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Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

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Re: Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

#91

Post by try_the_bass »

yason wrote: post #38
michaelt wrote: post #18

I sometimes wonder whether the people in the tech industry who worked on things like secure boot, attestation, and DRM saw this as the inevitability open source advocates always saw it as. Did they think, as they worked to transfer final say from users to corporations, by technical means, that politicians couldn't transfer that control to themselves by political means? Did they think they could lock things down to ex…

My impression is that people who can work on stuff like that are the kind who just take the stuff in the world for granted. "This is how the world is, we need digital restrictions so now we need to implement them." "I don't have a say about whether DRM or remote attestation is standard business practice or not, it is just how it is." This is akin to how two kinds of people respond to law. The first kind think "This i…

> This is akin to how two kinds of people respond to law. The first kind think "This is the law, we must follow it" and the other kind think "This law doesn't make sense, we must change it".

What? I don't understand how this is a "two kinds of people" generalization, when the two categories aren't even mutually-exclusive?

One can think a law is bad and should change, while simultaneously recognizing the rule of law and following it.

It's pretty weird to try to pit those two perspectives against each other

Re: Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

#92

Post by iugtmkbdfil834 »

windowliker wrote: post #82

How long until we find out the politicians have written in an exemption for themselves and the security apparatus? I hope my pessimism is unwarranted in this case, but it certainly isn't unfounded.

Meh, at this point it is pretty much standard clause. They are all copying each other's homework.

Re: Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

#93

Post by GZGavinZhao »

michaelt wrote: post #18

I sometimes wonder whether the people in the tech industry who worked on things like secure boot, attestation, and DRM saw this as the inevitability open source advocates always saw it as. Did they think, as they worked to transfer final say from users to corporations, by technical means, that politicians couldn't transfer that control to themselves by political means? Did they think they could lock things down to ex…

They're ultimately employees. Their employers hire them to write the code that the employers want. If they don't write the code, employers just fire them and move on to hire some other people to write code. As much as how ethically questionable it is, it's still very rare that people would give up their jobs to defend their viewpoint.

Re: Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

#96

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

michaelt wrote: post #18

I sometimes wonder whether the people in the tech industry who worked on things like secure boot, attestation, and DRM saw this as the inevitability open source advocates always saw it as. Did they think, as they worked to transfer final say from users to corporations, by technical means, that politicians couldn't transfer that control to themselves by political means? Did they think they could lock things down to ex…

Meanwhile Signal Corporation keeps trying to connect to updates2.signal.org even when the app is not being used. "Automatic updates", remote code execution by default with no option to disable

Silicon Valley has its own ideas of what "privacy" and "surveillance" mean

To those folks, it does not mean privacy from Silicon Valley companies

The Signal app will keep on trying to connect to the mothership

Because to the people who work on Silicon Valley software, that is not a privacy violation

The battle is over _control_ over software not privacy or surveillance. The later is not possible without the former

Silicon Valley does not want the user to have control any more than they want the government to have control

Re: Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

#97

Post by iugtmkbdfil834 »

pixl97 wrote: post #44
rockskon wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the average person think this? Perception of what other people think doesn't always line up with what they actually think.

>Does the average person think this? The average person hold all kinds of conflicting views. The average middle class parent will surveil the shit out of their children, for example. Hence the title of the article is not completely correct. The outcome of surveillance is the intent of the entity surveilling. In the case of the parent, this is likely the safety of their offspring. In the case of a state entity, it's l…

I think you are onto something with intent here. By now, we effectively know that various power centers are getting away with things that normal people do not. If true, the concern is not that we are getting away with things, but that we might be thinking that maybe current arrangement is no longer suitable. In other words, they are literally preparing for a worst case scenario. And to me, this seems silly now. As in, I buy the fear of a peasant uprising and being on the wrong side of the scythe, but I sincerely doubt peasants will actually do anything.

Re: Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

#98

Post by thenthenthen »

areoform wrote: post #14

Signal should come out swinging. Here's a pitch. The Government is going to put a snitch on every phone, tape every bedroom, and listen in every evening on every home. Every doctor's visit. Every therapy session. Every pub. Every street. Every store. When the snitches phone home, what you type to your lover may get the cops sent to your home. Artificial stasi in every desktop, laptop, tablet, camera, and phone. Aroun…

Signal the messaging app/platform? A funny thing is that Signal barely works (with VPN ofc) here in China. Sending media/images is impossible. Sometimes it’s blacked out weeks on end. Everything else seems to work fine ish (again with VPN ofc).

Re: Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

#99

Post by big85 »

skynotblue wrote: post #25

[flagged]

Surveillance which violates the privacy or other rights of lawful citizens is worse than crime, I argue. The criminal fears the police, but the government obeys nobody.

Security cameras in public areas, I don't have a problem. Government mandated scanning software running on my PC, yeah, I have a problem. It amounts to a warrantless search.

Re: Surveillance is not safety: A statement on the UK's latest threat to privacy [pdf]

#100

Post by iugtmkbdfil834 »

cucumber3732842 wrote: post #43
rockskon wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the average person think this? Perception of what other people think doesn't always line up with what they actually think.

The average person doesn't think that far ahead. They just hear "a cause I like can be furthered by implementing 1984" and so they support it. Check out any comment section on transportation policy, environmental policy, professional licensing for trades other than software. Look at how HN, people who should know how this sausage is made, schemes about how policy and technology can be used by government to enforce it…

There is something to be said about true believers, who will go out of their way to not 'live and let live'. I remember getting extra antsy when one such individual was flying drones over private properties looking for signs for what they believe is an issue.

Tech.. it truly is a tool and something of a true reveal of character. It immediately shows what you do with power.

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