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Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

patrick-breyer.de

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Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#201

Post by munk-a »

citilife wrote: post #164
xanaxagoras wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unless you're pre-informed on the issues, whoever presents it to you can just pick the side that gets you to the answer they want. This summarizes a good 75% of modern political discourse.

Ironically, this is why a lot of people argue everyone shouldn't vote. Basically, if you add some minor barriers to voting you'll get only those who know and care about what's going on to vote. Otherwise, you'll have lemmings. Where people with a bit of propaganda will drive everyone else off the cliff.

"Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time" - Churchill

There's a reason this quote gets echoed so frequently. Picking special electors to drive the government in a more informed manner is a dangerous path which includes a lot of danger around how to pick those electors.

It might be nice if there was a way to fairly filter out the politically illiterate but then again even the best system is likely just going to result in systemic discrimination against the disenfranchised class... and I think it's pretty damn likely that the filter would be quickly manipulated to shape the voting block in some partisan direction beyond just political literacy.

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#202

Post by dang »

This falls into the category of a bill proposal, or maybe not even that, since it seems to be just a paragraph announcing a forthcoming proposal?

For a substantive HN thread, it's probably better to wait until there's something actual to discuss. For better and/or worse, proposed bills usually don't come to much (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...).

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#203

Post by pimterry »

jka wrote: post #185
SiempreViernes wrote: post #85

I went three indirections down and I still can't find any actual quotes or even summaries of concrete proposals, so I'm surprised how many people can confidently judge that these unexplained proposals are a dumpster fire solely on the basis that they aim to precent child sexual abuse material... The most specific thing I found was a linked document that laid out three possible legislation options, all in very loose l…

Here's one regulatory measure that's enforced already and seems to fit within the criteria being described: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2021/1232/oj (agreed, it would be nice to have direct links to the enacted and proposed regulations to compare and understand the language used)

'Enforced' isn't the right word for that legislation - it's a derogation, meaning it's removing rules, not creating them.

Specifically, that regulation gives service providers a temporary legal mechanism to continue to scan their own traffic for CSAM, if and only if they want to do so, without breaking the law due to GDPR etc (which otherwise made doing so arguably illegal). It just re-legalized the scanning that service providers were doing voluntarily before GDPR, and which they're doing regardless outside the EU anyway.

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#204

Post by KoftaBob »

reedjosh wrote: post #17
PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Needlessly cynical. Human organizations of all kinds have problems, including governments. If you don't believe that government can ever function in a manner intended by the people it nominally represents, then everything is hopeless, since we (the vast majority of people) were also screwed over without representative government. I don't agree that one needs to conclude this. You can believe in government at the same…

> since we (the vast majority of people) were also screwed over without representative government. Without government we at least had choice. I think you're needlessly cynical. Humans can organize themselves quite well when they have maximum choice as individuals. The robber barons of the early nineteenth century were bolstered by governments--not hindered. Governments have always been corrupt.

Can you find me an example of this anarcho-libertarian system in the present/past that functions better than the current government systems of the developed world?

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#205

Post by 8note »

caterpi11ar wrote: post #108
arcticbull wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abortion is especially strange since a supermajority of Americans, across the political spectrum, of both genders, generally agree that some abortions should be permitted [1]. 70% want to keep the status quo. [2] It's even arguably a violation of the religious freedom of Jewish folks to ban abortion [3]. It's not forbidden by the Bible either - the Bible makes it clear that life begins 'at first breath' (Genesis 2:7)…

That Bible passage is about God blowing His breath into Adam who was non-biological clay up to that point. It has nothing to do with Adam taking his first breath. Obviously, Adam was never a foetus, nor was he a child, nor a teenager. As according to this passage life starts when you are a full grown man, should we allow abortions into the 108th trimester?

