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

People with nothing to hide

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 268 posts

Re: People with nothing to hide

#231

Post by diminoten »

capnrefsmmat wrote: post #188
john_flintstone wrote: post #78

Questions for people with nothing to hide: 1. Have you ever had an abortion? 2. Have you ever cheated on your husband / wife? 3. Are you currently looking for a new job? 4. Have you ever being diagnosed with a mental illness? 5. Are you currently on anti-depressants? 6. Were you ever sexually abused as a child? 7. Have you ever fancied someone of the same sex? 8. Have you ever had sex with someone of the same sex? 9.…

Responses like these just legitimize the idea that privacy is about hiding things. It isn't. Privacy is a way of restricting the government's power over you. Giving the government the power to read your email, tap your phone, and record your porn usage isn't bad simply because it's embarrassing. After all, the data will likely only be seen by a computer. But it gives the government enormous power to make decisions ab…

For someone like me, someone who has explored this area philosophically (and if you think that sounded pompous, just wait), I find arguments like, "YES YOU DO HAVE SOMETHING TO HIDE" to be a) presumptive and b) not compelling. It just smacks of a lack of understanding about personal responsibility and honesty.

What I'd want, if I didn't yet think privacy was necessary, would be an argument not that privacy is itself an inherent right, but that privacy is a reaction to the flawed nature of humanity. I'd look for why privacy is necessary and not innate, because that makes more sense to me than this abstract idea of a "right to privacy".

Even your argument takes about a dozen leaps to arrive at the conclusion that without privacy, governments can be more private. What you should be talking about is not the government's ability to hide things, but the idea that any government is a flawed entity which are governed by an imperfect set of laws built to represent a cultural morality. Without privacy, you should be saying, the inherent greed and cruelty that exists within every collection of people would run rampant over minorities.

If man were capable of not harassing minorities, then privacy wouldn't be such a big deal. So no, I don't think someone like me would want to hear that privacy is a human right. Someone like me would want to hear that privacy is absolutely necessary to combat the inherent evil that comes with collecting groups of people together. It's not about hiding what you have, it's about protecting minorities from the majority. That's all.

Re: People with nothing to hide

#232

Post by icebraining »

corresation wrote: post #163
goostavos wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>We have no idea what they actually did prevent Ugh.. what terrible reasoning. The absence of data is not somehow possible data. >pointing out the failure in the Boston bombing is a poor counterpoint given that to many it would suggest that increased surveillance is necessary, not less. It's actually a rather good counter point. It shows that the FBI/NSA/big brother already can't process all of the data it has in a…

The absence of data is not somehow possible data When you don't HAVE the data, it is nonsense to make conclusions as if you have the data, which is exactly what you and others are doing. Terrible reasoning indeed. shows that the FBI/NSA/big brother already can't process all of the data Once again -- no data (you have absolutely no idea what data they have or don't have), but you can declare that the problem is proces…

you have absolutely no idea what data they have or don't have

Well, that's not really true:

The FBI has confirmed that Russia alerted the agency in 2011 that Tsarnaev had ties to 'radical Islam' groups in his homeland. Homeland Security sources have also revealed the agency received tips in 2012 about his ties to extremists connected to a Boston mosque. (...) Tamerlan was said to have been named as one of the radicals that came to attention of an informant working with an agency attached to the Boston-area Joint Terrorism Task Force

Re: People with nothing to hide

#233

Post by meowface »

[deleted] wrote: post #219
stfu wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently those people in the twitter feed are fine with getting registered and living under high transparency. My suggestion would be a crowd funded campaign to doxx each one of them. Would be happy to donate a few hours of my time tracing their real names. With some funded capital we could buy and publish for each one a personal background check sort of a personal gift to free them from the burden of anonymity.

[deleted]

Fantastic job pulling their names from their Twitter profiles and putting them next to their Twitter usernames! I can't even imagine the amount of work that must've gone into such an effort.

Re: People with nothing to hide

#234

Post by meowface »

tomarr wrote: post #100
rrrrtttt wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Financial Times has called this the data intelligence complex, by analogy with the military-industrial complex. It's a government--private sector alliance that's spending $80bn yearly on spying on citizens with questionable returns. Can you imagine "how many jobs would be destroyed" if this were to stop?

We shouldn't forget how much $80 billion actually is. For that amount, they should be saving in the order of 40,000 people's lives from terrorism a year to justify the spending. (I've plucked the intervention per life-year saved from here: http://www.econ.ucsb.edu/~tedb/Courses/UCSBpf/readings/inter... and assumed each life-save has 50 potential years of their life left)

While I see your point, generally speaking law enforcement is not going to spend a proportional amount of money with respect to protecting citizens. Hundreds of thousands of dollars may be spent on a single investigation into a murderer that may only prevent the deaths of 1 or 2 people. You can't assign a monetary value to it. Protecting people from dying is a necessary service in any society.

If the NSA had a hypothetical program that didn't infringe on anyone's rights (likely impossible, but bear with me), but did consistently stop terrorist plots when they arose, even if all of the successful plots may kill a few dozen or a hundred people in total, most people would agree that spending $80 billion on that program is worth it due to the lives saved.

