Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

expression.fire.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 655 posts

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#111

Post by kklisura »

tqi wrote: post #58

> You’re not happy about it, but you hand over a photo of your passport and hope it doesn’t come back to haunt you. I think for this argument to carry weight with voters, privacy advocates need to be much more specific about what "coming back to haunt you" looks like. They do a little bit of it later on[1], but I think most people do a rough cost benefit in their head and decide that the small benefit outweighs the s…

> privacy advocates need to be much more specific

I'm starting to think we need to lean on conspiracy theories in order to get broader population on train with this - and I'm saying this in utmost regret. That's a borrowing game from a right wing/extremist playbook.

Start with this: requiring IDs online is a first step in micro-chipping the population.

...or how about this: marxists/atifa/nazis/zionists/islamist/whoever-group-people-think-is-in-power want to erode your privacy online so it can be used against you. Some nefarious group what to know your every move!

...or how about this: remember Epstein files!? Well the pedos now want to id your children online!

I simply saying truth/evidence/rational based approach to this will not get people attention. People just don't care.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#112

Post by [deleted] »

rockskon wrote: post #90
teravor wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the same thing that prevents them from doing reuse right now: platform detection mechanisms. the difference is that right now the identity of the subject is known whereas with ZKP (nullifier approach) only the dirty token is known and where that token was used.

So....what exactly would platform detection mechanisms be basing their decisions off of that wouldn't defeat the entire privacy-preserving premise of ZKP?

[deleted]

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#113

Post by vkou »

Aurornis wrote: post #108
vkou wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've also always been curious how a truely anonymous identity verification could possibly work. You go to a store. You show the clerk your id and give him a quarter. The clerk pulls a scratch-off ticket from the front of a ticket tape. The ticket contains a token identifier. It's anonymous. The clerk or his POS system knows your name and age, but doesn't know your number. The vendor providing the tape doesn't know…

> It's anonymous. The clerk or his POS system knows your name and age, but doesn't know your number. The vendor providing the tape doesn't know your number or your name. Where does this 3rd party identity token provider come from? For government-issued identity tokens, there are not separate parties. It's just the government, and they can choose to link whatever they want in their internal system if they decide it's…

> Where does this 3rd party identity token provider come from?

Some oracle whose job it is to print tokens and hand out rolls to the stores (and to the websystems). They would know which store got which roll, and which website authenticated it, but not who each ticket from that roll went to.

With a big enough roll, this is essentially anonymous.

Yes, lotteries know which store got the winning ticket, but they have no idea which of the patrons in the store got it. Not unless they ask Eve to get her telescopic lens and notepad out.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#114

Post by [deleted] »

teravor wrote: post #87
rockskon wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay - so you verify age and what else? What combination of details can you validate on that is meaningfully privacy-preserving and couldn't result in wide-spread re-use of tokens? Additionally - what would prevent some kids from getting a homeless man in the city to hand them his ID, get a facial scan, and everything else you can think of to generate a token and then pass that token around? ZKP are a cryptography-ne…

the same thing that prevents them from doing reuse right now: platform detection mechanisms. the difference is that right now the identity of the subject is known whereas with ZKP (nullifier approach) only the dirty token is known and where that token was used.

[deleted]

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#115

Post by Aurornis »

mossTechnician wrote: post #74

I appreciate the wealth of technical solutions that don't violate privacy, but isn't this overlooking an important point: that children don't need to be connected to the Internet at all times from such an early age? Many internet and cell phone providers seem to take it for granted that children must be online, which is already a net loss for their privacy as they mature.

That's their parents' decision to make, not yours.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#116

Post by biophysboy »

mossTechnician wrote: post #74

I appreciate the wealth of technical solutions that don't violate privacy, but isn't this overlooking an important point: that children don't need to be connected to the Internet at all times from such an early age? Many internet and cell phone providers seem to take it for granted that children must be online, which is already a net loss for their privacy as they mature.

Its a tragedy of the commons situation. The benefits of being offline are dampened by the kid being out of the loop

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#117

Post by flenserboy »

There will be your internet-connected computer which will be assumed to be compromised, & which little, if anything of use will be kept on, & then there will be the airgapped system you do work on, which will probably be the last trusted version of a Linux distro you have multiple copies stashed away of. It will be a very old-fashioned experience, & moving/sharing data will become a dicey business.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#118

Post by mossTechnician »

hasteg wrote: post #101
mossTechnician wrote: post #74

I appreciate the wealth of technical solutions that don't violate privacy, but isn't this overlooking an important point: that children don't need to be connected to the Internet at all times from such an early age? Many internet and cell phone providers seem to take it for granted that children must be online, which is already a net loss for their privacy as they mature.

I agree, I think kids should have limited access to the internet. I pretty much did and it worked out for me but I have seen so many reports about it causing harm in schools and personal life. (Specifically I think LLMs should not be used in education also, but different point) However, I think the main problem people have with this "think of the children" narrative is that it will force EVERYONE to give up their cre…

I am wholeheartedly against identity verification, especially when it comes to giving up privacy. And I hope these "think of the children" arguments can be pushed back at from multiple angles. If the danger is real, then by the time a child is online, 4 out of 5 in them in Australia can apparently access social media anyway. So even if everyone's privacy was somehow an acceptable price to pay, these requirements do nothing.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#120

Post by forinti »

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #59

This seems more like a technical problem that we could actually solve well if we wanted to and had competent people advising the governments. You go to DMV and they generate a keypair and an entry in a DB. App looks up your age with your public key + signed private key authorization from you. Apps can ask for specific checks like is_over_21, is_citizen or whatever without any more data. Something like that, details a…

It's a political problem, not a technical problem.
Post reply on HN