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Stallman: Facebook is Mass Surveillance

313 points by couchnaut 15y ago

turbulence 15y ago
I'm pretty sure I've seen this before...
jiggy2011 15y ago
I find it somewhat ironic that people like Stallman have battled for years to get so much FOSS out there. What did we do with all this free software? Used it to build things like facebook, google and various SaaS sites that not only tie our data into proprietary clouds but due to the nature of the GPL etc don't really have to share their code anyway. What they have really achieved is to turn everything they touch into a commodity and moved the "value" of software elsewhere. We seem to be moving to a world where most of our devices and the servers powering our apps will be running some form of Linux or BSD under the hood but we are actually more restricted than ever.
- roopeshv 15y ago
  GNU has already given a solution to this kind of situation. It's called AGPL (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html). But the problem is most people would be happy to avoid GPL, and stick with BSD, because a lot of people want that. If anyone can start with AGPL, that's a great start. PS: AGPL is the strictest GPL there is, like, LGPL is a looser version of GPL. It pretty much means, you give away almost all the stack. I don't understand the whole license, but I do know it's the strictest.
  - jiggy2011 15y ago
    Interesting , haven't read that license in detail. Does this mean that as soon as I run something on a network (or just the internet?) I am required to push my changes back upstream immediately? However I have a feeling that there is a sufficient body of GPL/LGPL code out there that people will just modify that. Since a lot of OSS code is contributed by companies, they don't really have any incentive to contribute to an AGPL project (in most cases).
    - skore 15y ago
      No, it just says that if anybody uses your software, they are entitled to get the source code. So on most GUN+Linux distributions, this is already the case. Not so much on the internet when you use a service on a website. The AGPL basically establishes the same concept on the internet that the GPL has established on the desktop.
      - jiggy2011 15y ago
        What's GUN+Linux? I didn't realise that ESR had created his own 2nd amendment based unix userland! I see, interesting idea unfortunately I really can't see it taking off, most companies would just prefer to work internally and then release some bits of code as LGPL/BSD when they are ready. What advantage could AGPL give the developer (assuming they are writing OSS for commercial rather than ideological reasons)?
        skore 15y ago
        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU/Linux_naming_controversy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU/Linux_naming_controversy The commercial advantage is that it levels the playing field: If I create a library that can be used for a website and release it as FOSS under a license that is not as restrictive as the AGPL, I basically create a disadvantage to my own business: Another company could use my code in a closed service and thus benefit from my work without giving me and their users the courtesy of benefiting from their work in return. I write commercial GPL software and will, in my next refactor, license certain parts of the software as AGPL. An example would be a library that connects an invoicing system to an online payment processor (ie. creates a full checkout process for invoice X at amount Y). I have a lot of work invested in the code (basically 5 years of my life) and the better and more reusable I make it, the easier it is to just retool it for another application. I would naturally love to see websites utilize the code, even if it is just in a SaaS setting. But since it is my work, I have decided to set the rules and if people want to use it, I think it's fair to ask that they should promote the same liberties that they received from me.
        15y ago
  - pors 15y ago
    AGPL was made to also catch "hosted software". It still needs you to modify the OSS before the license kicks in. It has not been tested in any legal case as far as I know, which is why large corporations avoid using AGPL licensed software (like MongoDB).
  - sunchild 15y ago
    The short version is that "distribution" includes providing access over a network.
  - tzs 15y ago
    The problem some of us have with AGPL is that we do not consider it to even be a free software license, as we think it violates freedom 0 on the FSF's definition of free software.
    - bad_user 15y ago
      AGPL redefines what distribution means. It's an EULA, very unlike the GPL. Also, some might say that GPL software was successful precisely because of the server-side loophole. That's not necessarily bad, because the cost of starting your own Google or Facebook is much, much lower than 10 years ago.
- the_tubes 15y ago
