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U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

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Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#341

Post by ClayShentrup »

studentrob wrote: post #323
ClayShentrup wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, Approval Voting is simpler and radically superior to IRV. www.electology.org/approval-voting-vs-irv Bayesian Regret calculations show IRV is actually THE WORST of the five commonly discussed alternative voting systems. The best is Score Voting, but it's not as simple as Approval Voting. http://ScoreVoting.net/BayRegsFig.html Clay Shentrup Co-founder of The Center for Election Science

Cool. Here's a better introduction to score voting [1] The site you linked looks like it was built in 1998 [1] http://electology.org/score-voting

I wrote most of that page. :)

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#342

Post by clouddrover »

musiciangames wrote: post #331
clouddrover wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> never meant for government to have so much power that lobbying it would be able to buy much influence I don't think lobbying is a problem because the government has too much power, but rather because of the electoral system. When voting is voluntary elections are won by the party that is best able to get out the vote. In order to get out the vote huge sums of money must be spent on political advertising and organiz…

> The only downside of compulsory voting is that there are more votes to count Australia has compulsory voting. It also has the donkey vote, estimated at 2% of votes. That is a downside. http://australianpolitics.com/voting/electoral-system/donkey...

Before they introduced compulsory voting in Australia voter turn out had fallen below 60%. So with compulsory voting the "true vote" if you like is total votes minus informal votes minus donkey votes. Voter turn out for Australian elections these days is greater than 94%. If 5% of those votes are informal or donkey votes then that's still 89% of voters completing "true votes". A 30% non-vote has a far greater influence over an election than a 2% donkey vote.

The Australian Electoral Commission has a page about it: http://www.aec.gov.au/About_AEC/Publications/voting/index.ht...

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#343

Post by Retra »

woodman wrote: post #268
Retra wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't do brute force. And any information you already know about the message can theoretically help you decipher it. In fact, there is no such thing as unbreakable encryption, even if you disallow brute force methods.

One time pad using a TRNG - impossible to break, even in the case of chosen plaintext attacks. Now you could argue that having a key as long as the plaintext is impractical, but if that is your concern then let me direct your attention back to my original point. There is a big difference between what is mathematically possible and what is possible within the constraints of thermodynamics.

You're correct, of course. But you can still side-channel a one-time pad.

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#344

Post by URSpider94 »

peterwwillis wrote: post #310
CWuestefeld wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's make sure we know what we're talking about here. The CU decision was over a bunch of people who made a movie that was critical of a political candidate, and aired that movie not long before the election. Is it your contention that we really should prevent this kind of thing from happening? Because to me, it seems like the very cornerstone of the democratic system. The minute such activity is illegal, the people…

> The minute such activity is illegal, the people have lost and we've become an oligarchy, unable to provide information to our fellow citizens necessary to cast informed votes. 'The people' aren't the ones 'providing information', campaigns full of biased individuals trying to beat a competitor are. The system and its 'elections' has nothing to do with the people, it has to do with a few powerful wealthy entities st…

Campaigns are actually explicitly prohibited from coordinating in any way with the so-called SuperPAC's that have unlimited fundraising ability.

As the parent said, how would you propose to limit political speech in a meaningful way without infringing on the free speech rights of the public at large?

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#345

Post by URSpider94 »

chii wrote: post #11

I feel like cases shouldn't be droppable unless both parties mutually agree, and the courts also must first agree.the courts should not agree if it's a case that could set a precedent that can have far reaching implications. What if next time, a smaller player than Apple was caught in this sort of case, and they can't fight back as easily? Then it'd be easier to setup a precedent favourable to one party. This seems l…

The All Writs Act basically demands that the FBI drop the court order if they can find another route to achieve the goals of the writ. By many reports, the FBI was no happier than Apple about the case being dropped.

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#346

Post by woodman »

Retra wrote: post #343
woodman wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One time pad using a TRNG - impossible to break, even in the case of chosen plaintext attacks. Now you could argue that having a key as long as the plaintext is impractical, but if that is your concern then let me direct your attention back to my original point. There is a big difference between what is mathematically possible and what is possible within the constraints of thermodynamics.

You're correct, of course. But you can still side-channel a one-time pad.

That isn't an attack on the encryption, which is a very important distinction to make. But I'm curious what exactly you have in mind - we are repeatedly performing the same xor instruction, so power analysis won't work, and there is no branching, so timing wouldn't work either.

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#347

Post by eru »

winstonewert wrote: post #324
eru wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting point. Yes, approval voting, like all other voting systems, requires voters to not only know their preferences, but also to play a little `game' (in the game theory sense of the word). The optimal strategy on who to vote for depends not only on preferences, but also on what you know about the other voters. Polls help here. The nice thing about approval voting is that, even though their might not…

I don't think other system require "playing the game" in the same way as approval voting. You can game any voting system by voting strategically, but approval voting seems unique in actually expecting people to have to vote strategically.

> I don't think other system require "playing the game" in the same way as approval voting.

You must be joking? Almost no one ever votes their true preference in first-past-the-post. People usually vote for the lesser evil of the top two candidates, because any other strategy (like voting for who you'd actually like to win the election) just wastes your vote.

In any case, check out eg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Approval_voting for other people's thoughts on the system. There's much more online about all aspects and pros and cons that we don't need to rehash.

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#348

Post by eru »

ClayShentrup wrote: post #340
winstonewert wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think other system require "playing the game" in the same way as approval voting. You can game any voting system by voting strategically, but approval voting seems unique in actually expecting people to have to vote strategically.

You can vote strategically in any deterministic voting method. There's nothing special about Approval Voting. People can vote honestly based on whether they approve (have a favorable opinion of) a candidate. Or they can be tactical and base the decision on probability of winning.

And in approval voting at least your strategy is very close to honesty.

Your strategic consideration only consists in choosing a cutoff.

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#349

Post by eru »

ClayShentrup wrote: post #307
gfunk911 wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like the idea but don't agree that all you do is vote above the cutoff. If there are 10 choices and I approve of 3, but I know my 7 and 9 are the only possible winners, I'll likely vote 1 2 3 7.

Your best strategy is to approve all candidates you prefer to the expected value of the winner. http://www.electology.org/score-voting-threshold-strategy This works out well, tending to elect Condorcet winners. http://ScoreVoting.net/AppCW.html

Thanks. So the best strategy is even simpler!

So you do vote above the cutoff. But the optimal cutoff is really simple to find from the polls.

Re: U.S. Drops California Case Against Apple After Accessing iPhone

#350

Post by eru »

winstonewert wrote: post #315
ClayShentrup wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't a problem. Numerous contentious Approval Voting elections and exit polls have been held with Approval Voting, showing voters can certainly cast a vote without being paralyzed by indecisiveness. If YOU can't make up your mind, then just don't vote. Seriously. You can get Approval Voting and just not even show up and vote. You'll still get massively better election outcomes because of all the people who do s…

I didn't intend to suggest someone wouldn't vote because they are "paralyzed by indecisiveness." My concern is that people will vote sub-optimally due to poor information about other voters preferences and poor understanding of the strategy involved.

That's a valid concern. http://www.electology.org/score-voting-threshold-strategy argues that in approval voting an honest ballot would give you (by some measure) at least 91% of the impact of a perfect tactical ballot.

An honest vote in first-past-the-post, say for your awesome friend Bob for President, would give you approximately 0% return compared to the proper strategy of voting for the lesser evil of Clinton.

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