5 ms·

Not OP. But I would give all my data to the police/government... in an encrypted manner that has guarantees in place that only valid criminal investigations can

by zo1 6y ago

Not OP. But I would give all my data to the police/government... in an encrypted manner that has guarantees in place that only valid criminal investigations can decrypt. Heck, we do it on some level all the time anyways when it comes to things such as filing taxes, getting married, running companies, enforcing contracts and various other day-to-day benign interactions. At this point, I'm more inclined to believe that "democratic" and "noble" governments and agents are the ones maliciously pushing for "privacy" because it suits their power-maintaining agenda. I'm struggling to find compelling and valid reasons why we can't pursue a general solution that involves us giving all this "private" data to a government entity for legitimate investigations, fraud prevention and crime-solving whilst keeping that data free from abuse.

earthboundkid 6y ago
> I'm struggling to find compelling and valid reasons why we can't pursue a general solution that involves us giving all this "private" data to a government entity for legitimate investigations, fraud prevention and crime-solving whilst keeping that data free from abuse. Because that's not logically possible. It would be nice if it were, but just think about it: if you give data to the government, humans can look at it. Can we ensure that the humans who look at it are good humans? No. Is there some mathematical way of signing and encrypting such that only good humans can look at it? No. Okay, so it's logically impossible to keep bad people out mathematically, but maybe it's a practical problem and it doesn't matter in practice? Except no, there are tons of evil governments (CCP being the most obvious, but pick your poison), and even good governments are subject to the problem that people can bribed and secrets can be stolen if there is sufficient motivation. It's just not compatible with human nature to say "collect all this information on people, but only use it For Good Purposes."
- CJefferson 6y ago
  But, the message you are replying to points out governments already have piles of information about you -- your taxes for example. They can easily add to this (in appropriate legal situations), by reaching out to banks in your country for example. While I understand the problem of evil governments, I broadly trust mine. I want them to have the power to investigate me, and my fellow citizens, for crimes. I don't want to love in a lawless country.
  - avianlyric 6y ago
    Do you trust all future governments? Germany 1933, Donald Trump today, far right extremism in Europe are all examples of how trustworthy governments become evil governments. Democracy doesn’t offer a defence against “evil” governments. Only that you need a majority (and frequently not even a majority) to vote for one.
    - CJefferson 6y ago
      I'm not clear what you are arguing for? Do you not want a functioning, effective police force now, in case they become evil in the future (or already are evil, depending on your point of view)? If a government turns full evil, they don't need evidence against you, they can just lock you up without charge.
      - avianlyric 6y ago
        But we already have functioning and effective police forces in the western world without having to give up our rights to privacy. Why would we want to give up more?
        CJefferson 6y ago
        Some people want to be more private than current (for example, this discussion of email keys). As more things move online, it is worth thinking where the balance should be (we probably agree on that), I think the balance should be less privacy (I'm sure you don't agree with that, a full discussion on that won't fit well in a ycombinator thread).
        avianlyric 6y ago
