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Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

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Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#51

Post by oAlbe »

vorce wrote: post #39

I changed some stuff, but it was when the reports came, not because of the movie. My changes: - Don't use gmail for private email. Self hosted it instead. - Switched to Firefox (from Chrome), changed my addons (https everywhere, privacy badger and mublock). - Deleted my facebook account. - Tried to get my friends to use a self-hosted irc server + mumble instead of skype - but that didn't last for long sadly. - Change…

I would add:

- Use TresorIt/SpiderOak/OwnCloud instead of Dropbox/Google Drive/One Drive.

- Use Tox in place of Skype (definitely hard, nobody is willing to switch away from the comfort of Skype).

- Consider using also Disconnect addon for Firefox.

Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#52

Post by icantthinkofone »

higherpurpose wrote: post #27
icantthinkofone wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His point is the last half. He's not a "person of interest" in these surveillance activities so it doesn't concern him; and it shouldn't.

That was exactly my point, too. You shouldn't care about other people's rights just because it affects you. Then you are those people anyway. You should care when it doesn't affect you too. For instance, you should care that the police is very brutal to black people, even if you are not black and the police acts much better around white people. Also, he's wrong. It does affect him. All data is analyzed . That include…

Straw man arguments all the way around with plenty of assumptions. You presume the government's intention is to monitor him and watch his every move to work against him. The fact is, the government may scan something about him looking for bad guys and, once it finds he is not one of them, quickly moves on.

Just as your badge may be checked when you enter work, or you have to walk through a metal detector, these scans are not looking for the every day man. You can thank terrorists for this and quit blaming the government for looking for them. You can thank the government for looking for them and curse the terrorists.

OT - "you should care that the police is very brutal to black people"

I have to say that this is a blatant lie brought on by the media and the internet scream. While you can find something bad about something at any time, to generalize based on the occasional incident is wrong.

Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#53

Post by Fizzadar »

vorce wrote: post #39

I changed some stuff, but it was when the reports came, not because of the movie. My changes: - Don't use gmail for private email. Self hosted it instead. - Switched to Firefox (from Chrome), changed my addons (https everywhere, privacy badger and mublock). - Deleted my facebook account. - Tried to get my friends to use a self-hosted irc server + mumble instead of skype - but that didn't last for long sadly. - Change…

>> Sigh. I don't think any of this matters much anyway.

This is exactly how I feel. I've reached the point where I assume the majority of my online communication is "public" - and use alternatives only when necessary to achieve (as close as possible) to true privacy.

Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#54

Post by nitai »

This is something I thought about it for a long time, too. I've been following this for years and was always suspicious about all the "free" services and what their motivation is behind it all.

Here is a list of apps/extensions I use:

- Firefox with disconnect.me, HTTPS everywhere, Adblock.

- Never EVER use Google for search. Always use DuckDuckGo.

- Deleted my Facebook account. - Never ever use Skype (I refuse anyone who wants to use skype) There are other alternatives.

- Whenever possible I use a VPN (mine it privateinternetaccess)

- Never use any storage services like Dropbox, OneDrive, GDrive, etc.

Now that being said, I struggle with some "habits" and alternatives. These are:

- Google Apps, especially email. There is a reason why it works and so many people use it. I've tried Thunderbird, Apple Mail, Airmail, Outlook, etc. But somehow always go back to gmail :-(

On another note, I wonder what people use for an operating system?!?

I myself use MacOS X. I run many servers, all of them are Ubuntu Servers. I love Linux. However for a desktop app, I need to be productive and fast. Every time I want to switch to Linux I find some app that is not working and I need to use a VM for that.

Is it even worth considering a switch of operating systems? Too paranoid?

Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#55

Post by drakenot »

SCHiM wrote: post #42

I've always browsed in a sandbox only, since the revelations however I also bought a couple of vps and now tunnel my traffic through one of the servers. This is a very cheap measure, 15$ a month, that probably increases your privacy but also attracts more attention to yourself. A more inconspicuous solution is probably a public vpn service, but those servers are not under your control and you won't be able to make su…

What do you use to browse in a sandbox?

Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#56

Post by geographomics »

higherpurpose wrote: post #27
icantthinkofone wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His point is the last half. He's not a "person of interest" in these surveillance activities so it doesn't concern him; and it shouldn't.

That was exactly my point, too. You shouldn't care about other people's rights just because it affects you. Then you are those people anyway. You should care when it doesn't affect you too. For instance, you should care that the police is very brutal to black people, even if you are not black and the police acts much better around white people. Also, he's wrong. It does affect him. All data is analyzed . That include…

> In my opinion he's wrong that he'll never be critical of his government. Obama won't rule forever, even if he does like him, and I assume he'll witness at least a few other governments during the rest of his life. Chances are he will become critical of his government, especially if things turn much worse (as the trend is right now). What if the government intends to cut his social benefits? What if the government introduces mandatory army enlisting? And so on and so on. Nobody can stay "non-critical" of the government for too long.

But I am openly critical of my government (the UK), both online and offline. I just don't feel there's any significant risk in this, or anything else in my online activities. And that is the reason why I haven't changed any of my online habits.

Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#57

Post by geographomics »

Tekhne wrote: post #45
geographomics wrote: post #9

No, there's nothing I can do about it, and I'm highly unlikely to be a person of interest under the mass surveillance programme, so why bother?

"First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me." —Martin Niemöller

But this is not about speaking out, this is about if it's worth bothering to take evasive measures to avoid automated surveillance.

Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#58

Post by searanger »

No I have not changed a thing. I've always assumed that they were watching everything. Why else would cell phone providers suddenly not charge for services like gps? Or the fact that Microsoft lost its monopoly case against Netscape. How is providing something free a monopoly case? It doesn't exist to protect businesses.

Re: Ask HN: Since CitizenFour, have you changed the way you conduct yourself online?

#59

Post by geographomics »

webjames wrote: post #14
geographomics wrote: post #9

No, there's nothing I can do about it, and I'm highly unlikely to be a person of interest under the mass surveillance programme, so why bother?

Glen Greenwald gave a TED talk about a similar point of view. http://www.ted.com/talks/glenn_greenwald_why_privacy_matters...

Glenn makes a compelling case, and I agree with him on most points, but this false equivalency highlights the difference between the claimed and actual risks of automated surveillance, to most people:

> because I want to be able to just troll through what it is you're doing online, read what I want to read and publish whatever I find interesting

One thing the mass surveillance programme does not do is publish 'interesting' personal data that passes through it. The risk of one's private communications reaching a wider audience than, rarely, the occasional analyst (who is bound by secrecy laws) is close to zero.

The vast majority of people are more at risk of having their laptops stolen, accounts hacked/phished, online presence stalked, and so on by other members of the public rather than the security services. It's much more important to protect against that, than be disproportionately concerned about an invisible omnipresence to which their everyday activities are a trifling insignificance.

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