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Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

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Re: Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

#21

Post by dripton »

milhous wrote: post #20
bradenb wrote: post #10

Here's where I get depressed about this whole thing: how will we know change has occurred? I mean, say in the best case scenario the government admits it was wrong and promises to stop the monitoring programs. How exactly are we supposed to know it has happened? I don't see why they couldn't simply start up a new secret program using the exact same resources and keep it from the public eye.

A good way to do it would be to radically downsize the federal government and return back to limited constitutional government. The less money they have, the less stuff they can do. Return power (and tax revenues) back to the states so that the people of that state can have a more powerful influence in state/local politics instead of everyone pleading, fighting, and begging at the national level in Washington. And si…

The US national debt is denominated in dollars. The US government decides what a dollar is. There's no way they can default. Just trigger hyperinflation.

Re: Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

#22

Post by lifeisstillgood »

This is going to be about a redefinition of privacy.

It was ok for governments to spy on other countries governments (and so their citizens). In this name we put satellites over us all. The problem with this is the satellites spied on everyone, and governments were supposed to ignore the right bits.

But now if a government wants to spy, it mostly needs to watch what people do or do not do online (I will bet real spies have some really odd online "tells")

So if its ok to spy on another government, it's going to be necessary to spy on everyone everywhere, and then ignore certain bits. Like satellites but much more finer grained. Oh and if you want to catch a spy in the USA, you need to spy on all US citizens to watch for those "tells".

What we want is not for governments to pretend the Internet does not exist, but rather to ensure that they cannot use the information found for anything we do not specifically legislate.

I am pretty sure this is something like an extension of the fourth amendment in US terms.

It's a redefinition of privacy - not that no-one knows, but that no-one is allowed to make use of knowing.

That's the trade-off we face. We get the Internet, we give up what we currently think of as privacy.

Re: Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

#24

Post by LoganCale »

bradenb wrote: post #10

Here's where I get depressed about this whole thing: how will we know change has occurred? I mean, say in the best case scenario the government admits it was wrong and promises to stop the monitoring programs. How exactly are we supposed to know it has happened? I don't see why they couldn't simply start up a new secret program using the exact same resources and keep it from the public eye.

If everyone started encrypting everything, it would matter less. Simply encrypting your email doesn't obfuscate everything, though, since subjects and recipients are still visible. But it's a start.

Until they put you in prison for not turning over your private keys.

Re: Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

#26

Post by s_husso »

fiatmoney wrote: post #6

Instead of a "campaign", how about some technical countermeasures? They're the only thing that actually has a chance of working. You simply can't rely on the political process as it exists when the response of the security establishment is to a) wait for an arbitrary crisis to dust off a naked power-grab, b) secretly "reinterpret" the law beyond recognition, and c) flatly ignore the law as they did with their "Terror…

I do agree. As a Google-talk/Gmail/Dropbox user, the short-term countermesure might be to encrypt all data [1].But ultimately the long-term goal should be to find an alternative to those services (which is/will be quite hard).

[1] at least there seems to be gtalk plugin already on the works: https://github.com/nicolas-t/gAES

Re: Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

#27

Post by _bfhp »

kunai wrote: post #8

Just the fact that we have to start websites like these, and march Capitol Hill to make the government realize its mistake is depressing, infuriating, and is gently, gradually tapping at a hot, steaming teapot of rage within every rational individual's psyche. What is the root cause? How did this get so incredibly bad? Is it the fault of the public? Is it the public's fault we are in an Orwellian state of Soviet-era…

The root cause? It's always money. Lawrence Lessig makes this clear, in a TED talk no less ( http://www.ted.com/talks/lawrence_lessig_we_the_people_and_t... )

Re: Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

#28

Post by jdp23 »

mayneack wrote: post #25

I wonder how often freedom works (the infamous tea party group supposedly funded by the koch brothers) is listed right next to greenpeace and on the same list of supporters as the PCCC and moveon.org. It can't be often

Privacy is one of those issues that cuts across the spectrum. With Stop REAL ID, we had transgender people and biblical literalists on the same side. A friend of mine was telling me about a coalition meeting a few years ago where the lobbyist for the Quakers was sitting next to -- and agreeing with -- the people from the NRA. Strange bedfellows indeed.

Re: Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

#29

Post by mehwoot »

milhous wrote: post #20
bradenb wrote: post #10

Here's where I get depressed about this whole thing: how will we know change has occurred? I mean, say in the best case scenario the government admits it was wrong and promises to stop the monitoring programs. How exactly are we supposed to know it has happened? I don't see why they couldn't simply start up a new secret program using the exact same resources and keep it from the public eye.

A good way to do it would be to radically downsize the federal government and return back to limited constitutional government. The less money they have, the less stuff they can do. Return power (and tax revenues) back to the states so that the people of that state can have a more powerful influence in state/local politics instead of everyone pleading, fighting, and begging at the national level in Washington. And si…

The less money they have, the less stuff they can do.

Iran-Contra, anybody? And the president that was in charge was a small government hero.

And since radical downsizing won't happen voluntarily, as both political parties are corrupt and incompetent, the only way I can see this happening is for the government to continue borrowing and spending money into oblivion, which will ultimately trigger an economic default. At that point, there will be no money for new secret programs.

Ah yes, starve the beast. That's working out well.

Re: Mozilla, EFF, Reddit And 83 Other Organizations Launch StopWatching.Us

#30

Post by Pwnguinz »

dripton wrote: post #21
milhous wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A good way to do it would be to radically downsize the federal government and return back to limited constitutional government. The less money they have, the less stuff they can do. Return power (and tax revenues) back to the states so that the people of that state can have a more powerful influence in state/local politics instead of everyone pleading, fighting, and begging at the national level in Washington. And si…

The US national debt is denominated in dollars. The US government decides what a dollar is. There's no way they can default. Just trigger hyperinflation.

Sure, that's the "technically correct, but practically worthless" answer. Trigger hyper-inflation and then what? It surely won't be "business as usual" afterwards.
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