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Let's start with your mistaken premise. You don't actually have privacy, and you won't be getting it back. Just by analyzing how you worded your public post,

by tslug 10y ago

Let's start with your mistaken premise. You don't actually have privacy, and you won't be getting it back. Just by analyzing how you worded your public post, which post you responded to, and the time you posted it, entities you have no awareness of are already learning more about you than you can imagine, and they're using big data techniques to mine that and lots of other sources of data in order to get an incredibly detailed picture of you. They're making money off that information, and they're gaining power from it. Do you want to know more about those entities and what they're doing with that information? Would you like to be one of the beneficiaries of your information, or would you like to continue to be left out? If you embrace privacy, you're also embracing their privacy, and you're reinforcing the increasingly asymmetric, and non-democratic advantage they have over you. Obviously, no one should be rounded up for anything, but yes, you and I had better open our minds to a better way to live together- and quickly. If you have a solution, by all means, offer it up, but privacy is dead, and if your answer is to try to stuff that genie back in the bottle, it's a non-starter. We need to embrace another path.

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 10y ago
Assuming your hypothesis were correct that making the data more widely accessible would diminish the power of those who are doing the surveillance now: Please explain why you think that it is easier to get those doing the surveillance now to open up their data and thus lose their power instead of getting them to not collect the data in the first place and thus lose the power?
- tslug 10y ago
  If I understand your question, the two options you've presented are: 1. Make a law to force governments and corporations to be more open, a la the Freedom of Information Act but turned into its live-casting modern equivalent, and 2. Not clear, but it sounds like a combination of adding more teeth to enforcement of our privacy laws and/or individually using much stronger crypto? If that's what you meant, then neither path sounds easy. They both sound like a giant pain in the butt. However, Path #1 sounds a hell of a lot healthier in the long run to me. It's the one I advocate, because I believe more information is always better. You can certainly argue that it will be abused, but if everyone can see everything, then you can see the abuser doing the abuse as well. That's a key point that's easy to miss. As to the diminished power, there's a similar argument to be made regarding wealth inequality. Hard to imagine the wealthy would agree to higher taxes if it hurts them, yet some of the most enlightened and even the very wealthiest do believe this, because they understand that while their individual wealth goes down if viewed in isolation, holistically, their true wealth goes up, because they improve the quality their country, its services, and the people they share their lives with.
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 10y ago
    I didn't mean any specific strategy at all, I am just wondering why you think that achieving transparency of the kind that you seem to have in mind would be easier than maintaining/gaining back privacy. I read what you wrote as "gaining back privacy is hard, therefore, we should aim for transparency". What I didn't see was a justification for why that would actually be easier. And if it's equally hard, that argument kindof falls apart, doesn't it? Also, I don't see why your suggested options are even necessarily in conflict? At least conceptually, I don't see any problem with transparency for governments and corporations, but privacy for individuals (unless they are acting in a role within those organisations)?! > However, Path #1 sounds a hell of a lot healthier in the long run to me. Do you mean that a society where noone feels the need to keep secrets would be a healthier society than what we have today, or do you mean that forcing everyone to publish all their secrets against their will would lead to a healthier society? Or something else entirely? > It's the one I advocate, because I believe more information is always better. You can certainly argue that it will be abused, but if everyone can see everything, then you can see the abuser doing the abuse as well. That's a key point that's easy to miss. Well, the one problem is, of course, whether that is actually any more realistic than strong privacy. Just because you hope that more transparency of the powerless will also bring more transparency of the powerful, doesn't mean one actually implies the other. You can actually have total lack of privacy for common folk and total secrecy of the elite at the same time. With power come the resources to maintain secrecy, whether legal or not. But maybe more importantly: Do you actually see the abuser doing the abuse? How would you actually find that out, in practical terms? Would you personally read all the data that's being published by the government? Millions of pages every day? After all, the more data, the better? Or wouldn't you, for the most part, have to rely on others, like journalists or activists, to filter out the interesting stuff and to put it into context for you? What do you expect powerful groups to do when they can clearly see how those journalists and activists are preparing to report on their wrongdoing? Just sit there and hope for