Here is the second part of the post as it was too long for HN:

-----

Edit. WIRESHARK and ARCMAP removed. See Entropius' post. Both commercial/harmless programs. Don't want to create a paranoia sandwich. It is bad enough as it is.

Second edit ETHEREAL removed - thanks to PointyOintment and azaydius

Third edit: Someone wrote to me asking what my problem is:

Thank you for contacting me with your concerns. I will answer as honestly and faithfully as I can. I am not an American. I am an attorney in a far away land. Look up my user name if you really must.

ALL the information I have posted is publically available. ALL of it. The NSA should be more careful.

What has the information been used for? The one XKeyscore slide stated over 300 terrorist captured. The NSA claim that their internal spying has disrupted 58 plots in the USA. Where are all these supposed terrorists and when are their trials starting? We're not talking about the Boston Bombing, because they weren't there for that. We're talking about 58 seperate terrorist attacks which Americans have never heard about? Oh wait I hear you say "they were kept secret for a reason..." No... How about this is all fiction. Where is the evidence? General Alexander should be able to sit back, smile and start listing the targets, preparations and everything regarding each of these "58 supposed plots", yet he can only point to a single guy sending $8500 to Al-Shabaab. WOW! $8500!!! Stop the frikken presses! $8500!! /s

The other uses of internationally intercepted communications is to mark people out for death based on who they have been talking to. You are aware that the US uses telephone metadata from Afghanistan to launch strikes. Meaning that the content of the phonecalls matters not, what matters is how many times you speak to someone considered to be few enough hops away from someone considered a terrorist? I think the continual drone strikes are a crime against humanity and you only have to consider what it is like [to live with the constant threat of death hanging over them.](http://www.livingunderdrones.org/living-under-drones/)

I'm not really enjoying my schadenfreude and I told you so when it comes to US citizens losing their rights. FFS! I TOLD YOU SO! You know how many thousands of downvotes I have had to endure trying to warn of the dangers? I eventually just gave up. Americans just knew better. It fucking pains me that I got nowhere fast.

I believe that privacy is a basic human right. It is not permissable to trample it underfoot because "terrorists" and "terrorism". I have lived through a real armed campaign with bombings and landmines and I didn't buy it then and still not buying it now.

Which USG clandestine operations do you believe are of value? It all seems to have backfired rather spectacularly.

What about the abuses of these very same progams that we're hearing about? Do you think the internal surveillance should be automated and watch for people spending money they shouldn't have, can't explain and/or haven't declared to the IRS? So you think the internal surveillance should be used for petty drug possession busts?

How many people are there in Al-Qaeda? A 100 as the ISI reckon? A 1000? How many of those are in the USA? OK. Now WHY are there 117,675 active surveillance targets in PRISM's counterterrorism database? It's out by a factor of 117:1. There are over a million Americans on the Terror Watch List. What is THIS ALL ABOUT? Do you have any idea?

What is the FISA court record for and against the government? All those warrants to do all that spying.... how many cases have eventuated because of this.

So yes, I am against the NSA and everything they do and enable. I don't think the NSA represents the USA in any meaningful way. From the outside it looks like a rogue operation with no meaningful oversight.