such thing as an in- voluntary moral obligation. 6. The only moral
obligations that oth- ers have toward me are those that autonomously I allow them to have; all I am
owed by others is respect for my autonomy. 7. Respect for the autonomy of others is sufficient ground
for overriding my own conscience.
Moral obligations can must be agreed to by all other parties involved, if one disagrees,
they are an coercive attempt to violate their autonomy
Daniel Callahan, Senior Research Scholar and President Emeritus of the Center, Senior Lecturer at the Harvard Medical School and is now
a Senior Scholar at Yale. He received his B.A. from Yale and a Ph.D in philosophy from Harvard. 10/1986, A Moral Good, Not a Moral
Obsession, The Hastings Center, Vol. 14, No. 5, Autonomy, Paternalism, and Community, Date Accessed- 7/21/2013
To¶ go one step further, does a respect for autonomy mean that we are not allowed to¶ imagine a good for others beyond that¶ which¶ they
imagine for themselves? Or¶ that we are not allowed to¶ persuade others¶ that their autonomous moral choices are¶ wrong, or defective, or
less valuable than¶ they might be? Of course we are allowed¶ to do those¶ things. The
moral autonomy of¶ others does not
rule out noncoercive attempts to persuade them to think or act differently. What we cannot do is to
impose¶ our values, or the dictates of our con-¶ science, upon them against their will.¶ Does it then
follow that the¶ only moral¶ obligations we can owe to autonomous¶ moral agents are those¶ formally
agreed to¶ by them in some contractual manner? Apparently so. We can talk with them, exhort¶ them,
attempt to persuade them. What we¶ cannot do, under the¶ implicit mutual contract, is to go one step
beyond the contract,¶ however¶ powerful our sense of obligation¶ might be or however powerful our
alternative notions of what would serve the moral¶ interests of another. The very point of the¶ moral¶
autonomy of another is to empower¶ his or her¶ personal liberty and to restrict¶ that of others toward
him or her.¶ Only a¶ voluntary ceding or suspension of autonomy rights can change the nature of that¶
relationship with others.
A2: Prefer Justice
Autonomy supersedes justice- justice is based off of the idea of self preference
Daniel Callahan, Senior Research Scholar and President Emeritus of the Center, Senior Lecturer at the Harvard Medical School and is now
a Senior Scholar at Yale. He received his B.A. from Yale and a Ph.D in philosophy from Harvard. 10/1986, A Moral Good, Not a Moral
Obsession, The Hastings Center, Vol. 14, No. 5, Autonomy, Paternalism, and Community, Date Accessed- 7/21/2013
It is sometimes said that¶ justice is powerful¶ enough to supersede autonomy, and¶ it is true that most
theories of¶ justice allow¶ the¶ suppression or overriding of individual¶ liberty under some
circumstances. Yet the¶ most popular and influential¶ contemporary¶ theories of justice (at least in the
United¶ States) see the source of a theory of justice¶ in individual needs and¶ desires, and the¶
outcome of a¶ reign of justice as the enthronement of individual¶ autonomy. Justice becomes little
more than a¶way station¶ on the road to self-determination.¶
Equal Prioritization
Achieving a balance of national security objectives and digital privacy is necessary.
Giuseppe, Vaciago is a lecturer in IT Law at University of Milan, focusing his research on cybercrime
and computer forensics. 2013. “Privacy vs. Security? A Dilemma of the Digital Era¶ ”Freedom from Fear
magazine.”
http://www.freedomfromfearmagazine.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=314:priv
acy-vs-security-a-dilemma-of-the-digital-era&catid=50:issue-7&Itemid=187
First and foremost, there are no winners or losers in the efforts to strike a balance between personal
rights and public order and security, as these two following examples illustrate. On the one side, Europe adopted a
data retention policy necessitating clearer definitions of the types of offences in connection to which
stored personal data may be subjected to disclosure. On the other side, during the Bush
administration the National Security Agency struck a deal with the main national telecommunications
carriers to set up a database of the records of all the phone calls and online activities of American
citizens.¶ Secondly, the EU-US joint statement released in Washington on 28 October 2009, as well as the Stockholm Program of 2
December 2009, are and must be treated as urgent calls for the active implementation of the Cybercrime Convention. Without wishing to
belittle the importance of this Convention, however, it is clear that in an area such as Internet which connects the entire world,
Intergovernmental Organizations also need to intervene, endeavouring to include as many countries as possible. ¶ The third and last
conclusion is more of a hope: the huge potential of the Internet cannot be exploited merely to keep in touch
with old classmates or make free video calls to family and friends. It is precisely as a result of the global interconnectivity it offers, allowing
people from different countries and backgrounds to share information and exchange ideas, that the
Internet must serve as the
starting point for setting up a framework of rules that reconciles privacy protection with the public
interest in detecting, investigating and preventing crime both online and offline, in a manner
satisfactory to all. We managed to draw up the Universal Declaration of Human Rights without the
benefit of the Internet as a universal instrument of peace. Imagine what we can now do, with it.
Surveilance Ineffective-Terrorists
The US surveillance progams aren’t effective at stopping terrorists-they can’t gain
access to their covert communications.
Bershidsky, Leonid. Staff Editor. Jun 23, 2013. U.S. Surveillance Is Not Aimed at Terrorists.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-23/u-s-surveillance-is-not-aimed-at-terrorists.html.
Accessed 7/16/2013.
