the most ironic part is that it's the US itself which is going to monitor compliance.
The entire problem for me is basically what Snowden revealed. In most democratic western countries a certain level of privacy is actually enshrined into law due to it's propensity for abuse. -- the US spying on Swedens behalf means that technically Sweden is not spying on Swedes.
The US having data on me by itself isn't a huge deal; there's no fucking way I will ever want to live there and factually: nobody is going to go sniffing into my life like in the movie "Enemy of the State" (though I suppose they could). However, the US sharing that information with Sweden can affect my life, because it's intentionally bypassing a protection that I am supposed to have in order to live in a free democratic system.
Failure to respect privacy lends itself to authoritarianism as people will self-censor if they feel they are not able to express themselves. Maybe I'm overstating this but it's a real concern of mine.
>Failure to respect privacy lends itself to authoritarianism as people will self-censor if they feel they are not able to express themselves. Maybe I'm overstating this but it's a real concern of mine.
Likely not overstating it because this is exactly what has happened both historically and currently in some countries.
The need for privacy is proven, not because people need to hide criminal behaviour or menial things, but because we can't rely on people with power to always do the right thing.
But it is also to hide criminal behaviour and that is actually good for a democracy because many things that were illegal previously are now legal because people broke bad laws, got away with it and nothing bad actually happened to the point that it changed all of society's mind on the issue enough to vote in favor of changing the law.
To have a functional democracy we actually need enough friction in the enforcement system that people have a reasonable chance of getting away with breaking laws so enforcement becomes a conscious decision to expend resources for obvious societal gain rather than a dragnet on behaviour we may not like but questionably harms anyway beyond the individual engaging in said behaviour.
Is it actually proven or does it just sound nice when stated that way? Perhaps it is, but my counter proof would be taking no measures to protect privacy, very likely being fully tracked by government, and not having any negative consequence. Privacy doesn't seem like a "need" in practice, especially when many vulnerable people will just continue to be bothered by police on public streets, forever.
Then the must face whatever punishment that society deems suitable for them if they are a part of it. It may seem unfair to that person, but it is considered to be for the greater good of people.
Okay, so our society here has decided that people who espouse your view need to immediately commit suicide or be killed by torturous methods that take days. It's the law.
"Don't be Black or Asian or a woman because in some countries that's not acceptable." Do you see how silly you sound? (I leave open the possibility that you are not silly and instead just an asshole or a bigot.)
>Don't be Black or Asian or a woman because in some countries that's not acceptable.
You don't need to follow the laws of every country at all times. I am sure I have broken plenty of Chineese laws, but that's okay because I don't live in China.
Then acknowledge that you want the ability to be a criminal by doing things based off your own beliefs rather than pretending you aren't trying to hide that behaviour.
Screw it, I'll bite. Got a weird feeling you just didn't phrase what you were trying to say as well as you could, and would appreciate clarification.
Is your assertion accurately represented by the following prepositions:
A) The poster you're replying to, is desirous of the purported safety of guaranteed informational asymmetry from those in power
B) the poster in being so desirous, in all likelihood, is mistaken in the perception that codified informational asymmetry is a protection to them, because the same protection covers the person in power, except arguably moreso
Or...
C) the only reason to be desirous of such asymmetry in the first place is that one harbors the possibility of criminal intent.
Which from your phrasing of your original comment, came off with an unsaid part of "which I (referring to yourself) don't have or care about).
I'd like to think C doesn't enter the equation; and I'm fairly sure others have probably reacted thinking that was where you were going with it. If that was the case, fine...
However, even C) is rebuffed by "the definition of criminal is fluid and changes over time; and there is little guarantee in the stickyness or aggreeableness of said change". Material examples resonant with said rebuff can be found in the Roe v. Wade overturn, among other things.
But if B) is more in line with your thinking, I'd be quite interested in further expanding on it. I'd also be interested in where you fall eith regards to the statement "everyone is criminal at some point, no exceptions".
I've always entertained the hunch that one of the best disinfectants for a serving public official would be the complete dissolution of any right to privacy for the term of service. Coincidentally, there'd be problems in that most potential candidates for such work would be few and far between, and there could be pathological effects/selection pressures on the candidate pool, but I've never really had anyone to rubber duck the theory off of before.
I would say that my view is closer to C, but instead of having criminal intent someone would have intent to do something regardless of the legality.
>However, even C) is rebuffed by "the definition of criminal is fluid and changes over time; and there is little guarantee in the stickyness or aggreeableness of said change"
Which is why I believe it to be important for laws to not be retroactive. If someone is living somewhere which allows retroactive laws and wanted to do something then trying to find ways to hide your potentially criminal behavior could be desirable. I believe people should just be honest that they want to have their crimes be hidden to reduce their legal liability than to pretend that they just really like privacy as a concept or because they think privacy in a human right.