the best, like, say, Putin or Erdogan? > As to the diminished power, there's a similar argument to be made regarding wealth inequality. Hard to imagine the wealthy would agree to higher taxes if it hurts them, yet some of the most enlightened and even the very wealthiest do believe this, because they understand that while their individual wealth goes down if viewed in isolation, holistically, their true wealth goes up, because they improve the quality their country, its services, and the people they share their lives with. The question is: Do you therefore want to give the wealthiest the power to write the tax code that's being enforced on everyone? Do you think that because some people have good intentions with all the data that's being collected, anyone who manages to collect data should therefore have the right to override the wishes of the people the data is about? If you want to find out whether something is risky, it's no use to only look at the successes. There absolutely have been monarchies where the monarch was a wise and responsible person. What does that tell us about whether monarchy or democracy should be the peferred form of government?
arca_vorago 10y ago
" You don't actually have privacy, and you won't be getting it back." This is a claim you have provided no evidence for that flies in the face of the fourth amendment and property rights, not to mention natural rights. If you are wondering, John Locke would be a good starting point if you are truly interested in having the discussion needed on the subject. "If you embrace privacy, you're also embracing their privacy, and you're reinforcing the increasingly asymmetric, and non-democratic advantage they have over you." False, the government can be and is subject to the people, and therefore it's rights to privacy say, while in the duty of office, are much degraded. (see: FOIA) They are not the same.
- tslug 10y ago
  You haven't been reading the news if you don't understand what's happening with privacy and big data right now. I can say with conviction that we don't have privacy. What I can't point to is exactly who has this information and what they're doing with it, because... privacy. Perhaps Y Combinator would care to share their IP access logs and tell you which servers appear to be scraping these posts? You could do it yourself, if only... oh yeah, privacy. I look forward to FOIA-liberated records the NSA, HS, CIA, FBI, and local law enforcement agencies have on us. I also look forward to reading the FOIA-liberated transcripts of all the backroom deal-making where it seems the government is actually being governed from. Do you think individual privacy helped bring us together as a nation to nominate the best candidates and elect the best President? Or do you think individual privacy helped us vilify each other in this election?
  - terrestrial 10y ago
    Privacy and transparency are not opposites. It is possible to have privacy in a perfectly transparent world. I agree that the privacy battle as we know it is already lost. Once someone has the kind of powers the "umpteen eyes" are possessing, no amount of legislation will make them give it up. That does not mean we should pretend that it is not a problem. There is a massive discrepancy right now in the kind of tools and information that is publicly available, and what secret government operations are possessing. What we should be fighting for is transparency, not privacy. I want to know exactly what kind of data is collected about me, and I want to know who accesses it and when (unless I'm subject to an investigation, during which the information about my data being accessed can be embargoed until it's over). I would blog about this, if it wasn't so damn difficult to host a website without revealing my full identity. I don't want future employers to judge me for political views, sexuality or whatever. That's why privacy is important, and still will be in a fully-transparent world (which I do think is inevitable, but no government is currently working towards that).
EliRivers 10y ago
You don't actually have privacy, and you won't be getting it back. I disagree, and if this is the starting assertion then we have a permanent disagreement that no amount of discussion can solve. Perhaps you could define "privacy". We must be using different definitions, as by my definition the fact that I do have privacy is as self-evident as the fact that only I know what I had for dinner.
- tslug 10y ago
  If you had dinner at a restaurant, the restaurant knows, and if you used a credit card to pay for it, the payment processing company can figure it out by correlating the menu prices with the total bill. If you cooked dinner at home, you used groceries, and the supermarket has a record of what you bought there. If you googled a recipe, then google knows. If anyone intercepts your sewage and analyzes it, they will know, too. Your gas company knows how much energy you used on the burner. Your electric company saw the power spikes from your blender and microwave, and it saw your fridge compressor turn on. If anyone left Siri or Google Assistant or Amazon echo on during dinner, then they know. Anyone going through your trash can see what wrappers you threw out, or any leftover food. What you had for dinner exactly is indeed "private" as you describe, but you see where I'm going with this? Your effective privacy is being pushed into a corner, because it's now possible with all of the little bits and pieces of clues you leave everywhere and the advent of big data to correlate these pieces into such a precise picture that your effective privacy is approaching zero over time.