  I believe that is was Stallman wants. You have the freedom to not share your code as much as you can. You have the freedom to use that free code as proprietary code. The user has the freedom to also use that proprietary code. This is the reason of the LGPL. As long as your code doesn't link to open code you can keep it as closed source as you want with any license you want. If you don't like using that proprietary system then you have the freedom to not to and use something more open. Freedom doesn't have to restrict you from doing what you want with your code or how you use it. That is what is cool about Stallman. He knows people like, want to make, release, and or use proprietary code and allows it. He just won't use it himself.
majmun 15y ago
Stallmans reminds me of Ted Kaczynski unabomber. (no offence) similair world view, he doesn't care of inovation because probably thinks that it leads to more controlled society. both are Neo-Luddites. only Kaczynski was more radical in his actions. If you want more of the same I suggest you read unabomber manifesto http://editions-hache.com/essais/pdf/kaczynski2.pdf http://editions-hache.com/essais/pdf/kaczynski2.pdf
- couchnaut 15y ago
  The creator of Emacs and gcc is a Neo-Luddite and on the same side as unabomber?!! Apparently there is some kind of nth humor level involved here that I can't really comprehend.
  - majmun 15y ago
    yes, what is your point? for fighting technology you can use technology. (and im not saying that he was neo-luddite allways)
    - couchnaut 15y ago
      No offense but you're implying it and my point anyway is that it's somewhat weird (if not anything worse) to draw parallels with unabomber just because Stallman said what's just obvious to anyone but Facebook addicts. For better or worse there is a growing danger in FB regarding the tons of personal data that the same users would just never give away if it weren't for FB. He is just trying to make users aware of that. He's certainly not the first to do it and hopefully not the last. Also he said nothing that could be interpreted as innovation stopper. Out and over.
      - deleted 15y ago
        [deleted]
      - couchnaut 15y ago
        To be honest I didn't see the video but even if he said that he should be "punched" for the reasons where he bases his opinion and not the opinion itself (unless "innovation" is a divine truth that we must accept no matter what - DDT was innovative at its time but it was no good). Moreover the transcript reads: “With software patents the US has become a dangerous place for software development, including innovative software development, because when a program is innovative, that means it has some new ideas in it. But it also has lots of well-known ideas in it. A large program combines thousands of ideas. So if you have some new ideas and you want to use them, in order to use them you have to combine them with a lot of other ideas that are well-known. And if you are not allowed to do that because those other ideas are patented, you can’t use your new idea,” not exactly hostile to innovation. Anyway - he is Stallman and he's known for not being extra diplomatic or even smart at politics. Like you, he speaks the way he feels - point is that IMHO there is a growing problem with all the data that we - FB users - carelessly upload. (Moreover I'm not convinced that FB has all that much to do with innovation any more but that's an entirely different conversation.) PS: Sorry if I sounded hostile but the unabomber reference drove me mad. My bad. PS2: this was supposed to be an answer to a comment that's not there any more - anyway.
savramescu 15y ago
“The Anonymous protests for the most part work by having a lot of people send a lot of commands to a website, that it can’t handle so many requests. This is equivalent of a crowd of people going to the door of a building and having a protest on the street. It’s basically legitimate." No it's not. This is just a few persons coming in buses and stopping the entry. If you want to equal it to protest then all the requests have to come from real people, not some bots. I'm also not agreeing with this: "I won’t use the non-free software at all! I dedicate my effort to getting away from it! So if they stop making it – that would be great!" This is ridiculous. I understand that the current IP legislation is a load of crap but trying to get ALL software to be free is absurd. How are developers going to live? How about groceries? Can I pay for that? Or that should be free as well?
- jiggy2011 15y ago
  I agree that you can not always compare a DDOS to people blocking a street. I think there's 2 reasons for this. 1) If you are busy protesting by blocking a street this causes you inconvenience as you can only physically be in one place at once. Whereas leaving your computer on to DOS while you go out to a bar isn't exactly a hardship. 2) Many of the DDOSers would not even be remotely aware of what they are doing , see the JS worm that they used recently. This is ridiculous. I understand that the current IP legislation is a load of crap but trying to get ALL software to be free is absurd. How are developers going to live? How about groceries? Can I pay for that? Or that should be free as well? You've just opened up a huge topic there, has been discussed on HN lots of times and while I have seen good arguments for copyright-less software in many areas (OS kernels , web frameworks etc) there are others where I don't think anyone has thought of another viable business model (at least not one that isn't even more freedom restricting in some way). Some would argue that these areas should just disappear or be done only by hobbyists but I think I would miss professionally produced video games for example, indie or AAA. To clarify though, I doubt that Stallman would support Anonymous or people who want to pirate software. To him any software that is not libre is irrelevant and should be rejected regardless of monetary cost or who distributes it.
