7 ms·

Please translate some terms for me, I'm naive. "Encryption" "Door Lock" "Camera-Free Bedroom"

by VMG 10y ago

throwanem 10y ago
I mean I get what you're saying, but there's actually a picture next to the article of a washing machine with a Bitcoin logo among the suds inside. Considering that it thus clearly doesn't mind the "money laundering" interpretation, why do you?
- imagist 10y ago
  Just because the article equates privacy with crime doesn't mean privacy is equal to crime. Privacy isn't equal to crime, and it's an attack on fundamental human rights to claim it is. Whether it's the article or Animats making the attack is irrelevant.
  - throwanem 10y ago
    There is a great deal of both law and precedent against perfect privacy in financial transactions, because of the strong association between such perfect privacy and criminality, and the very effective cover which the former affords the latter. Perhaps you feel the case should be otherwise. That's reasonable. But it is also a wildly heterodox view not generally sympathetic to those who are not already privacy absolutists or likely to become so, and you may find it worth your while to consider whether this particular hill is the one you want to die on.
    - Karunamon 10y ago
      ..and the very effective cover which the former affords the latter. This is an argument against web proxies, VPNs, all encryption, safes, door locks, window blinds, tamper evident tape, and just about every other privacy/security technology ever invented. Why is economic value transfer so special a use case that we must hamstring it in the name of crime prevention?
      - throwanem 10y ago
        For a reason which, standing on a train station platform as I was, I failed to note in my prior comment: anonymous, untraceable money transfer not only makes it easier to conceal crime, but acts as a uniquely powerful inducement to same. Making it possible to contract a murder, for example, in perfect forward secrecy, removes a significant deterrent against doing so at all. One may hasten to argue that such things are already possible today. They are. They are also quite difficult to achieve, which need not be the case with effectively anonymized cryptocurrencies. Further, that which facilitates the contravention of a nation's laws, in a way which renders detection and prosecution of the crime effectively impossible, is of its nature a direct attack on that nation's sovereignty. No government which wishes to maintain its power intact can long suffer such an infraction. I suspect that's why the toplevel commenter who started this thread spoke in such fashion. Bitcoin dodged one bullet already in the fallout from the Silk Road debacle. This looks like it might be another.
        pdkl95 10y ago
        > Making it possible to contract a murder Paying criminals was possible before cash was invented, and it will continue to be possible into the future. We even have movies that have hitmen being paid in gold, diamonds, favors, and other exchangeable assets as major plot devices. > difficult to achieve Our ancestors successfully exchanged goods and debt thousands of years ago. I doubt modern humans will have any difficulty inventing new non-cash methods of paying for services. This isn't theoretical, because we already see soap and other easy to fence goods used as exchangeable assets. https://priceonomics.com/why-thieves-steal-soap/ https://priceonomics.com/why-thieves-steal-soap/ Products like cigarettes and soap are appealing because they can perform some of the major functions of money. Since there is a consistent demand and market for them [...] they retain their value. [...] Since they have standard sizes, they can also be used as a unit of account. [...] In areas where fences or other buyers are always willing to purchase stolen products, soap is just as good as money. This concern about the anonymity of cash is propaganda. While everyone is concerned that a few poor or middle class people might get away with laundering petty amounts of money, the real thieves move far larger amounts of non-cash, very trackable money to corrupt politicians and offshore havens.
    - imagist 10y ago
      > There is a great deal of both law and precedent against perfect privacy in financial transactions, because of the strong association between such perfect privacy and criminality, and the very effective cover which the former affords the latter. This is true, but "this is how we've always done it" is a very poor reason to do something. The problem with this is that those in power determine what is considered criminal, which is only vaguely correlated with what is unethical enough to be worth criminalizing. > But it is also a wildly heterodox view not generally sympathetic to those who are not already privacy absolutists or likely to become so, and you may find it worth your while to consider whether this particular hill is the one you want to die on. If you were actually offering me advice for my own good, I'd take it for what it is. But you aren't. This is just a way of making it sound like privacy is not worth talking about. If you want to make an actual point against privacy I'd be happy to respond to it. I don't appreciate your advice as advice, because it's clearly ignorant of my actual goals. The thing about mathematically-enforced privacy is that it doesn't have to become the orthodoxy to become effective.
      - throwanem 10y ago
        What are your actual goals?
        imagist 10y ago
        To be able to buy and sell goods without anyone besides the person I'm buying and selling from knowing about it. Not because I want to do anything illegal, but for the same reason that you shut the door when you use the bathroom, and don't willingly install cameras pointing at your bed that broadcast to the entire internet. I'm not willing to give up my privacy just so governments can avoid doing the police work they're elected to do in order to prosecute crimes, or so corporations can bombard me with their shitty products.
        throwanem 10y ago
        I don't suppose I really equate what I do with my wallet, and what I do in a bedroom or a bathroom. It's an interesting perspective, though.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
S_Daedalus 10y ago
The ability to anonymously, and untraceably make money is not like the ability to encrypt information, a symbolic thing you have for insurance reasons, or your privacy. A private international to-cash economy is not the same as a private bedroom, or letter, or home.

