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Tech security has been an afterthought for too long. The core technologies we use are putting us at grave risk in ways we simply cannot imagine. As we now are
by eternalvision 9y ago
Tech security has been an afterthought for too long. The core technologies we use are putting us at grave risk in ways we simply cannot imagine. As we now are starting to realize, that all of our digital lives are permanently centrally recorded carries currently unimaginable risks down the road. That we have centralized global social networks carries risks that the majority of people are not able to experience or understand. We're progressing too fast technologically, and there's way too much of a gap between morphing cultural norms and a system of government that will be, by default, always out of date with respect to these evolving norms.
That we connect directly to a worldwide network with minimum consideration for security is very troubling. In decades to come, we'll look back in humility and realize that the manners in which we used technology added grave risks to our health.
In 2017, we are not in the "wild wild west" age of technology. Rather, we are firmly in the dark ages. We're so far away from having an understanding regarding the lack of social maturity in our technological growth that we fail to properly consider the downside risks.
This is a tough nut to crack because technology is simply too good for the majority, even the technically inclined majority. I recall efforts by very very talented folks to build decentralized technologies to help mitigate some of these long term risks, but such efforts will remain firmly at the fringes of intellectual superiority for a long time. Meanwhile, Goliath will simply grow stronger in time, unless there is some major cultural shift. Is there any such shift happening, beyond the fringe?
- TheSpiceIsLife 9y agoPoetic, but you shot yourself in the foot in the first paragraph. "That we have centralized global social networks carries risks that the majority of people are not able to experience" If the majority of people do not experience the consequences of the risks of whatever-it-is-your-railing-against, if those risks are never realised by the majority, your argument evaporates.
- eternalvision 9y agoPoint taken. The majority are not able to experience it because it has not happened for the majority, yet. The data is there, the technology to use that data in the future has not been employed.
- TheSpiceIsLife 9y agoI used to be right in to the impending doom of the techno-dystopia, but I've stopped worrying about it. Predicting the future is hard. We don't need a future info-technologically induced dystopia to commit atrocities. A shibboleth[1] will suffice. From modern times to way back. Then said they unto him, Say now Shibboleth: and he said Sibboleth: for he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took him, and slew him at the passages of Jordan: and there fell at that time of the Ephraimites forty and two thousand. Judges 12:6
- wu-ikkyu 9y agoPerhaps the reason most of us don't experience the risks is because the nature of cyber warfare is more subtle than any other form of warfare in history. Social engineers prefer to be undetectable, that means they're doing it right.
- TheSpiceIsLife 9y agoThen it's hard to tell where the line between (cyber) warfare and social engineering can be drawn. Is what Facebook did[1] (does?) warfare? I sometimes like to dabble in hyperbolic alarmism, so I'm inclined to want to say yes. Maybe it's a sign of progress that we now consider emotional manipulation "war". It's probably less harmful, by all accounts, than slaughtering each other. 1. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jun/29/facebook-users-emotions-news-feeds https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jun/29/facebook-...
- wu-ikkyu 9y agoI agree on all accounts. Facebook testing emotional manipulation is corporate psyops weapons development. Marshall McLuhan postulated back in the 1970 about the future of warfare: >World War I a railway war of centralization and encirclement. World War II a radio war of decentralization concluded by the Bomb... >World War III is a guerilla information war with no division between military and civilian participation
- eternalvision 9y agoCult-driven intellectual authorities believe that designing and firing rainbow glitter embedded bullets of absolute power at rebels is a justified path to social control. Tech such as FB's is misused accordingly.