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My standard response - I see a really big difference between private corporations operating under rules of democratic government (with both of them being bad in

My standard response - I see a really big difference between private corporations operating under rules of democratic government (with both of them being bad in many ways) and state sanctioned company, operating under the rules of an authoritarian regime. And merely pointing a fact that China is an authoritarian state is NOT sinophobia, and please don't use arguments like that to try to shutdown discussion. I've also seen myself few big-tech companies throwing literally hundreds of millions of dollars at ways to protect their infrastructure from USA government eavesdropping on their infrastructure. That's just not a possibility in an authoritarian state. And if you don't see reasons why giving very powerful, authoritarian regime full access to huge amount data about people is a problem - well, history books can show you some.

ProAm 4y ago
AT&T Room 641A has entered the chat. [1] Our government already spies on all of our telecom, the private companies are also complicit (be it by force or by choice (ex Oracle). I do not think the US is much different that China with the exception of the government not owning the companies at hand. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A
- kube-system 4y ago
  When this happens in a room in the west, it gets a Wikipedia page and people regularly post about it online and argue about whether the scope of the collection under law is appropriate. When this happens in an authoritarian state, it is business as usual, the scope of collection is not considered, and dissenting opinions quickly disappear. That’s the difference.
  - ProAm 4y ago
    Im not sure I follow. I think this happens to every company in an authoritarian state currently, not having a room like this would be the oddity? They collect everything by default, like we do, we just try to keep it secret?
    - kube-system 4y ago
      Western democracies discuss, legislate, and impose limitations on those collections powers in great detail.
      - ProAm 4y ago
        I disagree with this in practice. Look at the data collection of the NSA, CIA, FBI, etc.... No one is willing to legislate or limit that.
        kube-system 4y ago
        That is simply not true, there are tens of thousands of pages of law and regulation governing how those agencies must collect data. The most notable and relevant to this discussion is FISA which has been amended by Congress at least a dozen times. This is certainly not a topic that doesn’t come up in Congress.
        ProAm 4y ago
        I counter this with what Snowden leaked. And watching the head of the NSA lie to congress about data collection. [A] FISA is a rubber stamp, no one will give up this power (and I don't blame them). [1] [2] [1] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/05/foriegn-intelligence-surveillance-court-rubber-stamps-mass-surveillance-under https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/05/foriegn-intelligence-s... [2] https://www.npr.org/2013/06/13/191226106/fisa-court-appears-to-be-rubberstamp-for-government-requests https://www.npr.org/2013/06/13/191226106/fisa-court-appears-... [A] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2014/01/27/darrell-issa-james-clapper-lied-to-congress-about-nsa-and-should-be-fired/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2014/01/27...
  - cwkoss 4y ago
    I think you'd be surprised at how effective Chinese people are at discussing the things they aren't allowed to without getting spotted by the censors. Lots of slang terms get used, and the discussion continues.
    - kube-system 4y ago
      I’m aware, but this delegitimizes the conversations and forces them out of mainstream discussion. Mark Klein told the world about Room 641A on freekin PBS.
- justapassenger 4y ago
  It's VERY different - not only corporations know about it, but they fight with that form of a passive surveillance. At any major tech company, not even internal networks are considered to be safe, and things are encrypted to sometimes paranoid levels, that's costing A LOT (not only in processing power, that's nowadays less of an concern, but with a much increased complexity of their infrastructure). And before you ask - major threat model they target is governments sponsored hacking.
  - ProAm 4y ago
    I think these companies speak out of both sides of their mouth on this topic. And varies greatly depending on the level you are speaking with. An example I would state is Eric Schmidt, I believe he had a very cooperative relationship with the US Government, but also spoke against mass surveillance. (I also think that is just the nature of the role when you are in his shoes.)
  - cwkoss 4y ago
    Do you think that the tech companies that give deep access to US intelligence services are going to advertise it?
cwkoss 4y ago
The US government has become much more authoritarian since 9/11 and nationalism is on the rise. A few big tech companies have spent hundreds of millions keeping the state out of their databases, which probably gets billed to their PR budgets. Most tech companies do not put up such a big fight. Some court the state to get sweetheart deals, and the public has no basis for feeling confident that covert access wasn't an unpublicized provision of those deals. The US federal government can quite easily throw me in prison or destroy my livelihood if the right person/corporation with enough institutional clout had a grudge against me (see Steven Donziger, US lawyer who has been imprisoned for trying to hold Chevron accountable for illegally polluting in ecuador). Why should I, a US citizen who has no business need to travel to China currently, worry about the CCP's authoritarianism more than the US govts?
- lancesells 4y ago
  > Why should I, a US citizen who has no business need to travel to China currently, worry about the CCP's authoritarianism more than the US govts? It's the long cultural game that is probably being played that might or should have you worried. It's been happening for 10-15 years to US social media companies by outside and inside forces and it seems to have become a detriment to society in certain ways. Now think of a Facebook or Instagram that's directed by a (more) authoritative government against a culture that it's in opposition to. What does that look like in 20 years?
  - lancesells 4y ago
    Edit: And I think we should all be very worried about Google, Facebook, etc. These domestic corporations are too big to have any morals. The employees might but the machine is just a machine.
- adampk 4y ago
  This prevailing argument on hackernews that "American and China are equally authoritarian regimes" is patently absurd. One is used to hearing these types of nonsense points being made in high school by kids trying to be provocative and contrarian but it getting to a supposedly "rational" community makes me think the community has been infiltrated by Chinese agents or other special interest groups astroturfing.
Matl 4y ago
The problem is, to many people around the world it is hard to describe the U.S. as democratic. As I see it, in the U.S. the corporations have completely subverted the government whereas in China the corporations are afraid of the government. I am not sure why private interests controlling governments is less scary than governments controlling private interests? The U.S. lays claim to all data say Google stores about me, even the ones stored outside the U.S. As an European, the U.S. is much more likely to reach me if they wanted than China. I am not sure why the U.S. model is better than China's. Perhaps we in the West would do better to admit it's two sides of the same coin.
- adampk 4y ago
  This prevailing argument on hackernews that "American and China are equally authoritarian regimes" is patently absurd. One is used to hearing these types of nonsense points being made in high school by kids trying to be proactive and contrarian but it getting to a supposedly "rational" community makes me think the community has been infiltrated by Chinese agents or other special interest groups astroturfing.
  - ok123456 4y ago
    Why does the USA imprison 639 per 100k but China is only 91.6 per 100k? It would seem that the USA is much more authoritarian in absolute terms.
  - cwkoss 4y ago
    > makes me think the community has been infiltrated by Chinese agents or other special interest groups astroturfing. Astroturfing accusations are intellectually lazy and against the community guidelines of this site.
kube-system 4y ago
Agree with this. Governance is an important issue. The US is not perfect, but multi-party democratic states have mechanisms for checking and balancing misuse. The reality in authoritarian states is that misuse is done quietly and without dissent.
memonkey 4y ago
> And if you don't see reasons why giving very powerful, authoritarian regime full access to huge amount data about people is a problem - well, history books can show you some. Curious, are you referencing IBM and The Holocaust?

