5 ms·

From the abstract: Cryptography rearranges power: it configures who can do what, from what. I'd argue that the reverse is really the issue that needs more att

by pcl 11y ago

From the abstract: Cryptography rearranges power: it configures who can do what, from what. I'd argue that the reverse is really the issue that needs more attention. Online systems that do not provide strong cryptography rearrange power, as compared to their offline equivalents. It was not feasible to scan all phone calls for keywords in 1970, since that required effort from humans to do the patching and listening. The power dynamic changed when our industry brought those calls into a centralized, trivially-storable clear-text format. Encrypting the conversations is simply a partial return to the status quo of a few decades ago.

mangeletti 11y ago
+100 What powerful tool is I incrementalism that the whole population has forgotten that we used to be private individuals. The unification of the human race by the Internet now threatens the relevance of overgrown governments and banks. That's why they fight us.
- dasil003 11y ago
  I wouldn't say they do it because they feel threatened—how often do bureaucrats genuinely feel threatened? Most likely they are just legitimately trying to do their jobs, and the natural tendency will be to seek any power available that seems relevant to that task. Does any individual or organization ever voluntarily cede power?
nathan_long 11y ago
Good point. And even longer ago, all conversations required meeting, and were private unless an eavesdropper was physically nearby. Tech has created more extreme possibilities on both sides. On the privacy side, it's possible to exchange messages at a distance in an unreadable and nearly undetectable way. On the surveillance side, it's possible to eavesdrop on nearly everyone (except the very sophisticated). We can't and (don't want to) go back in time. The real question is "which danger is greater: conspiracy or oppression?"
- PhaseMage 11y ago
  > private unless an eavesdropper was physically nearby. I completely agree with your post. I have an idea for how to resolve this via networking topology. Right now, TCP/IP seems to me to be an engine for centralizing power: Limited hop count and hierarchical address assignment leads to star topologies, leading to economies of scale that again support centralization. I propose a network protocol stack that encourages a mesh topology, where it actually makes economic sense to physically link my home to 2 or more of my immediate neighbors. I surmise that all my neighbors (or all the neighbors of the person I'm communicating with) would have to be my adversary in order to spy on my communications (See secret splitting on Wikipedia). I feel that mass surveillance doesn't scale with this topology. I've been working for some time on designing such a networking protocol stack... What do folks here think? Is this worth my time?
  - mangeletti 11y ago
    Unfortunately, the other thing that doesn't scale with this topology is the network itself. A centralized network needs to be trusted for transporting data over vast expanses of underpopulated areas, or even urban bottlenecks (e.g., LA communicating with SF)). Ignoring this fact makes most "mesh" seem like the answer, but the real answer, especially pertaining emergence, is continual improvements in encryption, etc., not a replacement of the entire construct of the Internet, which itself is emergent.
    - PhaseMage 11y ago
      > A centralized network needs to be trusted for transporting data over vast expanses... Thanks for the reply! You state this as a fact, but I've spent many hundreds of hours trying to prove to myself that it's not a fact. I think with packet switched networks, you are probably correct. Instead, I've been designing an Isochronous network protocol. If you could help me out with more concrete details on why all non-centralized networks are incapable of running at scale, it could save me a lot of time! :-)
      - mangeletti 11y ago

by pcl 11y ago

mangeletti 11y ago

+100 What powerful tool is I incrementalism that the whole population has forgotten that we used to be private individuals. The unification of the human race by the Internet now threatens the relevance of overgrown governments and banks. That's why they fight us.

dasil003 11y ago
I wouldn't say they do it because they feel threatened—how often do bureaucrats genuinely feel threatened? Most likely they are just legitimately trying to do their jobs, and the natural tendency will be to seek any power available that seems relevant to that task. Does any individual or organization ever voluntarily cede power?

nathan_long 11y ago

Good point. And even longer ago, all conversations required meeting, and were private unless an eavesdropper was physically nearby. Tech has created more extreme possibilities on both sides. On the privacy side, it's possible to exchange messages at a distance in an unreadable and nearly undetectable way. On the surveillance side, it's possible to eavesdrop on nearly everyone (except the very sophisticated). We can't and (don't want to) go back in time. The real question is "which danger is greater: conspiracy or oppression?"

PhaseMage 11y ago
> private unless an eavesdropper was physically nearby. I completely agree with your post. I have an idea for how to resolve this via networking topology. Right now, TCP/IP seems to me to be an engine for centralizing power: Limited hop count and hierarchical address assignment leads to star topologies, leading to economies of scale that again support centralization. I propose a network protocol stack that encourages a mesh topology, where it actually makes economic sense to physically link my home to 2 or more of my immediate neighbors. I surmise that all my neighbors (or all the neighbors of the person I'm communicating with) would have to be my adversary in order to spy on my communications (See secret splitting on Wikipedia). I feel that mass surveillance doesn't scale with this topology. I've been working for some time on designing such a networking protocol stack... What do folks here think? Is this worth my time?
- mangeletti 11y ago
  Unfortunately, the other thing that doesn't scale with this topology is the network itself. A centralized network needs to be trusted for transporting data over vast expanses of underpopulated areas, or even urban bottlenecks (e.g., LA communicating with SF)). Ignoring this fact makes most "mesh" seem like the answer, but the real answer, especially pertaining emergence, is continual improvements in encryption, etc., not a replacement of the entire construct of the Internet, which itself is emergent.
  - PhaseMage 11y ago
    > A centralized network needs to be trusted for transporting data over vast expanses... Thanks for the reply! You state this as a fact, but I've spent many hundreds of hours trying to prove to myself that it's not a fact. I think with packet switched networks, you are probably correct. Instead, I've been designing an Isochronous network protocol. If you could help me out with more concrete details on why all non-centralized networks are incapable of running at scale, it could save me a lot of time! :-)
    - mangeletti 11y ago