“People who radicalise under the influence of jihadist websites often go through a number of stages,” the Dutch
report said. “Their virtual activities increasingly shift to the invisible Web, their security awareness increases and their activities
become more conspiratorial.” ¶ Radicals who initially stand out on the “surface” Web quickly meet people, online or offline, who
drag them deeper into the Web underground. “For many, finally finding the jihadist core forums feels like a warm bath after
their virtual wanderings,” the report said. ¶ When information filters to the surface Web from the core forums, it’s
often by accident. Organizations such as al-Qaeda use the forums to distribute propaganda videos, which careless participants or their
friends might post on social networks or YouTube. ¶ Communication on the core forums is often encrypted. In 2012, a
French court found nuclear physicist Adlene Hicheur guilty of, among other things, conspiring to commit an act of terror for distributing and
using software called Asrar al-Mujahideen, or Mujahideen Secrets. The program employed various cutting-edge encryption methods, including
variable stealth ciphers and RSA 2,048-bit keys. ¶ The NSA’s Prism, according to a classified PowerPoint presentation published by the Guardian,
provides access to the systems of Microsoft Corp. (and therefore Skype), Facebook Inc., Google, Apple Inc. and other U.S. Internet giants. Either
these companies have provided “master keys” to decrypt their traffic - - which they deny -- or the NSA has somehow found other means. Even
complete access to these servers brings U.S. authorities no closer to the core forums . These must be
infiltrated by more traditional intelligence means, such as using agents posing as jihadists or by informants within terrorist
organizations. ¶ Similarly, monitoring phone calls is hardly the way to catch terrorists. They’re generally not
dumb enough to use Verizon. Granted, Russia’s special services managed to kill Chechen separatist leader Dzhokhar Dudayev with a
missile that homed in on his satellite-phone signal. That was in 1996. Modern-day terrorists are generally more aware of
the available technology. ¶ At best, the recent revelations concerning Prism and telephone surveillance might deter potential recruits
to terrorist causes from using the most visible parts of the Internet. Beyond that, the government’s efforts are much more
dangerous to civil liberties than they are to al-Qaeda and other organizations like it.
Digital Surveillance is ineffective at stopping terrorism
Bershidsky, Leonid. Staff Editor. Jun 23, 2013. U.S. Surveillance Is Not Aimed at Terrorists.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-23/u-s-surveillance-is-not-aimed-at-terrorists.html.
Accessed 7/16/2013.
The infrastructure set up by the National Security Agency, however, may only be good for gathering
information on the stupidest, lowest-ranking of terrorists. The Prism surveillance program focuses on
access to the servers of America’s largest Internet companies, which support such popular services as
Skype, Gmail and iCloud. These are not the services that truly dangerous elements typically use.
Hackers
Hackers Good-Anonymous
Anonymous is good for society because it keeps governments and agencies in check.
Ivanov, Georgi (MA, HBA in Political Science) Jan 2013 What is Anonymous? Everything You Ever
Wanted to Know About the Shadowy Internet Group. http://www.policymic.com/articles/23922/whatis-anonymous-everything-you-ever-wanted-to-know-about-the-shadowy-internet-group Date Accessed:
7/18/13
Understanding Anonymous begins with an overview of their history, beginning with 4chan, and evolving into a
movement whose primary tools of the trade became denial of service and hacking attacks,
accompanied by the public release of sensitive information, including the personal data of individuals
involved with the organization placed in the cross-hairs. The public arm of Anonymous consists of press releases and
videos that are as much information about its activities as they are about its principles, but also provide commentary on current events. The
group does act out against cases where miscarriage of justice or corruption is concerned, and these are
actions that, while controversial, have merit. While hacking attacks are done to symbolize opposition to
one issue or another, leaking information is a practice that predates Anonymous, but still remains a
potent tool in revealing how organizations and governments that would not otherwise release their
information, operate. The consequent fallout creates a public relations disaster for the affected parties,
but it is a reminder that society works best when there is a degree of accountability and trust
between governments and governed.
Encrypted communications are practically impossible to crack
Ou, Geore. 2006 (Network engineer. “Is encryption really crackable?”. 30 Apr. Accessed 17 July 13.
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/ou/is-encryption-really-crackable/204)
The problem is compounded by the fact that much of the misinformation out there actually sounds somewhat believable and many people just
don't know what to believe. So to settle this once and for all, let's look at the facts. One of the things that make these myths plausible is the fact
that "128-bit" WEP encryption used in 802.11 Wireless LANs is so pathetically weak. The inside scoop is that WEP was designed during the late
90s during a time when USA export laws were extremely tight. Fearing 802.11 devices would be banned by US export laws, good encryption
algorithms were deliberately passed up by the 802.11 group in favor of a weaker one. The WEP algorithm was fundamentally flawed and the
802.11 standards body knew full well that it wasn't a strong encryption algorithm when they selected it. However, WEP's glaring weaknesses
are not characteristic of any properly implemented symmetric encryption algorithms used in SSL or VPN implementations. To give you an idea
of how good something like DES is, DES
is 30 years old and no one has found any weakness or shortcut for cracking it yet
though it can be brute forced. Brute force techniques are considered impractical because modern encryption
algorithms are 128 to 256 bits long.¶ Further propelling the myth that encryption is worthless is that I often hear people saying
that they heard that a 512 bit RSA key was broken. The truth of the matter is that 512 bit (and recently even 660 bit) RSA keys have been
broken by the University of Bonn in Germany but that is has absolutely nothing to do with the type of encryption that's used for ordinary bulk
encryption. Furthermore, RSA's inventors were well aware of the fact that it takes a much larger key to be secure which is why typical
implementations are at a minimum 768 bits and can easily go up to 2048 bits and beyond. To give you an idea what it takes to
break an
RSA 1620 bit key, you would need a computer with 120 Terabytes of memory before you can even
think about attempting it and the memory requirement virtually rules out massively distributed
cracking methods. Some may ask why use RSA keys when it's many orders of magnitude slower and requires so many more bits to be
secure, the reason is that RSA encryption has the special property of being able to do secure key exchanges in plain sight of an adversary who is
trying to break in but still remain safe. For this reason, RSA keys are strictly used for the initial phases of a secure communication session for the
purpose of Authentication (where one entity proves who they are) and for secure key exchanges (used for bulk symmetric encryption). Once
the initial transaction is complete, the key that was exchanged during the initial RSA phase can now be used for SSL or VPN bulk encryption with
algorithms like RC5, 3DES, or AES.¶ The last big factor in encryption myths and bit size inflation is salesmen and marketers because bigger
numbers always sound nicer. I've had salesmen come in to my office and try to tell me that RSA or AES encryption was worthless and that I
should be using their product which uses some kind of 1000 bit wonder-crypto solution. All it takes is one company to try and out do their
competitors and pitch their products using 4096-bit RSA and the next company will come along and pitch 16384-bit RSA keys in their product.