ProAm 4y ago

AT&T Room 641A has entered the chat. [1] Our government already spies on all of our telecom, the private companies are also complicit (be it by force or by choice (ex Oracle). I do not think the US is much different that China with the exception of the government not owning the companies at hand. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A

kube-system 4y ago
When this happens in a room in the west, it gets a Wikipedia page and people regularly post about it online and argue about whether the scope of the collection under law is appropriate. When this happens in an authoritarian state, it is business as usual, the scope of collection is not considered, and dissenting opinions quickly disappear. That’s the difference.
- ProAm 4y ago
  Im not sure I follow. I think this happens to every company in an authoritarian state currently, not having a room like this would be the oddity? They collect everything by default, like we do, we just try to keep it secret?
  - kube-system 4y ago
    Western democracies discuss, legislate, and impose limitations on those collections powers in great detail.
    - ProAm 4y ago
      I disagree with this in practice. Look at the data collection of the NSA, CIA, FBI, etc.... No one is willing to legislate or limit that.
      - kube-system 4y ago
        That is simply not true, there are tens of thousands of pages of law and regulation governing how those agencies must collect data. The most notable and relevant to this discussion is FISA which has been amended by Congress at least a dozen times. This is certainly not a topic that doesn’t come up in Congress.
        ProAm 4y ago
        I counter this with what Snowden leaked. And watching the head of the NSA lie to congress about data collection. [A] FISA is a rubber stamp, no one will give up this power (and I don't blame them). [1] [2] [1] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/05/foriegn-intelligence-surveillance-court-rubber-stamps-mass-surveillance-under https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/05/foriegn-intelligence-s... [2] https://www.npr.org/2013/06/13/191226106/fisa-court-appears-to-be-rubberstamp-for-government-requests https://www.npr.org/2013/06/13/191226106/fisa-court-appears-... [A] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2014/01/27/darrell-issa-james-clapper-lied-to-congress-about-nsa-and-should-be-fired/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2014/01/27...
- cwkoss 4y ago
  I think you'd be surprised at how effective Chinese people are at discussing the things they aren't allowed to without getting spotted by the censors. Lots of slang terms get used, and the discussion continues.
  - kube-system 4y ago
    I’m aware, but this delegitimizes the conversations and forces them out of mainstream discussion. Mark Klein told the world about Room 641A on freekin PBS.
justapassenger 4y ago
It's VERY different - not only corporations know about it, but they fight with that form of a passive surveillance. At any major tech company, not even internal networks are considered to be safe, and things are encrypted to sometimes paranoid levels, that's costing A LOT (not only in processing power, that's nowadays less of an concern, but with a much increased complexity of their infrastructure). And before you ask - major threat model they target is governments sponsored hacking.
- ProAm 4y ago
  I think these companies speak out of both sides of their mouth on this topic. And varies greatly depending on the level you are speaking with. An example I would state is Eric Schmidt, I believe he had a very cooperative relationship with the US Government, but also spoke against mass surveillance. (I also think that is just the nature of the role when you are in his shoes.)
- cwkoss 4y ago
  Do you think that the tech companies that give deep access to US intelligence services are going to advertise it?

