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Could the answer be to disallow companies from selling products to these regimes? Or even just to make it mandatory for companies to consider human rights and l

by CM30 9y ago

Could the answer be to disallow companies from selling products to these regimes? Or even just to make it mandatory for companies to consider human rights and laws in their country when operating abroad, so selling to a regime or individual who breaks them would be illegal? Seems like that could stop stuff like this stone dead, and make it very hard for tyrannical regimes to get any good technology at all.

loceng 9y ago
Unfortunately then they will simply move abroad to somewhere they can operate, assuming the employees want to live in those locations - and assuming the employees can't work offset in Canada.
- fra 9y ago
  That's alright. "But somebody's going to do it, why not me" is a slippery slope to evil.
  - loceng 9y ago
    I agree.
- jeena 9y ago
  That's what the guys at the Nuremberg trials said too.
- uabstraction 9y ago
  Let them move abroad then. If they want to work on the tools to prop up a dictatorship, they can go live in one.
bdamm 9y ago
There are already plenty of companies outside of Canada selling backbone-scale monitoring and intervention. The price of such solutions might not even go up very much if Canada decided to make it illegal for their own companies to sell such products. It would not be a good move for the Canadian government.
- lallysingh 9y ago
  It's just a few customers that they'd have to prevent, not the products.
samfriedman 9y ago
The researchers are hoping the government will add software like this to its list of "dual-use" goods (things which can be used both for civilian and military applications) in the Canadian export restrictions.
darepublic 9y ago
The answer is to do nothing. You want to make our country as bad as the countries that use these filters in the first place -- tyrannies.
- radicaldreamer 9y ago
  Oh come on, plenty of goods already have their sale restricted without any effect on the "freedom" of the people. Restricting internet filtering technology, just like military hardware and encryption technology, simply imposes higher costs on regimes which might not be able to afford them. It's not perfect, but a viable option if promoting freedom of expression is a policy the West wants to pursue.
  - existencebox 9y ago
    Bluntly, I can't sufficiently disagree with your assertion about not impacting the "freedom" of people, and in being somehow worth it. The fact that you seem aware of/to be hinting at the pre-1996 Encryption Export Restrictions makes this even more confusing, since the fallout from that is well-described and broadly negative. (e.g. netscape having to ship a purposefully weaker RSA implementation, which given the difficulty of obtaining the US implementation, ended up with even _domestic_ users being compromised). No, not only do I think it's "not perfect" I think it's overtly worse than doing nothing, given the increased legislative burdeon/pitfalls, reduced trust in US and bad optics as far as being consistent in what we stand for. Many of the nations we might most worry about have already shown that complexity is no barrier towards implementation, or else we wouldn't be having such a "fun time" with nuclear nonproliferation, something far more locked down _and_ far more difficult to implement compared to internet filtering. I'm not going to say there shouldn't be a line, I'm generally not a fan of how much in the manner of military arms we spread around the globe, but my principle is always to err on the side of less restrictions rather than more, especially when it doesn't seem to accomplish the stated goal and in many cases will amount to cutting off your nose to spite your face, and _especially_ when it sets a precedent/lowers the bar for govt intervention.
  - rightos 9y ago
    Restrictions on the export of cryptographic technology is definitely something that can be argued makes us less free. Fortunately many die hards have put massive effort into exporting cryptography and have effectively won at this point.
majidazimi 9y ago
The burden is on tech-workers. They should make sure for which company they are selling their talents.
- lallysingh 9y ago
  It's on more than just them.
- reaperducer 9y ago
  Sounds like a burden for the salespeople.
samlevine 9y ago
The entire West could do this, and in 10 years time either the Russians or the Chinese would have filled the gap. So then you've got a bunch of authoritarian regimes that are censoring the Internet, and the stability (perceived or otherwise) they've got is dependent on countries who don't care about human rights. Giving easy soft power to the Russians and Chinese isn't ideal.
- BLKNSLVR 9y ago
  Letting Russia and China fill that gap is in-line with the "good guy" position that The West likes to market itself as. It would also be much easier to draw the battle lines and get the population on board with a war when this distinction actually exists. If The West continues to do the stuff that the bad guys do and use the reason "well, if we didn't do it they would" then what's the difference between The West and the bad guys? That rationale you've proposed as akin to admitting that the Russians and Chinese are right. As someone already said, it's a slippery slope to evil.