Many IT consultants will shy away from quoting smaller bit sizes because they're afraid to be out done by their competitors. ¶ Ah, but what
about the dreaded massively distributed cracking brute force method for attacking something like 128 bit RC5 encryption? There
are
massive zombie farms of infected computers throughout the world and some may have gotten as big as 1 million
infected computers. What if that entire army was unleashed upon the commonly used 128 bit RC5
encryption? Surprisingly, the answer is not much. For the sake of argument, let's say we unleash 4.3 billion computers
for the purpose of distributed cracking. This means that it would be 4.3 billion or 2 to the 32 times faster than a single
computer. This means we could simply take 2 to the 128 combinations for 128-bit encryption and divide
it by 2 to the 32 which means that 2 to the 96 bits are left. With 96 bits left, it's still 4.3 billion times
stronger than 64 bit encryption. 64 bit encryption happens to be the world record for the biggest RC5
bit key cracked in 2002 which took nearly 5 years to achieve for a massive distributed attack. ¶ Now that
we know that the distributed attacks will only shave off a few bits, what about Moore's law which historically meant that computers roughly
doubled in speed every 18 months? That means in 48 years we can shave another 32 bits off the encryption armor which means 5 trillion future
computers might get lucky in 5 years to find the key for RC5 128-bit encryption. But with 256-bit AES encryption, that moves the date out
another 192 years before computers are predicted to be fast enough to even attempt a massively distributed attack. To
give you an
idea how big 256 bits is, it's roughly equal to the number of atoms in the universe!¶ Once some of these basic
facts on encryption become clear, "is encryption crackable" isn't the right question because the real question is "when can it be cracked and will
it matter then". This is just like Bank safes which are rated by the time it takes an attacker to crack it open and never sold as "uncrackable".
Encryption strength and the number of bits used are selected based on how many decades the data needs to be kept safe. For a secure ECommerce transaction, the data being transmitted is moot after a few decades which is why 128-bit encryption is perfectly suitable since it's
considered unbreakable for the next few decades. For top secret classified data that needs to remain secret for the next 100 years, the
Government uses NIST certified 256-bit AES encryption. So
the next time someone tells you that encryption is
crackable, ask him if he'll be around on this earth to see it demonstrated.
Cyberattacks
A cyber attack would not be that severe and countries aren’t likely to launch them
against each other.
Lewis, James, author of over 90 papers since becoming director of the technology and public policy program at the center for
strategic and international studies. December of 2002.“Assessing the Risks of Cyber Terrorism, Cyber War, and Other Cyber
Threats” center for strategic and international studies, Washington DC and Steptoe
publications.http://www.steptoe.com/publications/231a.pdf Date Accessed: July 16, 2013
Cyber crime is a serious and growing threat, but the risk to a nation-state in deploying cyber-weapons
against a potential opponent’s economy are probably too great for any country to contemplate these
measures. For example, writers in some of China’s military journals speculated that cyber attacks could
disable American financial markets. The dilemma for this kind of attack is that China is as dependent on the
same financial markets as the United States, and could suffer even more from disruption. With other
critical infrastructures, the amount of damage that can be done is, from a strategic viewpoint, trivial,
while the costs of discovery for a nation state could be very great. These constraints, however, do not apply to
non-state actors like Al Qaeda. Cyber attacks could potentially be a useful tool (albeit not a fatal or
determinative tool) for nonstate actors who reject the global market economy
Tech Bad
Technopoly creates an endless cycle of dependence, sickening the psyche of the
dependent
Postman, Neil. Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology, New York, Vintage Books, pp. 71-72. 1992
http://www.ibiblio.org/cmc/mag/1995/mar/hyper/npcontexts_119.html Date accessed- 7/16/13
Technopoly is a state of culture. It is also a state of mind. It consists in the deificaiton of technology,
which means that the culture seeks its authorization in technology, finds its satisfactions in
technology, and takes its orders from technology. This requires the development of a new kind of
social order, and of necessity leads to the rapid dissolution of much that is associated with traditional
beliefs. Those who feel most comfortable in Technopoly are those who are convinced that technical
progress is humanity's superhuman achievement and the instrument by which our most profound
dilemmas may be solved. They also believe that information is an unmixed blessing, which through its
continued and uncontrolled production and dissemination offers increased freedom, creativity, and
peace of mind. The fact that information does none of these things -- but quite the opposite -- seems to change
few opinions, for unwavering beliefs are an inevitable product of the structure of Technopoly. In
particular, Technopoly flourishes when the defenses against information break down. ¶ The
relationship between information and the mechanisms for its control is fairly simple to describe:
Technology increases the available supply of information. As the supply is increased, control
mechanisms are strained. Additional control mechanisms are needed to cope with new information.
When additional control mechanisms are themselves technical, they in turn further increase the
supply of information. When the supply of information is no longer controllable, a general breakdown
in psychic tranquillity and social purpose occurs. Without defenses, people have no way of finding
meaning in their experiences, lose their capacity to remember, and have difficulty imagining
reasonable futures. ¶ One way of defining Technopoly, then, is to say it is what happens to society
when the defenses against information glut have broken down. It is what happens when institutional
life becomes inadequate to cope with too much information. It is what happens when a culture,
overcome by information generated by technology, tries to employ technology itself as a means of
providing clear direction and humane purpose. The effort is mostly doomed to failure. Though it is
sometimes possible to use a disease as a cure for itself, this occurs only when we are fully aware of
the processes by which disease is normally held in check. My purpose here is to describe the defenses that in principle are
available and to suggest how they have become dysfunctional.
Computers and technology create a shield of ignorance to the real threats by hiding it
behind the need for technological advancement and speed.
