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It's hard to see how this will do anything besides generate a ton of false positives.

by brentm 9y ago

kbart 9y ago
Call me a cynic, but I doubt anyone really cares. What this really will be useful is as a database of people of selected race, origin and views to help appear for certain agencies to be working and generate headlines like: "50 suspected terrorists were deported", "terrorists bombing plot stopped" (of course, dummy bomb was provided by the same secret service) to justify even more mass surveillance in near future.
- joering2 9y ago
  I would like to upvote you, but I am genuinely afraid at some point HN is requested to share users' data, and someone at US GOV will ask me why did I sympathize with your message. Am I the only one this paranoid??
saimiam 9y ago
Or null results. What's to stop anyone from creating a secret profile and using a VPN (to avoid linking the terrorist persona's IP address with their main persona's IP address) just to talk to fellow terrorists? Terrorists could even force every recruit to use a common, shared profile or just avoid popular social media altogether when needing to discuss terrorist acts.
- brentm 9y ago
  I agree with you. Actual bad actors are not going to attempt to enter the US with sympathetic ISIS (etc) posts on their public Facebook page. What will happen though is many immigrants will end up having entry denied based on an immigration officers interpretation of a post they made on Twitter 3 years ago.
- matt4077 9y ago
  Yeah, and if ISIS were running an ISO 9001 certified terror plot, that's exactly how they'd do it. But in the real world, a terrorist doesn't just spawn at the other end of de_dust. They know others in these social circles long before they're radicalised. The current crop of terrorists also happens to be a few landings short of a pilot's license, so to speak: the "Four Lions factor" (named for the movie) refers to the hypothesis that the aggressors' incompetence has been a major factor foiling their plans. How are they going to use a VPN if they frequently blow themselves up because they get confused by time zones? Not that I consider this policy good in any possible way. It's one more example of that country softly proclaiming "all men are created equal / with unalienable rights", then turning around and making visitors feel like Somalian hostages. But if I were tasked with unearthing terrorist networks, I'd definitely get entirely to excited at the prospect of getting access to the Facebook graph.
  - brentm 9y ago
    There are threats in the world but picking the needle out of the haystack is very difficult and my biggest concern is how data is interpreted. If you were attempting to enter the US, migrating from Turkey and I determined that 3 people within your social graph, one direct connection 2 secondary are known terrorist does that mean you are a terrorist based on no other information? It's really hard without direct evidence and we're playing with peoples lives. The vast majority of people are no threat and will be productive members of society. I am afraid the guilt until proven innocent mindset in regards to immigrants is increasing in parts of the US. I wish everyone would settle down and relax for a minute but it seems like thing will only continue to increase as we begin to enter a new election year and then start what will be a very heated Presidential campaign.

It's hard to see how this will do anything besides generate a ton of false positives.

by brentm 9y ago

It's hard to see how this will do anything besides generate a ton of false positives.

Call me a cynic, but I doubt anyone really cares. What this really will be useful is as a database of people of selected race, origin and views to help appear for certain agencies to be working and generate headlines like: "50 suspected terrorists were deported", "terrorists bombing plot stopped" (of course, dummy bomb was provided by the same secret service) to justify even more mass surveillance in near future.

joering2 9y ago
I would like to upvote you, but I am genuinely afraid at some point HN is requested to share users' data, and someone at US GOV will ask me why did I sympathize with your message. Am I the only one this paranoid??

saimiam 9y ago

Or null results. What's to stop anyone from creating a secret profile and using a VPN (to avoid linking the terrorist persona's IP address with their main persona's IP address) just to talk to fellow terrorists? Terrorists could even force every recruit to use a common, shared profile or just avoid popular social media altogether when needing to discuss terrorist acts.

brentm 9y ago
I agree with you. Actual bad actors are not going to attempt to enter the US with sympathetic ISIS (etc) posts on their public Facebook page. What will happen though is many immigrants will end up having entry denied based on an immigration officers interpretation of a post they made on Twitter 3 years ago.
matt4077 9y ago
Yeah, and if ISIS were running an ISO 9001 certified terror plot, that's exactly how they'd do it. But in the real world, a terrorist doesn't just spawn at the other end of de_dust. They know others in these social circles long before they're radicalised. The current crop of terrorists also happens to be a few landings short of a pilot's license, so to speak: the "Four Lions factor" (named for the movie) refers to the hypothesis that the aggressors' incompetence has been a major factor foiling their plans. How are they going to use a VPN if they frequently blow themselves up because they get confused by time zones? Not that I consider this policy good in any possible way. It's one more example of that country softly proclaiming "all men are created equal / with unalienable rights", then turning around and making visitors feel like Somalian hostages. But if I were tasked with unearthing terrorist networks, I'd definitely get entirely to excited at the prospect of getting access to the Facebook graph.
- brentm 9y ago
  There are threats in the world but picking the needle out of the haystack is very difficult and my biggest concern is how data is interpreted. If you were attempting to enter the US, migrating from Turkey and I determined that 3 people within your social graph, one direct connection 2 secondary are known terrorist does that mean you are a terrorist based on no other information? It's really hard without direct evidence and we're playing with peoples lives. The vast majority of people are no threat and will be productive members of society. I am afraid the guilt until proven innocent mindset in regards to immigrants is increasing in parts of the US. I wish everyone would settle down and relax for a minute but it seems like thing will only continue to increase as we begin to enter a new election year and then start what will be a very heated Presidential campaign.