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Some people (including me) simply don't believe that a right to privacy makes any sense. If anything, we believe privacy to be the cause of some of today's most

Some people (including me) simply don't believe that a right to privacy makes any sense. If anything, we believe privacy to be the cause of some of today's most important problems. You people seem to speak as if the right to privacy is unquestionably good, and don't bother justify your beliefs. Surely, no progress can be made this way.

pdkl95 11y ago
I'm glad your have been able to live a life free from problems such as stalkers, domestic abuse, or gender or sexuality issues. Other people are not as privileged. It would be nice if we could live in an open society, but the reality is that discrimination and abuse still exist. Insisting that everybody forget about privacy is not only going to get some people killed and many others fired. Insisting that privacy is bad is effectively telling any minority that they have to stay "in the closet" if they want to keep their job and not be harassed by the bigots in society. That's just the practical issues. A stronger argument for privacy is best summed up by Jacob Appelbaum's observation in Citizenfour: What people used to call liberty and freedom we now call privacy. And we say, in the same breath, that privacy is dead. We have the freedom to decide what we want to disclose publicly. Of course, you still believe in privacy. If you really think privacy doesn't make any sense, post your name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, and any email addresses you've used. None of those items are "secret" information (like a password). I could list a lot more things, but you should get the idea.
- miguelrochefort 11y ago
  > I'm glad your have been able to live a life free from problems such as stalkers, domestic abuse, or gender or sexuality issues. Other people are not as privileged. There is zero correlation between the values I hold in this discussion and what best serves my personal interest. I have the capacity to completely detach myself from my arguments in a way that leads to a lack of bias. I am morally and intellectually selfless. Legislation should never arise from anecdotes or personal preferences. Would I be abused or stalked, the fact that transparency is inherently superior wouldn't change. > It would be nice if we could live in an open society, but the reality is that discrimination and abuse still exist. Insisting that everybody forget about privacy is not only going to get some people killed and many others fired. Insisting that privacy is bad is effectively telling any minority that they have to stay "in the closet" if they want to keep their job and not be harassed by the bigots in society. There is no debate to be had about the fact that pain will be involved in the transition to a transparent society. Of course it won't be easy. However, it would be unreasonable to ignore the biggest problem of our time just because of a short-term friction. Like any form of investment in life, there are short-term drawbacks. Human reasoning is weird as it understands a loss to be worse than a lack of gain. Loss aversion is the reason why we don't change things, which is the reason we can't get nicer things. People have no idea how much they're missing by trying to preserve "their" privacy. We're all "in the closet" in some regards. We're also all bigots. We must force people out of their closet. We must expose bigotry. Only then will things start to improve. > We have the freedom to decide what we want to disclose publicly. Quoting the Bible would have had the same effect. > We have the freedom to decide what we want to disclose publicly. Actually we don't. Should I have the right to erase something from your brain because you saw something I didn't want you to see? Of course I'm not suggesting that we should coerce people into doing anything they don't want to do, but a person's actions shouldn't be protected by any external entity. At the end of the day, an honest person has a lot more to gain by exposing themselves to the world instead of keeping things to themselves. IoT, Wearables, Big Data, AI are all concrete examples of how data gathering can improve people's lives. > Of course, you still believe in privacy. If you really think privacy doesn't make any sense, post your name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, and any email addresses you've used. None of those items are "secret" information (like a password). I could list a lot more things, but you should get the idea. Privacy and Transparency are not games you can play alone. They're inherently social. The society is built on top of expectations of privacy. For example, there is some information that I legally couldn't disclose, even if I wanted to. Likewise, my identity is only secured by archaic methods of authentication, which completely breaks if my password gets known. Private key cryptography is not a technology we should build sensitive systems on top of, and it will quickly be