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Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

networkworld.com

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Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#51

Post by peterwwillis »

snippyhollow wrote: post #23
peterwwillis wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However, I will suggest that his various missives, rants, and other statements contribute positively to the general fabric of discussion around software freedom and personal privacy. ESR stated in Revolution OS that RMS's 'wholesale attack' on (was it software patents or intellectual property? i don't remember now) was one of the reasons it was hard to convince businesses this wasn't just a hippie pipe dream. The Ope…

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think that a fully free cell phone OS is preventing you from being tracked. Even if free software was bug/backdoors free (I'm not sure about it). How do you connect to the network? Through a SIM-card, with an ID, linked to your cell-phone contract. And whatever goes on the broadband/network of your cell phone contract provider is free to read for him. You don't initiate your phone…

You can be tracked anywhere there's a communications infrastructure. It is required for things like law enforcement as well as being part of the protocols that run the network. Since basically every country on the planet does this, comparing it to a Stalinist order seems retarded, and I don't think it will ever change.

Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#52

Post by tomkarlo »

Having met RMS a few times in my years at MIT, I have no doubt that he is genuine in his views and it's not merely the hyperbole you get some from pundits.

The unfortunate downside of this is that he doesn't generally see the need to find compromise positions that are palatable to those who maybe agree with his thoughts but don't have the exact same value set. I may see his concern about privacy, etc but I also need to be reachable when I'm not at my desk. By being too extreme in his views, he reduces the chance that they'll be taken seriously.

Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#53

Post by peterwwillis »

count wrote: post #21
peterwwillis wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However, I will suggest that his various missives, rants, and other statements contribute positively to the general fabric of discussion around software freedom and personal privacy. ESR stated in Revolution OS that RMS's 'wholesale attack' on (was it software patents or intellectual property? i don't remember now) was one of the reasons it was hard to convince businesses this wasn't just a hippie pipe dream. The Ope…

The OpenMoko does not run all free code, and neither does any other shipping cellular device. The code in the baseband processor is very specifically NOT open on anything. In most cases, neither is the GPS. This is because, iirc, that the FCC requires it to be that way, for spectrum licensing and usage reasons.

Ok, this is a good point. The code encrypting/decrypting the GSM is not open, which means it'll eventually be cracked, and until then we have to just assume nobody else has figured it out. But does this have anything to do with being spied on?

Other than the government decoding your GSM communications (which it can just ask Ma Bell to tap without a warrant and get away with, according to the W.Bush-era abuses) I don't see that particular un-free code helping in tracking or spying on you.

Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#54

Post by m_myers »

jpv wrote: post #44

A little unrelated, but... "gNewSense" is the worst name for a laptop I've heard in a long time.

gNewSense is actually the "GNU/Linux" distribution: http://www.gnewsense.org/

The laptop is the Lemote Yeeloong -- which I'll grant isn't much better to English ears.

Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#55

Post by count »

peterwwillis wrote: post #53
count wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The OpenMoko does not run all free code, and neither does any other shipping cellular device. The code in the baseband processor is very specifically NOT open on anything. In most cases, neither is the GPS. This is because, iirc, that the FCC requires it to be that way, for spectrum licensing and usage reasons.

Ok, this is a good point. The code encrypting/decrypting the GSM is not open, which means it'll eventually be cracked, and until then we have to just assume nobody else has figured it out. But does this have anything to do with being spied on? Other than the government decoding your GSM communications (which it can just ask Ma Bell to tap without a warrant and get away with, according to the W.Bush-era abuses) I don'…

Well, it's not open, and all comms go through it - we have no idea what it actually does?

Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#57

Post by ebiester »

And anyone who is likely to be tracked is going to know this, and will not trust phone communications.

The more you have to hide, the more protections you must take. You cannot rely on technology. In extreme cases, it means eschewing technology entirely, living in caves, and living in Afghanistan and Sudan.

You cannot rely on that which you do not control, including free software.

Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#58

Post by dholowiski »

I lost all respect for RMS when I saw him speak at WordCamp San Francisco 2010 - he spoke, and acted like a total child. I'd point you to the video of it, but he made them shut down the live stream before he started (after he was late, which he blamed on Google Maps).

Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#59

Post by jrockway »

samatman wrote: post #46
drinian wrote: post #28

It's worth noting that the Chinese government is in fact debuting a system to track the movements of every cell phone in Beijing right now: http://beta.sg.news.yahoo.com/beijing-trial-mobile-tracking-... This isn't a prediction, it's reality today.

The Chinese government also runs the Great Firewall using primarily open source technologies. Free software on phones? If anyone can sideload whatever they want onto any platform they want, it's the Chinese. How does this help you, when the cellphone towers are tracking your phone's every movement, and when attempts to evade that tracking are sufficient to get you arrested or worse? The nature of the license for the…

The nature of the license for the software running on a radio has nothing to do with the ability to triangulate that radio, sadly.

But you don't have to disclose the fact that that radio source over there is jrockway's radio.

Freenet-style routing is an idea that comes to mind for solving this problem with software.

Re: Richard Stallman: Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream'

#60

Post by jrockway »

LXicon wrote: post #35
Figs wrote: post #31

Wouldn't you also need "free hardware" to avoid the risk of your device being used against you? If you're not willing to trust the software on your phone, why would you trust that there isn't a tracking device built directly into the chips on the phone?

The article does mention that Stallman uses a "rather slow" Lemote Yeeloong laptop because it's the only laptop with a free BIOS.

I thought it was the CPU microcode, not the BIOS? Because there are open source BIOSes that you can flash to a variety of more powerful machines.
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