Why I suspect China of leaking Prism.

Why I suspect China of leaking Prism.

Did the Prism presentation leak at exactly the perfect moment for maximum benefit for the Chinese government, or was that just an amazing coincidence?

Momentum and moral outrage about Chinese government hacking has been building up for years. Finally, this weekend, President Obama was scheduled to call China's new President President Xi Jinping (shee jihn-peeng) out on the carpet, take him to the woodshed and do other cliches to him about China's intense hacking.

But after years of being kept secret, facts about the Prism program leaked just days before Obama was going to lecture Xi on hacking, which resulted in domestic US outrage over Prismgate reaching a crescendo just as the leaders met.

Whenever China is accused of hacking, they always deny it, and follow the denial up with the charge that the US is the world's biggest hacker.

Everybody assumes that China knew about Prism (one benefit of all that hacking). If they didn't leak it in order to undermine Obama's moral authority and political juice, why didn't they? It all turned out beautifully for China.

The error on Obama's part was to emphasize hacking, rather than IP theft. On the accusation of government hacking to steal trade secrets, the US does have the moral high ground. But on the area of "hacking"? Forget it. The US government probably IS the world's biggest hacker.

UPDATE #1: The "whistleblower" who uncovered all this fled to China, and says he expects to never return.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/09/nsa-whistleblower-edward-snowden-why

(Pic props to _ _ _ Dan Gillmor _ _ _ and Nerdcore: _http://www.crackajack.de/2013/06/08/i-fixed-shepard-faires-obama-poster-to-fit-prism-also-happy-64th-george-orwells-1984/__ )_