Postman, Neil. Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology, New York, Vintage Books, pp. 118-20. 1992
http://www.ibiblio.org/cmc/mag/1995/mar/hyper/npcontexts_119.html Date accessed- 7/16/13
Because of what computers
commonly do, they place an inordinate emphasis on the technical processes of
communications and offer very little in the way of substance. With the exception of the electric light, there never has
been a technology that better exemplifies Marshall McLuhan's aphorism "The medium is the message." The computer is almost all
process. There are, for example, no "great computerers," as there are great writers, painters, or musicians. [I can't resist interjecting here:
there are no great "pencilers" or "brushers" either. What is this guy thinking?] There are "great programs" and "great programmers," but their
greatness lies in their ingenuity either in simulating a human function or in creating new possibilities of calculation, speed, and volume. Of
course, if J. David Bolter is right, it
is possible that in the future computers will emerge as a new kind of book,
expanding and enriching the tradition of writing technologies. Since printing created new forms of literature when it
replaced the handwritten manuscript, it is possible that electronic writing will do the same. But for the moment, computer technology
functions more as a new mode of transportation than a as new means of substantive communication.
It moves information -- lots of it, fast, and mostly in calculating mode. The computer, in fact, makes possible the fulfillment of Descartes' dream
of the mathematization of the world. Computers make it easy to convert facts into statistics and to translate problems into equations. And
whereas this can be useful (as when the process reveals a pattern that would otherwise go unnoticed), it is diversionary and
dangerous when applied indiscriminately to human affairs. So is the computer's emphasis on speed and especially its
capacity to generate and store unprecedented quantities of information. In specialized contexts, the value of calculation, speed, and
voluminous information may go uncontested.
But the "message" of computer technology is comprehensive and
domineering. The computer argues, to put it baldly, that the most serious problems confronting us at both
personal and professional levels require technical solutions through fast access to information
otherwise unavailable. I would argue that this is, on the face of it, nonsense. Our most serious problems are not
technical, nor do they arise from inadequate information. If a nuclear catastrophe occurs, it shall not
be because of inadequate information. Where people are dying of starvation, it does not occur
because of inadequate information. If families break up, children are mistreated, crime terrorizes a
city, education is impotent, it does not happen because of inadequate information. Mathematical equations,
instantaneous communication, and vast quantities of information have nothing whatever to do with any of these problems. And the computer
is useless in addressing them.
Tech pollutes the traditional sense of learning calling into question true learning.
Postman, Neil. Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology, New York, Vintage Books, pp. 16-19. 1992
http://www.ibiblio.org/cmc/mag/1995/mar/hyper/npcontexts_119.html Date accessed- 7/16/13
We can imagine that Thamus would also have pointed out to Gutenberg, as he did to Theuth, that the
new invention would create a vast population of readers who "will receive a quantity of information
without proper instruction...[who will be filled] will the conceit of wisdom instead of real wisdom"; that
reading, in other words, will compete with older forms of learning. This is yet another principle of technological change we may infer from the
judgment of Thamus:
new technologies compete with old ones -- for time, for attention, for money, for
prestige, but mostly for dominance of their world-view. This competition is implicit once we
acknowledge that the medium contains an ideological bias. And it is a fierce competition, as only
ideological competitions can be. It is not merely a matter of tool against tool -- the alphabet attacking ideographic writing, the
printing press attacking the illuminated manuscript, the photograph attacking the art of painting, television attacking the printed word. When
media make war against each other, it is a case of world-views in collision. In
the United States, we can see such collisions
everywhere -- in politics, in religion, in commerce -- but we see them most clearly in the schools,
where two great technologies confront each other in uncompromising aspect for the control of
students' minds. On the one hand, there is the world of the printed word with its emphasis on logic, sequence, history,
exposition, objectivity, detachment, and discipline. On the other there is the world of television with
its emphasis on imagery, narrative, presentness, simultaneity, intimacy, immediate gratification, and
quick emotional response. Children come to school having been deeply conditioned by the biases of
television. There, they encounter the world of the printed word. A sort of psychic battle takes place,
and there are many casualties -- children who can't learn to read or won't, children who cannot
organize their thought into logical structure even in a simple paragraph, children who cannot attend
to lectures or oral explanations for more than a few minutes at a time. They are failures, but not because they are
stupid. They are failures because there is a media war going on, and they are on the wrong side -- at least
for the moment. Who knows what schools will be like twenty-five years from now? Or fifty? In time, the type of student who is
currently a failure may be considered a success. They type who is now successful may be regarded as
a handicapped learner -- slow to respond, far too detached, lacking in emotion, inadequate in creating mental pictures of reality.
Consider: what Thamus called the "conceit of wisdom" -- the unreal knowledge acquired through the written word -- eventually became the
pre-eminent form of knowledge valued by the schools. There
is no reason to suppose that such a form of knowledge
must always remain so highly valued. To take another example: In introducing the personal computer to the
classroom, we shall be breaking a four-hundred year-old truce between the gregariousness and
openness fostered by orality and the introspection and isolation fostered by the printed word. Orality
stresses group learning, cooperation, and a sense of social responsibility.... Print stresses
individualized learning, competition, and personal autonomy. Over four centuries, teachers, while emphasizing print,
have allowed orality its place in the classroom, and have therefore achieved a kind of pedagogical peace between these two forms of learning,
so that what is valuable in each can be maximized. Now
comes the computer, carrying anew the banner of private
learning and individual problem-solving. Will the widespread use of computers in the classroom
defeat once and for all the claims of communal speech? Will the computer raise egocentrism to the
status of a virtue? These are the kinds of questions that technological change brings to mind when one
grasps ... that technological competition ignites total war, which means it is not possible to contain
the effects of a new technology to a limited sphere of human activity.... What we need to consider
about the computer has nothing to do with its efficiency as a teaching tool. We need to know in what
ways it is altering our conception of learning, and how, in conjunction with television, it undermines
the old idea of school.
WikiLeaks
A2: Threatens US Diplomacy
Wikileaks is not a threat to National Security, Diplomacy between nations will still
continue.