destroyed once P = NP gets proven and applied. Your question is like asking a person to not wear a seat belt in an unsafe car. I might not think that humans should wear seat belts forever, yet I still wear one when I drive my car every day. Fast-forward 1000 years in the future. Total transparency. Ask a person whether they'd like to keep their name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, email address (assuming these things still exist which they won't). Surely, that person would refuse to make this information private as doing so would make his life miserable considering all the benefits this used to enable. The least I can ask from people is to discuss this issue seriously, and not just accept privacy to be the solution to all of our problems. This whole obsession with privacy is just a distraction.
  - wkw3 11y ago
    > I have the capacity to completely detach myself from my arguments in a way that leads to a lack of bias. I am morally and intellectually selfless. The easiest person to fool is yourself. I've read Brin's Transparent Society as well, and I agree that a functioning society along those lines would be much, much healthier than we have now. However, this article is about the privacy-erasing tools used by the powers that be, whose very existence was secret to those on the outside until now. I'll surrender my privacy just after they do.
  - wavefunction 11y ago
    When the rich and powerful lay bear their secrets then I will happily follow. Until then, they and you don't get to decide unilaterally. I do detect a bit of ego in your arguments about being a "special person" and it makes me distrust your stance even more.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - ionised 11y ago
    > Fast-forward 1000 years in the future. Total transparency. Ask a person whether they'd like to keep their name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, email address (assuming these things still exist which they won't). Surely, that person would refuse to make this information private as doing so would make his life miserable considering all the benefits this used to enable. Never going to happen.
- grkvlt 11y ago
  > If you really think privacy doesn't make any sense, post your name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, and any email addresses you've used. I'd be quite happy for my country's intelligence agencies to have that information, sure, no problem...
flycaliguy 11y ago
Speaking of progress, flip back through history and examine the movements, individuals and groups who have shaped our comfortable life and society. If the authority at the time had the ability to completely invade their privacy, would they have been as effective? The truth is that the most important progress in society almost always begins outside the status quo and without privacy that status quo becomes much more difficult to disrupt.
- miguelrochefort 11y ago
  Do you not think that a better solution would be for people to accept these differences? Seems pretty obvious to me.
  - flycaliguy 11y ago
    So we all give up our privacy. Activists, judges, journalists, potential whistleblowers and so on. Then... the current power structure will just accept disruption to their system because it's the right thing to do? They won't use their intelligence advantage to maintain the status quo? They won't use their mass of information to slander and render ineffective any opposition?
  - hackuser 11y ago
    I don't think that's realistic. Rarely has that happened in practice; often people go overboard trying to suppress dissent and change.
Zigurd 11y ago
Stop projecting your views and choices on everyone. I don't need or want a lot of privacy. I'm also not black, or gay, or a Muslim. I'm not politically active. As such, I could live a comfortable life and not run up against the limits of freedom even in a fairly repressive social and political environment. I also manage to have some empathy, if only because it might serve me well someday. Try it. It's actually part of enlightened self-interest.
- miguelrochefort 11y ago
  These are not 'my' choices. I'm simply a reflect of universal absolute moral truth. What privacy advocates do is reduce freedom of knowledge. They're the kind of person that create PIPA/SOPA and kill the internet. I don't deem them wise. As for empathy, I fail to understand how it relates to the above.
  - AnimalMuppet 11y ago
    And what is your basis for claiming that this is "universal absolute moral truth"? You make that claim with exactly zero to back it up, to a bunch of people who profoundly disagree with you. The rest of us find that highly unpersuasive.
  - ionised 11y ago
    > What privacy advocates do is reduce freedom of knowledge. They're the kind of person that create PIPA/SOPA and kill the internet. I don't deem them wise. You're clueless. These people are ther exact cross section of the population opposed to those sorts of things.
    - miguelrochefort 11y ago
      That's what makes these people dangerous. They can't even realize the harm they're doing society.
      - ionised 11y ago