Please translate some terms for me, I'm naive. "Encryption" "Door Lock" "Camera-Free Bedroom"

by VMG 10y ago

Please translate some terms for me, I'm naive. "Encryption" "Door Lock" "Camera-Free Bedroom"

I mean I get what you're saying, but there's actually a picture next to the article of a washing machine with a Bitcoin logo among the suds inside. Considering that it thus clearly doesn't mind the "money laundering" interpretation, why do you?

imagist 10y ago
Just because the article equates privacy with crime doesn't mean privacy is equal to crime. Privacy isn't equal to crime, and it's an attack on fundamental human rights to claim it is. Whether it's the article or Animats making the attack is irrelevant.
- throwanem 10y ago
  There is a great deal of both law and precedent against perfect privacy in financial transactions, because of the strong association between such perfect privacy and criminality, and the very effective cover which the former affords the latter. Perhaps you feel the case should be otherwise. That's reasonable. But it is also a wildly heterodox view not generally sympathetic to those who are not already privacy absolutists or likely to become so, and you may find it worth your while to consider whether this particular hill is the one you want to die on.
  - Karunamon 10y ago
    ..and the very effective cover which the former affords the latter. This is an argument against web proxies, VPNs, all encryption, safes, door locks, window blinds, tamper evident tape, and just about every other privacy/security technology ever invented. Why is economic value transfer so special a use case that we must hamstring it in the name of crime prevention?
    - throwanem 10y ago
      For a reason which, standing on a train station platform as I was, I failed to note in my prior comment: anonymous, untraceable money transfer not only makes it easier to conceal crime, but acts as a uniquely powerful inducement to same. Making it possible to contract a murder, for example, in perfect forward secrecy, removes a significant deterrent against doing so at all. One may hasten to argue that such things are already possible today. They are. They are also quite difficult to achieve, which need not be the case with effectively anonymized cryptocurrencies. Further, that which facilitates the contravention of a nation's laws, in a way which renders detection and prosecution of the crime effectively impossible, is of its nature a direct attack on that nation's sovereignty. No government which wishes to maintain its power intact can long suffer such an infraction. I suspect that's why the toplevel commenter who started this thread spoke in such fashion. Bitcoin dodged one bullet already in the fallout from the Silk Road debacle. This looks like it might be another.
      - pdkl95 10y ago
        > Making it possible to contract a murder Paying criminals was possible before cash was invented, and it will continue to be possible into the future. We even have movies that have hitmen being paid in gold, diamonds, favors, and other exchangeable assets as major plot devices. > difficult to achieve Our ancestors successfully exchanged goods and debt thousands of years ago. I doubt modern humans will have any difficulty inventing new non-cash methods of paying for services. This isn't theoretical, because we already see soap and other easy to fence goods used as exchangeable assets. https://priceonomics.com/why-thieves-steal-soap/ https://priceonomics.com/why-thieves-steal-soap/ Products like cigarettes and soap are appealing because they can perform some of the major functions of money. Since there is a consistent demand and market for them [...] they retain their value. [...] Since they have standard sizes, they can also be used as a unit of account. [...] In areas where fences or other buyers are always willing to purchase stolen products, soap is just as good as money. This concern about the anonymity of cash is propaganda. While everyone is concerned that a few poor or middle class people might get away with laundering petty amounts of money, the real thieves move far larger amounts of non-cash, very trackable money to corrupt politicians and offshore havens.
  - imagist 10y ago
    > There is a great deal of both law and precedent against perfect privacy in financial transactions, because of the strong association between such perfect privacy and criminality, and the very effective cover which the former affords the latter. This is true, but "this is how we've always done it" is a very poor reason to do something. The problem with this is that those in power determine what is considered criminal, which is only vaguely correlated with what is unethical enough to be worth criminalizing. > But it is also a wildly heterodox view not generally sympathetic to those who are not already privacy absolutists or likely to become so, and you may find it worth your while to consider whether this particular hill is the one you want to die on. If you were actually offering me advice for my own good, I'd take it for what it is. But you aren't. This is just a way of making it sound like privacy is not worth talking about. If you want to make an actual point against privacy I'd be happy to respond to it. I don't appreciate your advice as advice, because it's clearly ignorant of my actual goals. The thing about mathematically-enforced privacy is that it doesn't have to become the orthodoxy to become effective.
    - throwanem 10y ago
      What are your actual goals?
      - imagist 10y ago
        To be able to buy and sell goods without anyone besides the person I'm buying and selling from knowing about it. Not because I want to do anything illegal, but for the same reason that you shut the door when you use the bathroom, and don't willingly install cameras pointing at your bed that broadcast to the entire internet. I'm not willing to give up my privacy just so governments can avoid doing the police work they're elected to do in order to prosecute crimes, or so corporations can bombard me with their shitty products.
        throwanem 10y ago
        I don't suppose I really equate what I do with my wallet, and what I do in a bedroom or a bathroom. It's an interesting perspective, though.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

S_Daedalus 10y ago

The ability to anonymously, and untraceably make money is not like the ability to encrypt information, a symbolic thing you have for insurance reasons, or your privacy. A private international to-cash economy is not the same as a private bedroom, or letter, or home.