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Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

reuters.com

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Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#161

Post by inopinatus »

slg wrote: post #154
dancemethis wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They totally still call you paranoid. Snowden unfortunately meant nothing to the general technology consumer mass. They're more than happy to defend tooth and nail their jails. See Discord or Zoom as prime current examples. It is ridiculous that he had to go through this just for people to shake their shoulders and keep on, except for the few that already were inclined to care.

It is a relatively common belief among non-technical people in my friend group that Facebook listens to everything you say within earshot of your phone and later displays ads to you based on what it hears. That belief still isn't enough to get those people to stop using Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. It isn't that people don't think they are being spied on. It is that people don't really care that they are being…

You suggest this is impossible; but I still remember that time I asked Alexa what colours the Lotus Elise was available in. For the next few weeks, whenever I went out, I'd see at least one Lotus parked on the street or at the mall or driving by.

Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#162

Post by bdamm »

inopinatus wrote: post #161
slg wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a relatively common belief among non-technical people in my friend group that Facebook listens to everything you say within earshot of your phone and later displays ads to you based on what it hears. That belief still isn't enough to get those people to stop using Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. It isn't that people don't think they are being spied on. It is that people don't really care that they are being…

You suggest this is impossible; but I still remember that time I asked Alexa what colours the Lotus Elise was available in. For the next few weeks, whenever I went out, I'd see at least one Lotus parked on the street or at the mall or driving by.

Similar to my experience of surveying vacuum cleaners on Amazon, then going to get lunch at Whole Foods where a clerk appeared suddenly at the checkout I was at to vacuum up a non-existent mess, with one of the models Amazon had offered up. The ratio of profit to sales cost on a high-end vacuum might be similar to a Lotus Elise. Or maybe it's just confirmation bias.

Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#163

Post by bdamm »

nostoc wrote: post #84
peteretep wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's possibly the most sophisticated hacking campaign when social and technical aspects combined. It’s the most sophisticated one _we know of_

And it's 10 year old now...

Frankly I expect basically all computers are compromised at this point.

Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#164

Post by jlokier »

wolco2 wrote: post #158
Thinkx220 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's comments like this that convince me most programmers are arogant douchebags. Just because someone has a weird idea about an event that had almost no direct affect on the general population doesn't mean we should remove those peoples ability to have a choice in matters which will effect them. Knowing more than someone else does not make you morally superior or give you more of a right to have a say in your own fa…

If that were the case we would give babies, kids and teenagers the right to vote. Kids would always vote in a superhero or ice cream. And chocolate would win in a landslide. We only allow those of a certain age to vote because they are able to understand and weigh the issues fairly. We only allow those of a certain age to be juriors for that reason.

> We only allow those of a certain age to vote because they are able to understand and weigh the issues fairly.

Yes, but we draw a simple, arbitrary rule at a fixed age because everyone grows older, so it isn't manipulable by anyone who is motivated to do so.

If the vote permission line is drawn by more complex means that gives a different answer for different people, it becomes a primary target for manipulation, abuse, and group selectivity.

For example if it was based on IQ tests or even general knowledge tests, it is already well understood that these are heavily biased tests which test for social background, culture and upbringing, rather than general intelligence.

If there's going to be a voter test, it needs to be extremely robust, something just about everyone has confidence in to be fair and appropriate.

Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#165

Post by inopinatus »

bdamm wrote: post #162
inopinatus wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You suggest this is impossible; but I still remember that time I asked Alexa what colours the Lotus Elise was available in. For the next few weeks, whenever I went out, I'd see at least one Lotus parked on the street or at the mall or driving by.

Similar to my experience of surveying vacuum cleaners on Amazon, then going to get lunch at Whole Foods where a clerk appeared suddenly at the checkout I was at to vacuum up a non-existent mess, with one of the models Amazon had offered up. The ratio of profit to sales cost on a high-end vacuum might be similar to a Lotus Elise. Or maybe it's just confirmation bias.

If this phenomenon isn't already a PKD short then it could be a SCP entry.

Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#166

Post by ChrisKnott »

LinuxBender wrote: post #114
lern_too_spel wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't listen to your phone calls either. If they did, Snowden would have leaked it, and it would have been a bombshell revelation. If you have information otherwise, you should blow the whistle.

There is no whistle to blow. It is fairly well known that all international calls into or out of each country are monitored by bots using speech recognition by the related agency for each repsective country. This has been the case for a very long time. Before bots, there were listening stations with thousands of people monitoring calls. There would be nothing for Snowden to leak in that regard. The only place this ha…

I am almost certain this has never been reported, I am also almost certain it is not the case. Can you provide a link?

Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#167

Post by x87678r »

I always assumed there would be insecurities in everything you buy and if there weren't backdoors it was normal for spooks in various nations to be able to crack it sooner or later. Using cloud services makes this even more likely. Does anyone really think they are 100% safe?

Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#169

Post by eyepea2007 »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #73
abvdasker wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look, my estimation of "general technology consumer mass" is incredibly low, but I promise you nearly every American adult knows who Edward Snowden is and probably has at least a vague idea of what he was trying to communicate. I agree that many — maybe even most — people don't understand the issue very well, but I think it did have a pretty large impact at the time and since.

>but I promise you nearly every American adult knows who Edward Snowden is and probably has at least a vague idea of what he was trying to communicate. I highly doubt this. In 2015, only 60% of Americans had some idea of who Snowden was, and only half of those had a positive opinion of him. I doubt this has improved over the past five years either. https://www.aclu.org/snowden-poll-results

Piggybacking on your point about the general public: historically something like 25 to 30 percent of people don't even know who the Vice President of the United States is...and this goes back to at least the 70s. Simply asking someone if they know who Snowden is doesn't really prove much. What percentage of people will just lie and say they know?

Re: Spy agency ducks questions about 'back doors' in tech products

#170

Post by jacobwilliamroy »

dancemethis wrote: post #30
pulse7 wrote: post #5

"The tactics drew widespread attention starting in 2013, when Snowden leaked documents referencing these practices." So this is what Snowden has done: he "drew widespread attention to these tactics". Before Snowden they would call you "paranoid" if you would allow yourself to mention it. Today they can not call you paranoid anymore. And yes, it has hurt US industry reputation. Many don't trust Intel processors and Ci…

They totally still call you paranoid. Snowden unfortunately meant nothing to the general technology consumer mass. They're more than happy to defend tooth and nail their jails. See Discord or Zoom as prime current examples. It is ridiculous that he had to go through this just for people to shake their shoulders and keep on, except for the few that already were inclined to care.

Nowadays the right wing nutbars are actually pro-government because they think that a large fascist government complete with secret police and massive surveillance will protect them from pedophile vampires. No I'm not joking. It's the same alex jones types who used to be all about neoliberalism and deregulation. The people who were afraid of "the chip" are now begging to be tagged because they think it will save them from human trafficking. That's what happens when Americans are trapped at home with nothing to do but go on facebook and youtube: they get indoctrinated into stupid christian deathcults.
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