by CM30 9y ago

loceng 9y ago

Unfortunately then they will simply move abroad to somewhere they can operate, assuming the employees want to live in those locations - and assuming the employees can't work offset in Canada.

fra 9y ago
That's alright. "But somebody's going to do it, why not me" is a slippery slope to evil.
- loceng 9y ago
  I agree.
jeena 9y ago
That's what the guys at the Nuremberg trials said too.
uabstraction 9y ago
Let them move abroad then. If they want to work on the tools to prop up a dictatorship, they can go live in one.

bdamm 9y ago

There are already plenty of companies outside of Canada selling backbone-scale monitoring and intervention. The price of such solutions might not even go up very much if Canada decided to make it illegal for their own companies to sell such products. It would not be a good move for the Canadian government.

lallysingh 9y ago
It's just a few customers that they'd have to prevent, not the products.

samfriedman 9y ago

The researchers are hoping the government will add software like this to its list of "dual-use" goods (things which can be used both for civilian and military applications) in the Canadian export restrictions.

darepublic 9y ago

The answer is to do nothing. You want to make our country as bad as the countries that use these filters in the first place -- tyrannies.

radicaldreamer 9y ago
Oh come on, plenty of goods already have their sale restricted without any effect on the "freedom" of the people. Restricting internet filtering technology, just like military hardware and encryption technology, simply imposes higher costs on regimes which might not be able to afford them. It's not perfect, but a viable option if promoting freedom of expression is a policy the West wants to pursue.
- existencebox 9y ago
  Bluntly, I can't sufficiently disagree with your assertion about not impacting the "freedom" of people, and in being somehow worth it. The fact that you seem aware of/to be hinting at the pre-1996 Encryption Export Restrictions makes this even more confusing, since the fallout from that is well-described and broadly negative. (e.g. netscape having to ship a purposefully weaker RSA implementation, which given the difficulty of obtaining the US implementation, ended up with even _domestic_ users being compromised). No, not only do I think it's "not perfect" I think it's overtly worse than doing nothing, given the increased legislative burdeon/pitfalls, reduced trust in US and bad optics as far as being consistent in what we stand for. Many of the nations we might most worry about have already shown that complexity is no barrier towards implementation, or else we wouldn't be having such a "fun time" with nuclear nonproliferation, something far more locked down _and_ far more difficult to implement compared to internet filtering. I'm not going to say there shouldn't be a line, I'm generally not a fan of how much in the manner of military arms we spread around the globe, but my principle is always to err on the side of less restrictions rather than more, especially when it doesn't seem to accomplish the stated goal and in many cases will amount to cutting off your nose to spite your face, and _especially_ when it sets a precedent/lowers the bar for govt intervention.
- rightos 9y ago
  Restrictions on the export of cryptographic technology is definitely something that can be argued makes us less free. Fortunately many die hards have put massive effort into exporting cryptography and have effectively won at this point.

majidazimi 9y ago

The burden is on tech-workers. They should make sure for which company they are selling their talents.

lallysingh 9y ago
It's on more than just them.
reaperducer 9y ago
Sounds like a burden for the salespeople.

samlevine 9y ago

The entire West could do this, and in 10 years time either the Russians or the Chinese would have filled the gap. So then you've got a bunch of authoritarian regimes that are censoring the Internet, and the stability (perceived or otherwise) they've got is dependent on countries who don't care about human rights. Giving easy soft power to the Russians and Chinese isn't ideal.

BLKNSLVR 9y ago
Letting Russia and China fill that gap is in-line with the "good guy" position that The West likes to market itself as. It would also be much easier to draw the battle lines and get the population on board with a war when this distinction actually exists. If The West continues to do the stuff that the bad guys do and use the reason "well, if we didn't do it they would" then what's the difference between The West and the bad guys? That rationale you've proposed as akin to admitting that the Russians and Chinese are right. As someone already said, it's a slippery slope to evil.