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This just seems extreme to me, considering how you've likely never been in this scenario and will in all likelihood not ever be in a scenario where you wouldn't

This just seems extreme to me, considering how you've likely never been in this scenario and will in all likelihood not ever be in a scenario where you wouldn't give the police this information but Google would (e.g. your own home being robbed or a masked stranger ringing your doorbell). Sometimes I think people covet privacy for its own sake, and don't think about the practicalities. The whole point of living in a collective society is that we give up some freedoms for the sake of overall increased prosperity, that's always been the tradeoff, and this is just one of those tradeoffs.

fleetwoodsnack 4y ago
Louis Brandeis on the right to privacy: https://louisville.edu/law/library/special-collections/the-louis-d.-brandeis-collection/the-right-to-privacy https://louisville.edu/law/library/special-collections/the-l...
- TameAntelope 4y ago
  Yeah, like I said, you give up some of your rights in order for a prosperous society to exist. I'm not denying the right exists, I'm saying we give up our other rights all the time for the benefit of society, why is privacy any different? Further, it's a spectrum. You're not putting a camera up for police to peruse at their leisure, it's only in specific situations.
  - azlev 4y ago
    You are not giving up privacy to a prosperous society, you are just giving up privacy. I couldn't find evidence that mass surveillance is good a society.
    - judge2020 4y ago
      'prosperous society' ~= convenience, less human hours wasted on boring stuff. The convenience of a video doorbell and connected home sure seem worth it to me.
      - Karunamon 4y ago
        And how are either of those things substantially impacted if Google's policy was "we do not hand over user data without a warrant"?
        judge2020 4y ago
        I'm not saying they are, just that consumers are giving up privacy for some sort of return. It's not required, as there are E2E HomeKit alternatives, but it's inaccurate that 'all you do is give up privacy'.
      - fleetwoodsnack 4y ago
        Agree to disagree. Systems that frustrate the accumulation and concentration of power seem to be integral to a functional society, nevermind a prosperous one, historically speaking. “Convenience, less human hours wasted on boring stuff” is fine as an individual consumer mindset, but does not form sufficient criteria for evaluating complex social systems.
      - azlev 4y ago
        You can have all of this without giving up data.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
    - nullfield 4y ago
      What was the discussion I remember seeing long ago, about two kinds of surveillance-in-society?: Kinda-good, 1, so and so can just go check the camera that points at the central plaza fountain that anyone can access, and sees that his spouse has arrived and is waiting for him as agreed. or Bad, 2, cameras all over that everyone has no idea who controls, watches, and/or is recording
  - NoGravitas 4y ago
    As noted above, the trade-off our society has chosen to make is search warrants. Otherwise, it might as well be "for the police to peruse at their leisure". Is Google going to rigorously vet every "emergency" request for data the police make?
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
    That attitude is the start of a slippery slope. If the end always justifies the means then none of your freedoms will be protected if someone else decides it's more convenient for you to not have them. This is the major problem with the big government authoritarianism that has infected the republican party.
    - TameAntelope 4y ago
      Slippery slope arguments are a fallacy. If something bad happens, or is proposed, we can address it when the bad thing happens or is proposed. Nothing actually bad is happening or is proposed here.
jmkb 4y ago
In the vein of principals, yes, privacy for its own sake is valuable to me. In the vein of practicalities, both Google and the justice system (USA for me) are monstrously large bureaucracies known to make difficult-to-redress errors. Google's capricious account banning, police raiding incorrect addresses, eg. The decision to share with them more information than the law requires is one I'd prefer to make myself.
- trasz 4y ago
  >bureaucracies known to make difficult-to-redress errors Or just plain out refusing to fix errors where they would be relatively easy to fix; compare Scalia's "it's fine to fry a provably innocent person as long as the procedures are followed" argument.
- TameAntelope 4y ago
  And I think this view is irrational. Privacy for its own sake is effectively hoarding, and as you clearly show, hoarding can be caused by fear, which you have for Google and the justice system. A numerate person would know how rare these things you're afraid of are, and not let those fears drive how they live. I (hopefully) follow that path, and I recommend you check it out! I read what you wrote in the same way I suspect you would read someone who is afraid of space because meteors have killed people (as a rough example). It just doesn't seem like the rates at which the things you're worried about are happening in a volume that would actually matter to a society.
jakelazaroff 4y ago
We already have that tradeoff. It’s called a warrant. If the police get one, you are forced to give them access to your otherwise-private affects. This is a step beyond that. Warrants are granted at the discretion of a judge, the bar is high, the scope is narrow and you (theoretically) have recourse if it’s abused. Here, the discretion is Google’s, the bar is nonexistent, the scope is unlimited and you have zero recourse if you think you’ve been wronged. This wouldn’t be an issue if people trusted Google or the police. But they don’t, and it’s pretty easy to imagine ways in which this could be abused to harm people. Let’s say you live in Texas and get abortion pills in the mail. If the police have a warrant to search your house for something unrelated, they (theoretically) can’t see the pills and decide to charge you with an unlawful abortion (unless they were “in plain view”, etc). But if Google gives police access to footage of your house extrajudicially, police can use anything they see as evidence against you. And make no mistake — things like that will happen as a result of this policy.
- TameAntelope 4y ago
  I think you're taking this way further than anyone actually involved would. IF what you're saying ever did even come close to occurring, we both know Google would shut it down quickly. Not just because it's horrible, but because it's also bad for business, and they've shown a propensity to protect data when it would be used as you hypothesize here. Google is smart enough to know that "snitching" on its users is bad for business. Think "track a burglar as he moves through a neighborhood" not "snoop (illegally) on the contents of people's mail".
  - jjkaczor 4y ago
    "I think you're taking this way further than anyone actually involved would" Just because you currently seem to have a "failure of imagination" does not mean that law enforcement, corrupt/facist/dystopian government officials or even unscrupulous employees within the tech sector itself will not absure their observational powers now or in the future. Or maybe you just haven't been paying attention to the news for the last "n" decades.
    - 4y ago

fleetwoodsnack 4y ago

Louis Brandeis on the right to privacy: https://louisville.edu/law/library/special-collections/the-louis-d.-brandeis-collection/the-right-to-privacy https://louisville.edu/law/library/special-collections/the-l...