Interesting thoughts; I think on a fundamental level there is something you misunderstand about privacy though.
I genuinely do not engage in any criminal activities (that I am aware are criminal at least) - so I dont fully understand where the criminality angle comes from.
However, consider the toilet: everyone basically knows whats going on in the toilet, some people do criminal things in the toilet, yet we give toilets doors & special stalls. This is what privacy is, a little comfort that you are not being watched while doing intimate or personal things. With the understanding that, yes, sometimes this comfort can lead to some people abusing it.
Heres the blatant problem with the law changing without true justification: people plan around the laws and if a right is lost suddenly it would have life altering ramifications for more than a negligible volume of people.
If society has proven anything, it is that criminal justice systems are imperfect and laws are arbitrarily defined by the most powerful individuals in a country.
The suggestion you're making is that rather than recognise abuse of power, that instead this is an excuse for individuals to commit unnamed crimes.
So I thought I'd start at the most basic example: Police that have used government databases to spy, stalk and harrass: ex's and attractive women they saw in public. This is barely scratching the surface in the many ways that information of totally innocent people has been misused.
This list is of course not exhaustive. There are simply too many examples to cite here.
There are no "good guys and bad guys", that is an infant's-level understanding of crime. Rather all systems need to be designed assuming that bad actors may access them. This means that "red tape" and oversight is needed, as well as ensuring that not too much information is pooled into a single system.
The information that Facebook/Google learns about their users far exceeds what governments have allowed in their own systems. Privacy advocates are right to be concerned about access to these systems.
This is true of most democratic countries especially the "Five Eyes" and "Fourteen Eyes" countries.
That I currently have a protection in law does not mean that the sitting government enjoys that I have it, however it is politically toxic to remove such laws directly so they erode them over time; in the mean time they enter these arrangements with third-party countries. (thus, terms like FIVEYES and FOURTEENEYES exist)
I believe though that intentionally loopholing the law to avoid this political problem is much worse than repealing the laws that protect me. It shows a fragrant disregard for the rule of law.
a Rundown of the western alliances:
* Five Eyes countries: United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand
* Nine Eyes countries: The Five Eyes plus Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, and France
* Fourteen Eyes countries: The Nine Eyes plus Italy, Germany, Belgium, Sweden, and Spain
* Partners of the 14 Eyes: Israel, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, British Overseas Territories
There's precedent for the EU and other western European nations pressuring the US to do the right thing. It would behoove European leaders to put some pressure on the US to pass their own domestic privacy laws in line with their own. Diplomatic pressures could be useful here, in conjunction with domestic lobbying.
As a US citizen, I'd love European style data protections enshrined as law.
there are actually some data protection laws enshrined in US law, the US enters these agreements because they are doing the same thing as I described but in the inverse.
> As a US citizen, I'd love European style data protections enshrined as law.
As a US citizen, I'm desperate for this. Or even better laws. The GDPR, for instance, is a great thing and better than anything we have going here -- but it's still insufficient.
> The US having data on me by itself isn't a huge deal; there's no fucking way I will ever want to live there and factually:
I don't know how anyone can say this with certainty about any country these days unless you have a terminal disease or are up there in laps around the sun.
You have Western leaders literally toying with the idea of starting WW3 this week by inviting Ukraine into NATO - and sure it's not a certaintly, but so-called world leaders with bunkers are surprisingly laissez-aller about this.
And sure, the US is part of that block of countries, but there's a ton more distance between Russia and the US, than between Russia and Sweden.
<< Maybe I'm overstating this but it's a real concern of mine.
I don't think you are. I live in US and its version of 'privacy' has been normalized to a horrifying degree ( click this button so that we can do whatever we want ). We are basically at a point where 'enemy of the state' movie comparison is not even apt, because in that movie the audience would be petrified by it. Most are comfortably post-privacy.
Just about every survey on this topic clarifies people are nowhere remotely near 'post-privacy.' [1] That's a random one, but they all say the exact same thing. Basically everybody, by an absolutely overwhelming margin, feels that the risks of mass surveillance (including from the government) outweigh the benefits, with a similarly overwhelming majority also concerned about how the data is being [mis]used.
The problem is our democracy is completely broken, and the fact that 80%+ of people agree on something that would even be socially beneficial, means absolutely nothing in terms of getting it done. Politicians and corporations love hoovering data for the exact same reason - perceived power. So nothing changes. And no politicians run on topics that people care about because you don't get to the point of being able to run for the presidency unless they're a billionaire, or have become really good at greasing the bellies of those that matter. And those that matter, only want even more surveillance.
It's topics like this, and others, that lead individuals like me to think our system is due to collapse. Not the issue in and of itself, but the fact we have a democracy that seems to have little to nothing to do with the interests of the people. Instead it's just propagandized crap after propagandized crap made into the issue of the day (that incidentally tends to have absolutely 0 benefit to the lives of the average American), while what people actually care about is completely ignored.
