Most of us have better sense than to debate you on this topic, I still crack up at the thought of what happened to the last two guys on here who tried. And failed. Big time. They did not have "I do security engineering" in their vocabulary.
I seriously wonder what it would take for people to finally get up in arms over this topic and really have the conviction to ensure policies change. It seems people get upset for a little bit then get lulled back to sleep. Is it one of these things that people don't care about until it effects them significantly? If people on here aren't worried now (and personally I'm not as worried as I come off, I just find it interesting to think about) what would it take for you to be genuinely concerned? I think Oliver had it right perhaps, maybe people won't care until its their dick picks getting exposed or viewed. I guess conversations being recorded etc doesn't bother people, but some person in a dark room looking at a dick pick you sent to whoever? Thats too far?
That's just human nature... you only worry about shit that directly affects you. "Oh my god the black man is getting held back!" Uhmmm, I'm a white dude living in Canada, so beyond the PC "oh man, that's just wrong, I don't condone that" response, I couldn't give a shit. Because it doesn't affect me in the slightest. I'm not racist, it's not that I don't care that it's happening, it's just that I don't care enough to actually do something about it. "Oh my god women are getting paid less than guys!" Uhnmmm, again, I'm a dude making good bank, so beyond the PC "oh woman, that's just wrong, I don't condone that" response, I couldn't give a shit. Because it doesn't affect me in the slightest. I'm not a misogynist, it's not that I don't care that it's happening, it's just that I don't care enough to actually do something about it. "Oh my god the government is being slowly but surely bought by lobbyists and self-interest groups"! Meh, I'm too small to do anything about it, so I'll just hit this "like" button on facebook or upvote this Reddit thread... that'll show them. Heaven forbid I actually go do something constructive about it. See where I'm going with this? As long as people don't have an "in your face" personal impact of something, they generally just ignore it and go on their merry way. Or they're just too busy and wrapped up in the small things of life to really step back and see the big picture and invest the energy in doing something about it. Now, shut down their local bus stop, charge more for street parking, raise the price of their morning Starbucks, increase their property taxes, threaten to take away their jobs, and you'll get their immediate attention and they will actively do something about it... because it immediately impacts them. It's about the long view... very few people can see it, or give a shit about it. So many things are allowed to go on these days because there's no short-term affect from it, and there's no immediate impact. This surveillance thing WILL have a long-term effect, I guarantee it. And it's a case of boiling the frog... when it finally becomes apparent, it'll be too late. Read an interesting Reddit AMA about a woman who was in Germany during the rise of the Nazis, and she had some damn interesting things to say... nobody really saw it coming (except for a few who were shouting the warnings), but they were quickly silenced, and once it was there, it was too late. At that point it took a major uprising to change things.
You're right, most of us probably would get bored with it. But what about your crazy ex-girlfriend? Or your micro-managing boss? Or your overbearing mother? Or your frumpy wife who is trying to catch you masturbating "because it's cheating"? Or that annoying salesman? Or that corrupt cop? Or that stalker who has been watching you from afar, and today is the day he's finally going to "set you free"...
To piggyback on to this point a little bit; most people break the law everyday and they don't realize it. Gambling with your friends, internet piracy, evading part or all of taxes. Simple things, like betting $10 on a football game with a friend or doing a landscaping job under the table. It is illegal but people do this everyday without thinking about it. We all know that the true indication of someone's intent is to watch their actions and ignore their words. Watch the Government's actions, they are behaving in a paranoid and fearful way. Now they have the ability to watch you and listen to everything you say. They have the means to prove you are a criminal, which allows them the ability to incarcerate you. They haven't done it yet as far as I can tell but this combination gives them the leverage over you, to control you. In the end, I think this is the real point; control.
