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It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

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Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#151

Post by soulofmischief »

jespinel wrote: post #9

IMO, this is one of the main strengths of the US: you have 50 different options to live according to your values and beliefs, and relatively little friction if you decide to move to a state that better reflects them.

In addition to everything else said downstream of your comment, I want to point out that there is a recent trend of legislation quickly being introduced across several states at once, as evidenced by the rash of "social media" teen bans and such.

It is unrealistic for many to move states or live in their ideal state, but we don't even live in the "50 different options" world anymore.

Corporate and NGO interest groups are seeing to it that your politicians and journalists are controlled from the municipal to national levels. Tribal two-party politics has reduced our world to "red" and "blue" states, and plenty authoritarian legislation has bipartisan support.

You also can't just keep playing whack-a-mole and uprooting your entire life each time a state you considered safe suddenly introduces legislation you disagree with.

Some would even argue that it isn't very patriotic to flee a community and allow it to rot instead of participating in its liberation.

Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#152

Post by lxgr »

r14c wrote: post #95
Ajedi32 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point, though I still think it's a pretty good backstop if the worst thing a tyrannical government can do to you is force you to move 100 miles.

For context, states within 100mi of Salt Lake City are: - Wyoming - Idaho 100mi doesn't get you into the population center of either state. the western US is BIG, really you're talking like 1k miles to get anywhere that's meaningfully different from utah. Depending on where you live in utah, that might not get you out of the state either.

Also, how high are the chances that these two states will never pass similar laws?

As far as I can tell for similar laws (e.g. age verification), once one state moves ahead on some controversial issue and gets away with it at the Supreme Court level, others follow suit very quickly, and then your odds quickly go to 50:50 when you thought you were picking out the best of 50.

Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#153

Post by atmavatar »

Avicebron wrote: post #96
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #28

This is the next part of the national Orwellian surveillance system that is "age verification". The first part installs spyware in every operating system. The second part makes it illegal to work around it or find any alternative means of privacy. The final step is a government-mandated ID for logging into these devices with the OS controls, so the government can track everything you do on every device. This is the m…

As hyperbolic as it stands, right to privacy should be an amendment. As long as the internet continues to be an integral part of banking, insurance, healthcare, education, (name anything vaguely personal) we can't allow free, unmonitored transit around it to be curtailed. Imagine losing your health insurance because the rightspeak of yesterday became the wrongspeak of today. It's insane people can't grasp this.

The fourth amendment is already what you're asking for.

Unfortunately, it was worded to address the privacy concerns of the time and the Supreme Court over the years has watered it down significantly, not the least of which has been to allow the warrantless purchase of personal information from corporations who collect it from their customers, regardless of their consent or knowledge.

Notwithstanding whether there's a chance at being ratified, we could update the fourth amendment to modernize it and counter bad Supreme Court rulings as well, but I'm afraid it's going to have to be a repeated process of touching it up from time to time in the face of bad actors in government who want to chip away at its protections.

Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#154

Post by 0xbadcafebee »

sigbottle wrote: post #100
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #28

This is the next part of the national Orwellian surveillance system that is "age verification". The first part installs spyware in every operating system. The second part makes it illegal to work around it or find any alternative means of privacy. The final step is a government-mandated ID for logging into these devices with the OS controls, so the government can track everything you do on every device. This is the m…

No amount of technology solves social, political, and ethical problems, unfortunately.

Absolutely agreed! We must show up and protest, via phone/email/social, and in person. Threatening to vote them out of office is our one card to play.

Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#155

Post by 0xbadcafebee »

jespinel wrote: post #9

IMO, this is one of the main strengths of the US: you have 50 different options to live according to your values and beliefs, and relatively little friction if you decide to move to a state that better reflects them.

All the states are passing these laws, as part of a coordinated billion-dollar lobbying campaign.

Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#156

Post by Barbing »

lxgr wrote: post #149
Barbing wrote: post #70

“The internet is built to, and will always, route around censorship. If Utah successfully hampers commercial VPN providers, motivated users will transition to non-commercial proxies, private tunnels through cloud services like AWS, or residential proxies that are virtually indistinguishable from standard home traffic. These workarounds will emerge within hours of the law taking effect. Meanwhile, the collateral damag…

A nice idea in theory, but would you seriously argue that all the Internet censorship in several countries has been completely without effects? A law doesn't need to be impossible to circumvent to cause great damage.

It can, right. One effect’s directly listed (“the collateral damage will fall on businesses, journalists, and survivors of abuse who rely on commercial VPNs for essential data security.”)

Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#157

Post by pseudalopex »

dlcarrier wrote: post #141
pseudalopex wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A more truthful take would be something like "Utah is the latest state to pass yet another law that conflicts with the constitution and will not go into effect". The law will go into effect probably. It may be negated later.

Technically, unconstitutional laws stay on the books, but they are not enforceable. You could say that they are in effect when the law becomes official, but for all practical purposes, the prohibition on describing what a VPN is or how to use it is unenforceable and not in effect.

Many unconstitutional laws were enforced before negated. And laws negated specifically and a law you hope will be negated are not equivalent.

To negate a law consumes money and time. They are practical purposes. Or you predicted Utah will try to enforce the law never? Chilling effects are effects. And a reasonable person would not call someone untruthful because they predicted differently.

The headline was sensational. The law takes effect was not.

Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#158

Post by Barbing »

close04 wrote: post #2

> It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs > The law, which takes effect May 6, doesn't make VPNs illegal — but it's a blow to your rights, even if you don't live in Utah. > websites subject to the state's age verification law will be legally barred from explaining how to use a VPN to get around age restrictions. They'll also be liable for enforcing age verification for any user within Utah's phy…

Is that why this post is missing from the front page? But it doesn’t show flagged.

Re: It's official: Utah is the U.S. state closest to banning VPNs

#159

Post by cucumber3732842 »

kstrauser wrote: post #47
jespinel wrote: post #9

IMO, this is one of the main strengths of the US: you have 50 different options to live according to your values and beliefs, and relatively little friction if you decide to move to a state that better reflects them.

The problem is when some states get full of themselves and try to regulate wants to remove the right for local kids to see adult content by pushing complex, unmeetable requirements onto all 50 states. Texas wants to block the other 49 from sending Federally-legal medicines to Texas residents. In general, "small government" states spent a lot of time and effort making other states implement their local experiments. If…

How's this any different than CA telling merchants across the country they can't ship in all manner of products?
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