4 ms·

GDPR is excellent but has some downsides

nonrandomstring 5y ago
For most ordinary people this stuff is hard. Why would you not trust your ISP or a mail provider like Google? To correct this we need to start education at a young age. In other threads we have discussed ad-nauseum why email is almost impossible to secure. I proposed that the law can be an effective tool here too. But education is also an important factor. The GDPR works well but places the onus on companies. To get further we also need to ask people who use online services (or are the non-consenting victims of them) to take on some more responsibility. With better education people will start to understand that communication and information transfer is a tradeoff between potential conveniences and risks. Right now digital technology pushes a model of the world that's a sweet-shop of delights - all "convenience and efficiency" - without thought for consequences. I tried to make that dietery metaphor in Digital Vegan [1] "Civic cybersecurty" is a term I started using circa 2018 [2] to make a distinction between the corporate cybersecurity we teach at university level and a 21st century programme of everyday digital literacy we desperately need. The former is mostly about securing assets, whereas the latter is about intellectual self defence to preserve privacy, reputation, freedom and choice in a digital world. Most of what we call "National Security" is really at the economic and cultural level (not the interests of a tiny elite, as it has come to be defined). Therefore "national security" being no more than the sum total of individual earned securities of each citizen, is better expressed by the term "civic security" to distinguish it from what Schneier deems a "threat to security" created by current government attitudes. [1] https://digitalvegan.net https://digitalvegan.net [2] http://www.icicte.org/assets/icicte2019_5.4_farnell.pdf http://www.icicte.org/assets/icicte2019_5.4_farnell.pdf
- giuliomagnifico 5y ago
  Yes I agree with you, “with better education” everything would be better but…not all the “ordinary people” must know these things, some people know some things, some people know other things but people who know this stuff should tell/invite our legislators to build better laws. It should be in everyone's interest.

For most ordinary people this stuff is hard. Why would you not trust your ISP or a mail provider like Google? To correct this we need to start education at a young age. In other threads we have discussed ad-nauseum why email is almost impossible to secure. I proposed that the law can be an effective tool here too. But education is also an important factor. The GDPR works well but places the onus on companies. To get further we also need to ask people who use online services (or are the non-consenting victims of them) to take on some more responsibility. With better education people will start to understand that communication and information transfer is a tradeoff between potential conveniences and risks. Right now digital technology pushes a model of the world that's a sweet-shop of delights - all "convenience and efficiency" - without thought for consequences. I tried to make that dietery metaphor in Digital Vegan [1] "Civic cybersecurty" is a term I started using circa 2018 [2] to make a distinction between the corporate cybersecurity we teach at university level and a 21st century programme of everyday digital literacy we desperately need. The former is mostly about securing assets, whereas the latter is about intellectual self defence to preserve privacy, reputation, freedom and choice in a digital world. Most of what we call "National Security" is really at the economic and cultural level (not the interests of a tiny elite, as it has come to be defined). Therefore "national security" being no more than the sum total of individual earned securities of each citizen, is better expressed by the term "civic security" to distinguish it from what Schneier deems a "threat to security" created by current government attitudes. [1] https://digitalvegan.net https://digitalvegan.net [2] http://www.icicte.org/assets/icicte2019_5.4_farnell.pdf http://www.icicte.org/assets/icicte2019_5.4_farnell.pdf

giuliomagnifico 5y ago
Yes I agree with you, “with better education” everything would be better but…not all the “ordinary people” must know these things, some people know some things, some people know other things but people who know this stuff should tell/invite our legislators to build better laws. It should be in everyone's interest.