Helller, Kevin J. (Associate Professor at the University of Melbourne) Dec 2010 Why the Benefits of
WikiLeaks Far Outweigh Its Dangers http://opiniojuris.org/2010/12/03/why-wikileaks-good-faroutweighs-its-harm/ Date Accessed: 7/18/13
I have no doubt that some diplomats may respond to WikiLeaks’ disclosures by self-censoring and by
avoiding written communications. But it is difficult to believe that WikiLeaks will have any significant or
lasting effect on the US’s ability to engage in diplomacy with friendly or unfriendly governments; after
all, this is hardly the first time in U.S. history that diplomatic secrets have been disclosed. Robert Gates, the Secretary of
Defense, said it best a couple of days ago: Let me just offer some perspective as somebody who’s been at this a long
time. Every other government in the world knows the United States government leaks like a sieve , and it
has for a long time. And I dragged this up the other day when I was looking at some of these prospective releases. And this is a quote from John
Adams: ‘How can a government go on, publishing all of their negotiations with foreign nations, I know not. To me, it appears as dangerous and
pernicious as it is novel.’ Now, I’ve
heard the impact of these releases on our foreign policy described as a
meltdown, as a game-changer, and so on. I think those descriptions are fairly significantly
overwrought. The fact is, governments deal with the United States because it’s in their interest, not
because they like us, not because they trust us, and not because they believe we can keep secrets . Many
governments — some governments — deal with us because they fear us, some because they respect us, most
because they need us. We are still essentially, as has been said before, the indispensable nation. So other
nations will continue to deal with us. They will continue to work with us. We will continue to share
sensitive information with one another. Is this embarrassing? Yes. Is it awkward? Yes. Consequences for U.S.
foreign policy? I think fairly modest.
Meta-Ethics
Naturalism
Acting in accordance with natural facts is the meta-ethic for the round, and as such all
moral argumentation must be consistent with it. Moreover, naturalism best responds
to moral claims.
Papineau [Papineau, David, (Professor of Philosophy of Science at King's College) "Naturalism", (The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy)]
Realist moral
naturalism also seems better off than non-naturalist realism in two further respects. The first relates to
is hard to see how non-natural moral facts could have any motivating
force: after all, if such facts are incapable of having effects of any kind, they will a fortiori be incapable
of motivating human beings. True, moral motivation is not a straightforward matter for naturalist moral realists either: if moral facts
the motivating force of moral facts. It
are natural, then won't it be possible for someone to recognize their existence, yet not be correspondingly moved to action in any way?
However, there are various responses naturalist realists can make to this challenge. (Ridge 2006 Section 5, Lenman 2006 Section 2.) The other
point on which naturalist moral realists seem better placed than non-naturalists has to do with [in] explaining the supervenience of moral facts
on other facts. As
noted earlier, intuition seems to demands that two situations that are identical with
respect to physical properties will also be morally identical. For naturalists, this will follow from
general naturalist principles. Non-naturalists, by contrast, would seem to lack any obvious
explanation of why moral facts should so supervene on physical facts
Naturalism best responds to moral claims
Papineau [Papineau, David, (Professor of Philosophy of Science at King's College) "Naturalism", (The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy)]
Realist moral naturalism also seems better off than non-naturalist realism in two further respects. The first relates
to the motivating force of moral facts. It is hard to see how non-natural moral facts could have any motivating
force: after all, if such facts are incapable of having effects of any kind, they will a fortiori be incapable of
motivating human beings. True, moral motivation is not a straightforward matter for naturalist moral realists either: if moral facts are
natural, then won't it be possible for someone to recognize their existence, yet not be correspondingly moved to action in any way? However,
there are various responses naturalist realists can make to this challenge. (Ridge 2006 Section 5, Lenman 2006 Section 2.) The other point on
which naturalist moral realists seem better placed than non-naturalists has to do with [in] explaining the supervenience of moral facts on other
facts. As noted earlier, intuition
seems to demands that two situations that are identical with respect to
physical properties will also be morally identical. For naturalists, this will follow from general
naturalist principles. Non-naturalists, by contrast, would seem to lack any obvious explanation of why
moral facts should so supervene on physical facts
Heredity play a major role in our decision and moral actions as people based on how it
effects our environment.
Fontanilla Conrado , Staff analist, 8/26/12, Does Heredity Influence How Our Life Would Be?
http://conradofontanilla.hubpages.com/hub/Does-Genetics-Influence-Our-Life-Would-Be
It is difficult to separate the effect of heredity or genetics from that of environment. But let's assume
that that can be done. A person may have the genes to enable him to grow 6 ft tall but due to poverty
and inadequacy of food he grew only to 5.5 ft tall. The food is part of his environment. Other parts of his
environment are: relationship with parents, brothers or sisters if he has any, classmates, members of his congregation. He learns moral values
from them.¶ The phrase "would be" in the question pertains to moral values. A crocodile eats any smaller animal in its pond thus he dominates
the pond. Let's say it does not care whether its diet suffers of not. The crocodile is amoral. A man/woman may be imbued with moral values. He
knows what is good or bad according to his/her environment. His/her
genetics affect his/her capacity to learn and to
adapt to his/her environment. But his/her morals guide him/her what s/he "would be." His/her
genetics makes him/her what s/he "is." His/her environment makes him/her what s/he "would be."¶
For example, Einstein, derived from his genetic make up, had the capacity to come up with the formula E = mc2.. During World War II he feared
that Hitler's Germany might have used this formula to develop a powerful bomb as demonstrated by the V-2 rockets that Germany used to
bomb London in 1944. He wrote a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt of the U.S. and urged him to develop a bomb for use in retaliation
against Hitler's Germany in case it unleashed an atomic bomb.¶ Then the atomic bombs developed by the U.S were dropped over Nagasaki and
Hirosima killing thousands of Japanese civilians (not combatant soldiers) on the spot and maiming several others for life. Einstein was horrified.
