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FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

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Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#241

Post by deegles »

layer8 wrote: post #178
srndsnd wrote: post #31

To me, what's missing from that set of recommendations is some method to increase the liability of companies who mishandle user data. It is insane to me that I can be notified via physical mail of months old data breaches, some of which contained my Social Security number, and that my only recourse is to set credit freezes from multiple credit bureaus.

I’m completely sympathetic to making companies more liable for data security. However, until data breaches regularly lead to severe outcomes for subjects whose personal data was leaked, and those outcomes can be causally linked to the breaches in an indisputable manner, it seems unlikely for such legislation to be passed.

Nearly everyone's data has been leaked already. Any strong protections would only protect people who haven't been born yet imo.

Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#242

Post by darby_nine »

This is truly interesting from a dialectical perspective. The current narrative is that data is simultaneously infinitely valuable and presents zero liability. This contradiction can't hold forever (though it can hold longer than any of us are alive, of course)

I suspect it will break in the direction of the narrative that "data wasn't that valuable anyway", regardless of how disingenuous this sentiment is. Nothing else preserves the economic machine while simultaneously dismissing the concerns of consumers. Perhaps we'll get special protection for stuff like SSNs to make it seem like politicians are acting on the behalf of their constituents (even though a competent manager of a rational society would simply ban use of ssn as a form of identification as this is basically public information.

Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#243

Post by kragen »

treypitt wrote: post #232
kragen wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yes, privacy is not an individual problem; it's a civil defense problem, and not just when your opponent is a nation-state. we already saw this in 02015 during the daesh capture of mosul; here's the entry from my bookmarks file: https://www.facebook.com/dwight.crow/media_set?set=a.1010475... “#Weaponry and morale determine outcomes. The 2nd largest city of Iraq (Mosul) fell when 1k ISIS fighters attacked “60k” Iraqi…

Are you saying you think more critical government databases than OPM or security clearance rosters are inevitably going to be breached? I'd like to think the government or corporation can effectively protect some databases at least...

those are already pretty bad, but i think the really dangerous ones are things like verizon's billing records and customer location history, credit card transaction histories, license plate registrations, credit bureau histories, passport biometrics, enough voice recordings from each person for a deepfake, public twitter postings, etc.

consider https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1943_bombing_of_the_Amsterdam_...:

> The 1943 bombing of the Amsterdam civil registry office was an attempt by members of the Dutch resistance to destroy the Amsterdam civil registry (bevolkingsregister), in order to prevent the German occupiers from identifying Jews and others marked for persecution, arrest or forced labour. The March 1943 assault was only partially successful, and led to the execution of 12 participants. Nevertheless, the action likely saved many Jews from arrest and deportation to Nazi extermination camps.

to avoid partisan debate, imagine a neo-nazi group takes over the us, which presumably we can all agree would be very bad. after they took over, how hard would it be for them to find all the jews? not just make a list of them, but physically find them? (much easier than it was in 01943, i'm sure we can agree.) how hard would it be for them to find all the outspoken anti-fascists? where could those anti-fascists hide?

now, step it up a notch. how hard would it be for them to find all the jews before they take over? it wouldn't be that hard if the databases leak. and if you feel safe because you're not jewish, rest assured that neo-nazis aren't the only groups who are willing to use violence for political ends. someone out there wants you dead simply because of the demographic groups you belong to. the reason you haven't been seeing widespread political violence previously is that it hasn't been a winning strategy

the situation is changing very fast

Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#244

Post by neom »

digging wrote: post #213
orthecreedence wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is my experience as well. I talked to a LOT of people after the Snowden debacle (techies and otherwise) and the general attitude was "so what? they aren't using the information for anything bad!" or "I have nothing to hide!" (in this thread, for instance: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41594775 ) I think people don't really understand what an enormous sleeping dragon the entire thing is.

> I think people don't really understand what an enormous sleeping dragon the entire thing is. Isn't that what I said? Mostly we're debating semantics. My deeper point is that it's counterproductive and borderline misanthropic to argue "People just don't care about evil being done!" whereas the argument that "People seriously have no idea yet what they're 'agreeing' to" opens the door to actual solutions, for one inc…

But what is the "enormous sleeping dragon" my mom, dad, little sister, and teenage cousins need to understand? - and, even once it's patently clear, does it with certainly not result in another "...and???"

Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#245

Post by nimbius »

srndsnd wrote: post #31

To me, what's missing from that set of recommendations is some method to increase the liability of companies who mishandle user data. It is insane to me that I can be notified via physical mail of months old data breaches, some of which contained my Social Security number, and that my only recourse is to set credit freezes from multiple credit bureaus.

I think the only reason were seeing this revelation from a federal agency after 20 years is to boost the governments case against tiktok.

Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#247

Post by hackerdood »

herf wrote: post #188

Please make it so my kids can watch a YouTube video required by school without watching 20 YouTube shorts after. That's all I want.

Assuming it’s on a computer (big assumption for kids) you can install this[0] extension and customize it to do things like remove shorts from appearing, disable autoplay, hide recommended videos, etc. it’s a good way to not let YouTube pull your focus away from you.

[0] https://unhook.app/

Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#248

Post by xhevahir »

cynan123 wrote: post #95

Lina Khan has been on a tear. She actually seems to care about online human rights.

I will be surprised if she's still there six months from now. Trump will remove her if he becomes president; whereas if Harris wins, and the GOP take the Senate--a pretty likely scenario--I fear Harris won't hesitate to use Khan as a bargaining chip to gain confirmation of her appointments.

Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#249

Post by Dylan16807 »

1659447091 wrote: post #231
TinyRick wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you would rather be known as someone who had an opportunity to report a violation, and chose not to? From my perspective it seem like you decided against acting with integrity in this situation - the moral thing would have been to report the violation, but you chose to look the other way and resign.

> it seem like you decided against acting with integrity in this situation ... you chose to look the other way and resign. I agree with this statement. This isn't a judgement, we all have to make choices; the "right" choice (the one that aligns with integrity) is usually the one that will be the least self-serving and even temporarily harmful. They did what was right for them, that's okay, but it was not the choice o…

How is quitting right for them? They chose a path that's bad for the users and bad for them.

Re: FTC: Vast Surveillance of Users by Social Media and Video Streaming Companies

#250

Post by Dylan16807 »

lesuorac wrote: post #128
polygamous_bat wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think a better example would be You (AirBnB Host) rent a house to Person and Person loses the house key. This is not a direct analogue, a closer analogy would be when the guest creates a copy of the key (why?) without my direct consent (signing a 2138 page "user agreement" doesn't count) and at some later point when I am no longer renting to them, loses the key.

I'm still much more interested in the answer to who is liable for the robbery. Just the Robber? Or are any of the key-copiers (instead of losers w/e) also?

I don't really care about the answer to that specific question, where there's only one household.

What I will say is the guy that has copies of 20000 people's keys should get in trouble if he loses his horde.

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