cwkoss 4y ago

The US government has become much more authoritarian since 9/11 and nationalism is on the rise. A few big tech companies have spent hundreds of millions keeping the state out of their databases, which probably gets billed to their PR budgets. Most tech companies do not put up such a big fight. Some court the state to get sweetheart deals, and the public has no basis for feeling confident that covert access wasn't an unpublicized provision of those deals. The US federal government can quite easily throw me in prison or destroy my livelihood if the right person/corporation with enough institutional clout had a grudge against me (see Steven Donziger, US lawyer who has been imprisoned for trying to hold Chevron accountable for illegally polluting in ecuador). Why should I, a US citizen who has no business need to travel to China currently, worry about the CCP's authoritarianism more than the US govts?

lancesells 4y ago
> Why should I, a US citizen who has no business need to travel to China currently, worry about the CCP's authoritarianism more than the US govts? It's the long cultural game that is probably being played that might or should have you worried. It's been happening for 10-15 years to US social media companies by outside and inside forces and it seems to have become a detriment to society in certain ways. Now think of a Facebook or Instagram that's directed by a (more) authoritative government against a culture that it's in opposition to. What does that look like in 20 years?
- lancesells 4y ago
  Edit: And I think we should all be very worried about Google, Facebook, etc. These domestic corporations are too big to have any morals. The employees might but the machine is just a machine.
adampk 4y ago
This prevailing argument on hackernews that "American and China are equally authoritarian regimes" is patently absurd. One is used to hearing these types of nonsense points being made in high school by kids trying to be provocative and contrarian but it getting to a supposedly "rational" community makes me think the community has been infiltrated by Chinese agents or other special interest groups astroturfing.

Matl 4y ago

The problem is, to many people around the world it is hard to describe the U.S. as democratic. As I see it, in the U.S. the corporations have completely subverted the government whereas in China the corporations are afraid of the government. I am not sure why private interests controlling governments is less scary than governments controlling private interests? The U.S. lays claim to all data say Google stores about me, even the ones stored outside the U.S. As an European, the U.S. is much more likely to reach me if they wanted than China. I am not sure why the U.S. model is better than China's. Perhaps we in the West would do better to admit it's two sides of the same coin.

adampk 4y ago
This prevailing argument on hackernews that "American and China are equally authoritarian regimes" is patently absurd. One is used to hearing these types of nonsense points being made in high school by kids trying to be proactive and contrarian but it getting to a supposedly "rational" community makes me think the community has been infiltrated by Chinese agents or other special interest groups astroturfing.
- ok123456 4y ago
  Why does the USA imprison 639 per 100k but China is only 91.6 per 100k? It would seem that the USA is much more authoritarian in absolute terms.
- cwkoss 4y ago
  > makes me think the community has been infiltrated by Chinese agents or other special interest groups astroturfing. Astroturfing accusations are intellectually lazy and against the community guidelines of this site.

kube-system 4y ago

Agree with this. Governance is an important issue. The US is not perfect, but multi-party democratic states have mechanisms for checking and balancing misuse. The reality in authoritarian states is that misuse is done quietly and without dissent.

memonkey 4y ago

> And if you don't see reasons why giving very powerful, authoritarian regime full access to huge amount data about people is a problem - well, history books can show you some. Curious, are you referencing IBM and The Holocaust?