201–210 of 445 posts
You probably put to much stock in the whole "I've never been through the imaging machines" bit. It's not about remaining opt-out puritan or something. Fight when you can. I hope op reads this, buried in all the other comments. Please, for the sake of everyone, dust yourself off and opt out again. It doesn't matter if you do it every time. I opt out every time I can, but there have been plenty of times when I don't. T…
This happened to me at Heathrow in London, except there's no option to "opt-out". You either do it, or you don't fly. It's randomly selected, so although I triggered no safety protocols, I was picked out for backscatter. I was a hair's width from turning around and flying from Gatwick instead at a few hundred bucks cost (nothing compared to observing my rights) - but the engagement was too important.
When was this? Heathrow doesn't currently use back scatter [1]. [1] http://www.heathrowairport.com/heathrow-airport-guide/heathr...
It's way off at the side, so nobody really knows it's going on. Your only recourse is to take it up with the home office.
There is an extremely simple solution: leave. I've not lived in the US for almost two years now. I've only had to travel back twice in that time. Meanwhile, in the same time I've visited France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany multiple times. None of those travel experiences were nearly as unpleasant or stressful as my two trips to the US. Furthermore, the technology communities that are growing up in these pla…
There is an extremely simple solution: leave. I've not lived in the US for almost two years now. I've only had to travel back twice in that time. Meanwhile, in the same time I've visited France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany multiple times. None of those travel experiences were nearly as unpleasant or stressful as my two trips to the US. Furthermore, the technology communities that are growing up in these pla…
This reminds me of the NSA recruitment session at the University of Washington (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVIHvbYYxJo) where the NSA agent tried to tell a skeptical student that she should not keep asking embarrassing questions, because even if an NSA job was not right for her, she should not prevent other students from joining the agency. In other words, it's fine to disagree with turning your country into a police state, you don't have to join the secret police, but don't interfere with your fellow citizens who want to profit from joining the police force.
"when bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle." --Edmund Burke
There is an extremely simple solution: leave. I've not lived in the US for almost two years now. I've only had to travel back twice in that time. Meanwhile, in the same time I've visited France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany multiple times. None of those travel experiences were nearly as unpleasant or stressful as my two trips to the US. Furthermore, the technology communities that are growing up in these pla…
I know hacker news doesn't generally appreciate comments like this, but moving to Europe is the last thing you want to do if your objection is based on the political theory of individual liberty. Practically speaking the US is losing respect for personal freedom, but at least there's a legal framework and founding ideal for it here.
This is an honest question — I believe things to be exactly the opposite, but I'll correct my belief if I'm wrong.
There is an extremely simple solution: leave. I've not lived in the US for almost two years now. I've only had to travel back twice in that time. Meanwhile, in the same time I've visited France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany multiple times. None of those travel experiences were nearly as unpleasant or stressful as my two trips to the US. Furthermore, the technology communities that are growing up in these pla…
Thinking of other European countries, in the UK, signs at Gatwick say that if you are selected for a full-body scan and decline to use the machine, you will not be allowed to travel.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, I left too. I've lived in a couple parts of Europe and then Japan since leaving. All of them feel more "free" than post-Bush (I guess I really mean post-Bin Laden) USA; people enjoy more civil rights, and (more pragmatically) more freedom from idiotic hassle in the name of... whatever kind of fuckery it is that keeps the prison lobby, the TSA, and the general industrial-fearmongering complex in business and fre…
The rampant xenophobia in Japan is what keeps me from moving there. You mean even if I becomes a naturalized citizen (an ordeal in itself) that most places will still treat me like a foreigner? No thanks. The US is occupied by an enemy force that they supported and elected. Every time another basic human right is violated by the legislative and executive branch those cheer. Does it matter that drunk driving kills mor…
I've lived seven years in Japan. Even if I were to get Japanese citizenship, I wouldn't identify myself culturally as Japanese (and neither would Japanese think of me as Japanese).
Countries like the US separate cultural identity and citizenship, so having citizenship but still being seen as a foreigner might seem a bit strange at first. On the other hand, if I was to go to the US, there are certain cultural identities I could never have. For instance, as a white guy, I could never be treated as an African American, no matter how much I wanted to be or tried.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Self-driving cars will kill air travel for distances shorter than an overnight car trip. Or we will suddenly find that airlines' customers are not a security risk and deserve good service throughout their trip.
Time to short manufacturers of midrange jets, like Embraer.
Especially since there are security-circumventing mechanisms developing (private flights) that make heavy use of midrange jets.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Assuming it's possible to say that two images are from the same person, it would be trivial to work out specifically who that was with any frequent flyer. You'd just build up a body of images of "person 1" then cross-reference with flight records till you narrow it down to only being one possible person who had been on all those flights...
For what possible fucking reason! This is foolishness or possibly a form of mental illness.
You've got head shape, hand shape, height, shoulder width, BMI, and length of every major body segment. From there you can calculate all sorts of ratios to apply to people, and I'd bet you could make a pretty good guess at gait for motion analysis.
A database like this would also be proof against facial surgery; changing bone lengths is harder. So if you get a known terrorist once, you should be able to spot them much more easily in the future. And of course you'd keep the records indefinitely, because you never know who's going to turn out to be a terrorist. Or a drug mule. Or a political protester [1].
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO for the historical version; http://nymag.com/news/features/nypd-demographics-unit-2013-9... for the modern one.
There is an extremely simple solution: leave. I've not lived in the US for almost two years now. I've only had to travel back twice in that time. Meanwhile, in the same time I've visited France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany multiple times. None of those travel experiences were nearly as unpleasant or stressful as my two trips to the US. Furthermore, the technology communities that are growing up in these pla…
If you have other concerns, you're likely to be sadly disappointed by overt corruption, intolerance, censorship, extreme taxation, or other ways your freedom can be violated.
It's not at all that simple.