5 ms·
If your adversary is a Twitter employee, you graph "Payoff for 'outing' vs. likelihood of being fired" and come to the conclusion that no Twitter employee has c
by patio11 11y ago
If your adversary is a Twitter employee, you graph "Payoff for 'outing' vs. likelihood of being fired" and come to the conclusion that no Twitter employee has cared enough. If your adversary is substantially better resourced than a Twitter employee or would not suffer equivalent costs (e.g. if your adversary is law enforcement), assume the inevitability of compromise.
An interesting question is "How would you rate the ability of e.g. investigative journalists on this score?", to which I answer "Equivalent to their ability to ask someone in their social circle to tell them what the answer is."
- hkmurakami 11y agoI'd add that the potential is worse than just getting fired. This could cause a fall in the stock price and a subsequent lawsuit.
- azernik 11y agoThose probably don't hit the employee themselves; those hit the company. Classic principal-agent problem.
- nostrademons 11y agoCompanies will often sue for the difference. If random company X employee doxes a client of X, and then the market cap of X falls by $Y on the news and consequence loss of trust, company X has a pretty good case that financial damages of $Y are warranted through the actions of the employee's breach of contract. Chances are, the employee has nowhere close to $Y in assets, but will settle for $Z << $Y to avoid having a huge lawsuit with the potential to garnish many years worth of wages hanging over their head. Many people who might think that the risk of being fired is worth having the inside scoop on a story might reconsider when the threat is a lawsuit from Google/Facebook/Twitter.
- briandear 11y agoAlthough given the value of Twitter stock bonuses and options a stock price hit does matter.
- gregmac 11y agoNot just fired though: if they either didn't do it anonymously, or someone outed the outer, they'd be putting future job prospects in jeopardy as well. The story about them doing this will quickly shoot to the top of search results for their name, and probably stick with them forever. Who wants to hire someone who is infamous for violating their previous company's privacy policy and abusing their access privilege? Who wants to stay on as a customer of a company where that person now works?
- mdpopescu 11y agono Twitter employee has cared enough True, but the danger is not only with large enemies. I have had the network admin of my internet provider read my emails because he was bored. I know because we later became friends and he told me about it - with proof. (This was before gmail and everything-important-is-on-ssl.) I also come live in a country where "government employees are reading your emails" is up there with "the water is wet", so large enemies are pretty much assumed to know everything they care to know.