by tslug 10y ago

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 10y ago

Assuming your hypothesis were correct that making the data more widely accessible would diminish the power of those who are doing the surveillance now: Please explain why you think that it is easier to get those doing the surveillance now to open up their data and thus lose their power instead of getting them to not collect the data in the first place and thus lose the power?

tslug 10y ago
If I understand your question, the two options you've presented are: 1. Make a law to force governments and corporations to be more open, a la the Freedom of Information Act but turned into its live-casting modern equivalent, and 2. Not clear, but it sounds like a combination of adding more teeth to enforcement of our privacy laws and/or individually using much stronger crypto? If that's what you meant, then neither path sounds easy. They both sound like a giant pain in the butt. However, Path #1 sounds a hell of a lot healthier in the long run to me. It's the one I advocate, because I believe more information is always better. You can certainly argue that it will be abused, but if everyone can see everything, then you can see the abuser doing the abuse as well. That's a key point that's easy to miss. As to the diminished power, there's a similar argument to be made regarding wealth inequality. Hard to imagine the wealthy would agree to higher taxes if it hurts them, yet some of the most enlightened and even the very wealthiest do believe this, because they understand that while their individual wealth goes down if viewed in isolation, holistically, their true wealth goes up, because they improve the quality their country, its services, and the people they share their lives with.
- zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 10y ago
  I didn't mean any specific strategy at all, I am just wondering why you think that achieving transparency of the kind that you seem to have in mind would be easier than maintaining/gaining back privacy. I read what you wrote as "gaining back privacy is hard, therefore, we should aim for transparency". What I didn't see was a justification for why that would actually be easier. And if it's equally hard, that argument kindof falls apart, doesn't it? Also, I don't see why your suggested options are even necessarily in conflict? At least conceptually, I don't see any problem with transparency for governments and corporations, but privacy for individuals (unless they are acting in a role within those organisations)?! > However, Path #1 sounds a hell of a lot healthier in the long run to me. Do you mean that a society where noone feels the need to keep secrets would be a healthier society than what we have today, or do you mean that forcing everyone to publish all their secrets against their will would lead to a healthier society? Or something else entirely? > It's the one I advocate, because I believe more information is always better. You can certainly argue that it will be abused, but if everyone can see everything, then you can see the abuser doing the abuse as well. That's a key point that's easy to miss. Well, the one problem is, of course, whether that is actually any more realistic than strong privacy. Just because you hope that more transparency of the powerless will also bring more transparency of the powerful, doesn't mean one actually implies the other. You can actually have total lack of privacy for common folk and total secrecy of the elite at the same time. With power come the resources to maintain secrecy, whether legal or not. But maybe more importantly: Do you actually see the abuser doing the abuse? How would you actually find that out, in practical terms? Would you personally read all the data that's being published by the government? Millions of pages every day? After all, the more data, the better? Or wouldn't you, for the most part, have to rely on others, like journalists or activists, to filter out the interesting stuff and to put it into context for you? What do you expect powerful groups to do when they can clearly see how those journalists and activists are preparing to report on their wrongdoing? Just sit there and hope for the best, like, say, Putin or Erdogan? > As to the diminished power, there's a similar argument to be made regarding wealth inequality. Hard to imagine the wealthy would agree to higher taxes if it hurts them, yet some of the most enlightened and even the very wealthiest do believe this, because they understand that while their individual wealth goes down if viewed in isolation, holistically, their true wealth goes up, because they improve the quality their country, its services, and the people they share their lives with. The question is: Do you therefore want to give the wealthiest the power to write the tax code that's being enforced on everyone? Do you think that because some people have good intentions with all the data that's being collected, anyone who manages to collect data should therefore have the right to override the wishes of the people the data is about? If you want to find out whether something is risky, it's no use to only look at the successes. There absolutely have been monarchies where the monarch was a wise and responsible person. What does that tell us about whether monarchy or democracy should be the peferred form of government?