  - idonthack 15y ago
VMG 15y ago
Except that it is completely voluntary.
- muyuu 15y ago
  People can be tricked into giving away absolutely everything. As Facebook so aptly proves.
  - VMG 15y ago
    It still happened voluntarily. I'm not saying that this means that it is therefore morally good, I'm just staying that there is a qualitative difference between facebook and the secret police terrorizing people in dictatorships.
- masklinn 15y ago
  No. It's completely "voluntary" and the quotes are important: if your whole social environment standardizes on a platform, you're an outcast if you don't step aboard. If your professional environment standardizes on a platform, you're an outcast if you don't step aboard. It's only actually completely voluntary if you have infinite money and no issue (and no repercussion from) completely dropping whole social and professional circles out of your life. And that still requires the network/system is honest about it[0], when Google automagically creates a G+ account for you when you sign up for (supposedly) unrelated services or forces you to create one to access other content, "voluntary" is really debatable. Again, unless you have no issue shedding whole social circles instantly. [0] http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2012/01/google-doubles-plus-membership-with-brute-force-signup-process.ars http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2012/01/google-doubles-p...
  - VMG 15y ago
    The thing is that surveillance should be reserved to people who lived under something like the Stasi regime and had to risk their life to escape. You only have to pick up the phone instead of using the computer. [edit] G+ doesn't change the surveillance situation at all. I have a G+ account and I don't do anything with it. Google doesn't have any additional information.
dotemacs 15y ago
What has to be noted here is that this is published on Russia Today. From my understanding of it, it tries to offset the US crazies like Fox and its ilk...
- lunarscape 15y ago
  To me RT is a Kremlin mouthpiece giving a voice to obscure anti-US and anti-EU voices. At one stage is was nothing but 24 hr anti-Georgia propaganda.
  - narrator 15y ago
    I've seen the BBC and other western media quoting some random unknown Chinese or Russian intellectual and giving them the world stage because they agreed with the western perspective on China or Russia.
- couchnaut 15y ago
  RT happened to have the longest and most full presentation of the interview that I could find in a minute. I originally saw this in Free Software Magazine which linked to this piece http://www.deccanchronicle.com/channels/sci-tech/others/richard-stallman-facebook-surveillance-system-007 http://www.deccanchronicle.com/channels/sci-tech/others/rich... but it seemed too short for HN. Now (regarding other more strong notes on this thread) - Stallman has his opinions and he supports them in a very logical way (albeit a bit too passionate). Moreover, he tries to support personal freedom, which in my books is more of an American value than anyone's else. So, trying to dump the real issue here by referring to what RT may be (according to what sounds like post modern cold war psychosis) is at least cheap propaganda.
blueplastic 15y ago
It's interesting to me that in general Hacker News seems to be anti-Stallman and kinda think of him as a nut or don't deeply understand his position. You'd think if any subculture understood the threats he's talking about, it'd be here.
DanBC 15y ago
There are people who are uncomfortable about the intrusions of various websites, but who use those websites anyway. These people "just" need a better alternative to switch. But I have no idea what to do about the people who just don't care. For example, OKC recommended a person to me recently. EDIT: Redacted a bit more. She lists her blackberry pin; her facebook account; an email address; her cell / mobile phone number; and her twitter account. That's enough information to find her profiles on a wide range of websites.
- iamjustlooking 15y ago
  Even though you redacted that information it's quite easy to find that person still because of the poor spelling and grammar. Perhaps you should remove it.
  - DanBC 15y ago
    Yes. You're right. I have done.
- slig 15y ago
  You'd be surprised to see how easy is to find all that with just the OKC username. Lots of people use the same handler for all kinds of services.
ppod 15y ago
Is it true that sites with a facebook like button send the IP address of hits back to facebook?
- tikhonj 15y ago
  If the like button is hosted on Facebook, your browser requests it from there when you visit the page. So the site doesn't have to do anything except include an img tag with a Facebook url in it; everything else is a consequence of how the internet works.
