Theory is of course relevant when the implementation of it, and the environment that it&#x27;s implemented in, is what is poisoned.<p>It&#x27;s easy for us to sit at our desks and churn out our work and be mad. And there&#x27;s things to be mad about for sure. The wanton disregard for civil liberty and protection is simply irredeemable. And to be sure, I&#x27;ve been a fan of your country&#x27;s very public responses over the last few years to personal privacy. I hope the US legislature can learn a thing or two.<p>But It&#x27;s not the &quot;five eyes&quot;. It&#x27;s the entire world. Any country with an interest in protecting their sovereignty also has some form of information gathering operation.<p>When that operation gets big and exposes itself, folks get upset because, yeah, being spied on isn&#x27;t a comfortable thing. Do some countries go about gathering this information more morally than others? Something tells me we&#x27;d have to be in the secret inner sanctums of the biggest opponents to really know, and I think the answer would be &quot;a spade is a spade.&quot;<p>Does it help our countries protect themselves? I honestly don&#x27;t know.<p>But I do know that &quot;grey hatting&quot; in the general development community doesn&#x27;t garner this sort of bile and venom. I don&#x27;t know why being a grey hat for a government should be treated differently.