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Cowards

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Re: Cowards

#121

Post by wavefunction »

Aqueous wrote: post #81

There are cowards and then there are people who willfully exaggerate. A backdoor implies unfettered access to data for batch collection and processing. That's what this story was about at the beginning - the government was indiscriminately collecting and possibly analyzing your private data using some sort of massive, sinister Big Data operation, the scale of which we can not even conceive, and these big web companie…

It's more about seizing the moment of widespread outrage to effect change, rather than ho-humming like a jaded hipster.

Re: Cowards

#122

Post by pbz »

peterjancelis wrote: post #87
Qz wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole reason we even know about all this is because someone did have that courage.

Yes, but do we really think that person will lead a long and untroubled life now?

And this summarizes everything that's wrong with the current ethos. We expect everything to be safe, and we expect everything to be easy. Nothing is above our comfort level and safety. Maybe the knife hasn't cut deep enough, or maybe we don't have the stamina to get off our couch. Either way, sad.

Re: Cowards

#123

Post by einhverfr »

vadiml wrote: post #118
dasil003 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whoah, hold on, I don't think anyone is saying this is easy or there aren't risks for Zuckerberg. However to say he shouldn't stand up against tyranny and abuse of government power because he has responsibility to parties x, y and z is exactly the line of thinking that allows totalitarian governments to thrive. Government power is not absolute, that power is derived from the people. No one person can stand up to the…

Risking one’s own well being to help the community is basically a definition of an altruistic behaviour. Nobody and i mean NOBODY can reach and keep the position of CEO of big international corporation by exhibiting altruistic tendencies. The environment is too competitive and it promotes egoism and punishes altruism. (BTW, The same reasoning stand for political leadership too). So, I don’t think we can really expect…

That is a problem to be solved then.

Re: Cowards

#124

Post by mtgx »

jd007 wrote: post #56
sillysaurus wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It means that people should at least be willing to challenge immoral behavior in a court, even if it's legal. We don't need to have a "conversation". We need to challenge this behavior in courts, and win.

To challenge immoral behavior in court may be much harder than you think, and TBH I don't think it's even needed here (though IANAL so this is me speculating). I think it's enough to claim that what NSA did is unconstitutional.

I don't think he meant challenging Google and Facebook in Court, but challenging the government and the Patriot Act and hew new FISA in Court.

Re: Cowards

#125

Post by einhverfr »

wwweston wrote: post #83
sage_joch wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What the hell does this even mean? It means that if telling the truth is illegal, they should have the courage to break the law.

> It means that if telling the truth is illegal, they should have the courage to break the law. Personally, I think they found a way to tell the truth without breaking the law. They apparently said what they were required to say, to the letter. People found it transparently suspicious. Now the secret appears to be out. Could be an accident, I suppose.

They should have at least remained silent. By issuing grossly misleading denials they look silly and dishonest. And yes, cowardly.

Had they said, "We do not comment on matters of national security," such would have been honest, careful, and truthful and it would have been darned hard to prosecute them or put them at risk for effectively revealing that the press was right.

Re: Cowards

#126

Post by jamespo »

fijal wrote: post #103
scythe wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Y'know, I'd like to believe I'd do that in this situation, too. But people are more generous in theory than in practice. You have to realize: Mark Zuckerberg isn't just looking out for Mark Zuckerberg by posting what he did. He has a family, a social life, and a whole lot of people at Facebook who depend on him. To whom, perhaps, it would not be fair for Zuck to martyr himself on the great gallows of the United State…

"First they came for the communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the socialists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me."

This isn't reddit. It also isn't particularly relevant.

Re: Cowards

#127

Post by AnthonyMouse »

peterjancelis wrote: post #86
cerebrum wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get your point on obligations. He has a family ok, but nothing would prevent him from resigning from Facebook and writing a post explaining his reasons for doing so(unwillingness to spy on its users). He would still be a rich man able to provide for his family and there are tons of others who could step into his place. I'm not saying he should do that but with the amount of money he has he can afford to lose…

The government would go after Facebook as an entity when Zukerberg speaks out. This means other FB directors could be held liable, shareholders could sue him for breaching his fiduciary duty, his life could be made hell even if PR wise it's impossible to arrest him, etc. We are talking about the most powerful monopoly on force humanity has even seen here, a group of people who consider it their right to kill people o…

>The government would go after Facebook as an entity when Zukerberg speaks out.

You honestly think the government is going to go after a multibillion dollar international corporation? Doing that is what gets the government into trouble, because the corporation has the resources to defend itself. And they're clearly not going to destroy Facebook and Google in any event -- can you imagine the public outrage, to say nothing of the economic damage?

Governments retain power through leverage. They don't actually have the power to destroy everyone, but they have the power to destroy one person, and the power to threaten everyone with the risk of being that one person. When the government is wrong, this relies on everyone being too afraid to do the right thing, and people not talking to each other and working together.

This is pretty basic stuff. If you stand up and no one else does, you die now. If no one stands up, you die later. If everyone stands up, you win. Which would you rather do?

Re: Cowards

#128

Post by einhverfr »

natrius wrote: post #98
sage_joch wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What the hell does this even mean? It means that if telling the truth is illegal, they should have the courage to break the law.

I don't think we have enough information to come to that conclusion. Plain old FISA orders are lawful and constitutional. There's no good reason to disclose them, but there is a good reason to push for a limited term on their secrecy. As described, PRISM is far from a plain old FISA order. It sounds like they're collecting data broadly. If that's the case, that's worth leaking. Someone thought so.

Also consider this. They have a 51% confidence that the target is foreigner.

In the case of gmail, "please send me a random 10 users' info, data, and emails" gives you over a 70% chance that any given one in that sample is a foreigner. With Facebook it is closer to 85%.

So think about that. It means the filters could deliberately overinclude Americans and still meet their standards.

Re: Cowards

#129

Post by asmithmd1 »

natrius wrote: post #98
sage_joch wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What the hell does this even mean? It means that if telling the truth is illegal, they should have the courage to break the law.

I don't think we have enough information to come to that conclusion. Plain old FISA orders are lawful and constitutional. There's no good reason to disclose them, but there is a good reason to push for a limited term on their secrecy. As described, PRISM is far from a plain old FISA order. It sounds like they're collecting data broadly. If that's the case, that's worth leaking. Someone thought so.

"Plain old FISA orders are lawful and constitutional."

Maybe that is currently true; jailing Japanese Americans also passed court muster. Secret orders from a secret court doesn't square with the ideals of America I was taught in civics class.

Re: Cowards

#130

Post by einhverfr »

dylangs1030 wrote: post #23

An article that waxes poetic, yet is so very hollow and devoid of realism. What would you have these companies do? Band together in a mighty ring of technological resources and begin a Privacy Revolution? This is unrealistic. As an American, I am saddened and angered by the recent news of the past two days. I am disgusted with what our government has done - what it has hidden from us, to take advantage of us unawares…

This is true to a point. However, a much more appropriate response would have been "We are aware of the reports that we have been sending massive data to the NSA. If this was the case, I would not be able to confirm or deny it. I would just like you to keep that in mind as you report on this story."

Simple, straight to the point, and contains worlds of meaning behind the plausible deniability. "No sir, I did not think I was confirming the existence of the program. I believed I was operating in compliance with all gag orders and just reminding people that these orders come with gag orders, so because everyone knows that I didn't think that would violate the gag order...."

By issuing silly denials that didn't withstand more than a few hours of public scrutiny they look silly, cowardly, and dishonest.

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