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The worst thing IMO it enables the regimes who are too technically inept and would never had a chance of building anything remotely as effective to successfully
by varjag 5y ago
The worst thing IMO it enables the regimes who are too technically inept and would never had a chance of building anything remotely as effective to successfully spy on their dissidents. It's the outsourcing of totalitarianism.
- srmarm 5y agoIt's a chance for the tech type to act as mercenary and just as immoral.
- WJW 5y agoWhat a weirdly phrased sentiment. As written it seems to imply that it's OK to spy on dissidents if you are technically competent enough? In any case, I don't think any government that wants to be totalitarian will be stopped by technical limitations.
- varjag 5y agoIt means that previously complicated ways of high tech surveillance become ubiquitous as they are accessible for moderate price to any entity. A proliferation issue. More of bad thing is worse than less of a bad thing. But I seriously feel as you almost insist in uncharitable reading of my post.
- WJW 5y agoI did not mean to and perhaps not being a native English speaker affected how I interpreted it. Sorry if I offended you here. I do still think that entities (especially nation-states) which want to surveil dissidents will not be overly hindered by their technical expertise or lack thereof. If anything, I expect that the presence of high-profile politicians on the list will finally spur some serious research into defensive measures. Proliferation of offense begets proliferation of defense in a mouse-and-cat game after all.
- varjag 5y agoUnlike oldschool surveillance methods these provide a high degree of automation. This allows for qualitatively different surveillance state than was possible with a bunch of Stasi guys in trenchcoats. It also isn't held back by borders or jurisdictions. It's not much of cat and mouse game either: neither Apple or Google appear to be able countering the threat but worse it's not them who are the targets. It's the individuals/dissidents who are (short of ceasing electronic communication) utterly helpless here.
- Y_Y 5y agoI think that's an uncharitable interpretation. I understood it as something like: "Before Pegasus there were lots of regimes which would have liked to spy on their populace, but were prevented from doing so by their technical incompetence. It's fortunate that totalitarians are often not sophisticated enough to spy effectively, but that is mitigated by the availability of tools like this."