Google Engineer Wins NSA Award, Then Says NSA Should Be Abolished
Google Engineer Wins NSA Award, Then Says NSA Should Be Abolished
He would know.
July 26, 2013
Last week, Dr. Joseph Bonneau learned that he had won the NSA’s first annual Science of Security (SoS) Competition. The competition, which aims to honor the best “scientific papers about national security” as a way to strengthen NSA collaboration with researchers in academia, honored Bonneau for his paper on the nature of passwords.
And how did Bonneau respond to being honored by the NSA? By expressing, in an honest and bittersweet blog post, his revulsion at what the NSA has become:
On a personal note, I’d be remiss not to mention my conflicted feelings about winning the award given what we know about the NSA’s widespread collection of private communications and what remains unknown about oversight over the agency’s operations. Like many in the community of cryptographers and security engineers, I’m sad that we haven’t better informed the public about the inherent dangers and questionable utility of mass surveillance. And like many American citizens I’m ashamed we’ve let our politicians sneak the country down this path.
In accepting the award I don’t condone the NSA’s surveillance.Simply put, I don’t think a free society is compatible with an organisation like the NSA in its current form.
In an interview with Andy Cush at Animal, Bonneau went even farther in his critiques of the NSA:
I’d rather have it abolished than persist in its current form. I think there’s a question about whether it’s possible to reform the NSA into something that’s more reasonable…But my feeling based on what I’ve read is that I don’t want to live in a country with an organization like the NSA is right now.
...
... the winner of the NSA award wants, like many privacy rights activists and citizens concerned with the government’s Fourth Amendment violations, for the NSA to be reformed by a political process (like the one which narrowly failed in the House yesterday).
Either that, or have it abolished altogether.
http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/google-engineer-wins-nsa-award-then-says-nsa-should-be-abolished
= new reply since forum marked as read
a number of engineers and other tech heads who are feeling somewhat guilty at this point...but many didn't realize the extent of the surveillance. There's always time to speak out against it as an insider. Strangely, there don't seem to be the usual mass surveillance defenders in this thread. I wonder why...
Thanks for your post. I know there are many in the same boat. 
for those who don't go along. Not everybody has to do a Snowden, but not participating in it is an admirable choice, if there are any other job alternatives.
They refuse to believe any of this stuff.
"Where's the proof?" they ask.
It's GREAT that more folks who really know what is going on are speaking out.
for honesty in perceptive geeks
Why does he want Republicans to win?!
