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Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

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Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#101

Post by jsutton »

icebraining wrote: post #40
fleitz wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if they aren't being asked to build a tool, then there's nothing for them to help the FBI with because the device functions as designed. It is precisely the design of the device that the FBI wants Apple to alter using some sort of tool that Apple will make for them.

My point was just that the FBI didn't ask Apple to "build a tool for the FBI that will allow them to look at any user's data". They asked Apple to prevent some security mechanisms of that particular device from working. Whether Apple builds a tool or uses manual labour with existing tools to do so is irrelevant for the FBI.

They haven't explicitly asked for that specifically, but that would be the consequence of fulfilling the request.

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#102

Post by likpok »

fnordfnordfnord wrote: post #97
tptacek wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Possible, but unlikely. According to a recent study, the majority of offenders are sentenced for violent offenses, and the majority of those sentenced for violent offenses have never been convicted of a drug crime.

>According to a recent study Please post the study.

It's not exactly "recent", but http://harvardjol.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/HLL104_crop... is what I presume 'tptacek is talking about (it was discussed on HN before).

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#103

Post by JoeAltmaier »

jljljl wrote: post #100
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heck so does "pursuing happiness". Skiing accidents. Bankruptcy when your art studio goes under. Smoking. Pretty much anything fun. As a country, the USA is actually constituted to allow these things. Because, individual freedoms. And inalienable rights. I hear somebody want to crack down on something, I think "There goes somebody who forgot what it means to be American"

Being pedantic: pursuit of happiness and inalienable rights are in the Declaration of Independence, not the constitution. The right to regulate interstate commerce (and thus put restrictions on a lot of the fun things) is enumerated.

Being pedantic right back: the US Supreme Court refers to the Declaration as source material for the Constitution, to illuminate its intent.

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#104

Post by nickik »

rayiner wrote: post #83
nickik wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First many of those crime cartels could not exist without the banning of drugs, prostitution and gambling. The same goes for violent crimes in general. Large numbers of violent crimes are done by people involved in drug dealing or consuming. If drugs were legal you would not put so many people in these situations. Falling crime rates is happing all over the first world. Most countries have know-where near the policy…

> First many of those crime cartels could not exist without the banning of drugs, prostitution and gambling. That doesn't mean that it's an "invented crime." It's undeniable that drugs, gambling, and prostitution have real social costs and harms. The people are entitled to regulate commerce in their society generally, but trade in harmful things especially. When people uses organized violence to circumvent that regul…

You can not expect me to support the weaking of encryption and critical infrastructure just to arrest criminals who would not exist if the state policy would not be stupid in the first place.

> It's undeniable that drugs, gambling, and prostitution have real social costs and harms.

Its also undeniable that enforcing these things has real social cost and harms. In this balance I am of the opinion that it would be far superior to have a different policy.

> You're presupposing a direction of causation here. Your average street gang does not exist because of drug dealing or consumption (and indeed, violent street gangs long predate any restrictions on drugs or alcohol). They deal in drugs because it's easy money, but arise for other reasons.

That does not mean that these gangs would be much weaker and therefore less important if they could not make easy money. These are mutually supportive, a tight group can do well in a illegal market, and because of that it can produce benefits for its members, increasing memberships and power.

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#105

Post by jessaustin »

rayiner wrote: post #64
jessaustin wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fairness, one could consider the "public order" "crimes" listed there to also be inventions of the state. Are legislative or prosecutorial inventiveness implicated in the increase of those from 1.9% to 13.8% of the total in less than 40 years? Over a period during which violent crime dropped precipitously, they had to do something to justify the constant construction of new prisons.

The public order category includes drunk driving and weapons offenses (mostly, felon-in-possession). Those are not inventions of the state. The public is entitled to control the possession and operation of dangerous instrumentalities that create risk of harm to others.

Harming people or property is criminal, and has been in most societies, even when automobiles or firearms are used to cause harm. OTOH "drunk driving" and "weapon possession" and indeed any "risk"-based "crime" are the epitome of invention. (The criminality of weapon possession has a long and sordid history, but not in those polities that civilized nations would care to emulate.) If all felons are so fucking dangerous, why aren't they in prison? Of course, the vast majority aren't actually dangerous, but it's still fun to deprive them of Constitutional rights! [EDIT:] The main reason why "convicts with guns" has been on the rise is probably that the number of convicts is on the rise, period.

One notes when examining the timeframe of the graph you linked that MADD was formed in 1980. That explains the legislative inventiveness; nothing drives policy like fat stacks of nonprofit cash! Take a trip to any courthouse anywhere, and you'll witness the racket that MADD, prosecutors, and municipalities have engineered to employ lawyers by depriving the poor of the mobility that would make their lives easier.

So thanks for the info; clearly the answer to my question is "yes".

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#106

Post by awinter-py »

This would have more force if G didn't have a history of siding with tech giants on moral issues. 2 CEOs ago, apple asked G to collude in a hiring scam and G replied with an emoticon.

If the device were truly secure we wouldn't be having this conversation. Alternatively, if law enforcement wanted to get into a dead guy's filing cabinet on suspicion of conspiracy murder, with a valid court order, there wouldn't be any outrage.

We're being bamboozled by a PR campaign in favor of closed-source software. If the guy was still alive apple could just push him an IOS update containing backdoors galore. This is not a secure device!

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#107

Post by rayiner »

jessaustin wrote: post #105
rayiner wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The public order category includes drunk driving and weapons offenses (mostly, felon-in-possession). Those are not inventions of the state. The public is entitled to control the possession and operation of dangerous instrumentalities that create risk of harm to others.