Well, see, the P in PM stood for private; but, on the new TiB, they're just called "conversations." Lol Sometimes the people shouting warnings are paranoid nutjobs, or wild-eyed skeptics. And, then sometimes, they're just old guys like me, that have years of experience to see where something is headed. A few years ago, we had a thread on TiB about the Snapshot device that Progressive Insurance offers. I went off on how that will be just another way for the government to get involved in my life. Because, I (correctly) assumed that in a few years, other insurance companies would also do that. And, I took it to the logical conclusion that in a few more years, every insurance company will require such a device, in order to have insurance with them. And, in a few more years, the government will require that the insurance companies provide that data "anonymously" - in the name of safety studies or some such nonsense. Eventually, it will lead to monitoring and potential "automatic tickets" mailed to you when you speed and things like that. Most of the reaction from TiB to my post, was that I was crazy, and it's just to save a few dollars on your insurance, and what's the big deal. Now Allstate and American Family and other insurance companies offer these devices. And, cops use a device called a Crash Cube where they can download info from your OBD following an accident. (They only collect it with your consent, right? And, they wouldn't download it if you were say, unconscious at the scene, right?) There is one delightful roadblock to this headed where I thought it was. The devices are fucking up people's cars and causing electric issues and component failures. So, there are class action suits in progress that may slow or shut down the conclusion I expected.
I feel like you guys have gone more hyperbolic. Don't you mean, "will never work perfectly"? The military protects the masses fairly well, no? Healthcare? Not saying either are flawless, but they've been around a while and I don't think a reasonable person would say either have "failed". And again, given our non-autocratic system, citizens (and the admittedly few Elizabeth Warren-like politicians) have the opportunity to change these or any mass-protecting programs. Is it really? You're honestly worried that your government is going to "retaliate" against you, for some reason, by sharing pics of your junk? "Toddamus was caught (doing some crime) and as punishment we're going to share pics of his penis for all to see - muhahaha!" To be honest the idea makes me chuckle. And if the government ever did some mass genital pic sharing, for some fucking reason, and it included mine, I would be FAR more puzzled and concerned about the maturity level of government officials than I would be embarrassed that everyone could see my (proud, triumphant) weiner. Why are you guys so fixated on dick pics? Good point. Let's take it further: every member can click on every other member's name and see every PM and rep point they've ever written, in addition to every post. Then what? The TiBettes would have their accounts scoured for nudes, members who don't like each other (hypothetically, of course) would go through each other's accounts to get their hate on, and then...we'd all have a quick Jack/Jill off to Shegirl's pics, go back to work and get on with our lives. If she's that crazy I would get a restraining order and the chip would ensure she never came within a certain distance of me. My boss would probably see the time I spend on here (something he could already do, by the way) and tell me to stop -- I wouldn't like it, but I can't really complain. If my mother really wanted to see the stuff I search online at home, she could do so at her own risk. I would never marry someone who did anything less than encourage my self-inflicted orgasms (assuming I'm not ignoring her). Isn't "annoying salesman" redundant? Not sure how that example would be any different than today (or 20 years ago). Corrupt cop wouldn't last long since he'd have a chip monitoring him, too. There's nothing stopping a stalker from doing exactly that today, except in my chip world, everyone would know who killed me automatically, so that might make said stalker think twice about turning my skin into curtains. This is where I got that fun thought experiment from. Not trying to be difficult, but neither one of those really bothers me. And like Nettdata said in another post, whether it's the government, private companies or determined hackers, we're all losing our privacy, and the longer this whole internet thing is around, the more we're likely to lose. I think you guys are overlooking a very real factor: it's not just the convenience that makes people willing (or complacent) to give up their privacy, it's that losing their privacy really isn't that bad, especially when it brings the ability to communicate with anyone and learn...basically anything (also porn). I bet that if the government straight up said "We have ALL the crotch shots", you guys wouldn't stop using your phones or even stop taking pantless pics. "They're lookin' at our dick pics!" is a great emotional rallying cry, and makes for a funny Oliver bit, but what is the big deal, really? A large part of why it gets a reaction out of people is that we've been conditioned to feel ashamed about our genitals and sexuality (stupid society). I think Huxley and Orwell were wrong on this point (but nonetheless insightful), and that the reality (in the western, democratized world) will end up somewhere in the middle. I think there's a good chance it's going to lead to a different, better society where people aren't so freaked out about trivial shit, possibly leaving room for us to tackle issues that actually matter. As good as the Oliver piece was, the worst take away I got from it, like in this thread, is 'dick pics omg!' What if, just maybe, we truly didn't give a shit about the fact that we all have junk of varying degrees of attractiveness?
