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Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

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Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#91

Post by anonym29 »

madmads wrote: post #84
anonym29 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have an extremely generous and optimistic view of the cognitive capital of the average person.

That's probably the most self-aggrandizing interpretation. Could it be that other people have other priorities or interests rather than spending their time figuring out how to obtain digital privacy without compromising in the areas they care about? No surely it's their low "cognitive capital" /s

You are very fortunate to never had the displeasure of having to interact with profoundly stupid people. Not ignorant, not uneducated, but genuinely stupid and slow people.

E.g., People for whom significant, immediate, unexpected mechanical feedback in operating something simple, like window blinds, wouldn't cause them to consider whether they might be doing something wrong, and instead continue operariting the blinds in the wrong direction until they snap and break, genuinely being unaware that they were doing it wrong.

People who are genuinely lacking the common sense you'd expect a human to have, not even with any cognitive disability or learning disorder of any kind - just genuinely stupid but otherwise ordinary people.

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#92

Post by schnubbidubb »

crazygringo wrote: post #27

I can sympathize with the general notion that more encryption is better, even if I wouldn't go to the extreme of declaring it a duty . But the author just completely lost me at: > We should all use PGP, SSL or equivalent tools; VPNs, Tor and/or SSH tunnelling; IPFS, or other distributed file systems — and ditch proprietary OS's in favour of Linux or truly free Android distros... Those tools and techniques should ceas…

"Those tools and techniques should cease to be arcane nice-to-haves for nerds: we must get more non-technical people onboard" is key here, I would say.

If those tools cease to require arcance incantations and work seamlessly like every other thing everyone else is already using, then I don't think it's unrealistic at all.

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#93

Post by avodonosov »

If you suddenly die, would you want your family or heirs to access your data (photos, writings, communicatinos, projects, documents, whatever)?

If yes, how to achieve that without compromising the security of encryption of all your data?

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#94

Post by lazide »

rdm_blackhole wrote: post #89
lazide wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people look at things like the Stasi and think - the problem with it was who was in charge, not that it existed. We’re the good guys so it would be a good thing. Not a bad thing. The problem is, they’re almost always the absolute worst to deal with, as almost any evil is excusable when done ‘for the right reasons’ or when ‘we’re the good guys’, where selfish evil at least sometimes takes a break or feels bad. An…

> Many people look at things like the Stasi and think - the problem with it was who was in charge, not that it existed. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. It seems to me that most of the Eastern European states would be against this law but as it stands, they most certainly welcome it. > How a group does is more about what it does with it, and how it directs it/reins it in (and acknowledge…

The tricky part is, everyone tends to forget the inconvenient things. Or just not research them. Even if it’s staring them in the face.

And denying that we could be bad (or have bad tendencies) that need to be resisted makes it more likely that we would, ultimately, be really bad.

But acknowledging we can be bad ‘hurts’. People want to feel good, and right, and justified. The more pain they are in, the more true it is. People don’t like pain. When it gets really bad, they look for scapegoats and seek comfort in delusion, anger, etc.

There is a balancing act in here somewhere. Frankly though, looking at history as best as I can - the wheel exists, and the analogy of the wheel is so apt because it does keep going in cycles. Pretending that knowing history will somehow insulate us from repeating it is a delusion.

It will all happen again.

The best we can hope for, is that we can make it less painful or evil when it does.

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#95

Post by judge2020 »

nine_k wrote: post #3

In short: since the EU is trying to introduce legislation to monitor private communication, the author states that it's a moral duty of everyone to start encrypting their communications (instant messaging in particular), as a form of civil disobedience. It works when many (preferably most) people disobey.

Unfortunately this doesn't work because a _lot_ of will people legitimately will tell you they "have nothing to hide" and would tell you they'd let 3-letter agencies in the U.S. go through their phone with a fine-tooth comb (at least, until they're actually being faced with that reality and try to get out of it).

The only reason we currently have any message encryption is because a few tech companies have made the decision to protect as many as possible by releasing products which enable it (iOS, Whatsapp, and now texts via Google Messages). Not everyone who uses these products knows they're protected and not everyone will care if they were to turn off E2EE tomorrow.