He said that had he known that the atomic bomb would be used on civilians he would not have urged President Roosevelt to make them
(Einstein, A. Ideas and Opinions. 1954).¶ There is duality in man/woman. One part biological; the other moral. ¶ His/her
genetics
enables him to adapt to the environment. S/he is incapable of making his/her own food, unlike plants.
So s/he must eat plants to live. To live is part of "would be." That leads us to consider morality as scaled in degrees.
Eating plant may not arouse some sense of guilt, as a plant is also a creature. Or munching seeds of peanut may give us some pleasure when in
fact we are killing germinal life. Up the ladder, if there is such a moral ladder, consider the consumption of chicken meat. We kill the chicken
when we prepare it for cooking and consumption. Yet we, except some people, do not feel a moral compunction about it.
Hardwired For Survival
Humans are naturally aware of biological survival risks
Jeanna Bryner, staff analyst and editor, 9/24/07, Modern Humans Retain Caveman Survival Instincts, live science,
http://www.livescience.com/4631-modern-humans-retain-caveman-survival-instincts.html Date accessed- 7/16/13
Like hunter-gatherers in the jungle, modern humans are still experts at spotting predators and prey,
despite the developed world's safe suburbs and indoor lifestyle, a new study suggests. ¶ The research, published online this week in the
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , reveals that humans today are hard-wired to pay attention to other people and animals
much more so than non-living things, even if inanimate objects are the primary hazards for modern, urbanized folks. ¶ The researchers
say the finding supports the idea that natural selection molded mechanisms into our ancestors' brains that were
specialized for paying attention to humans and other animals. These adaptive traits were then passed on to
us. ¶ "We're assuming that natural selection takes a long time to build anything anew and that's why this is left over from our past," said study
team member Leda Cosmides, an evolutionary psychologist at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). ¶ Ancestor's eyes ¶ Immersed
in a
rich, biotic environment, it would have been imperative for our ancestors to monitor both humans
and non-human animals. Predators and prey took many different forms—lions, tigers and bears—and they changed often, so
constant eyeballing was critical. ¶ While the environment has changed since then, with high-rises emerging where forests once took root and
pampered pets taking the place of stalking beasts, our instinct-driven attention has not followed suit. ¶ "Having
this pop-out
attentional bias for animals is sort of a vestigial behavior," said study team member Joshua New of Yale University's
Perception and Cognition Lab. ¶ In the study, groups of undergraduate students from UCSB, watched images displayed on computer
monitors. The flashing images alternated between pairs of various outdoor scenes, with the first image
showing one scene and the next an alternate version of that scene with one change. Participants
indicated each time whether they detected a change. ¶ The photographs included animate categories, such as people and
other animals, as well as inanimate ones, such as plants, artifacts that can be manipulated (stapler or wheelbarrow) and fixed artifacts, such as
landmarks (windmill or house). ¶ Modern hunter-gatherers ¶ Overall,
the subjects were faster and more accurate at
detecting changes involving all animals compared with inanimate objects. They correctly detected nearly 90
percent of the changes to "living" targets compared with 66 percent for inanimate objects. ¶ In particular, the students spotted changes in
elephant and human scenes 100 percent of the time, while they had a success rate of just over 75 percent for photos showing a silo and 67
percent for those with a coffee mug. ¶ Though we are more likely to meet death via an SUV than a charging wildebeest, the results indicated
subjects were slower and less successful at detecting changes to vehicles than to animals. ¶ The researchers compare our attentional bias
toward animals to the appendix, an organ present in modern humans because it was useful for our ancestors, but useless now. ¶ These results
have implications for phobias and other behaviors that involve focus toward specific categories of objects over others. ¶ "People develop
phobias for spiders and snakes and things that were ancestral threats. It's very infrequent to have somebody afraid of cars or electrical outlets,"
New told LiveScience . "Those statistically pose much more of a threat to us than a tiger. That makes it an interesting test case as to why do
tigers still capture attention."
Error Theory
ERROR THEORY DEMANDS THE EPISTEMIC REASON BE SEPARATE FROM MORALITY
Rowland, Richard., Journal on Ethics on Social Philosophy, January 2013, Moral Error Theory and the Arguments from Epistemic
Reasons, http://www.jesp.org/PDF/Moral%20Error%20Theory_final.pdf
Error theorists are not skeptical of hypothetical reasons.10 But they hold ¶ that if there are only
hypothetical reasons, our understanding of morality ¶ is radically mistaken, because our
understanding of morality entails that ¶ there are categorical reasons.¶ 11 However, our understanding
of epistemic ¶ reasons and justification also entails that there are categorical reasons. As ¶ I said, it seems
that there is reason for everyone to believe that dinosaurs ¶ once roamed the earth regardless of what
they want to believe; there ¶ would still be reason for me to believe that I am in my office writing right
¶ now even if believing this made me extremely unhappy or did not promote any of my desires. Two
agents in the same epistemic situation seem ¶ to have the same epistemic reasons, regardless of their
desires or goals or the roles that they find themselves in, just as two people who see a child ¶
drowning seem to have moral reasons to save the child regardless of their ¶ desires, goals or roles. So,
if there are only hypothetical reasons for belief, ¶ our understanding of epistemic reasons is just as
badly mistaken as our ¶ understanding of morality and moral reasons is if there are only hypothetical
reasons for action.
There is a nuanced difference between nihilism and Error Theory, the later concedes
that we try to make moral jdugements.
Joyce, Richard., Entry for Encyclopedia of Ethics, 2013, “NIHILISM”, Encyclopedia,
http://www.victoria.ac.nz/staff/richard_joyce/acrobat/joyce_nihilism.pdf
Even restricting attention to “moral
nihilism,” matters remain indeterminate. Its most ¶ prominent usage in the field of
metaethics treats it as a synonym for “error theory,” therefore ¶ an entry that said only “Nihilism: see ERROR THEORY”
would not be badly misleading. ¶ This would identify moral nihilism as the metaethical view that moral
discourse consists of ¶ assertions that systematically fail to secure the truth. (See Mackie 1977; Joyce
2001.) ¶ A broader definition of “nihilism” would be “the view that there are no moral facts.” This ¶ is
broader because it covers not only the error theory but also noncognitivism (see¶ NONCOGNITIVISM).
