3 ms·

It's funny how privacy protections are turning out. Every week or so we see the same pattern repeat. The BIG problem with privacy is government data sharing. Me

It's funny how privacy protections are turning out. Every week or so we see the same pattern repeat. The BIG problem with privacy is government data sharing. Medical records, police records, travel records, financial records, ... we keep hearing stories of real people really getting hurt because of these data sharing agreements. And yet all we hear about is Google data sharing, Facebook data sharing. And when it comes to problems with that, we hear about a few commercial disputes. And yet in law the situation is that we are protecting against the second case, with everywhere exceptions for the first case. And while I'm happy for such protections, I feel protections against government data sharing (especially against them sharing mistakes/inaccuracies/out of date info) would have much more positive results.

bawana 8y ago
and you cannot sue Uncle Sam. Furthermore, govt data is being withheld from public access because of the shutdown - yet those fat congressmen and senators continue to draw paychecks upwards of 200k.
loudmax 8y ago
My feeling is that there will be more and more data sharing and we're going to have to reorganize our society around the assumption of transparency. Cheap cameras connected to the cloud will continue to proliferate and face recognition software will get better and more widely available. Trying to prevent big corporations and the government from using data about people is going to be an uphill battle, and probably hopeless. If you start from the assumption that massive amounts of data on people will be collected and exist, I don't see how you successfully keep it all secret without turning into a police state. The solution will be to make this data available to everyone. Not just government and the financially powerful, but everyone. Some types of activities should remain private, especially when it's practical to do so. Encryption works, so conversations can be private so long as all participants agree. Certain types of medical records should be kept private, and some types of legal records where few people are involved. But general activity that falls outside of the bands that society has deemed worthy of special protection should be considered public. Travel records? Forget it, that stuff's all over the place. As far as financial records, society has an interest when large sums of money are involved. IMHO we'd be better off if privacy and wealth were inversely correlated.
- candiodari 8y ago
  yeah but how many people are getting oocked out of the us because of a holiday in Pakistan or Iran ?

bawana 8y ago

and you cannot sue Uncle Sam. Furthermore, govt data is being withheld from public access because of the shutdown - yet those fat congressmen and senators continue to draw paychecks upwards of 200k.

loudmax 8y ago

My feeling is that there will be more and more data sharing and we're going to have to reorganize our society around the assumption of transparency. Cheap cameras connected to the cloud will continue to proliferate and face recognition software will get better and more widely available. Trying to prevent big corporations and the government from using data about people is going to be an uphill battle, and probably hopeless. If you start from the assumption that massive amounts of data on people will be collected and exist, I don't see how you successfully keep it all secret without turning into a police state. The solution will be to make this data available to everyone. Not just government and the financially powerful, but everyone. Some types of activities should remain private, especially when it's practical to do so. Encryption works, so conversations can be private so long as all participants agree. Certain types of medical records should be kept private, and some types of legal records where few people are involved. But general activity that falls outside of the bands that society has deemed worthy of special protection should be considered public. Travel records? Forget it, that stuff's all over the place. As far as financial records, society has an interest when large sums of money are involved. IMHO we'd be better off if privacy and wealth were inversely correlated.

candiodari 8y ago
yeah but how many people are getting oocked out of the us because of a holiday in Pakistan or Iran ?