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The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

theintercept.com

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Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#191

Post by foobar2021 »

icelancer wrote: post #111
mywittyname wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can't rely on SCOTUS to make this ruling for another 50+ years, so our best hope is to start with state legislators. The majority of law enforcement happens at a state level, and most state legislators aren't as hamstrung as the federal one is, so this is the easiest way to achieve the most impactful results. Also, POTUS is in charge of most federal law enforcement agencies. So it might be possible to handle this…

>> We can't rely on SCOTUS to make this ruling for another 50+ years If that's a comment about the bureaucracy working slowly as hell, that is reasonable. If it's about the makeup of the court, I disagree. Kavanaugh and especially Gorsuch are two you want on the court in this case.

Judiciary doesn’t make laws. Every controversial ruling that people worry the SCOTUS could be permanently solved by passing a law or amending the constitution. But if that happens then lawmakers no longer have the talking point to use when running for re-election every 2/6 years so both parties they a shared incentive to keep the status quo.

If you don’t put it into law/constitution then a new set of justices could reverse the ruling in the future.

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#192

Post by ukd1 »

nostromo wrote: post #179
JasonFruit wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a Supreme Court ruling: if there's no law outlawing it, there's no basis for them to rule against it. Do you really want five unelected, unaccountable lawyers deciding this matter?

Here you go: "Amendment IV: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

But, nothing is being searched or seized here; it seems like people gave up their personal data, ignored or didn't read a ToS, and companies are selling it - not being forced to give it up. I don't like it, but does it mean it's illegal?

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#193

Post by mc32 »

salawat wrote: post #121
mc32 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure but previous to credit scores what was the option? References from friends and business acquaintances? Sure credit scores aren’t perfect but they are better than the legacy alternative.

...Excuse me? Is there a way that could be better rephrased? What was the option for what? You're replying to a post about discriminating against a divorcee, but having the landlord hide it behind the justification of "bad credit". Not to be the missing antecedent police, but are you referring to by 'ther option' the pre-existing excuse to paper over arbitrary discrimination, or to practice of lending/renting in gene…

I hear ya. A landlady could very well find out someone is an Antivaxxer who lost their good job and took a lesser job and now has degraded credit and may deny the lease or may want bigger advance.

What do you suppose is a better tool you have or would build which hides this person’s history but can vouch for their creditworthiness or lack of it?

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#194

Post by dragonwriter »

nostromo wrote: post #179
JasonFruit wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a Supreme Court ruling: if there's no law outlawing it, there's no basis for them to rule against it. Do you really want five unelected, unaccountable lawyers deciding this matter?

Here you go: "Amendment IV: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Amendment IV doesn't actually expressly include a warrant requirement for anything.

It requires searches and seizures to be reasonable.

It also creates requirements for the basis of any warrants that are issued.

It is a series of Supreme Court rulings that infers a general warrant requirement with some exceptions from that text.

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#195

Post by mmcdermott »

Cederfjard wrote: post #156
mmcdermott wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feels like it would be more airtight to amend the Constitution. Why hope that precedence falls a certain way instead of removing any ambiguity from the law?

The last amendment to the US constitution that was proposed and then ratified came in 1971. With bipartisanship being what it is today, do you think there’s any chance of pushing another one through at this point in time? The bar is high, and American politicians are loathe to give any opponents perceived wins, even if it’s regarding overwhelmingly popular policies. Sure, you’re probably right that it’d be more airti…

I suspect the bigger issue is public indifference. Only a small percentage of voters anywhere on the political spectrum vote on privacy as an issue.

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#196

Post by FpUser »

edgyquant wrote: post #126
FpUser wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"It really feels like there are a lot of people with strong Chinese interests mudding the waters of debate by equating the US with China." What you say feels to me as Joseph McCarthy has just sprung back to life.

I feel like equating someone asking why pro-Chinese sentiment seems to be taking place with McCarthyism is dishonest and a quick way to shut down a legitimate question.

May I ask what is "dishonest" about what I wrote? It is my opinion and I am entitled to it (yet). And how did it "shut down a legitimate question"?

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#197

Post by dragonsky »

whimsicalism wrote: post #28
nostromo wrote: post #8

We need a Supreme Court ruling or law that says if the government doesn’t have a warrant to collect your data, they also can’t buy it from third parties. We also need privacy protections so these companies wouldn’t exist in the first place.

I absolutely think that the government should be able to purchase data in order to conduct investigations. Unlike private actors, governmental actors are publicly constrained in their actions and representatives of the will of our society.

My major concern with this is the accuracy of the information. I regularly put in dodgy data on registration forms where there is no financial contract. This puts me at risk of being held to that information. Because it's on the computer, it must be right.

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#198

Post by manquer »

kingkawn wrote: post #159
Cederfjard wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The last amendment to the US constitution that was proposed and then ratified came in 1971. With bipartisanship being what it is today, do you think there’s any chance of pushing another one through at this point in time? The bar is high, and American politicians are loathe to give any opponents perceived wins, even if it’s regarding overwhelmingly popular policies. Sure, you’re probably right that it’d be more airti…

Between 1971-72 there were 2,500 politically motivated domestic bombings in the US. Partisanship now, as bad as it is, doesn’t come close to that level of violence.

That maybe more because getting away with bombing was easier then than now?.

While there was issues that got escalated in the past - there was literally civil war over one, the data shows that amount of legislation passed has slowed down considerably recently.

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#199

Post by LogonType10 »

Zak wrote: post #178
smallerfish wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No doubt. But, say that the NSA were given the purvue over enforcing sanctions (because they are the national security agency). Should they be able to monitor who is visiting the country with the sanctions? Sanctions are kind of like the tax agency situation - if you're going to wield them as a national security tool, then you want to be able to enforce them, otherwise they're relatively meaningless. And enforcing th…

I don't want the NSA to perform domestic civilian law enforcement functions any more than I want the army to, for similar reasons. The type of oversight applied to military and foreign intelligence action is fundamentally political. Whether and how to impose sanctions against, spy on, or invade another country are questions for congress and the president in the US and rarely involve the courts. The type of oversight…

What about when Russian hackers shut down American hospitals and can't be extradited? Who's going to hack back and enforce the law? The FBI can't do it.

Re: The U.S. Treasury is buying private app data to target and investigate people

#200

Post by nybble41 »

gred wrote: post #101
VRay wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Private companies (theoretically/ideally) don't have the power of life and death over you

More broadly, a monopoly on violence.

Slightly less broadly, a monopoly on "legitimate" violence not limited to self-defense or a proportional, reciprocal response to prior violence.

If the state actually managed to monopolize all violence that would be much better than what we have in practice, with plenty of non-state violence in addition to that instigated by the state, though calling any aggressive use of violence "legitimate" would remain a travesty.

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