Both these theories deny that there are moral facts—the difference ¶ being that the error theorist
thinks that in making moral judgments we try to state facts (but ¶ fail to do so, because there are no
facts of the type in question), whereas the noncognitivist ¶ thinks that in making moral judgments we
do not even try to state facts (because, for ¶ example, these judgments are really veiled commands or
expressions of desire). (In ¶ characterizing noncognitivism in this way, I am sidelining various linguistic permissions that ¶ may be
earned via the quasi-realist program (see QUASI-REALISM).) While it is not ¶ uncommon to see “nihilism” defined in this broader way, few
contemporary noncognitivists ¶ think of themselves as “nihilists,” so it is reasonable to suspect that the extra breadth of the ¶ definition is often
unintentional.
NEITZSCHE SUPPORTS ERROR THEORY
Joyce, Richard., Entry for Encyclopedia of Ethics, 2013, “NIHILISM”, Encyclopedia,
http://www.victoria.ac.nz/staff/richard_joyce/acrobat/joyce_nihilism.pdf
Various eighteenth- and nineteenth-century continental philosophers (e.g., Schopenhauer, Feuerbach,
Fichte, Kierkegaard) are associated in one way or another with nihilism, though their nihilistic streaks
tend to be each so sui generis as to defy easy categorization. Even Nietzsche, who is often treated as a
kind of grandfather of European nihilism, is extremely different to classify (see NIETZSCHE,
FRIEDRICH). In certain moods he seems to be clearly advocating an error theory (moral nihilism). In
Twilight of the Idols he writes: There are absolutely no moral facts. What moral and religious
judgments have in common is the belief in things that are not real. Morality is just an interpretation of
certain phenomena or (more accurately) a misinterpretation. (1889, VIII.1 / 2005: 182)
MORAL ERROR THEORY REJECTS FIRST-ORDER MORAL CLAIMS
Olson, Jonas., Department of Philosophy at Stockholm University, 2010, Error Theory and Reasons to Believe,
people.su.se/~jolso/papers/DefMETapril2010.doc
according to
moral error theory, first-order moral claims are uniformly false. First-order moral claims are claims
that entail something about what some agent morally ought to do or not to do, what would be
morally permissible or impermissible for some agent to do or not to do, what there is moral reasons
for some agent to do or not to do, and the like; or what would be morally good (bad) or morally
(un)desirable, and the like. Hence, if error theory is correct, the claim that, e.g., torture is wrong is
false. But the law of the excluded middle entails that if it is false that torture is wrong, it is true that
torture is not wrong. And the negative claim that torture is not wrong appears to entail that torture is
morally permissible, which is clearly a first-order moral claim. This suggests that contrary to the
contentions of many moral error theorists, moral error theory does have distinctive first-order moral
implications. And rather vulgar ones at that; anything turns out to be morally permissible! I shall not attempt
to resolve this issue here. I note merely that one possible strategy for sidestepping this problem is to
opt for a version of moral error theory that says that first-order moral claims rest on false
presuppositions and are therefore uniformly neither true nor false. In order not to exclude this
version of moral error theory, I shall take moral error theory to be the view that no first-order moral
claim is true. Analogously, I shall take epistemic error theory to be the view that no first-order
epistemic claim is true, where first-order epistemic claims are claims to the effect that there are
epistemic reasons for some agent to believe or not to believe some proposition or that believing some
proposition is or would be permissible or impermissible, and the like.
Before I get started I need to make a brief preliminary remark about formulations of error theories. It is routinely said that
Quasi- Realism
QUASI-REALISM BAD BECAUSE IT LEGITAMIZES CONTRADICTING ETHICS
Moore, A.W., Philosopher of Philosophy at St. Hugh’s College, July 2002, Quasi-Realism and Relativism,
http://users.ox.ac.uk/~shug0255/pdf_files/quasi-realism-and-relativism.pdf
If it is true that ‘an ethic is the propositional reflection of the dispositions ¶ and attitudes, policies and
stances, of people,’ as Simon Blackburn says in ¶ summary of the quasi-realism that he champions in this excellent and wonder- ¶ fully
provocative book (p. 310), then it seems to follow that different dispo- ¶ sitions, attitudes, policies and
stances-different conative stares, for ¶ short-will issue in different ethics, each with an equal claim to
truth; and ¶ this in turn seems to be one thing that could be reasonably meant by that ¶ slippery
polyseme ‘relativism’. If such relativism does follow, a good deal ¶ remains to be said about how much
force it has. At the limit it might do no ¶ more than signal the abstract possibility of an ethic rivalling
that of humans. ¶ More potently, it might somehow legitimize the different ethics of different ¶ groups
of humans in actual conflict with one another. But without the possibility of some such variability of
ethic to match a possible variability of ¶ conative state, the quasi-realist’s claim that an ethic ‘reflects’
a particular ¶ combination of conative states appears hollow.
OUR COGNATIVE STATES EFFECT OUR MORAL STANDARDS
Moore, A.W., Philosopher of Philosophy at St. Hugh’s College, July 2002, Quasi-Realism and Relativism,
http://users.ox.ac.uk/~shug0255/pdf_files/quasi-realism-and-relativism.pdf
The relativism in question is not the view that, had our conative states been different, different ethical
standards might have applied; Blackburn has persistently and persuasively argued that he is not committed to anything like that.
Nor is it the view that, had our conative states been different, we might have applied different ethical
standards; that is a platitude (and scarcely merits the label ‘relativism’). The view is something lying
subtly between these, ¶ namely that, had our conative states been different, we might have applied
different ethical standards and it might have been right for us to do so; we might have had different
ethical beliefs and those different ethical beliefs ¶ might have been true.
Legality
Legality is the base of societal morals
George C. Christie. ON THE MORAL OBLIGATION TO OBEY THELAW. Duke Law Journal December, 1990.