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - mike-cardwell 15y ago
    Google Analytics creates the same problem. This is why I use server side analytics instead. I don't want to send a list of everybody who visits my website to Google.
    - SoftwareMaven 15y ago
      What do you use for those analytics? Is it something you built or a third-party thing?
      - 18pfsmt 15y ago
        My guess is that he is using Piwik (wikipedia has an entry), as that is the best OSS package that I know of. It's LAMP-based, so YMMV.
- rmc 15y ago
  The webpage doesn't send IP address, your browser contacts facebook for the icon and hence sends IP address and cookies to facebook, in the same way that image hotlinking would work. Remember it's not just IP address, but could be cookies. Facebook can set a cookie that will be stored in your browser and will be sent to facebook each time. So if your laptop moves around, then the facebook cookie follows you. Since this is at the browser level there are browser extensions that will block this for you if you want.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
tezza 15y ago
I just don't see what the big deal is... The set of information people publish on their own about themselves (like blogs) is almost exactly the same as the set of information they disclose via Facebook. Anyone can datamine people's blogs for similar surveilance. . From Stallman's blog & email history on newsgroups I could work out: who he knows what projects he participates in his age infer his sexual preference infer his religion (may even be explicit there) where he lives where he was on any day (conference speaker history) People shout and scream about themselves as often and loudly as they can. Facebook is just the medium du jour. Those concerned with privacy have oodles of crypto-tools to do so with. It's just people can't be bothered. That's the root problem.
- pessimizer 15y ago
  Stallman is an intentionally public person who wants you to know these things.
  - tezza 15y ago
    Many many people besides a public figure like Stallman have written a blog or participated in a newsgroup. -- Let's just see what can be done without Facebook: You (pessimizer) have listed your email address pessimizer@xxxxxx . You have an HN comment history. Your email pops up in google under Arkansas You commented on a Django topic. I could infer your set of HN buddies (maybe not including myself now!). All those methods are almost as bad as facebook for disclosing information. If you use a pseudonym to hide from those - why don't you use a pseudonym as your facebook account?? -- I haven't listed my email, but I'm pretty sure people could work out who I was and where I lived from my comment history. But I am reasonably happy that the reward of not having to screen all my comments for incriminating info is worth the risk of someone figuring it out. (edit with an example)
    - flatline 15y ago
      You make some good points, but I think there's a difference between having a few personal details about someone and surveillance. The clincher with Facebook is the amount of detailed information about the time and place that you are doing things, all in the hands of a single private entity. There's no telling what kind of analysis this data gives them and perhaps law enforcement (if not today, tomorrow?). For example, a few weeks ago there was a post circulating about how FB inferred the location of a photo without any location information in the exif data. Even if you use their ever-changing privacy controls to hide your data from people you don't know, Facebook still has access to all of it.
lelele 15y ago
RMS: "Free software literally gives you freedom in the area of computing. It means that you can control your computing. It means that the users individually and collectively have control over their computing. And in particular it means they can protect themselves from the malicious features that are likely to be in proprietary software," Open-source, proprietary or not, gives you control over your computer compared to closed-source software. It's not free software versus proprietary software. Free software goes beyond open-source, and besides safety gives you freedom.
Craiggybear 15y ago
There are a lot of people here who don't seem to understand you can earn money and a good living with 'free' software. The term 'free' is very misunderstood in this context. Its free as in freedom/free speech, not (necessarily) free as in beer. Although sometimes (most times) its both. This doesn't stop you using it to earn a living. It allows you to freely use and modify it to your own purposes. Contrast that with non-free (i.e. locked, obfuscated and proprietary). I've written freely available stuff that people have (never the less and willingly) paid me rather handsomely for the privilege of using or modding to their own needs. They didn't have to, but people can be inherently decent that way. I could have made it entirely closed and I think I'd have made less out of it if I had. I would have had to market it for a start -- and that's a fucking headache. I'm not a salesman and don't want to be. Anyhow, Stallman is 100% right. Everything he's been warning us about for years is already upon us. With much worse to come.