First, let me start off with the whole "The government does a bad job at preventing terrorist attacks." That is bullshit. We have no idea at what doesn't happen because of their efforts. Just because 100% doesn't get stopped means they're shit. So let's get that out the way. My first question is this with the "THE GOVERNMENT WILL HAVE EVERYTHING" aspect to privacy is...has anyone thought of the actual logistics necessary to pull it off? Also the fact that the monolithic government is made up of people. Those people work 8 hour days. How much data can 1 person go through? That's video, audio, photos, on multiple mediums. Think about how much of this shit you create in a day. The amount of man power required to establish actualize the big fear of "zero privacy because government: is insane. Not to mention the type of people required, you'd need thousands of super focused, non-slacking, morally bankrupt people, motivated with enough cash to focus on this. Nett, you know the amount of people and time it takes to get a videogame out. The people running League of Legends can barely keep the servers up for a damn computer game with 1-2 million people playing. Think about what it would take to actively monitor an entire country of people. Second question: What's the motivation? If the MONOLITHIC GOVERNMENT really wants to invade privacy, they have to have a motivation. What's that motivation? Is it to protect the country against threats foreign or domestic? If someone is a threat the system is going to look them over. Is it to stay in power? Well, haven't seen any regime change rally's recently. Is it to make money? Well they're making plenty of money already. If they wanted more, it'd be much easier to cut public service programs that go to poor and old people. What's the desired end-game that they're really not getting now? That they weren't getting 50 years ago? Sidebar: Also, Iran really isn't worse than the US with a lot of things, so Russia/China might be better comps of autocratic goverments at this point. My gf just got back from Iran visiting family. Her dad goes back every year. She was hanging out with her two 20 something cousins. One of the things she told me is that there are so many hackers in Iran due to the cultural emphasis on engineering. The government blocks FB and Twitter, and they're as successful as the US at stopping Pirate Bay. There are apps to get around everything. Fun Fact: No copyright law so latest Adobe MS? 4 bucks. Random people get pulled and silenced there for weird internet things as much as black people do here for walking down the street.
Parker, two things... First, data is not gone through by individuals. This data is mined using enormous banks of computers with heuristic algorithms that are designed to identify the patterns that the people in charge want them to identify. Those patterns don't have to be for identifying terrorists, they could just as easily be for picking out naked selfies. Since computers are so good at picking out patterns, they can look for lots of different types of data at once. The humans can simply sit there and get fed streams of data that only meet the criteria they want to review - which means you don't need a ton of humans to look at a ton of different communications, because they don't have to weed out much noise. If that's not terrifying to you, please think about it some more. There's virtually no oversight or accountability, just people playing with giant collections of data. Want to fuck with the next election? Plug in some known candidate coordinates and use that to gather some data about the person's movements. Use that with cell tower databases to find their cell phone number and gather data about their personal calls and texts. Or scrape the collection heap for that number to discover their email addresses and IPs since they've probably emailed the number to someone. Dig a little deeper to find out they like to search midget tranny porn, or had an affair 10 years ago, or once talked about bombing the government because they were pissed. It's not that someone is literally watching every minute of the day. It's that at any minute of the day, they could choose to dig through any aspect of a person's life. Second, is your argument here really that they can collect all the data they want just because it's hard to look at it all? That seems like an awfully weak position.
Bang on, that's a great way to put it. It's not so much a specific end game I'm worried about, it's the general trend towards "we've decided that we need access to all this stuff, so we're just going to go for it." It's the creation of this infrastructure that gives them everything - that's fucked up. And if everything is ok, and they really do just have our best interests at heart, why lie about it at every turn? We totally don't have access to your private stuff! -But look at this, you kind of do. Oh, you found that? Oh… yeah, ok, we kind of do, but that's it! -But look at this other thing, it says you have access to everything. Found that too huh? Shit. Well, I think the important thing is that we bring the guy who gave you that to justice. Even if you're not worried about it today, who knows what the world will look like in 20 years. Who knows who's going to be in power, and what they're going to want to try to do. This precedent of the government giving themselves full access to everything is pretty damn terrifying in my opinion.
