4 ms·

First off, having a cell phone or having friends over with cell phones means, technologically speaking, you can be tracked and overheard by a sufficiently advan

First off, having a cell phone or having friends over with cell phones means, technologically speaking, you can be tracked and overheard by a sufficiently advanced adversary, given reason. That said, I think this is making waves precisely because it is centralized. If you trust Apple, and their decentralized approach, you can opt in. If you live in a country which forces you to scan QR codes, you either need a lot of friends or you can’t easily escape the surveillance. That said, given the ubiquity of police cameras in London and the way they are spreading to other areas currently for automated speed ticketing, it seems likely that we’re on a path to significantly more surveillance digitally in the future. But... let’s not fool ourselves, what your carrier or ISP knows, your government is one court order away, at best, from knowing...

SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
I don’t like this argument. Yes, your phone could be used to get information on you. That does not mean there is then no issue with phones doing contact scanning and recording. You can own a phone, acknowledge the risk, and not want to see that risk expanded recklessly. The privacy systems “SEEM” ok, but any hesitation is rightfully earned. These companies and governments have abused trust and have not earned it back. This is system a road paved with best intentions and should absolutely not be implemented until coivd19 is over and people can think clearly. The hard push right now for it is clearly not wanting to “let a crisis go to waste”.
- lstamour 7y ago
  I’m not making an argument that there’s no issue with phones doing contact scanning. Rather, I trust Apple, and maybe Google, to do what they say they will do, and I trust that they will be very closely inspected from a security perspective by third-parties to confirm that. I’m not saying that phones should always report your location, but I am saying that they already have that capability. It’s like complaining about cookies when your phone already has a perfectly unique fingerprint due to Chrome’s origin trials, say.
  - SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
    > Rather, I trust Apple, and maybe Google, to do what they say they will do For me SV of the past some years or so has and not even started to repair that trust. I don’t think your phone logging proximity to every phone it’s been near is similar to browser cookies. Historically, I’m skeptical that it won’t almost immediately be abused and will remain optional. There is no going back from a government sponsored, first party system like this. So there is no need to rush in now.
    - lstamour 7y ago
      Those who have control in government set the rules up as they see fit. If Apple and Google don’t support a method to do this, they will be pushed by law to do it differently. If your problem is that something will be made mandatory, either change the law or find a loophole, as anyone else would have to. The current implementation, at least for Apple, is 100% optional, even if you have an app installed allowed to read this data, you can still turn it off in settings. If the point you’re making is that PRISM existed, and therefore SV can’t be trusted, outside of abolishing the NSA, what would actually fix this? The problem is one of legislation, not technology. And it’s worth pointing out that if you’re this afraid of tracking, you should probably set your phone to voicemail and turn on airplane mode on a regular basis. Your ISP knows what devices you have, and where they are. This doesn’t change that. Besides, even without Apple and Google, governments are inventing apps. So I fail to see how tech companies proposing a less-privacy-invading-option is harmful? Would you prefer tech companies outright lied, were caught lying and then had to implement a worse solution anyway? The law is the law... tech companies don’t themselves make it, they just propose the rules for their walled garden within what the law allows.

SlowRobotAhead 7y ago

I don’t like this argument. Yes, your phone could be used to get information on you. That does not mean there is then no issue with phones doing contact scanning and recording. You can own a phone, acknowledge the risk, and not want to see that risk expanded recklessly. The privacy systems “SEEM” ok, but any hesitation is rightfully earned. These companies and governments have abused trust and have not earned it back. This is system a road paved with best intentions and should absolutely not be implemented until coivd19 is over and people can think clearly. The hard push right now for it is clearly not wanting to “let a crisis go to waste”.

lstamour 7y ago
I’m not making an argument that there’s no issue with phones doing contact scanning. Rather, I trust Apple, and maybe Google, to do what they say they will do, and I trust that they will be very closely inspected from a security perspective by third-parties to confirm that. I’m not saying that phones should always report your location, but I am saying that they already have that capability. It’s like complaining about cookies when your phone already has a perfectly unique fingerprint due to Chrome’s origin trials, say.
- SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
  > Rather, I trust Apple, and maybe Google, to do what they say they will do For me SV of the past some years or so has and not even started to repair that trust. I don’t think your phone logging proximity to every phone it’s been near is similar to browser cookies. Historically, I’m skeptical that it won’t almost immediately be abused and will remain optional. There is no going back from a government sponsored, first party system like this. So there is no need to rush in now.
  - lstamour 7y ago
    Those who have control in government set the rules up as they see fit. If Apple and Google don’t support a method to do this, they will be pushed by law to do it differently. If your problem is that something will be made mandatory, either change the law or find a loophole, as anyone else would have to. The current implementation, at least for Apple, is 100% optional, even if you have an app installed allowed to read this data, you can still turn it off in settings. If the point you’re making is that PRISM existed, and therefore SV can’t be trusted, outside of abolishing the NSA, what would actually fix this? The problem is one of legislation, not technology. And it’s worth pointing out that if you’re this afraid of tracking, you should probably set your phone to voicemail and turn on airplane mode on a regular basis. Your ISP knows what devices you have, and where they are. This doesn’t change that. Besides, even without Apple and Google, governments are inventing apps. So I fail to see how tech companies proposing a less-privacy-invading-option is harmful? Would you prefer tech companies outright lied, were caught lying and then had to implement a worse solution anyway? The law is the law... tech companies don’t themselves make it, they just propose the rules for their walled garden within what the law allows.