When we look at USA today it more looks like a 3 rd world country. Just the military is left the rest of the country is a complete joke ( infrastrucuture is even in eastern european countries better). The US economy collapsed long ago and lives almost solely from import goods because USA is just a parasite robbing out other countries and of course handling the international trade with the US Dollar. But good news is China is the new upcoming power and happened already ( they have a lot of fabrics).

Too much data and too inept people controlling things.

I am not particularly worried about my data.

Knowledge is power.
Do we want nobody to have it, just because it can be misused if it falls into the wrong hands?
I say: let's just try and keep it away from the wrong hands... Those who would sacrifice security for freedom... deserve every bit of "freedom" they get. - not quite Thomas Hobbes

etc.

There are two separate things: US (government) spying on its own citizens (I have no strong opinion on that, as I am not an US citizen), and US (government and companies) spying on non-US citizens (I'm interested in this, as it covers also me).

As I said earlier, I am not interested in the information that NSA, CIA or whatever are spying (not only US citizens, but also abroad). Of course they do, I didn't expect less from them.

I'm more interested on the information whether the US companies, who also operate abroad, are really willingly co-operating and helping their government to spy abroad. So, when people suspect that some Chinese (telecom etc.) companies are doing that for the Chinese goverment(***), should similar allegations now be set upon US companies?

Related to that, I also find the reports interesting what exactly the companies are doing with the data they gather about us (even if they didn't deliver that data to their governments). Like the reports of some companies collecting data of cancer patients, and selling that information to companies making cancer drugs so that they can pinpoint their advertising to those who might have cancer.

(***) Just a couple of weeks ago, at least here in the news there were allegations by some ex-CIA operative from US, who was blaming e.g. Huawei for spying for the Chinese government (Huawei makes e.g. telecom technology for phone operators and ISPs, and offers services to maintain their networks). I also think Huawei has been earlier rejected from e.g. Indian and Australian networks for similar non-technical reasons/suspicions, no matter whether they are true or false.

Are US companies any better then, should they be treated with similar caution abroad?

Well, kinda Hobbes. But as much as I like to use Hobbes to explain the idiocy of Franklin's quote on freedom (yup, actually done that before)... I'm pretty sure that his philosophy actually justifies most of the insane stuff the US government is doing for "national security.

I think the worst enemy of the people is the mass media since with it you can control public opinon and then of course whoever controls the media controls the government. It's just a matter of public opinon forming. But since most Americans can't even read anymore, the US government has no stress with such dumb inhabitants.

So are the media controlling the government or the government the media? :P

There we have the c-word and that is what this stuff is really about, not the s-word. Perhaps not at this moment but give 5-10 years with the advancement of technology. Sure there are laws, but laws are also interpreted to a degree which results in norms. Norms can be changed, new laws can be passed having a new plateau of established norms to start from. Now we have established the norm "almost everything which runs through the net is stored, personalized, set into a timeline" by private security contractors and government agencies, corporations as most people seem to give a shit.

Data Mining, learning algorithms, Bayes stuff will provide the next step - profiles of how likely it is what someone does next to a given point in time according to his saved timeline, a nice %-value which will decide for you if you are against "democracy and freedom" in the world.

Big data, analyzed and used will be/is one of the most powerful weapons in the world to protect an established system.

edit: In case you wonder what Big data is about http://www.privacysos.org/node/1006

Notice that in combination with the crap mass media and public opinion forming, voting becomes entirely meaningless. I mean the germans do not even know that they are still occupied, you can vote for whom you want it doesn't matter. Then they say yes we control everything it is just fear mongering so that you do not speak out. In Russia under boshevism the people also did not speak out and then 60 million died in the gulag death labour camps so that you get a picture. The EU is also a fucking joke just to enslave the germans. As i said the carp media just here to control you, even worse is hollywood propaganda which is not entertainment but solely to manipulate you. I could tell you all the truth but you have been brainwashed to death with the school system + mass media.

I don't know whether I should laugh or cry when reading such preposterous conspiracy theories... please, guys, stop bumping this thread, already...

Just out of curiosity, by whom ?

The BRD gmbh i just an allied construct sold to the germans as their government ^^.

Nothing is more worse who falsely believe they are free.

J.W. von Goethe

Once you realize that oh it's just a rumor. Much more important is oh who controls the media and the school system ??
I think the Americans are even worse enslaved with the mass media + hollywood. Yet hollywood movies are not entertainment just indoctrination. I think what our so called "elite" fears most is that their most powerful weapons go down. Electricty for their propaganda machines. It could happen that the slaves come awake then. I still believe the germans are among the most intelligent and creative so they need hard measures to keep the germans in check.

That's a bit abstract to me. You mean that the true force governing germany now is... the WW2 allies ?

France, Poland, England, Australia, Canada, Russia, USA, Greece, China, etc ? They vote decisions in secret and give the resulting instructions to Merkel ?

I don't get exactly what you mean, or how you see things.

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Edit - Okay, inbetween posts narrow it down to the USA. But the USA itself is "under control". So, by whom ? Who are your "them" ?