        You’re right on you final points. My two rebuttals for advocating for less privacy online is that being online naturally makes you less private, not more. Previously if someone, government or otherwise, wanted to learn about you, they would need to physically follow you, tap your phones, intercept your post etc. Warrants for searches were built around this. Online, you can dig into the private life of someone on the other side of the plant who you’ve never met. With the application of computers you can dig into the lives of hundreds of people you’ve never met. All without leaving the comfort of your desk. The opportunity for fishing expedition is unprecedented at the moment, and it always easy to justify a fishing expedition if you pick a horrific enough crime (child pornography seems to be the favourite right now). Finally privacy is the strongest bulwark we have against government overreach. That doesn’t mean some top down conspiracy of a totalitarian-elect government. It can be normal everyday government administrators who decide to step outside their bounds for personal reasons, or belief of moral superiority. Simply put, there’s no better deterrent for bad behaviour than hard work. Privacy makes bad actors work hard for their lunch. It makes the good actors work hard as well, but the solution to that isn’t less privacy, it’s more funding and resources for good actors.
int_19h 6y ago
Because we don't trust the government agents to provide such guarantees, or to honor them if they do?
avianlyric 6y ago
How exactly would you do this? > in an encrypted manner that has guarantees in place that only valid criminal investigations can decrypt What constitutes a valid criminal investigation, who decides? Do you, does a prosecutor, a judge, the police? Is it a valid to decrypt your data just see if you were at a specific location at a specific time? What about so the police can check a theory? How about to see if you joined an unsanctioned protest, smoked a joint, speed while driving, downloaded a movie? Speeding and copyright theft are both criminal, are you saying that your happy to make it trivial to investigate you for these crimes an prosecute you for them? It used to be criminal to engage in homosexual behaviour, and in some parts of the world. Once upon a time that would be a valid criminal investigation in the US. For a short while it was looking like abortions might become criminal in the not too distant future. Privacy is a fundamental tool for allowing society to progress and change, and for avoiding totalitarianism.
- zo1 6y ago
  >"What constitutes a valid criminal investigation, who decides? Do you, does a prosecutor, a judge, the police?" Some sort of formal process with reasonable oversight the necessity of multiple points of compromise and/or collusion in order for the data to be abused for non-governmental use. Bottom line, I can't say I've "solved" the problem and have the perfect answer to your question. But I'm sure we, collectively as a society filled with smart people that want to move us forward, could put down some (fundamental?) tools/rules/processes that would negate the potential for abuse up until a certain point. Maybe we can't do 100%, but we could do 95 or 98%? >"Is it a valid to decrypt your data just see if you were at a specific location at a specific time? What about so the police can check a theory? How about to see if you joined an unsanctioned protest, smoked a joint, speed while driving, downloaded a movie?" Yes, very much so Yes! Especially the location based stuff as it's perfect for investigations without revealing details. "List all people that were within 50m of this crime location during this timespan." <-- that is so unbelievably powerful as a crime-solving tool, that I am baffled that we're avoiding it out of privacy concerns. As for the speeding example: That's probably another example of us already giving the data (car's black-box) to government (and private insurance companies) in order to facilitate an investigation. But to your point about drug-use, speeding and copyright infringement. If we don't want something prosecuted then we shouldn't have it as a crime. But as it stands now, a bunch of what you mentioned is a crime. That represents an implicit agreement by all of us in society that says we deem those things punishable. We can't hide behind lack of capability to police said crimes, but still label them as such. That is ripe for offical-power abuse. For all we know, if we lived in a society where we had such strict enforcement of laws as I suggest, we'd potentially have greater churn and change in our laws to match the opinions of society as it changed and evolved. > "Privacy is a fundamental tool for allowing society to progress and change, and for avoiding totalitarianism." I disagree. I'm not seeing it. There is just way too much going wrong today in 1-st world countries whilst we have really good privacy for it to be the case. We're downright descending into totalitarianism and thought/opinion control territory, all whilst our "privacy" is mostly maintained and respected. Are you saying we need more of it? What would that look like to you?