I don't personally think that $80 billion being spent to protect lives is wasteful, generally speaking. I do see how it is wasteful in this situation, because it has very questionable results, and when the collateral damage of the plan is so incredibly great.

Re: People with nothing to hide

#235

Post by Ygg2 »

icebraining wrote: post #146
Ygg2 wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can simply ask them do you go everywhere naked? If not then they have something to hide. Literally.

Clothes serve many purposes beyond hiding your body. Protection from dirt and weather conditions, social signaling, etc.

It's a hyperbole to demonstrate that hiding certain things isn't an illegal or a even bad thing. In fact I'd say its overall better for all involved.

And for the record there is always a way to do all the listed things while being completely more or less naked (transparent clothing, frequent showerings, small discreet tatto, etc).

Re: People with nothing to hide

#236

Post by pinaceae »

jnbiche wrote: post #194
pinaceae wrote: post #179

I seriously don't get the mouthfrothing outrage. For years and years, everyone knowledgeable kept saying - if you post it on the internet, it is public. You're using Google - Google reads your stuff. Algorithms build a profile of you, select ads, etc. You're using Amazon - Amazon knows and never forgets what you're buying and browsing for. You're using Credit Cards - the CC company knows a lot about you. You have a b…

Do you really not understand the difference between the government having this data and a private corporation? I'll spell it out: the government has guns and can lock you up based on their interpretation of the data, private corporations can't. And please don't try to tell me that the government only targets the guilty with the data they collect and the observations they make. Many, many innocent people are caught up…

for the vast majority of people, private corporations have a larger impact on their life than the NSA.

the NSA will not touch your life. your bank, your mobile operator, your credit card company - immediate impact. if the latter want to fuck you up, you're toast as well. see all the foreclosures, etc.

this focus on government is truly strange. just one of the players, but somehow special.

the NSA has accomplished, what a lot of fucking startups are attempting - your unified social media profile. linkedin is green with jealousy.

Re: People with nothing to hide

#237

Post by wavefunction »

Qantourisc wrote: post #169
Carlee wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me it's a bit like maintenance: You only notice it's there when it doesn't work. Like someone else said, we have no idea how much crap they actually catch, maybe the boston incidence is just one instance out of many others that were prevented.

Then it's in their own interest to publish a few numbers from time to time.

Could we even trust the numbers? It's like, if they lie about the system existing, what else is fair game?

Re: People with nothing to hide

#238

Post by billiamram »

john_flintstone wrote: post #78

Questions for people with nothing to hide: 1. Have you ever had an abortion? 2. Have you ever cheated on your husband / wife? 3. Are you currently looking for a new job? 4. Have you ever being diagnosed with a mental illness? 5. Are you currently on anti-depressants? 6. Were you ever sexually abused as a child? 7. Have you ever fancied someone of the same sex? 8. Have you ever had sex with someone of the same sex? 9.…

According to your quiz, I have nothing to hide, but I'm still a strong privacy advocate. Privacy to me is all about context and understanding the consequences of your actions. If I run naked through Times Square, I shouldn't have any reasonable expectation of physical privacy, but if I whisper to a friend I would. Either way the important factor in both scenarios is that your expectation of privacy aligns with reality.

As for context, specifically with regards to prism, if I dial a wrong number that happens to belong to a terrorist, I may find myself guilty by association, with the burden of proof of innocence in my own hands. Quickly hanging up and dialing a similar number after might not be sufficient defense since that could be a strategy terrorists use to cover their tracks.

Re: People with nothing to hide

#239

Post by rmc »

mtgx wrote: post #62
rmc wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Select bias. You don't know what they did stop.

I'm sure they have plenty of proof ready to share with the public, to prove that the system is worth it, even though it's unconstitutional, but apparently no one cares about that and about American values anymore: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Etm4dHdaApo

Or to explain that and how they stopped a threat might reveal how much they know, who their informers are, what type of codes they can break, and hence make it hard to stop the next one. If you tell Bad Guys™ (a) that and (b) how you stopped a previous attack, then the next set of Bad Guy™ will know not to make those mistakes.

Re: People with nothing to hide

#240

Post by throwmeaway33 »

Ygg2 wrote: post #235
icebraining wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clothes serve many purposes beyond hiding your body. Protection from dirt and weather conditions, social signaling, etc.

It's a hyperbole to demonstrate that hiding certain things isn't an illegal or a even bad thing. In fact I'd say its overall better for all involved. And for the record there is always a way to do all the listed things while being completely more or less naked (transparent clothing, frequent showerings, small discreet tatto, etc).

I think you're example is a good example of how weak the arguments for privacy are. All I see are hyperbolic examples. My favorite ones are where people try to bring up how the lack of privacy lead to horrors like NAZI Germany or Iran as if the US is somehow comparable. And they say "But government can change!". Only in la-la land is the US government going to turn into Iran. No developed country in the past 50 years (even ones where privacy is not considered a god given right) has slipped back in totalitarianism.
Post reply on HN