Harming people or property is criminal, and has been in most societies, even when automobiles or firearms are used to cause harm. OTOH "drunk driving" and "weapon possession" and indeed any "risk"-based "crime" are the epitome of invention. (The criminality of weapon possession has a long and sordid history, but not in those polities that civilized nations would care to emulate.) If all felons are so fucking dangerou…

It's a very narrow interpretation of democracy that doesn't give people the right to mitigate risky conduct and requires them to wait for actual harm in order to react. It's also one without a sensible limiting principle: can't require safety inspections for aircraft, gotta wait for a bunch of people to fall out of the sky first!

> nothing drives policy like fat stacks of nonprofit cash

Oh yes, that well funded concerned mother lobby. Fucking it up for sociopathic assholes since 1980.

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#108

Post by icebraining »

zaphar wrote: post #92
icebraining wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point was just that the FBI didn't ask Apple to "build a tool for the FBI that will allow them to look at any user's data". They asked Apple to prevent some security mechanisms of that particular device from working. Whether Apple builds a tool or uses manual labour with existing tools to do so is irrelevant for the FBI.

The point that gets lost here is that it's close to impossible for Apple to build a tool that will only allow them to look at any users data. Once the tool exists it's a simple hexedit away from working on anyones phone. While the court may be asking for something single use that same court may not understand the full implications of what they are asking. Thus the need for a public discourse on the topic.

It's not an hexedit away because Apple won't have to provide it to the Feds, hence they can still demand a court order each and every time. Except for the cost, it's no different than if they had to re-build it every time.

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#109

Post by jessaustin »

rayiner wrote: post #107
jessaustin wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Harming people or property is criminal, and has been in most societies, even when automobiles or firearms are used to cause harm. OTOH "drunk driving" and "weapon possession" and indeed any "risk"-based "crime" are the epitome of invention. (The criminality of weapon possession has a long and sordid history, but not in those polities that civilized nations would care to emulate.) If all felons are so fucking dangerou…

It's a very narrow interpretation of democracy that doesn't give people the right to mitigate risky conduct and requires them to wait for actual harm in order to react. It's also one without a sensible limiting principle: can't require safety inspections for aircraft, gotta wait for a bunch of people to fall out of the sky first! > nothing drives policy like fat stacks of nonprofit cash Oh yes, that well funded conce…

You've happened upon one of the main criticisms of democracy, addressed notably in Zakaria's The Future of Freedom. But I don't say that it's invalid for the people's representatives to unjustly oppress the lawbreakers we're discussing here. I only say that they shouldn't! You can dress it up in irrelevant appeals to democracy, but we're still locking up more people than any other society that has ever existed in history, and that's wrong.

...can't require safety inspections for aircraft, gotta wait for a bunch of people to fall out of the sky first!

Don't tell any enterprising nonprofit interest-group enthusiasts, but we have "special" and "experimental" airworthiness certificates, which amount to basically that. Of course, those certificates don't cover aircraft which are naturally subject to the regulation of the state.

Oh yes, that well funded concerned mother lobby.

In fiscal year 2012-3, they spent $34,327,399, of which they spent 64.4% on actual programs. Nationally, 9 out of 10 charities spend a higher percentage. [0]

Fucking it up for sociopathic assholes since 1980.

As I have observed every one of the five or six days I've spent in various courthouses over the last five years (and as any practicing lawyer with a conscience surely has observed much more often), these laws do far more to harm the poor than they do to make the roads safe. Perhaps you've heard about protests in Ferguson, MO? Predatory policing and prosecution was one of the main focuses of that.

[0] http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary...

Re: Sundar Pichai Responds to Apple and the FBI Hacking Request

#110

Post by fnordfnordfnord »

rayiner wrote: post #107
jessaustin wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Harming people or property is criminal, and has been in most societies, even when automobiles or firearms are used to cause harm. OTOH "drunk driving" and "weapon possession" and indeed any "risk"-based "crime" are the epitome of invention. (The criminality of weapon possession has a long and sordid history, but not in those polities that civilized nations would care to emulate.) If all felons are so fucking dangerou…

It's a very narrow interpretation of democracy that doesn't give people the right to mitigate risky conduct and requires them to wait for actual harm in order to react. It's also one without a sensible limiting principle: can't require safety inspections for aircraft, gotta wait for a bunch of people to fall out of the sky first! > nothing drives policy like fat stacks of nonprofit cash Oh yes, that well funded conce…

> right to mitigate risky conduct and requires them to wait for actual harm in order to react.

Isn't that the way the judicial system typically works even when it is obviously broken? Isn't this the reason we have things like weird laws that are "unenforceable", because as a matter of policy we tend to wait for actual harm to occur before we expend effort to address it?

>can't require safety inspections for aircraft, gotta wait for a bunch of people to fall out of the sky first!

That's actually the way the FAA came into existence. The Wright brothers didn't have to send $5.00 to the FAA for a permit, or submit to safety inspections, or anything like that. Nor did anyone else, for a long time WRT the early aircraft industry in the US. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Aviation_Administratio...

>Oh yes, that well funded concerned mother lobby. Fucking it up for sociopathic assholes since 1980.

There's the appeal to emotion common to arguments in favor of harsher sentencing for DUI offenders. It appears to be the case however that more and bigger sticks aren't really reducing the number of sociopathic assholes driving drunk.

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