by zo1 6y ago

earthboundkid 6y ago

> I'm struggling to find compelling and valid reasons why we can't pursue a general solution that involves us giving all this "private" data to a government entity for legitimate investigations, fraud prevention and crime-solving whilst keeping that data free from abuse. Because that's not logically possible. It would be nice if it were, but just think about it: if you give data to the government, humans can look at it. Can we ensure that the humans who look at it are good humans? No. Is there some mathematical way of signing and encrypting such that only good humans can look at it? No. Okay, so it's logically impossible to keep bad people out mathematically, but maybe it's a practical problem and it doesn't matter in practice? Except no, there are tons of evil governments (CCP being the most obvious, but pick your poison), and even good governments are subject to the problem that people can bribed and secrets can be stolen if there is sufficient motivation. It's just not compatible with human nature to say "collect all this information on people, but only use it For Good Purposes."

CJefferson 6y ago
But, the message you are replying to points out governments already have piles of information about you -- your taxes for example. They can easily add to this (in appropriate legal situations), by reaching out to banks in your country for example. While I understand the problem of evil governments, I broadly trust mine. I want them to have the power to investigate me, and my fellow citizens, for crimes. I don't want to love in a lawless country.
- avianlyric 6y ago
  Do you trust all future governments? Germany 1933, Donald Trump today, far right extremism in Europe are all examples of how trustworthy governments become evil governments. Democracy doesn’t offer a defence against “evil” governments. Only that you need a majority (and frequently not even a majority) to vote for one.
  - CJefferson 6y ago
    I'm not clear what you are arguing for? Do you not want a functioning, effective police force now, in case they become evil in the future (or already are evil, depending on your point of view)? If a government turns full evil, they don't need evidence against you, they can just lock you up without charge.
    - avianlyric 6y ago
      But we already have functioning and effective police forces in the western world without having to give up our rights to privacy. Why would we want to give up more?
      - CJefferson 6y ago
        Some people want to be more private than current (for example, this discussion of email keys). As more things move online, it is worth thinking where the balance should be (we probably agree on that), I think the balance should be less privacy (I'm sure you don't agree with that, a full discussion on that won't fit well in a ycombinator thread).
        avianlyric 6y ago
        You’re right on you final points. My two rebuttals for advocating for less privacy online is that being online naturally makes you less private, not more. Previously if someone, government or otherwise, wanted to learn about you, they would need to physically follow you, tap your phones, intercept your post etc. Warrants for searches were built around this. Online, you can dig into the private life of someone on the other side of the plant who you’ve never met. With the application of computers you can dig into the lives of hundreds of people you’ve never met. All without leaving the comfort of your desk. The opportunity for fishing expedition is unprecedented at the moment, and it always easy to justify a fishing expedition if you pick a horrific enough crime (child pornography seems to be the favourite right now). Finally privacy is the strongest bulwark we have against government overreach. That doesn’t mean some top down conspiracy of a totalitarian-elect government. It can be normal everyday government administrators who decide to step outside their bounds for personal reasons, or belief of moral superiority. Simply put, there’s no better deterrent for bad behaviour than hard work. Privacy makes bad actors work hard for their lunch. It makes the good actors work hard as well, but the solution to that isn’t less privacy, it’s more funding and resources for good actors.

int_19h 6y ago

Because we don't trust the government agents to provide such guarantees, or to honor them if they do?

avianlyric 6y ago

How exactly would you do this? > in an encrypted manner that has guarantees in place that only valid criminal investigations can decrypt What constitutes a valid criminal investigation, who decides? Do you, does a prosecutor, a judge, the police? Is it a valid to decrypt your data just see if you were at a specific location at a specific time? What about so the police can check a theory? How about to see if you joined an unsanctioned protest, smoked a joint, speed while driving, downloaded a movie? Speeding and copyright theft are both criminal, are you saying that your happy to make it trivial to investigate you for these crimes an prosecute you for them? It used to be criminal to engage in homosexual behaviour, and in some parts of the world. Once upon a time that would be a valid criminal investigation in the US. For a short while it was looking like abortions might become criminal in the not too distant future. Privacy is a fundamental tool for allowing society to progress and change, and for avoiding totalitarianism.

zo1 6y ago
>"What constitutes a valid criminal investigation, who decides? Do you, does a prosecutor, a judge, the police?" Some sort of formal process with reasonable oversight the necessity of multiple points of compromise and/or collusion in order for the data to be abused for non-governmental use. Bottom line, I can't say I've "solved" the problem and have the perfect answer to your question. But I'm sure we, collectively as a society filled with smart people that want to move us forward, could put down some (fundamental?) tools/rules/processes that would negate the potential for abuse up until a certain point. Maybe we can't do 100%, but we could do 95 or 98%? >"Is it a valid to decrypt your data just see if you were at a specific location at a specific time? What about so the police can check a theory? How about to see if you joined an unsanctioned protest, smoked a joint, speed while driving, downloaded a movie?" Yes, very much so Yes! Especially the location based stuff as it's perfect for investigations without revealing details. "List all people that were within 50m of this crime location during this timespan." <-- that is so unbelievably powerful as a crime-solving tool, that I am baffled that we're avoiding it out of privacy concerns. As for the speeding example: That's probably another example of us already giving the data (car's black-box) to government (and private insurance companies) in order to facilitate an investigation. But to your point about drug-use, speeding and copyright infringement. If we don't want something prosecuted then we shouldn't have it as a crime. But as it stands now, a bunch of what you mentioned is a crime. That represents an implicit agreement by all of us in society that says we deem those things punishable. We can't hide behind lack of capability to police said crimes, but still label them as such. That is ripe for offical-power abuse. For all we know, if we lived in a society where we had such strict enforcement of laws as I suggest, we'd potentially have greater churn and change in our laws to match the opinions of society as it changed and evolved. > "Privacy is a fundamental tool for allowing society to progress and change, and for avoiding totalitarianism." I disagree. I'm not seeing it. There is just way too much going wrong today in 1-st world countries whilst we have really good privacy for it to be the case. We're downright descending into totalitarianism and thought/opinion control territory, all whilst our "privacy" is mostly maintained and respected. Are you saying we need more of it? What would that look like to you?