> should we allow abortions into the 108th trimester

Yes. That's not a viable fetus, and keeping it in the womb forever isn't going to change that

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#206

Post by solarkraft »

srcreigh wrote: post #45

Here's the uncommon opinion. Google/FB, by extension US government, already performs mass surveillance. There are actually 2 solutions to this problem. One is stopping Google/FB. The other is making mass surveillance more common, lessening the impact of mass surveillance. In that sense non-US govs taking mass surveillance is a boon to power balances and competition amongst nations and economies. Does this opinion hav…

> making mass surveillance more common, lessening the impact of mass surveillance

The fuck?

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#207

Post by jollybean »

mildmotive wrote: post #86
jollybean wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

? I don't get it, it's the easiest thing to understand. Terrorism, human trafficking, 'high treason' (i.e. nuclear secrets, spying). Those are very real things and I think it would be relatively easy to convince the population that some degree of oversight is necessary. Because there's legitimacy. I fully support the idea, nominally, except that I don't trust the bureaucracy at all, and so I'm pretty much against it,…

> To the point where I think a national committee ought to validate every single surveillance request, not even a local judge. Which wouldn’t make it mass-surveillance. The problem is when the government enforces an infrastructure of mass-surveillance where information about everybody, in their homes, outside, their communication, and so on, is being collected. Regular people like you and I will have zero ability to…

Yes, but it's more complicated.

For example - I think in the US, Verizon etc. has to keep a history of 'call records' - so that, in the event of some issues, that information can be acquired. I don't know how much oversight goes into that later part, but ideally, it would be a lot.

Even in that case, there is kind of a 'record' or 'background tracking' related to what would otherwise be 'very legit' situation.

Same for search, tweets, DMs etc. etc..

I'm fine with it as long as there is 'really good oversight' ... which I don't trust any of our governments to do. Not the EU/UK/US/Canada etc..

The answer is always the same: 'it depends' , 'it's nuanced', and always requires 'high degree of competence', 'transcend politicization', 'transcend descent into bureaucracy' and 'unforeseen situations' esp. 'data leaks', 'weird constitutional rulings' and 'weird populist political situations'. Etc..

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#208

Post by UnpossibleJim »

arcticbull wrote: post #61
joebob42 wrote: post #6

I don't understand who wants this. does any of their actual constituency want it? Or is it literally just the actual elected officials getting power hungry? Stuff like abortion, etc where I don't really understand the other side. I've at least met real people who are pro life. I've never met the people who want these clownish surveillance things but they keep coming up anyways.

Abortion is especially strange since a supermajority of Americans, across the political spectrum, of both genders, generally agree that some abortions should be permitted [1]. 70% want to keep the status quo. [2] It's even arguably a violation of the religious freedom of Jewish folks to ban abortion [3]. It's not forbidden by the Bible either - the Bible makes it clear that life begins 'at first breath' (Genesis 2:7)…

I mean, the whole argument on the sacredness of life by the religious right is hypocritical as the new testament is anti war, and any justification of war doesn't come about until post 400 A.D. when the "saints" weigh in on the subjects. The apostles were pretty "hippy-ish" about it.[1]

Their pro-life stance would hold A LOT more weight if they were out protesting wars and military spending, not to mention foreign occupation through military means and trying to have that money spent on humanitarian programs. I give credit to the Amish for at least being consistent (and no, I'm not religious).

[1] https://www.christianbiblereference.org/faq_war.htm

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#209

Post by solarkraft »

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #62

This seems to be contrary to GDPR, and possibly might not fly for a country like -say- Germany.

GDPR mainly forbids abusing data for your own purposes. It probably allows abusing it for the government through law enforcement cooperation.

Re: Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11

#210

Post by mcv »

joebob42 wrote: post #6

I don't understand who wants this. does any of their actual constituency want it? Or is it literally just the actual elected officials getting power hungry? Stuff like abortion, etc where I don't really understand the other side. I've at least met real people who are pro life. I've never met the people who want these clownish surveillance things but they keep coming up anyways.

As far as I understand it, it's always been the European Commission who wants this, and the European Parliament that opposes this. Hopefully they will do so again, but it might be prudent to remind them that they need to oppose this.
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