I'm just asking questions. I don't have an argument really. The questions I have are: who would make that decision, who would actually do it and why would they do it? And also, right now they could break into my my apartment at work, hack my password, toss in a keylogger that sends records incognito and get a lot of information doing that. I guess I'm unsure if there is a difference between a highly motivated party now vs a highly motivated party right before Skynet activates. I also don't know if it's because of me being black, but I do already live in world where someone in authority could just fuck up my shit on a whim. So I'm really just asking questions, because this is such a one sided conversation (I'm surprised this became a thread given it going the same way it did when Snowden popped up in the news the first time), I'm trying to look at it from an actual "how could this happen to x person" view. Hence my wondering what would the motivation would be for the Government to do this and how many people would they do it to? What criteria as mentioned would have x person pop up? What is the benefit to the government to do that? Are we afraid of the "Government" or are we afraid of an asshole we pissed off in H.S. now having access to all this stuff? Because the fact someone COULD is scary. Someone could walk up, stab me, and keep walking if they planned to leave no DNA evidence or the murder weapon. Why someone would WANT to is even scarier. So my line of thinking just makes me wonder, what would need to happen for the Government to WANT to do something like that to individual people.
Sure. All of which would be completely illegal and difficult to do covertly, as well as being impossible to carry out on a whim or on a large scale. If someone devoted a lot of resources at a highly specific target, there's probably not much difference in terms of purely collecting information. You could collect this same data through the more targeted data collection processes that is available now, through taps, keyloggers, bugs and targeted hacking. It would be more challenging, slower and harder to hide. The difference is we're not talking about a specific target here. We're talking about wholesale collection of everyone's data, with no oversight into how it's used. Which leads into the next point... We don't know. THAT'S the problem. There's no accountability, no reasonable belief that the data is being used in a crime, no expectation that the people being spied on are criminals. It's essentially an presumption of guilt, the expectation that all the data is potentially illegal so they'd better collect it all. Then, once it's collected, it's just a free-for-all because there's no oversight and no transparency. I understand the value that this data has in terms of discovering patterns to combat the crazies. Just because something is valuable, though, doesn't mean it's justified. I mean, it's probably also valuable to violate someone's 5th amendment rights by torturing them into a confession but we don't allow that nevermind. There's a due process because it protects citizens from an over-zealous government. It's important that the government be accountable to the process, otherwise the citizens have lost control. Are you really willing to just shrug and trust that they're probably not interested in you? It's clear that they treat the access to this data so trivially that they're willing to snoop on nude photos that people send to each other. Think about what that means: the internet is full of naked photos, and these people are so incredibly cavalier about the data they have access to, they are stealing something that is available by the thousands with a simple Google search.
What I'm having a hard time understanding is people tolerate this because they have faith that the people in the dark rooms within the NSA and NSA offices abroad are collecting this information benevolently. That the person in that dark room somehow has a higher moral constitution than say a scrub on the Geek Squad at Best Buy. The assumption of government benevolence is what I'm stumbling on. For a culture who says they fundamentally don't trust the federal government, it seems they put an awful lot of trust in the intelligence agencies to not abuse their power. It seems in the US a large portion of the population doesn't allow gun control in case we need to rise up because big government is bad. However, they'll allow the NSA and whoever to collect all their conversations, texts and emails without a second thought. It doesn't make a dam bit of sense. Another fundamental thing I don't understand, is why are people here resisting the idea of limiting the NSA's domestic data mining capabilities? I haven't heard one person here say that by limiting their abilities we'll compromise security. So if limiting what they can do doesn't impede national security, whats the harm on putting restrictions on what they're capable of? Are people here tolerant of current policies and practices because they haven't been effected yet? Or is the attitude more they think that no harm will come of these policies and the almost assured progression of these policies?
I can't think of who in their right mind WANTS somebody prying into their personal life. Most of us don't like people that we personally know doing things like going through our phones or wallets/purses. Sure, many of us have "nothing to hide" but we've all done things that are against the law or at least shameful. How would you feel if some government weirdo you've never heard of reads the text you sent to only your best friend shitfaced bragging about how you just boned the half-retarded girl that works the hotdog stand.
I think the disconnect with most people from the fear still lies in the motivation. On the flip side of the paragon of morality there is the assumption that if they can do something fucked up, they will. I guess that I'm looking at as people working in the NSA are probably going to get promoted going after high priority targets vs. the guy who just downloaded or viewed midget tranny porn. There is a lot of conversation saying "They're not doing this for the good of the people" with strong implications that everything is going to be used to fuck the citizens. I think the support evidence is scarce on each side. Going further into it, if people are just assholes, all on the same level as a Geek Squad dude. How much harder is it than a hospital leaking your herpes results? Your bank leaking your sex toy purchases? Now, the comeback to that is being held accountable, but once the damage is done, who gives really a shit about accountability? So I can't help on zeroing in on the chance of the event actually happening and that is still tied to motivation.
