Looking Back at the Snowden Revelations

Post by cameronbrown » Wed, Sep 25, 2019, 3:32 PM UTC

Darkstryder wrote: post #122

stiray wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am European too. But without the freedom of speech, we wouldnt be discussing this. They are both liberties and we need them both. There is no "I care more about X". We need them both as fundamental human rights.

Of course. But free speech is not absolute, even in USA (libel laws and all that). What I find interesting is how the threshold between the freedom of speech and the freedom of others people is set differently between US and most of Europe. For instance you can be convicted for incitement to ethnic or racial hatred in a lot of European countries [1] while to the best of my knowledge this kind of speech is protected i…

Post by cameronbrown » Wed, Sep 25, 2019, 3:35 PM UTC

Darkstryder wrote: post #72

stiray wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Description of my life. I was telling people for years what is going on, not from position of daydreaming, but what I would be able to pull off. I got back everything from tin foil hat to "I have nothing to hide". Snowden changed that and I am gratefull to him for exactly that... And for one more sentance, that is a work of pure genius: “Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing…

> “Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say.” I find this sentence interesting because it is very specific to the American public. I am European and personally I care a lot more about privacy than free speech, and America's obsession with free speech boggles my mind. It might hav…

Post by jigglesniggle » Wed, Sep 25, 2019, 3:39 PM UTC

pingyong wrote: post #95

jigglesniggle wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You assume a device can not be tracked from creation to dsitribution. Why?

Of course one device can be tracked. But not every CPU can be tracked, I consider that quite infeasible indeed. If you already know the target, and know that target is looking to buy a new PC/laptop, you can feed it a specific CPU, sure. But you could just as well feed it some sort of modified BIOS that doesn't require any special hardware, and would be pretty much just as hard to detect for someone that isn't specif…

Post by PopeDotNinja » Wed, Sep 25, 2019, 3:43 PM UTC

cookie_monsta wrote: post #114

PopeDotNinja wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't say I don't care. I would say I permanently trust government less, as I do feel mostly powerless to make them less nosey. If I have an opportunity to vote against mass surveillance, I will do that for sure.

Under what circumstances can you imagine being given a vote on mass surveillance?

Post by lostjohnny » Wed, Sep 25, 2019, 3:46 PM UTC

cameronbrown wrote: post #133

Darkstryder wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say.” I find this sentence interesting because it is very specific to the American public. I am European and personally I care a lot more about privacy than free speech, and America's obsession with free speech boggles my mind. It might hav…

Free speech is not responsible for WWII at all?! You forget that Hitler's ideas were popular at the time - that's why he was elected. Slowly but surely it was the free speech of Jews, their very ability to combat the incoming tyranny before it was to late, was clamped down on. As such, censorship was quite popular. Free speech levels the playing field between government and people.