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Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

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Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#211

Post by techer »

rtpg wrote: post #196
Bartweiss wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, but I'm talking about a scale even shorter than that. Roe v Wade was a clear and unambiguous advance for abortion rights, and the battle lines are now arrayed somewhere different than they were before Roe. The fight isn't over, but it's fairly clear who holds what. I'm talking about even knowing when you've made progress. If a federal directive came through tomorrow expansively forbidding the NSA from collec…

There have been countless times where courts have told three-letter agencies to stop doing things and they have stoppped . The judiciary has the power to protect us, much more than we give credit for. There's still rule of law, and the executive mostly listens to what the judiciary tells it to do. For all its flaws, some of our institutions work pretty well compared to most places. I cannot think of another country w…

Agencies all the way down

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#212

Post by morninj »

gnarbarian wrote: post #208
gnarbarian wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. This is why the fight to maintain gun rights is a never ending battle as well. Arming yourself with a gun is the best defense against a violent attacker. Legally enshrining that right is important. But even if we didn't have that right, we could still defend ourselves clandestinely via illegal means and home made weapons. Similarly when it comes to security, privacy, and anonymity the best defense is to arm…

If someone made an argument that supports our right to strong encryption and doesn't also apply to gun rights I'd be impressed.

I feel safer when every private citizen I interact with uses strong encryption. I do not feel safer when every private citizen I interact with carries a gun.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#214

Post by mbrock »

StavrosK wrote: post #15
zeveb wrote: post #5

It'd be better, of course, if we didn't rely on Signal not storing all that metadata and instead used a protocol which made it impossible for anyone to be in a position to choose whether or not to store it. Unfortunately, the protocols that enable truly traffic–analysis-resistant messaging (I believe the Pynchon Gate[1] is currently the best-of-breed) tend to have increased latency and consume greatly-increased bandw…

Yeah, but I'm kind of tired of having to fight my own government every step of the way. I'd prefer a political solution at this point.

Maybe the pirates win the upcoming Icelandic election. They give asylum to Snowden and decide to become kind of like the Estonia of online privacy. Maybe they invest public funds in accelerators and scholarships etc. With a political climate like that, Icelandic businesses could make stronger claims about protecting data, making that a point of global competition. And then maybe the US politics could slowly start to change.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#215

Post by gnarbarian »

morninj wrote: post #212
gnarbarian wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If someone made an argument that supports our right to strong encryption and doesn't also apply to gun rights I'd be impressed.

I feel safer when every private citizen I interact with uses strong encryption. I do not feel safer when every private citizen I interact with carries a gun.

I genuinely appreciate your response but it is not an argument.

fallacy [1]

>I feel x

isn't an argument. for example: I feel safer with a gun.

fallacy [2]

> ... when every private citizen I interact with carries a gun.

Having the right to carry a gun or the right to encryption does not imply everyone will/must carry one or use it at all times.

With encryption criminals around you can plan attacks, steal your identity, and trade child pornography without fear of the prying eyes of law enforcement ever being able to discover the evidence. That would probably make a large number of other people 'feel' unsafe as well. feeling a certain way isn't an argument.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_emotion

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#217

Post by mirimir »

fweespeech wrote: post #169
mirimir wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it was illegal to smoke marijuana everywhere in the US for several decades. That didn't stop people from doing it. And now it's becoming legal.

Yes. However, that doesn't change the fact casual users that are largely harmless ended up losing years of their lives and had their ability to earn a good living to support themselves casually destroyed in the process.

True, sadly enough. But my point is that the Drug War didn't stop people from doing what they wanted to do. Unjust laws tend to get ignored.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#218

Post by jacalata »

gnarbarian wrote: post #215
morninj wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel safer when every private citizen I interact with uses strong encryption. I do not feel safer when every private citizen I interact with carries a gun.

I genuinely appreciate your response but it is not an argument. fallacy [1] >I feel x isn't an argument. for example: I feel safer with a gun. fallacy [2] > ... when every private citizen I interact with carries a gun. Having the right to carry a gun or the right to encryption does not imply everyone will/must carry one or use it at all times. With encryption criminals around you can plan attacks, steal your identity…

Of course emotions are an argument. We're not Vulcans. Pretending that emotional impact is an irrelevant factor is a great way to win an argument without ever making anyone care what you said.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#219

Post by dredmorbius »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #35
StavrosK wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but I'm kind of tired of having to fight my own government every step of the way. I'd prefer a political solution at this point.

I trust a well designed protocol over some murky promise not to collect data on me. They collected data when they weren't supposed to before...

The best protections would come from both.

A strong political regime and support for privacy. Strong technical tools for enforcing those political goals.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#220

Post by gnarbarian »

jacalata wrote: post #218
gnarbarian wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I genuinely appreciate your response but it is not an argument. fallacy [1] >I feel x isn't an argument. for example: I feel safer with a gun. fallacy [2] > ... when every private citizen I interact with carries a gun. Having the right to carry a gun or the right to encryption does not imply everyone will/must carry one or use it at all times. With encryption criminals around you can plan attacks, steal your identity…

Of course emotions are an argument. We're not Vulcans. Pretending that emotional impact is an irrelevant factor is a great way to win an argument without ever making anyone care what you said.

Thanks for the reply.

I 'feel' safer with the right to carry a gun. I can feel safer when everyone has a gun. Therefore morninj's argument does in fact also apply to guns.

Anyone can feel a certain way about anything, which is why it is invalid when trying to construct a logically sound objective argument.

A subjective premise can not lead us all to an objective conclusion.

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