Would you all agree that, one way or another, we're heading towards less privacy? Even just based on what people willingly share? Last night I had the thought that the trend towards less privacy could be a kind of social evolution for a species that, deep down, knows it's better. That it serves a preventative, self-policing function. Aside from providing hillariously awesome videos, those dash cams in Russia have helped fight fraud and corruption. And I'd bet you're all completely in favour of cops wearing body cameras. I also think the other current trend, of people doing all they can to find something someone said online in order to publically shame them, will fade, and the culture overall will mature a bit and realize we all say and sometimes post stupid shit. The actual assholes, who say truly horrendous or incriminating things, will learn to grow or shut the fuck up. The fact that you guys keep going from terrorism to nekkid pics makes me think that however this all plays out, it isn't going to be that big of a deal. I read that first quoted line and my first response was, "...and?" So some perv could glance at or even masturbate to a nekkid pic of me without me ever knowing. This is a nightmare because...? If they were cute, they could've just asked. Only thing that would piss me off is if they distributed it for money and I didn't get a cut, and I'm pretty sure there are laws against that. Say your politician scenario happened, and we all found out that a politician who looked like a white night actually watched midget tranny porn and had an affair 10 years ago and freaked out at the government in a message to a friend after he or she lost some past election. Now imagine that the culture at large had the sense to go, "Well, almost all of us have some sexual tastes that others would find strange, and no marriage is perfect. We all make mistakes. And that comment was obviously made in anger, one time, years ago." And then we went back to judging them on their professional record and got on with our lives. Fucking crazy, right? Now imagine we found out they watched and distributed child porn, or found many messages with detailed plans to blow up a building. I do agree that the government lying and the lack of transparency is fucked up, but isn't that a systemic issue across the board? Given how much info the government is required to have on us (residence, work, driver's license etc), I still don't see the scary in knowing who we communicate with or what our junk looks like. Of course, I still have electrical tape over my laptop camera for when I'm watching my midget tranny porn, but that's just cuz my O-face is intense. The more I ponder this issue sleepily on the train home, the more I think I'd be ok in a world where the only place I could be assured of visual privacy was in my home. If the worst thing the government does is check my shit for illegalities and occasionally jack it to my pics, or private companies monitor my online habits in order sell me shit more effectively, at this point, my attitude is: search and collect away. Also, to state the obvious: it is possible to live a life where you aren't constantly connected and can't take a pic of your dick at any given moment. I even met a 20 year old who only had a basic flip phone with no camera and a desk top computer at home. No Facebook, Twitter, IG or anything. Scary stuff, I know.
The fact that the government is secretly and actively spying on it's own citizens, without transparency or accountability, amazes me almost as much as the fact that a large portion of those citizens don't see the big deal about it. I'm absolutely gobsmacked over the "meh" attitude that elicits from some people around here. Who fucking cares why they're doing it, or the justification... the fact that it is being done is the problem. Y'all are buying into some serious fucking propaganda if you think that's OK in the least.
Cool so you wouldn't mind then if I browsed through all your emails and cell phone records? I'm not going to look at them, I'm just going to keep them in a safe somewhere where they'll be forgotten about... Its not that I want to actively spy on you, its just I want your personal information for safe keeping just in case you lose it or something So far I still haven't heard a single dam person say why this is OK. I've heard why it doesn't effect them, why they don't think its a big deal, why they think people are making too big of a deal out of it, but why can't someone answer why this is OK and justifiable?
I don't understand this at all. If that's your opinion, then I really have no further arguments. You're saying that you have literally no right to privacy at all, any time, anywhere, and you have no concerns about what the government does with this data despite the fact that they have no oversight. edit: Why is this different from saying that the police shouldn't have to get a search warrant to look through your house? Or have probable cause to arrest you? I mean, everyone is obviously completely competent and trustworthy, right? If that's the case... well, okay, but I don't get it. I'm not fine with just turning over my entire life to someone with no other reason than "some people are bad."
It's one thing to understand that it's wrong and just not give a shit about it enough to do anything about it because it has no direct effect on your life, that I can totally relate to. But to not see that it's wrong in the first place? That's what's so confusing to me. It's almost like a weird state of denial.