Anyhow, rant over. Point being, no nobody is "post-privacy", let alone comfortably. It's more like we're a democracy that's become "post-democracy", and seemingly comfortably so. Plato is more a prophet than a philosopher at this point.
> Basically everybody, by an absolutely overwhelming margin, feels that the risks of mass surveillance (including from the government) outweigh the benefits, with a similarly overwhelming majority also concerned about how the data is being [mis]used.
And this has always been true. People blame the victims of surveillance for not being concerned enough to stop the perpetrators, who somehow come off as innocent by comparison; i.e. if you let them get away with it, of course they'll do it - who wouldn't! You might as well say it of a murder victim (if you empathize with murderers like coders empathize with tech giants.) As Stallman says, you're compelled to sign away your rights, because they'll make you do it to send your kids to school, to have a phone, to pay your taxes, to go to court, to interview for a job, to pay your rent, etc. For the average person this entails signing dozens of EULAs with dozens of different companies.
We can pretend that we're living in a democracy, but if the current actual material reality of citizenship necessarily requires signing all of your rights away (most often your right to privacy, your right to trial, or your right to speak), you know where you're living. You don't need to be a techie to know what that is; everybody knows what that is.
I respectfully disagree. While I agree with the inclusion of corps and governments as interested parties bent on getting as much information as possible, I am unwilling to exclude just average people living in America. Last time I suggested a more private forum for something the response was an overwhelming, 'but X is free'. People are may be choosing between partial privacy and subsidized non-private services, but they are actually overwhelmingly voting with their money for post-privacy stuff.
I am saying this as the odd sheep in the family. Everyone else has kids running with Chromebooks, Ipads, every app imaginable, self imposed house wiretap and TV that carefully tracks their choices. And I have a wife too, which does put up with some of my craziness, but is unwilling to give up facebook so I need to carve out an exception for her on my network.
You are not wrong about our democracy, but have you considered that it is partially by design?
This sentiment lacks perspective. You know yourself how much of a hassle it is to preserve your privacy or rights, and how ineffective it can still be with lots of effort and a lot of technical knowledge. Tech is not other people's hobby and job, they've got other things to worry about. If you ask them, they'll tell you how they feel about their privacy, but they can't invest the time you have into understanding how to preserve it.
They give up their privacy and go to work. They give up their privacy and go to school. They give up their privacy to have a laugh. It's a horrible investment of time and effort for them to live in hyperawareness of actual threats that are also almost impossible to avoid. That doesn't make them responsible for their plight any more than a antebellum slave that fails to escape the plantation.
It is a valid argument. I actually agree with you ( and OP ). The point I am making is that we simply cannot take the blame off the victims either. Unlike plantation slaves they actually do have a choice ( an annoying choice, but a choice nonetheless ). It is hard, if not plain impossible, to move the needle if the general population response is a generalized shrug. They need to get angry. They are not there.
So yeah, I am accepting my share of the blame. People in general need to accept theirs. Once that happens, we can go after the actual culprits. Things don't change until we recognize reality for what it is.
I don’t think it is correct to reason from generic survey question to specific policy proposal. There is a revealed preference that privacy is not a major factor to many Americans when competing interests are thrown into the mix.
Most people living in the US believe that they can go on Facebook, post a copypasta "notice" that they got from a "lawyer friend" on Facebook that removes the right of Facebook to use or share any of their data, and that's enough to keep their data safe.
as if the spying is even necessary, sweden is more than willing to make up fake charges on behalf of the US wanting someone arrested, this is how they got assange
Snowden, if any, shown that the USA gov can and already do regularly monitor communications.
We have CTF, KYC and AML regulations, as well as any related laws, for a reason.
Europe has now to deal with Russian invasion of Ukraine, because of this anti American sentiment.
If you don't see how the two things are related, and blame the USA who's the largest security supporter of Ukraine and Europe via NATO, then this whole privacy debate is useless.
Edit: 100 years ago, Germany was in a similar position like Russia today. Large powerhouse who thought they could get their way by military force. Sure, let Germany take some poland. Because of Germany we got WW1 and WW2, and 100 years later many haven't really learned their lessons.
The entire problem for me is basically what Snowden revealed. In most democratic western countries a certain level of privacy is actually enshrined into law due to it's propensity for abuse. -- the US spying on Swedens behalf means that technically Sweden is not spying on Swedes.
The US having data on me by itself isn't a huge deal; there's no fucking way I will ever want to live there and factually: nobody is going to go sniffing into my life like in the movie "Enemy of the State" (though I suppose they could). However, the US sharing that information with Sweden can affect my life, because it's intentionally bypassing a protection that I am supposed to have in order to live in a free democratic system.
Failure to respect privacy lends itself to authoritarianism as people will self-censor if they feel they are not able to express themselves. Maybe I'm overstating this but it's a real concern of mine.