TameAntelope 4y ago
Yeah, like I said, you give up some of your rights in order for a prosperous society to exist. I'm not denying the right exists, I'm saying we give up our other rights all the time for the benefit of society, why is privacy any different? Further, it's a spectrum. You're not putting a camera up for police to peruse at their leisure, it's only in specific situations.
- azlev 4y ago
  You are not giving up privacy to a prosperous society, you are just giving up privacy. I couldn't find evidence that mass surveillance is good a society.
  - judge2020 4y ago
    'prosperous society' ~= convenience, less human hours wasted on boring stuff. The convenience of a video doorbell and connected home sure seem worth it to me.
    - Karunamon 4y ago
      And how are either of those things substantially impacted if Google's policy was "we do not hand over user data without a warrant"?
      - judge2020 4y ago
        I'm not saying they are, just that consumers are giving up privacy for some sort of return. It's not required, as there are E2E HomeKit alternatives, but it's inaccurate that 'all you do is give up privacy'.
    - fleetwoodsnack 4y ago
      Agree to disagree. Systems that frustrate the accumulation and concentration of power seem to be integral to a functional society, nevermind a prosperous one, historically speaking. “Convenience, less human hours wasted on boring stuff” is fine as an individual consumer mindset, but does not form sufficient criteria for evaluating complex social systems.
    - azlev 4y ago
      You can have all of this without giving up data.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - nullfield 4y ago
    What was the discussion I remember seeing long ago, about two kinds of surveillance-in-society?: Kinda-good, 1, so and so can just go check the camera that points at the central plaza fountain that anyone can access, and sees that his spouse has arrived and is waiting for him as agreed. or Bad, 2, cameras all over that everyone has no idea who controls, watches, and/or is recording
- NoGravitas 4y ago
  As noted above, the trade-off our society has chosen to make is search warrants. Otherwise, it might as well be "for the police to peruse at their leisure". Is Google going to rigorously vet every "emergency" request for data the police make?
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
  That attitude is the start of a slippery slope. If the end always justifies the means then none of your freedoms will be protected if someone else decides it's more convenient for you to not have them. This is the major problem with the big government authoritarianism that has infected the republican party.
  - TameAntelope 4y ago
    Slippery slope arguments are a fallacy. If something bad happens, or is proposed, we can address it when the bad thing happens or is proposed. Nothing actually bad is happening or is proposed here.

jmkb 4y ago

In the vein of principals, yes, privacy for its own sake is valuable to me. In the vein of practicalities, both Google and the justice system (USA for me) are monstrously large bureaucracies known to make difficult-to-redress errors. Google's capricious account banning, police raiding incorrect addresses, eg. The decision to share with them more information than the law requires is one I'd prefer to make myself.

trasz 4y ago
>bureaucracies known to make difficult-to-redress errors Or just plain out refusing to fix errors where they would be relatively easy to fix; compare Scalia's "it's fine to fry a provably innocent person as long as the procedures are followed" argument.
TameAntelope 4y ago
And I think this view is irrational. Privacy for its own sake is effectively hoarding, and as you clearly show, hoarding can be caused by fear, which you have for Google and the justice system. A numerate person would know how rare these things you're afraid of are, and not let those fears drive how they live. I (hopefully) follow that path, and I recommend you check it out! I read what you wrote in the same way I suspect you would read someone who is afraid of space because meteors have killed people (as a rough example). It just doesn't seem like the rates at which the things you're worried about are happening in a volume that would actually matter to a society.

jakelazaroff 4y ago

We already have that tradeoff. It’s called a warrant. If the police get one, you are forced to give them access to your otherwise-private affects. This is a step beyond that. Warrants are granted at the discretion of a judge, the bar is high, the scope is narrow and you (theoretically) have recourse if it’s abused. Here, the discretion is Google’s, the bar is nonexistent, the scope is unlimited and you have zero recourse if you think you’ve been wronged. This wouldn’t be an issue if people trusted Google or the police. But they don’t, and it’s pretty easy to imagine ways in which this could be abused to harm people. Let’s say you live in Texas and get abortion pills in the mail. If the police have a warrant to search your house for something unrelated, they (theoretically) can’t see the pills and decide to charge you with an unlawful abortion (unless they were “in plain view”, etc). But if Google gives police access to footage of your house extrajudicially, police can use anything they see as evidence against you. And make no mistake — things like that will happen as a result of this policy.

TameAntelope 4y ago
I think you're taking this way further than anyone actually involved would. IF what you're saying ever did even come close to occurring, we both know Google would shut it down quickly. Not just because it's horrible, but because it's also bad for business, and they've shown a propensity to protect data when it would be used as you hypothesize here. Google is smart enough to know that "snitching" on its users is bad for business. Think "track a burglar as he moves through a neighborhood" not "snoop (illegally) on the contents of people's mail".
- jjkaczor 4y ago
  "I think you're taking this way further than anyone actually involved would" Just because you currently seem to have a "failure of imagination" does not mean that law enforcement, corrupt/facist/dystopian government officials or even unscrupulous employees within the tech sector itself will not absure their observational powers now or in the future. Or maybe you just haven't been paying attention to the news for the last "n" decades.
  - 4y ago