291–300 of 349 posts
This reminds me of a random, but chilling, scene in "Minority Report". The protagonist confronts a man he thinks is responsible for killing his child. The man decides to reassure the protagonist by explaining how kind he was to the child, and made sure the child didn't suffer when he killed him. He's presenting it as though this is a legitimate defense for such an obvious violation. The part that sticks with me is th…
> such a viscerally gross violation How did you reach this conclusion? Because your entire response hinges on this being true. I highly doubt it is a "violation" in the first place, and certainly not a "gross violation", the courts decided that it was not, as you call it "an amoral and illegal way for him to use people without their consent" (well, maybe amoral, as courts have nothing to say about that).
For the 'legal' part... you're generally not allowed to install whatever arbitrary software you want on other people's machines without some sort of consent, even in an Apple store. I'm not sure how much more elaboration this needs.
For the 'moral' part... he's taking a small intimate chunk of a person's life without their knowledge or consent and putting it in a picture frame because he finds it interesting and enjoyable. The reason he gives for this is "art". There's not even slight consideration of the people involved other than he considers that intimate chunk of their life and likeness to be his personal medium for "art", the same way clay or watercolors might be to a less terrifying person. Again, there are far worse ways he could create 'art' via nonconsensual intimacy, but my point is that it's fundamentally amoral to use people in that way in the first place.
What's interesting about this is that in this community we read about security researchers that do illegal (but generally not unethical) things, and about large companies that do unethical (but arguably not illegal) things. This guy does the worst of both and somehow people seem to be on his side.
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A picture is a very dangerous thing in the wrong hands. A normal picture of a person could still expose something important about them to the wrong party. Eg, "I visit the unsavory part of town", "I'm not really washing my hair", "I'm slacking off", etc. Those are mostly "real-world" concerns. There's the paranoia angle: some stranger wants your picture specifically. What could they have in mind? If you look at least…
Heh, Google's concern is far more visceral. Most people get an android phone and leave the defaults on, meaning that not only is all their textual data, like search and location kept by Google, forever . Things like their photos are uploaded from their phone to their account.
Big companies' data collection is on the whole quite subtle, and they like it that way. Google will suck up tons of data, digest it, and use it to throw ads at you. But it doesn't really occur to anybody that Google might be interested in looking for people picking their nose in front of their phone's camera, and making a compilation of that to present as "art". If anything of the sort happened, Google would make sure to make an example of whatever rogue employee did that. They like their data collection to be obscure and harmless looking. That's not to say that it is harmless, but finding problems with what Google is doing takes at least a bit of intellectual thought.
Meanwhile, an artist secretly recording people is almost certain to have some sort of quirky agenda that's going to immediately turn a large amount of people off, even if it's ultimately silly and non-consequential.
>>> "What is your day job, Kyle?" "This is my day job. I'm a media artist, I just write a lot of code. I spend most of my time making open source tools with other people." "But how do you make money?" "I get commissions, grants, and live off artist fees from exhibiting work. I fly to conferences and festivals and do workshops and presentations. Sometimes I'll do residencies." This agent and I are both having a ‘Deuce…
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The author was caught installing a remote administration tool on someone else’s computers and using that RAT to take surreptitious photos of the computers’ users which he then posted online for personal gain. Seems to me that the legal system was working as designed here, protecting the public from this individual’s actions. It’s strange that he’s getting a free pass in the HN comments for hijacking computers, steali…
except - his software didn't have any remote administrative capabilities. - all photographers take pictures in public and then post them for profit, there is nothing new about that whatsoever. - There were no disclaimers on the computers in Apple's store that would prevent him from installing such software. Matter of fact, they are available for people to use and test in any way they see fit. He's getting a free pass…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The author was caught installing a remote administration tool on someone else’s computers and using that RAT to take surreptitious photos of the computers’ users which he then posted online for personal gain. Seems to me that the legal system was working as designed here, protecting the public from this individual’s actions. It’s strange that he’s getting a free pass in the HN comments for hijacking computers, steali…
except - his software didn't have any remote administrative capabilities. - all photographers take pictures in public and then post them for profit, there is nothing new about that whatsoever. - There were no disclaimers on the computers in Apple's store that would prevent him from installing such software. Matter of fact, they are available for people to use and test in any way they see fit. He's getting a free pass…
The most curious thing about this project is how people seem to have a visceral reaction to having photos of them made without their permission; but having their activity tracked online hardly evokes the same reaction. It's weird. What harm is a random picture of my face in public going to do? But still some people worry so much about that. Whereas only very few people show the same reaction to the fact that Google s…
A picture is a very dangerous thing in the wrong hands. A normal picture of a person could still expose something important about them to the wrong party. Eg, "I visit the unsavory part of town", "I'm not really washing my hair", "I'm slacking off", etc. Those are mostly "real-world" concerns. There's the paranoia angle: some stranger wants your picture specifically. What could they have in mind? If you look at least…
Can you explain this one?
This reminds me of a random, but chilling, scene in "Minority Report". The protagonist confronts a man he thinks is responsible for killing his child. The man decides to reassure the protagonist by explaining how kind he was to the child, and made sure the child didn't suffer when he killed him. He's presenting it as though this is a legitimate defense for such an obvious violation. The part that sticks with me is th…
> such a viscerally gross violation How did you reach this conclusion? Because your entire response hinges on this being true. I highly doubt it is a "violation" in the first place, and certainly not a "gross violation", the courts decided that it was not, as you call it "an amoral and illegal way for him to use people without their consent" (well, maybe amoral, as courts have nothing to say about that).
"I was still under the false belief that all varieties of law enforcement are designed to protect the public from harm. It was a sign of my privilege, and of my naive faith in the system." > Systems are designed first, to benefit their creators, and subsequently their controllers, and then everyone else. Unless you designed the system, you should assume it's not designed to benefit you by default.
The author was caught installing a remote administration tool on someone else’s computers and using that RAT to take surreptitious photos of the computers’ users which he then posted online for personal gain. Seems to me that the legal system was working as designed here, protecting the public from this individual’s actions. It’s strange that he’s getting a free pass in the HN comments for hijacking computers, steali…
The legal system was deployed to protect Apple, not the public. That the public benefited was just a coincidence.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
except - his software didn't have any remote administrative capabilities. - all photographers take pictures in public and then post them for profit, there is nothing new about that whatsoever. - There were no disclaimers on the computers in Apple's store that would prevent him from installing such software. Matter of fact, they are available for people to use and test in any way they see fit. He's getting a free pass…
If what you’re saying is true (which I highly doubt, given that he was tampering with computer equipment that didn’t belong to him), then the laws need to change so that we can prosecute people like this. I absolutely do not want to live in a society where people can install malware on computers in public spaces to spy on me. I don’t care if it’s for advertising or some self-serving “art” project.
I'm sorry that photography offends you. Wait till you see what those new fanged house door bells are doing!