arca_vorago 10y ago

" You don't actually have privacy, and you won't be getting it back." This is a claim you have provided no evidence for that flies in the face of the fourth amendment and property rights, not to mention natural rights. If you are wondering, John Locke would be a good starting point if you are truly interested in having the discussion needed on the subject. "If you embrace privacy, you're also embracing their privacy, and you're reinforcing the increasingly asymmetric, and non-democratic advantage they have over you." False, the government can be and is subject to the people, and therefore it's rights to privacy say, while in the duty of office, are much degraded. (see: FOIA) They are not the same.

tslug 10y ago
You haven't been reading the news if you don't understand what's happening with privacy and big data right now. I can say with conviction that we don't have privacy. What I can't point to is exactly who has this information and what they're doing with it, because... privacy. Perhaps Y Combinator would care to share their IP access logs and tell you which servers appear to be scraping these posts? You could do it yourself, if only... oh yeah, privacy. I look forward to FOIA-liberated records the NSA, HS, CIA, FBI, and local law enforcement agencies have on us. I also look forward to reading the FOIA-liberated transcripts of all the backroom deal-making where it seems the government is actually being governed from. Do you think individual privacy helped bring us together as a nation to nominate the best candidates and elect the best President? Or do you think individual privacy helped us vilify each other in this election?
- terrestrial 10y ago
  Privacy and transparency are not opposites. It is possible to have privacy in a perfectly transparent world. I agree that the privacy battle as we know it is already lost. Once someone has the kind of powers the "umpteen eyes" are possessing, no amount of legislation will make them give it up. That does not mean we should pretend that it is not a problem. There is a massive discrepancy right now in the kind of tools and information that is publicly available, and what secret government operations are possessing. What we should be fighting for is transparency, not privacy. I want to know exactly what kind of data is collected about me, and I want to know who accesses it and when (unless I'm subject to an investigation, during which the information about my data being accessed can be embargoed until it's over). I would blog about this, if it wasn't so damn difficult to host a website without revealing my full identity. I don't want future employers to judge me for political views, sexuality or whatever. That's why privacy is important, and still will be in a fully-transparent world (which I do think is inevitable, but no government is currently working towards that).

EliRivers 10y ago

You don't actually have privacy, and you won't be getting it back. I disagree, and if this is the starting assertion then we have a permanent disagreement that no amount of discussion can solve. Perhaps you could define "privacy". We must be using different definitions, as by my definition the fact that I do have privacy is as self-evident as the fact that only I know what I had for dinner.

tslug 10y ago
If you had dinner at a restaurant, the restaurant knows, and if you used a credit card to pay for it, the payment processing company can figure it out by correlating the menu prices with the total bill. If you cooked dinner at home, you used groceries, and the supermarket has a record of what you bought there. If you googled a recipe, then google knows. If anyone intercepts your sewage and analyzes it, they will know, too. Your gas company knows how much energy you used on the burner. Your electric company saw the power spikes from your blender and microwave, and it saw your fridge compressor turn on. If anyone left Siri or Google Assistant or Amazon echo on during dinner, then they know. Anyone going through your trash can see what wrappers you threw out, or any leftover food. What you had for dinner exactly is indeed "private" as you describe, but you see where I'm going with this? Your effective privacy is being pushed into a corner, because it's now possible with all of the little bits and pieces of clues you leave everywhere and the advent of big data to correlate these pieces into such a precise picture that your effective privacy is approaching zero over time.