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Google’s Schmidt: Surveillance fears are ‘going to end up breaking the Internet’

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Google’s Schmidt: Surveillance fears are ‘going to end up breaking the Internet’

#51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Year later and people still misquote that, you should look up the reality of your quote.

The misquote is close enough. "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place." Years later and people are still defending the indefensible by calling into question the messengers instead of responding to his actual message.

> The misquote is close enough.

No it isn't, you proceed to misquote him again by missing out half of his point.

> Years later and people are still defending the indefensible by calling into question the messengers instead of responding to his actual message.

Then quote his goddamn message, instead of cutting it in half.

Re: Google’s Schmidt: Surveillance fears are ‘going to end up breaking the Internet’

#52
post #50
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The major powers don't do it, in turn, because they have more to gain from trade than from piracy. Don't you think that applies to the Internet, too?

Maybe. Spying is less invasive than piracy and less likely to dampen commerce. Is anyone not going to shop at Amazon because the government might spy on the transaction?

That is the claim the story makes for instance:

>Wyden himself cited a study from Forrester Research that found that surveillance concerns could cost U.S. companies a quarter of their foreign revenue by 2016.

The bigger issue is not consumer behavior but how Nation-States react. If they balkanize and securitize the internet then consumers may not be able to access amazon/google/facebook even if they wanted to (see Great Firewall of China). This is exactly the point Google and members of the US Senate are making in the article.

Re: Google’s Schmidt: Surveillance fears are ‘going to end up breaking the Internet’

#53
post #50
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The major powers don't do it, in turn, because they have more to gain from trade than from piracy. Don't you think that applies to the Internet, too?

Maybe. Spying is less invasive than piracy and less likely to dampen commerce. Is anyone not going to shop at Amazon because the government might spy on the transaction?

Yes; that's kinda the whole theme of the article.

Re: Google’s Schmidt: Surveillance fears are ‘going to end up breaking the Internet’

#54

It's funny because even though the headline is hyperbolic, I feel that it's not far from the truth... except it's not going to end up breaking the internet. The internet has been broken from the outset. It wasn't originally designed for high security, it was designed for collaboration and it's only as we start retrofitting security on top of it are we realizing just how inadequate it is. It just goes to show that whe…

There is a term for this - it is "peak internet". I suggest that peak internet occurred in 2010, give or take:

http://blog.kozubik.com/john_kozubik/2010/12/peak-internet.h...

Re: Google’s Schmidt: Surveillance fears are ‘going to end up breaking the Internet’

#55
post #48

Google (and others) has a simple solution to this: encrypt everything end-to-end. If Google can't know what the user's data is, then neither can the US government (supposedly). That should increase the trust other countries put into Google and other tech companies.

Then how do I search my GMail?

EDIT: Fat clients

This is where Apple's and Google's respective computing strategies start showing their strengths and weaknesses. Apple has put a lot of effort into creating the best "fat" client platforms around. From iOS to Mac OS X, the majority of the functionality exists at the endpoint, augmented by optional cloud services with fairly narrowly-scoped purposes.

By contrast, Google delivers an end-user experience by pushing their platform closer to end users. Google operates on the basis that the network is cheap (RIP Sun, "The network is the computer"), and that it can economize by providing functionality at the data center.

I'd argue that Google reflects a more modern way of thinking, and that Apple's approach is somewhat anachronistic. However, as far as surveillance goes, Apple is perhaps at an advantage. All things equal, it's easier to attack a few datacenters than to individually attack millions of reasonably secure endpoints.

This is doubly true when we consider business models of the two companies. In order for Google to monetize your information, it needs to see your information in some sense. That makes Apple's business model of mostly doing cost recovery through device sales even more beneficial in a surveillance-averse world.

EDIT 2: If Apple wanted to be proactive about divesting Google from some of its monetizable data collection, it would extend something like iMessage encryption to Apple users on Gmail. Send email from Apple's client to another iDevice user over gmail? Give them the option of encrypting it. Don't let Google peek in.

Re: Google’s Schmidt: Surveillance fears are ‘going to end up breaking the Internet’

#56
post #46
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I could see where you're coming from, but the two objective arguments I see that argue for the toning down of government surveillance, or at least major changes to our surveillance system would be: 1. The current policies and attitude are [seemingly] going to have negative economic impacts of enormous proportions. 2. Surveillance will always be a cat and mouse game as technology improves, and surveillance will become…

I agree, and I think the surveillance should be drastically reformed. I just think that the only way to accomplish this is to convince a large chunk of the population to change their minds on the issue, not to try to start at the top of government.

I guess eventually those people will be at the top of government, which is really cool to think about.
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