4 ms·

It's (claimed to be) rubbish because thinking otherwise can be seen to weaken the privacy-champion's position. Many people have an instinct to "circle the wagon

It's (claimed to be) rubbish because thinking otherwise can be seen to weaken the privacy-champion's position. Many people have an instinct to "circle the wagons" around their personal ideological position, afraid to give an inch in case it becomes a mile. I also think like Vint Cerf, that privacy is an artifact of modern society. I also think that since modern society is the one we find ourselves in, that privacy should be aggressively protected. Privacy is more important now than ever precisely because we're an urbanized and connected society. I have never had a problem with an investigator hanging out somewhere writing down license plate numbers. But take issue with always-on automated license plate readers scanning where everyone is all the time. It's a difference in resources. And to go full Godwin, the Nazis were far more effective with IBM's help.

TeMPOraL 11y ago
> I also think that since modern society is the one we find ourselves in, that privacy should be aggressively protected. Privacy is more important now than ever precisely because we're an urbanized and connected society. That's an interesting and important point I learned to appreciate in an explicit form only recently. Thank you for making it. That said, I still don't see from a practical point, how we can expect to keep privacy and progress? The always-on automated license plate readers exist because cameras and computing power are dirt chip now, and no amount of effort sans starting a third world war and rolling us back to medieval times will revert that. Laws are weaker than technology, and the current development will make it only easier to create more complex and cheaper machines that replicate various functions of humans, only faster and better. We could try and fight for changes in law that would make mass-scale data collection illegal, but that would not make it impossible or unfeasible - it will only limit the access to "the good guys". So criminals, creeps and government services (at least those secret ones) will keep spying on us anyway, while we would be throwing away a lot of potential improvements and scientific advancements that could be enabled by a "god's eye" view. And so I sometimes wonder, since we can't put the genie back in the box, and fighting it only means giving up our own powers while merely inconveniencing the bad guys, maybe we should just embrace the society that's becoming self-aware and make sure this awareness is put to a good use? ETA: > And to go full Godwin, the Nazis were far more effective with IBM's help. True, but I don't think we should frame it as anything else as (1930/1940) IBM helping evil people who they know were evil. The Nazis were equally more effective with help of any other country that provided them with materials they used for war. On the other hand, we are all better off thanks to IBM, so this can't be an argument against general-purpose computing, or punchcards and identification numbers.
- tremon 11y ago
  > That said, I still don't see from a practical point, how we can expect to keep privacy and progress? I don't follow. How are the two mutually exclusive? Your false dichotomy between license plate readers and medieval times isn't very convincing to me. > Laws are weaker than technology Really? So since it is technologically possible for me to remove my license plates from my car, no judge will be able to make me put them back? And, since it is technologically possible, it is ok for others to clean out your bank account, and you would have no redress other than to hack your money back to you?
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    > I don't follow. How are the two mutually exclusive? Your false dichotomy between license plate readers and medieval times isn't very convincing to me. What is the current direction of technological progress? More computing. Faster computing. More ubiquitous computing. More connectivity. Leveraging all that for optimization. Today we have cameras so small that every one is carrying two of them in their pocket. Tomorrow, at least one of which will be replaced or augmented with a geometry scanner. Scientists want to have nanosats in orbit that will keep continuous, real-time surveillance of the planet. Can't you really see that almost everything we do now erodes privacy? Or in more theoretical sense - every single thing you do generates ripples in reality that spread and interact with other things (generating more ripples) with the speed of light. Every thing you say or do leaves traces. Most of them escape our notice, because there's only so much things we can pay attention to. But they are still there, and with more sensors and more computing powers, we're untangling the great web of causality. Whatever is not known we can try to infer. Privacy disappears with the amount of compute we can throw at it. > Really? So since it is technologically possible for me to remove my license plates from my car, no judge will be able to make me put them back? You know that your car probably has several RFID tags and radio chips in various places like e.g. tires? With time it may be the case that no judge will care to make you put them back - they won't need to. Anyway, my point does not apply to individuals, but on a large scale. Whenever a new technology arrives that is so useful/popular that lots of people start to use it, laws and customs adjust to accomodate it. Since laws and customs follow technological progress and not the other way around, it follows that laws are weaker than technology.

TeMPOraL 11y ago

> I also think that since modern society is the one we find ourselves in, that privacy should be aggressively protected. Privacy is more important now than ever precisely because we're an urbanized and connected society. That's an interesting and important point I learned to appreciate in an explicit form only recently. Thank you for making it. That said, I still don't see from a practical point, how we can expect to keep privacy and progress? The always-on automated license plate readers exist because cameras and computing power are dirt chip now, and no amount of effort sans starting a third world war and rolling us back to medieval times will revert that. Laws are weaker than technology, and the current development will make it only easier to create more complex and cheaper machines that replicate various functions of humans, only faster and better. We could try and fight for changes in law that would make mass-scale data collection illegal, but that would not make it impossible or unfeasible - it will only limit the access to "the good guys". So criminals, creeps and government services (at least those secret ones) will keep spying on us anyway, while we would be throwing away a lot of potential improvements and scientific advancements that could be enabled by a "god's eye" view. And so I sometimes wonder, since we can't put the genie back in the box, and fighting it only means giving up our own powers while merely inconveniencing the bad guys, maybe we should just embrace the society that's becoming self-aware and make sure this awareness is put to a good use? ETA: > And to go full Godwin, the Nazis were far more effective with IBM's help. True, but I don't think we should frame it as anything else as (1930/1940) IBM helping evil people who they know were evil. The Nazis were equally more effective with help of any other country that provided them with materials they used for war. On the other hand, we are all better off thanks to IBM, so this can't be an argument against general-purpose computing, or punchcards and identification numbers.

tremon 11y ago
> That said, I still don't see from a practical point, how we can expect to keep privacy and progress? I don't follow. How are the two mutually exclusive? Your false dichotomy between license plate readers and medieval times isn't very convincing to me. > Laws are weaker than technology Really? So since it is technologically possible for me to remove my license plates from my car, no judge will be able to make me put them back? And, since it is technologically possible, it is ok for others to clean out your bank account, and you would have no redress other than to hack your money back to you?
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  > I don't follow. How are the two mutually exclusive? Your false dichotomy between license plate readers and medieval times isn't very convincing to me. What is the current direction of technological progress? More computing. Faster computing. More ubiquitous computing. More connectivity. Leveraging all that for optimization. Today we have cameras so small that every one is carrying two of them in their pocket. Tomorrow, at least one of which will be replaced or augmented with a geometry scanner. Scientists want to have nanosats in orbit that will keep continuous, real-time surveillance of the planet. Can't you really see that almost everything we do now erodes privacy? Or in more theoretical sense - every single thing you do generates ripples in reality that spread and interact with other things (generating more ripples) with the speed of light. Every thing you say or do leaves traces. Most of them escape our notice, because there's only so much things we can pay attention to. But they are still there, and with more sensors and more computing powers, we're untangling the great web of causality. Whatever is not known we can try to infer. Privacy disappears with the amount of compute we can throw at it. > Really? So since it is technologically possible for me to remove my license plates from my car, no judge will be able to make me put them back? You know that your car probably has several RFID tags and radio chips in various places like e.g. tires? With time it may be the case that no judge will care to make you put them back - they won't need to. Anyway, my point does not apply to individuals, but on a large scale. Whenever a new technology arrives that is so useful/popular that lots of people start to use it, laws and customs adjust to accomodate it. Since laws and customs follow technological progress and not the other way around, it follows that laws are weaker than technology.