There is, however, an epistemologically more basic point that can be made here. The stark separation between law and morality-the
assumption that the law does not affect morality-is simply untenable. In particular, I wish to assert that the prevailing public morality
of
any society is very definitely influenced by the law. 2 4 No serious observer of American society over the past thirty years,
and certainly no one who has spent a substantial portion of that time in the South, can have any doubt that decisions like Brown v. Board of
Education 25 and federal civil rights legislation
have profoundly influenced public perceptions as to the morality
as to what constitutes "theft," "fraud," or "stealing" are profoundly
influenced by legal analysis-indeed, "theft" and "fraud" are legal terms of art. My argument, of course, is not
that we should go to the opposite extreme and deny the force of morality in the law; instead, I wish to argue that the two are
inseparable: It is a chicken-and-egg situation. Many of the writers I have mentioned, for example, use the act of promising as
of segregation. Furthermore, notions
an illustration of the kind of activity that generates moral obligations. Yet, in their often extended discussions as to when promises create
binding moral obligations, they curiously fall back on the analysis used by lawyers to determine whether contracts are legally binding. To
demonstrate that promises create moral obligations in certain circumstances, these writers sometimes cite actual legal decisions and legal
treatises, and they even cite the Uniform Commercial Code and the Restatement of Contracts. 2 6 Some of them even expressly adopt the legal
position that promissory obligations are ultimately created by the reasonable objective expectations of the other parties to the transaction and
not by the actual subjective intent of the alleged promisor 2 7 If the critics of legal obligation are telling us anything, it appears to be that if a
promise creates a legal obligation, it also creates a moral obligation. The example of promising
also shows that the separation of morally significant matters (in which moral obligations
supply the needed direc- tion) from the problems of social coordination in a complex
world (in which law sometimes shows the way) is simply untenable. In a complex world,
everything is a matter of social coordination, as the practice of promising demonstrates.
The point can be made even more decisively by taking a situation that would appear
to provide one of the paradigmatic examples of morality, in and of itself, providing a
sufficient basis of obli- gation, namely, the circumstances under which the killing of
another human being is permissible. It is instructive to note that, when Raz dis- cusses this situation, he talks
of "laws prescribing behaviour which is morally obligatory independently of the law (e.g. prohibiting murder, The example of
promising also shows that the separation of morally significant matters (in which moral obligations supply the needed direction) from the problems of social coordination in a complex world (in which law sometimes shows the way) is simply
untenable. In a complex world, everything is a matter of social coordination, as the practice of promising demonstrates. The
point can be made even more decisively by taking a situation that would appear to provide one of the paradigmatic
examples of morality, in and of itself, providing a sufficient basis of obli- gation, namely, the circumstances under which the
killing of another human being is permissible. It is instructive to note that, when Raz discusses this situation, he talks of
"laws prescribing behaviour which is morally obligatory independently of the law (e.g. prohibiting murder,
Rule of Law
The rule of is necessary to limit abuses of the majority.
Michael Meyer-Resende is a director of Democracy Reporting International, a Berlin-based group promoting
political participation.
09 Democracy Reporting International
http://www.democracy-reporting.org/files/essential_elements_of_democracy_2.pdf date accessed
7/20/13 Democracy Reporting International
There are few definitions of the rule of law in the context of international instruments related to ensuring democratic practices within states.30
Nonetheless, its core meaning is clear. That is, the
rule of law commits all public authorities to comply with
independently and impartially administered legal and justice systems, such that states make
continuous efforts ¶ ‘[g]uaranteeing that no individual or public or private institution is above the
law’.31 Sometimes the rule of law is narrowly construed as an efficient and effective system of justice and
law enforcement. Beyond that, it is also interpreted to imply certain standards for ¶ the legislative process, namely that this should be
an open and transparent process that reflects the will of the people and the outcomes of which are public and freely available. Increasingly, the
rule of law is seen through a broader conceptual framework ¶ that links it to human rights and democratic order; e.g., UN Human Rights
Commission resolution on democracy and the rule of law (resolution 2005/32), the OSCE Copenhagen 1990 commitments and the Charter of
Paris for a New Europe. ¶ As
an inherent element of democracy, the rule of law therefore indicates that the
will of the majority has clear and certain limits, not only in the form of universal human rights, but
also in relation to the constitutional framework of a state. Consequently, for example, public referenda should not be
used to overrule constitutional provisions.
Rule of law ensures security and democracy
Gabriel Marcella, teaches strategy in the Department of National Security and Strategy of the United
States Army War College, Carlisle, Pennsylvania. The Imperative of the Rule of Law in the Democratic
State.¶ DEMOCRATIC GOVERNANCE AND THE RULE ¶ OF LAW:¶ LESSONS FROM COLOMBIA. December
2009 date accessed 7/20/13 http://www.StrategicStudiesInstitute.army.mil/
¶ Any discussion of democratic governance in conflicted societies must begin with security and the ¶
rule of law. Although security, state presence, and social and economic progress are all important
mutually ¶ reinforcing elements in establishing a government’s authority and legitimacy, it is the rule
of law and its ¶ acceptance by the people that binds them all together. Democracy is not possible
without security, and ¶ security without the rule of law is a Hobbesian hell. Achieving security and the rule of law
requires political ¶ will, resources, and time to repair and build institutions and develop the rules of democratic community that ¶ are generally
accepted by the populace. That
is why the Constitution of the United States and the Declaration ¶ of
Independence are such singular documents. They codified a long process of institutional and political ¶
development that began before the Magna Carta in 1215 and ultimately transformed 13 colonies into a ¶ democratic state that survived a
great civil war and is still evolving in the 21st century. Indeed, the Magna ¶ Carta was itself the result of the security and enforcement of the
King’s Law, established by English monarchs as early as Henry II (1154-89). Within the security provided by the Magna Carta, the barons took
the first steps towards what eventually became widespread parliamentary democracy.
The rule of law makes democracy work
because law is the collective will of society, making possible the monopoly on the legitimate use of force, equal rights, and social
order. Six elements comprise the rule of law: order and security, legitimacy, and checks.