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Unless your mom is planning to involve herself in illegal activities I don't see a problem. Most electronic communication channels are compromised anyway. If yo

by fsloth 7y ago

Unless your mom is planning to involve herself in illegal activities I don't see a problem. Most electronic communication channels are compromised anyway. If you don't want eavesdroppers, don't use electronics.

jedberg 7y ago
> Unless your mom is planning to involve herself in illegal activities I don't see a problem. I assume you'd be happy to post all your credit card receipts and emails for all of us to see then. You're not doing anything illegal, right? That would be the only reason you don't want those things to be visible.
- hnthrow0693 7y ago
  What exactly leads you to believe that posting your credit card number on hacker news is somehow equivalent to not being outraged by the U.S. sharing _encrypted_ messages of suspected terrorists with the UK? Let’s not pretend the world is so black and white.
  - jedberg 7y ago
    I was arguing against the idea of "if you're not doing anything wrong you have nothing to hide". It's a bad attitude to have because allowing the government to have that power at all is a problem, even for terrorists and murderers and pedophiles. Because we don't know if people are those things until we investigate them, which means the government gets broad powers to investigate people to look for those kinds of crimes, and maybe find other people they want to get for other reasons. I used to investigate computer crime. Yeah, my job would have been a lot easier if I had unlimited access to anyone's email. But instead I had to investigate and build a case without privileged access. It was harder, but I was glad that the system couldn't be abused. Why should governments or law enforcement have privileged access?
    - Sammi 7y ago
      Also because "good" democratic governments that respect human rights and personal freedoms deteriorate to oppressive tyrannies all the time. What's to say that your country won't? Who'll protect you when they come knocking on your door to talk about that thing you posted about somewhere online, which used to be quite legal and no problem, but now is super illegal for some oppressive reason or another? First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
- drdaeman 7y ago
  Better ask for browsing and messaging history. That should be a much better analogy. Especially in the postmodern hypersensitive world.
- srbby 7y ago
  Obviously not here, but I don't care much if LE sees them.
- fsloth 7y ago
  Sorry, I was too brief. I explained it further it in another comment. But my point was that you should presume all communications channels are transparent to nation states. I was not referring that it's okay to have a surveillance civilization. My point was that we have a surveillance civilization, and you either use the communication fabric supported or you don't.
albertgoeswoof 7y ago
I guess the government will only ever use their powers for good, and those powers will never fall into the wrong hands? I suppose the definition of illegal activity is also fixed and social norms will not change over time?
- Quiark 7y ago
  Yup, governments always follow their own laws. Including, I don't know, Hong Kong for example. </mega_sarcasm>
A4ET8a8uTh0 7y ago
It is an interesting perspective for me and so I feel obligated to respond. I do not think you are wrong about the compromised part. I do think you are wrong about thinking that is a desired state. The argument that innocents have nothing to hide is tired. God will sort them out follows closely.
fsloth 7y ago
To the several downvoters: My point was not that it's okay to have surveillance. My point was that there is no uncompromised electronical communications platform. If you wish to communicate using anything having room for a man in the middle attack, it is very hard to proof that the medium is NOT compromised by a nation state or another third party. You can communicate fairly securely without the messaging being intercepted by black hat non-nationstate third parties. I don't think anyone can guarantee security against nation states. So if you want to communicate, you either communicate, or you don't, but requiring a 100% tamperproof platform is really hard. For example, Echelon system probably had/has intercept capability for all phone traffic in europe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON These systems were in place in 1960:s. AFter that modern telecoms substrate was developed in close collaboration with nation state defence parties. As a non-expert, there is no reason to think any platform is secure from nation state eavesdropping.

by fsloth 7y ago

jedberg 7y ago

> Unless your mom is planning to involve herself in illegal activities I don't see a problem. I assume you'd be happy to post all your credit card receipts and emails for all of us to see then. You're not doing anything illegal, right? That would be the only reason you don't want those things to be visible.

hnthrow0693 7y ago
What exactly leads you to believe that posting your credit card number on hacker news is somehow equivalent to not being outraged by the U.S. sharing _encrypted_ messages of suspected terrorists with the UK? Let’s not pretend the world is so black and white.
- jedberg 7y ago
  I was arguing against the idea of "if you're not doing anything wrong you have nothing to hide". It's a bad attitude to have because allowing the government to have that power at all is a problem, even for terrorists and murderers and pedophiles. Because we don't know if people are those things until we investigate them, which means the government gets broad powers to investigate people to look for those kinds of crimes, and maybe find other people they want to get for other reasons. I used to investigate computer crime. Yeah, my job would have been a lot easier if I had unlimited access to anyone's email. But instead I had to investigate and build a case without privileged access. It was harder, but I was glad that the system couldn't be abused. Why should governments or law enforcement have privileged access?
  - Sammi 7y ago
    Also because "good" democratic governments that respect human rights and personal freedoms deteriorate to oppressive tyrannies all the time. What's to say that your country won't? Who'll protect you when they come knocking on your door to talk about that thing you posted about somewhere online, which used to be quite legal and no problem, but now is super illegal for some oppressive reason or another? First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
drdaeman 7y ago
Better ask for browsing and messaging history. That should be a much better analogy. Especially in the postmodern hypersensitive world.
srbby 7y ago
Obviously not here, but I don't care much if LE sees them.
fsloth 7y ago
Sorry, I was too brief. I explained it further it in another comment. But my point was that you should presume all communications channels are transparent to nation states. I was not referring that it's okay to have a surveillance civilization. My point was that we have a surveillance civilization, and you either use the communication fabric supported or you don't.

albertgoeswoof 7y ago

I guess the government will only ever use their powers for good, and those powers will never fall into the wrong hands? I suppose the definition of illegal activity is also fixed and social norms will not change over time?

Quiark 7y ago
Yup, governments always follow their own laws. Including, I don't know, Hong Kong for example. </mega_sarcasm>

A4ET8a8uTh0 7y ago

It is an interesting perspective for me and so I feel obligated to respond. I do not think you are wrong about the compromised part. I do think you are wrong about thinking that is a desired state. The argument that innocents have nothing to hide is tired. God will sort them out follows closely.

fsloth 7y ago

To the several downvoters: My point was not that it's okay to have surveillance. My point was that there is no uncompromised electronical communications platform. If you wish to communicate using anything having room for a man in the middle attack, it is very hard to proof that the medium is NOT compromised by a nation state or another third party. You can communicate fairly securely without the messaging being intercepted by black hat non-nationstate third parties. I don't think anyone can guarantee security against nation states. So if you want to communicate, you either communicate, or you don't, but requiring a 100% tamperproof platform is really hard. For example, Echelon system probably had/has intercept capability for all phone traffic in europe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON These systems were in place in 1960:s. AFter that modern telecoms substrate was developed in close collaboration with nation state defence parties. As a non-expert, there is no reason to think any platform is secure from nation state eavesdropping.