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Afghans are racing to erase their online lives
- est31 5y agoFriendly reminder that when you delete your discord account, they don't delete your statements, just strip the account name from them, similar to how Github is doing it with their ghost account. For Github, I sort of understand it. For discord, it feels very dangerous to me.
- SilverRed 5y agoNo IM platform I am aware of does this. SMS doesn't do it, telegram doesn't do it, email doesn't do it. Most platforms do not even let you edit or delete messages at all.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- eitland 5y agoIn Telegram you absolutely can delete messages from the UI at least and I've seen nothing to suggest anyone knows a way to get them back as if it was known someone surely had posted it here ;-) Just log press, delete and select "Delete for me and <other(s)>". In Telegram, as an admin you can also select auto delete for a group.
- guardian5x 5y agoYou can also delete messages in Discord and much more.
- eitland 5y agoI don't know and I don't have anything bad (or good) to say about Discord, I just wanted to point out that it was possible in Telegram.
- est31 5y agoFor SMS, the logs are stored on the devices, not with the providers. So providers have to take an extra effort to listen in. With Discord, it's already in a database. E-Mail does keep logs around but many clients have features to delete mails older than N weeks/months/etc. In discord or telegram, you need to use third party tools for that.
- tester34 5y agoYou can write/use script that deletes all your messages I haven't used this myself, but maybe this? https://gist.github.com/victornpb/135f5b346dea4decfc8f63ad7d9cc182 https://gist.github.com/victornpb/135f5b346dea4decfc8f63ad7d...
- voldacar 5y agoI like that. If someone's sent me a message in the past, they shouldnt be able to retroactively reach into my computer and remove it.
- josefx 5y agoThere is you not wanting to delete information from a public web service when they ask and there is people dying because you wouldn't delete information from a public web service.
- dendriti 5y agoStrange that you're worried about someone "reaching into your computer" but seem to have no problem using Discord, whose disrespect for personal privacy is legendary.
- est31 5y agoIt's not your computer. The cloud, and discord is a cloud service, is always someone else's computer. If you want it be stored locally on your computer, use the discord data export feature or some other feature like it. Also, Discord might be a "nice" company right now, but maybe it gets bought by facebook in 5 years.
- jb1991 5y agoIsn’t this also how Reddit does it? Seems to be a popular strategy for social media services.
- namibj 5y agoGitHub also allows you to self-bot. Discord will ban you for that, even if you delete your messages with the app on a stock Android without any macros or other tools that reduce the required effort over the naive way (e.g. `from: namibj` search; repeat for each "server"). (Btw; you have a pending email. I lost my old domain, but keybase has other accounts and an encryption key linked. You have 24h before I'll have to reach out harder, due to acute urgency.)
- trhway 5y ago>The Taliban has previously shown it’s capable and willing to harness the vast data piles we create every day to try and filter out people it believes are detrimental to its way of life, including official government databases. In 2016, Taliban insurgents killed 12 passengers on a bus they stopped after requiring everyone to scan their fingerprints on a biometric machine that cross-checked a database of security force workers, according to an Afghan army commander. “Most of the passengers were not familiar with the machine but we knew it was a biometric device that could identify security force members from amongst civilians,” the commander told Afghan news website TOLOnews at the time. That is a pretty deep penetration of the former regime which is also evidenced by the speed of the power transfer. Not that it is a surprise in general for anybody who paid attention, and the end game was clear, yet the actual forest-fire like speed is still very impressive - for example the pro-Soviet puppet regime back then fought for 3 years after the Soviet forces had left before finally falling.
- anonleb4 5y agoIf there's one thing China got right it's the non-interference policy in internal affairs of other countries. Others should learn by example.
- whoaisme 5y agoYeah I also like that about china. For example this time it didn't interfere https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/genghis-khan-exhibition-nantes-cancelled-censorship-chinese-government https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/genghis-khan-exhibition... Could site countless of other examples of the chinese not meddling
- pmlnr 5y agoHuh? What would you call them trying to place a Fudan University in Hungary then?
- shashwatak 5y agoDid China drone strike civilians and hospitals in Hungary? Did the USA build any Universities in Afghanistan or Iraq?
- pmlnr 5y agoThe word was interfere - it's a broad thing.
- neolog 5y agoChina is threatening to attack Taiwan. https://www.rand.org/blog/2021/06/the-signal-and-the-noise-understanding-chinas-military.html https://www.rand.org/blog/2021/06/the-signal-and-the-noise-u...
- sofixa 5y agoWhich they consider to be a rebellious province ( so an internal matter).
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- kunagi7 5y agoSince the Taliban are now the government they probably have access to the previous military employment databases so even if they erase their online lives, clean up their phone... They might find who they are and punish them (torture, death) for working with the "enemy".
