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> History has shown us time and time again that when privacy is given away because "bad people can use it", without fail turns out to be detrimental to the law
by wolverine876 4y ago
> History has shown us time and time again that when privacy is given away because "bad people can use it", without fail turns out to be detrimental to the law abiding citizens, with little to no impact to criminals. In many cases it further pushed the government into a dictatorial, even totalitarian regimes.
I agree with the conclusion, but I wonder about the claims and reasoning.
Can you give us examples? I don't recall that many 'bad people can use it' arguments that led to what is described. I doubt it's led a liberal democracy to become authoritarian, and under existing authoritarian regimes, there is little or no privacy to give away.
Finally, the biggest privacy threat in free countries now isn't government but corporations.
- datagram 4y agoAs far as privacy goes, the USA Patriot Act is probably one of the better examples of "we have to erode privacy to catch criminals": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversial_invocations_of_the_Patriot_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversial_invocations_of_t... As for general "bad people can use it" scenarios, US airport security would be my go-to example. Everyone has to take their shoes off at airport security, even though the Deparment of Homeland Security's own tests have shown that that terrorists could still still easily sneak weapons and explosives through security: https://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-tsa-screeners-20150602-story.html https://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-tsa-screeners...
- wolverine876 4y agoThose are alleged examples of privacy eroding, but not of it leading to authoritarian government.