Bruce Schneier is an internationally-recognized [6] security expert [7] who regularly writes for CNN [8], Wired [8] and other publications. Schneier’s blog was just listed by Time as one of the 25 best blogs [9] in the world. Schneier trounced the former head of the TSA [10] (87% to 13%) in a recent debate on airport security hosted by the Economist.
Washington’s Blog asked Schneier 3 questions today by email.
[Q] Many top experts (including you) have said that mass surveillance on Americans is harmful to national security [11], as it makes the haystack too big to search meaningfully for bad guys.
As a layperson, it seems to me that the same is true with many of our counter-terrorism efforts since 9/11 [12].
[A] Yes.
[Q] For example, Nobel prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz calculates that the U.S. will end up spending $3-5 trillion [13] dollars in the Iraq war [a Brown University study actually concluded that the Iraq war could end up costing $6 trillion dollars [14]]. Yet the 9/11 Commission found that Iraq had no connection to 9/11 [15].
[A] Right.
[Q] Similarly, “mission creep” has resulted in numerous activities – including protesting or being a privacy advocate – being labelled as “potential terrorism” [16].
Putting aside the fact that this is trashing our Constitutional liberties [17], is this counterproductive from a counter-terror perspective because it “creates a bigger haystack” and distracts our intelligence, defense and law enforcement services from focusing on actually finding and stopping the real terrorists who want to kill people on U.S. soil?
[A] I certainly think so.
(Note: Schneier was not commenting on any of our links, as our questions were sent in plain text.)