pdkl95 11y ago

I'm glad your have been able to live a life free from problems such as stalkers, domestic abuse, or gender or sexuality issues. Other people are not as privileged. It would be nice if we could live in an open society, but the reality is that discrimination and abuse still exist. Insisting that everybody forget about privacy is not only going to get some people killed and many others fired. Insisting that privacy is bad is effectively telling any minority that they have to stay "in the closet" if they want to keep their job and not be harassed by the bigots in society. That's just the practical issues. A stronger argument for privacy is best summed up by Jacob Appelbaum's observation in Citizenfour: What people used to call liberty and freedom we now call privacy. And we say, in the same breath, that privacy is dead. We have the freedom to decide what we want to disclose publicly. Of course, you still believe in privacy. If you really think privacy doesn't make any sense, post your name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, and any email addresses you've used. None of those items are "secret" information (like a password). I could list a lot more things, but you should get the idea.

miguelrochefort 11y ago
> I'm glad your have been able to live a life free from problems such as stalkers, domestic abuse, or gender or sexuality issues. Other people are not as privileged. There is zero correlation between the values I hold in this discussion and what best serves my personal interest. I have the capacity to completely detach myself from my arguments in a way that leads to a lack of bias. I am morally and intellectually selfless. Legislation should never arise from anecdotes or personal preferences. Would I be abused or stalked, the fact that transparency is inherently superior wouldn't change. > It would be nice if we could live in an open society, but the reality is that discrimination and abuse still exist. Insisting that everybody forget about privacy is not only going to get some people killed and many others fired. Insisting that privacy is bad is effectively telling any minority that they have to stay "in the closet" if they want to keep their job and not be harassed by the bigots in society. There is no debate to be had about the fact that pain will be involved in the transition to a transparent society. Of course it won't be easy. However, it would be unreasonable to ignore the biggest problem of our time just because of a short-term friction. Like any form of investment in life, there are short-term drawbacks. Human reasoning is weird as it understands a loss to be worse than a lack of gain. Loss aversion is the reason why we don't change things, which is the reason we can't get nicer things. People have no idea how much they're missing by trying to preserve "their" privacy. We're all "in the closet" in some regards. We're also all bigots. We must force people out of their closet. We must expose bigotry. Only then will things start to improve. > We have the freedom to decide what we want to disclose publicly. Quoting the Bible would have had the same effect. > We have the freedom to decide what we want to disclose publicly. Actually we don't. Should I have the right to erase something from your brain because you saw something I didn't want you to see? Of course I'm not suggesting that we should coerce people into doing anything they don't want to do, but a person's actions shouldn't be protected by any external entity. At the end of the day, an honest person has a lot more to gain by exposing themselves to the world instead of keeping things to themselves. IoT, Wearables, Big Data, AI are all concrete examples of how data gathering can improve people's lives. > Of course, you still believe in privacy. If you really think privacy doesn't make any sense, post your name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, and any email addresses you've used. None of those items are "secret" information (like a password). I could list a lot more things, but you should get the idea. Privacy and Transparency are not games you can play alone. They're inherently social. The society is built on top of expectations of privacy. For example, there is some information that I legally couldn't disclose, even if I wanted to. Likewise, my identity is only secured by archaic methods of authentication, which completely breaks if my password gets known. Private key cryptography is not a technology we should build sensitive systems on top of, and it will quickly be destroyed once P = NP gets proven and applied. Your question is like asking a person to not wear a seat belt in an unsafe car. I might not think that humans should wear seat belts forever, yet I still wear one when I drive my car every day. Fast-forward 1000 years in the future. Total transparency. Ask a person whether they'd like to keep their name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, email address (assuming these things still exist which they won't). Surely, that person would refuse to make this information private as doing so would make his life miserable considering all the benefits this used to enable. The least I can ask from people is to discuss this issue seriously, and not just accept privacy to be the solution to all of our problems. This whole obsession with privacy is just a distraction.
- wkw3 11y ago
  > I have the capacity to completely detach myself from my arguments in a way that leads to a lack of bias. I am morally and intellectually selfless. The easiest person to fool is yourself. I've read Brin's Transparent Society as well, and I agree that a functioning society along those lines would be much, much healthier than we have now. However, this article is about the privacy-erasing tools used by the powers that be, whose very existence was secret to those on the outside until now. I'll surrender my privacy just after they do.
- wavefunction 11y ago
  When the rich and powerful lay bear their secrets then I will happily follow. Until then, they and you don't get to decide unilaterally. I do detect a bit of ego in your arguments about being a "special person" and it makes me distrust your stance even more.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- ionised 11y ago
  > Fast-forward 1000 years in the future. Total transparency. Ask a person whether they'd like to keep their name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, email address (assuming these things still exist which they won't). Surely, that person would refuse to make this information private as doing so would make his life miserable considering all the benefits this used to enable. Never going to happen.
grkvlt 11y ago
> If you really think privacy doesn't make any sense, post your name, address, bank account numbers, social security number, and any email addresses you've used. I'd be quite happy for my country's intelligence agencies to have that information, sure, no problem...

flycaliguy 11y ago

Speaking of progress, flip back through history and examine the movements, individuals and groups who have shaped our comfortable life and society. If the authority at the time had the ability to completely invade their privacy, would they have been as effective? The truth is that the most important progress in society almost always begins outside the status quo and without privacy that status quo becomes much more difficult to disrupt.

miguelrochefort 11y ago
Do you not think that a better solution would be for people to accept these differences? Seems pretty obvious to me.
- flycaliguy 11y ago
  So we all give up our privacy. Activists, judges, journalists, potential whistleblowers and so on. Then... the current power structure will just accept disruption to their system because it's the right thing to do? They won't use their intelligence advantage to maintain the status quo? They won't use their mass of information to slander and render ineffective any opposition?
- hackuser 11y ago
  I don't think that's realistic. Rarely has that happened in practice; often people go overboard trying to suppress dissent and change.

Zigurd 11y ago

Stop projecting your views and choices on everyone. I don't need or want a lot of privacy. I'm also not black, or gay, or a Muslim. I'm not politically active. As such, I could live a comfortable life and not run up against the limits of freedom even in a fairly repressive social and political environment. I also manage to have some empathy, if only because it might serve me well someday. Try it. It's actually part of enlightened self-interest.

miguelrochefort 11y ago
These are not 'my' choices. I'm simply a reflect of universal absolute moral truth. What privacy advocates do is reduce freedom of knowledge. They're the kind of person that create PIPA/SOPA and kill the internet. I don't deem them wise. As for empathy, I fail to understand how it relates to the above.
- AnimalMuppet 11y ago
  And what is your basis for claiming that this is "universal absolute moral truth"? You make that claim with exactly zero to back it up, to a bunch of people who profoundly disagree with you. The rest of us find that highly unpersuasive.
- ionised 11y ago
  > What privacy advocates do is reduce freedom of knowledge. They're the kind of person that create PIPA/SOPA and kill the internet. I don't deem them wise. You're clueless. These people are ther exact cross section of the population opposed to those sorts of things.
  - miguelrochefort 11y ago
    That's what makes these people dangerous. They can't even realize the harm they're doing society.
    - ionised 11y ago