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#96

Post by rdm_blackhole »

SenAnder wrote: post #68
rdm_blackhole wrote: post #30

I am baffled how we went from a liberal "free" democracy to this ersatz of a totalitarian regime where all our conversations/messages/photos need to be dissected, catalogued and approved by un-elected bureaucrats. I mean you can literally go to eastern Europe to see the vestiges of the Stasi where they used to listen to the conversations of their citizens while trying to find dissidents among them. This isn't some ki…

> How come we end up here again? Through failure of instinct. Seeing government agents open your letters, copy their contents, then re-seal them to send them on their way, or tap your phone and listen attentively with headphones, provokes an immediate, instinctive, visceral reaction. There's no need to construct elaborate scenarios how an ordinary law-abiding citizen could fall afoul of his government to make them se…

The problem is that the new law would certainly have people involved in it to double check the false positives which could amount to millions of photos and messages being shared each year with LEOs.

Not to mention that they would use all this data to train the next generation of algorithms.

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#97

Post by dylan604 »

qsort wrote: post #32
nonrandomstring wrote: post #5

> you would be morally obliged to disobey In days of yore my CS law module was taught by a QC - that's a high ranking barrister in the UK - who explained the world of difference between the "The Rule of Law" and "the law" in a class called "jurisprudence". Rule of Law (capitalised conceptual) is there as permanent ground truth in contrast to the ephemeral du-jure laws. At times I still struggle with that profound cou…

> if one deeply, passionately believes in the necessity of The Law and all of society's institutions, one must with equal passion break laws "-- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likel…

[dead]

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#98

Post by gizmo »

I don't want to be overly inflammatory but the core issue here is that Europe very badly wants to be a technocratic police state.

Free speech is a joke in Europe (despite loud denials from Europeans who insist free speech exists in Europe and the restrictions are /necessary/ in the war against misinformation).

The right to protest is slowly getting strangled. How are Europeans OK with protests requiring /permission/ from the police?

Government transparency? Zero to none. You'll get stonewalled or ignored when you ask for information. Don't be so difficult. Just believe the government has the /best intentions/.

Surveillance cameras on every street corner. No store accepts cash money anymore. Your car and phone track and store your every move.

This crackdown on encryption is just another domino about to fall.

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#99

Post by madmads »

anonym29 wrote: post #91
madmads wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's probably the most self-aggrandizing interpretation. Could it be that other people have other priorities or interests rather than spending their time figuring out how to obtain digital privacy without compromising in the areas they care about? No surely it's their low "cognitive capital" /s

You are very fortunate to never had the displeasure of having to interact with profoundly stupid people. Not ignorant, not uneducated, but genuinely stupid and slow people. E.g., People for whom significant, immediate, unexpected mechanical feedback in operating something simple, like window blinds, wouldn't cause them to consider whether they might be doing something wrong, and instead continue operariting the blind…

What are you talking about? How does this relate to anything in the discussion? Besides, you were denigrating the intelligence of the average person, as though that's the reason they don't acquire all the skills necessary to have digital privacy.

Ironically, that's a stupid assumption to have. You might be in your own bubble, but I know many very intelligent people who do not have the time or interest in gaining digital privacy. It's not as easy or without compromise as you seem to think.

Re: Encrypting private data and private communications is now an ethical duty

#100

Post by lazide »

danbruc wrote: post #88
lazide wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. And underlying ‘might makes right’ is another even more basic one, ‘they who survive and reproduce wins’. Everything else gets layered on top, with more and more sophistication. Ethics and morals are attempts to encode various ideas of long term successful strategies for that longer term goal, to help counteract many of the shorter term incentives. But, like most ‘shoulds’, they are often just wishes by those di…

The most basic law is the only law that can not be broken, the laws of physics. That is what might makes right is backed by, surviving and reproducing is what you get as the result of being able to inflict more violence on the other side than they can on you.

Eh, might makes right is in one scenario. Poisoning, betrayal, manipulation, propaganda, co-opting often work too. As many ‘strong men’ have learned to their detriment.

Underlying it, those who survive will justify however they want, they’ll be the ones writing the history books.

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