4 ms·

I'm going to take issue with this, because I see this line of argument a lot on HN recently. There is a fundamental difference between "like in kind" and "like

by ethbro 8y ago

I'm going to take issue with this, because I see this line of argument a lot on HN recently. There is a fundamental difference between "like in kind" and "like in severity". Do the US and China both monitor telecom? Yes. Has the US built a national firewall? No. Do the US and China both have legal processes for acquiring court ordered telecom intercepts? Yes. Is the US legal system wholly subordinate to political goals? No. Do the US and Chinese governments lean on companies to comply with their wishes? Yes. Do US companies survive at the whim of the US government and generally lack independent legal recourse to fight pressure? No. If you want to go through point-by-point with what's similar between Chinese and US data monitoring regimes, I'm happy to do so. But they aren't close to the same.

e40 8y ago
I really dislike the "they're both the same" arguments. People do the same about the US political parties (and use this as an excuse to either not vote, or vote for their favorite side, based on this). This thinking allows people to let the worse offender off the hook.
- lightbyte 8y ago
  "they're both the same" is never an argument, it's a lazy cop out from someone who is either too cynical or disillusioned to care and do their own research.
- wenc 8y ago
  It's fallacious outcome of analogical thinking which says "because two things have some things in common, they have everything in common". It's a pretty common fallacy [1], and easily deconstructed if recognized. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_the_undistributed_middle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_the_undistributed_m...
pelario 8y ago
Not a fan or defensor of China here; but the US has way more history of intervention in other countries; so I would be much much worried about US-based companies that provide searching or social networking services
- BLKNSLVR 8y ago
  But China has a worse record of human rights abuses. In regards to intervention in other countries, China consumes them. Tibet, Taiwan no longer exist according to China. They've all got bad history. If God existed and was to strike down on the unworthy nations of the world, very few would be spared. And I dislike this as much as any rational person (hello? rational people...?) but if it came to choosing sides in what appears to be inevitable future conflict, I'd choose the US over China and Russia. I hate that it's the case, but the US, I think, is the least worst option. This may be based purely on cultural familiarity, but, well, there it is.
  - fivecents 8y ago
    you forgot to mention North Korea and its people. China made North Korea's existence possible by backing Kim. Still, China is deporting North Korean refugees back to North Korea, even though it knows those people die of torture & "execution shows". oh and there's the organ harvesting: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/in-the-face-of-criticism-china-has-been-cleaning-up-its-organ-transplant-industry/2017/09/14/d689444e-e1a2-11e6-a419-eefe8eff0835_story.html?noredirect=on https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/in-the-fac...
    - Aunche 8y ago
      If you're going to bring up North Korea, you might as well bring up the long, long list of corrupt dictators the US supported or even brought into power. Batista in Cuba, the Shah of Iran, Carlos Castillo Armas of Guatamala, Saddam Hussein, and the Taliban are just the ones I can think of on the top of my head.
      - fivecents 8y ago
        didn't US remove most of them when it realized their immoral acts? US thought they were good guys at first, so US does make mistakes... but China? it has its biggest mistake on its front yard--North Korea. but I guess China can never learn...
3pt14159 8y ago
The real problem is that I'm not sure its really going to change anything. Do we really think that the Chinese can't hack our network gear? The SS7 hack was disclosed in 2008 and was ongoing until at least 2017, the last year I looked into it. Nationalizing 5G or specifying a specific source of origin will help at the margins, but I'm coming to the conclusion that without a fundamental redesign of the internet security isn't possible. Even then, I'm not sure. Even if you somehow change the internet at the protocol level and magically make it secure form the legion of vectors the surveillance can just move somewhere else. Sell some rooted phones on eBay. Buy a security company or a social network. The Chinese bought 500px (a company I was CDS of for a year before I quit) for a hot minute before selling it back to the Americans (to Getty). With the RAWs they now have the sensor fingerprints of a ton of DSLRs tied to real email addresses, etc. Plus countless photos of naked people that were private. Sure they could probably have gotten that data some other noisy way, but this is basically risk-free, and they probably made a profit on it by scaring Getty that the photo licensing business was about to get into a margins war with China.

by ethbro 8y ago

e40 8y ago

I really dislike the "they're both the same" arguments. People do the same about the US political parties (and use this as an excuse to either not vote, or vote for their favorite side, based on this). This thinking allows people to let the worse offender off the hook.

lightbyte 8y ago
"they're both the same" is never an argument, it's a lazy cop out from someone who is either too cynical or disillusioned to care and do their own research.
wenc 8y ago
It's fallacious outcome of analogical thinking which says "because two things have some things in common, they have everything in common". It's a pretty common fallacy [1], and easily deconstructed if recognized. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_the_undistributed_middle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_the_undistributed_m...

pelario 8y ago

Not a fan or defensor of China here; but the US has way more history of intervention in other countries; so I would be much much worried about US-based companies that provide searching or social networking services

BLKNSLVR 8y ago
But China has a worse record of human rights abuses. In regards to intervention in other countries, China consumes them. Tibet, Taiwan no longer exist according to China. They've all got bad history. If God existed and was to strike down on the unworthy nations of the world, very few would be spared. And I dislike this as much as any rational person (hello? rational people...?) but if it came to choosing sides in what appears to be inevitable future conflict, I'd choose the US over China and Russia. I hate that it's the case, but the US, I think, is the least worst option. This may be based purely on cultural familiarity, but, well, there it is.
- fivecents 8y ago
  you forgot to mention North Korea and its people. China made North Korea's existence possible by backing Kim. Still, China is deporting North Korean refugees back to North Korea, even though it knows those people die of torture & "execution shows". oh and there's the organ harvesting: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/in-the-face-of-criticism-china-has-been-cleaning-up-its-organ-transplant-industry/2017/09/14/d689444e-e1a2-11e6-a419-eefe8eff0835_story.html?noredirect=on https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/in-the-fac...
  - Aunche 8y ago
    If you're going to bring up North Korea, you might as well bring up the long, long list of corrupt dictators the US supported or even brought into power. Batista in Cuba, the Shah of Iran, Carlos Castillo Armas of Guatamala, Saddam Hussein, and the Taliban are just the ones I can think of on the top of my head.
    - fivecents 8y ago
      didn't US remove most of them when it realized their immoral acts? US thought they were good guys at first, so US does make mistakes... but China? it has its biggest mistake on its front yard--North Korea. but I guess China can never learn...

3pt14159 8y ago

The real problem is that I'm not sure its really going to change anything. Do we really think that the Chinese can't hack our network gear? The SS7 hack was disclosed in 2008 and was ongoing until at least 2017, the last year I looked into it. Nationalizing 5G or specifying a specific source of origin will help at the margins, but I'm coming to the conclusion that without a fundamental redesign of the internet security isn't possible. Even then, I'm not sure. Even if you somehow change the internet at the protocol level and magically make it secure form the legion of vectors the surveillance can just move somewhere else. Sell some rooted phones on eBay. Buy a security company or a social network. The Chinese bought 500px (a company I was CDS of for a year before I quit) for a hot minute before selling it back to the Americans (to Getty). With the RAWs they now have the sensor fingerprints of a ton of DSLRs tied to real email addresses, etc. Plus countless photos of naked people that were private. Sure they could probably have gotten that data some other noisy way, but this is basically risk-free, and they probably made a profit on it by scaring Getty that the photo licensing business was about to get into a margins war with China.