- hef19898 5y agoIf the Taliban are really smart, they don't do any of that for quite a while. That would give them a ton of legitimation internationally.
- kunagi7 5y agoThey're waiting for the remaining NATO and other western diplomats and personnel to leave. The evacuation is ongoing. They have the airport surrounded but they don't engage war against the NATO soldiers. So they try to look legit both inside and internationally. After the last NATO soldier leaves the airport who knows what will they do.
- hef19898 5y agoTrue. Who knows what they do after that. The Afghan war was a mess basically from day one, the retreat is in a different league al together so. Quite embarrassing for the most powerful military alliance on the planet, too.
- trhway 5y ago>Quite embarrassing for the most powerful military alliance on the planet, too. Not really. There is a reason Afghanistan is called "Graveyard of Empires". https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/afghanistan/2001-11-01/afghanistan-graveyard-empires https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/afghanistan/2001-11-... Judging by the history that i'm naturally close to and know well, i.e. Russia history, the drive to free your Motherland from foreign occupants is like 10-100x multiplier of force.
- jeofken 5y ago99% of afghanis believe Sharia law should be the law of the land. [0] Finally they are free from their foreign oppressor, and they can go back to having their country ruled as they please. Anyone who believes in democracy will agree to this [0] https://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-beliefs-about-sharia/ https://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-relig... Edit: the Taliban also outlaws the Afghani and Pakistani tradition of Bacha Bazi - the widespread custom of raping young boys, and with this in mind I am not surprised they are overjoyed to yet again be free to punish those who partake in it [1]. Truly a win for democracy and for protecting children from predators. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacha_bazi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacha_bazi
- senectus1 5y agothat poll is not suspect at all. nu uh.
- jeofken 5y agoDo you have any reading resources to share about faults in Pew Research’s methodology? If they are untrustworthy, it would be good to know
- Sergiu37 5y agoThe issues with that 99% is that this had a 5% error margin and only represented adults 18+ 10 years ago. 10 more years of american ocupation and rise of social media, exposure to western way of life in the last 10 years could definitelly make changes. Also even if they wanted the sharia law many didn’t agree with some oppresive things mentioned there even 10 years ago.
- jeofken 5y agoGiven a 5% margin, the worst case result is still 94% support - truly the will of the people. Discriminating children from participating in democracy is also norm in the west, and probably wise. It is interesting that you assume 10 extra years of foreign occupation makes the average person more sympathetic to the occupying force.
- newyankee 5y agoUnpopular opinion: You really cannot fight an ideology, the Taliban is so successful because it has some (if not most) support amongst the masses. If there wasn't any, people would've resisted. May be this is a beginning of a long civil war in the nation but I doubt ordinary people will have a voice, they are surely significantly outnumbered.
- throwawaysea 5y agoI don’t think this is an accurate take. The Taliban does not have support of most of the masses. Various surveys consistently show that public support for democracy is more widespread than support for an Islamic emirate (example https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/03/30/afghans-want-peace-new-data-show-theyre-open-surprising-number-options/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/03/30/afghans-w...). This makes sense - something like 2/3rds of Afghanis are under 25. They only know a relatively peaceful life without oppression or repression, under elected governments with America’s backing. The women and children in Afghanistan don’t want a society where they can’t get educated or where music and other media are banned. People didn’t resist because the US strategy to exit so quickly left them mentally unprepared and also demoralized them by lending credence to the notion that the Taliban’s threat demanded a hasty exit. America also really didn’t make a great attempt at establishing a professional, sustainable Afghan military (see https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/08/how-america-failed-afghanistan/619740/ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/08/how-americ...) which is why military generals and various reports recommended against a hasty compete exit of US troops. The first few villages and province capitals to fall made the Afghani people fearful and they are just a poor people looking to survive. It isn’t worth getting killed if they think it is an unwinnable situation. But they’re still hungry for democracy and peace.
- rich_sasha 5y agoIt could be that the drive against the Taliban in fact starts once these people under 25 see what the Taliban are like, for themselves. It is hard to resist something abstract. Of course, in North Korea, that awareness probably exists, and it doesn’t help. But maybe it’s not the same.
- Animats 5y agoIt's not clear whether the Taliban will allow Afghans to leave the country. However, for now the Taliban has re-opened the border to Pakistan. The current issue, surprisingly, seems to be Afghans stuck on the Pakistan side who want back into Afghanistan. No idea how this plays out. The Taliban leadership may just let people leave for a while to eliminate opposition the easy way.
- vaylian 5y agoThis is the perfect article for the "nothing to hide" crowd. It just shows that whatever we think is fine at the present moment, might become a problem. And if we can't take control over our digital past, this can have serious consequences.