313 points by couchnaut 15y ago

I'm pretty sure I've seen this before...

jiggy2011 15y ago

I find it somewhat ironic that people like Stallman have battled for years to get so much FOSS out there. What did we do with all this free software? Used it to build things like facebook, google and various SaaS sites that not only tie our data into proprietary clouds but due to the nature of the GPL etc don't really have to share their code anyway. What they have really achieved is to turn everything they touch into a commodity and moved the "value" of software elsewhere. We seem to be moving to a world where most of our devices and the servers powering our apps will be running some form of Linux or BSD under the hood but we are actually more restricted than ever.

roopeshv 15y ago
GNU has already given a solution to this kind of situation. It's called AGPL (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html). But the problem is most people would be happy to avoid GPL, and stick with BSD, because a lot of people want that. If anyone can start with AGPL, that's a great start. PS: AGPL is the strictest GPL there is, like, LGPL is a looser version of GPL. It pretty much means, you give away almost all the stack. I don't understand the whole license, but I do know it's the strictest.
- jiggy2011 15y ago
  Interesting , haven't read that license in detail. Does this mean that as soon as I run something on a network (or just the internet?) I am required to push my changes back upstream immediately? However I have a feeling that there is a sufficient body of GPL/LGPL code out there that people will just modify that. Since a lot of OSS code is contributed by companies, they don't really have any incentive to contribute to an AGPL project (in most cases).
  - skore 15y ago
    No, it just says that if anybody uses your software, they are entitled to get the source code. So on most GUN+Linux distributions, this is already the case. Not so much on the internet when you use a service on a website. The AGPL basically establishes the same concept on the internet that the GPL has established on the desktop.
    - jiggy2011 15y ago
      What's GUN+Linux? I didn't realise that ESR had created his own 2nd amendment based unix userland! I see, interesting idea unfortunately I really can't see it taking off, most companies would just prefer to work internally and then release some bits of code as LGPL/BSD when they are ready. What advantage could AGPL give the developer (assuming they are writing OSS for commercial rather than ideological reasons)?
      - skore 15y ago
        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU/Linux_naming_controversy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU/Linux_naming_controversy The commercial advantage is that it levels the playing field: If I create a library that can be used for a website and release it as FOSS under a license that is not as restrictive as the AGPL, I basically create a disadvantage to my own business: Another company could use my code in a closed service and thus benefit from my work without giving me and their users the courtesy of benefiting from their work in return. I write commercial GPL software and will, in my next refactor, license certain parts of the software as AGPL. An example would be a library that connects an invoicing system to an online payment processor (ie. creates a full checkout process for invoice X at amount Y). I have a lot of work invested in the code (basically 5 years of my life) and the better and more reusable I make it, the easier it is to just retool it for another application. I would naturally love to see websites utilize the code, even if it is just in a SaaS setting. But since it is my work, I have decided to set the rules and if people want to use it, I think it's fair to ask that they should promote the same liberties that they received from me.
        15y ago
- pors 15y ago
  AGPL was made to also catch "hosted software". It still needs you to modify the OSS before the license kicks in. It has not been tested in any legal case as far as I know, which is why large corporations avoid using AGPL licensed software (like MongoDB).
- sunchild 15y ago
  The short version is that "distribution" includes providing access over a network.
- tzs 15y ago
  The problem some of us have with AGPL is that we do not consider it to even be a free software license, as we think it violates freedom 0 on the FSF's definition of free software.
  - bad_user 15y ago
    AGPL redefines what distribution means. It's an EULA, very unlike the GPL. Also, some might say that GPL software was successful precisely because of the server-side loophole. That's not necessarily bad, because the cost of starting your own Google or Facebook is much, much lower than 10 years ago.
the_tubes 15y ago
I believe that is was Stallman wants. You have the freedom to not share your code as much as you can. You have the freedom to use that free code as proprietary code. The user has the freedom to also use that proprietary code. This is the reason of the LGPL. As long as your code doesn't link to open code you can keep it as closed source as you want with any license you want. If you don't like using that proprietary system then you have the freedom to not to and use something more open. Freedom doesn't have to restrict you from doing what you want with your code or how you use it. That is what is cool about Stallman. He knows people like, want to make, release, and or use proprietary code and allows it. He just won't use it himself.

majmun 15y ago

Stallmans reminds me of Ted Kaczynski unabomber. (no offence) similair world view, he doesn't care of inovation because probably thinks that it leads to more controlled society. both are Neo-Luddites. only Kaczynski was more radical in his actions. If you want more of the same I suggest you read unabomber manifesto http://editions-hache.com/essais/pdf/kaczynski2.pdf http://editions-hache.com/essais/pdf/kaczynski2.pdf

couchnaut 15y ago
The creator of Emacs and gcc is a Neo-Luddite and on the same side as unabomber?!! Apparently there is some kind of nth humor level involved here that I can't really comprehend.
- majmun 15y ago
  yes, what is your point? for fighting technology you can use technology. (and im not saying that he was neo-luddite allways)
  - couchnaut 15y ago
    No offense but you're implying it and my point anyway is that it's somewhat weird (if not anything worse) to draw parallels with unabomber just because Stallman said what's just obvious to anyone but Facebook addicts. For better or worse there is a growing danger in FB regarding the tons of personal data that the same users would just never give away if it weren't for FB. He is just trying to make users aware of that. He's certainly not the first to do it and hopefully not the last. Also he said nothing that could be interpreted as innovation stopper. Out and over.
    - deleted 15y ago
      [deleted]
    - couchnaut 15y ago
      To be honest I didn't see the video but even if he said that he should be "punched" for the reasons where he bases his opinion and not the opinion itself (unless "innovation" is a divine truth that we must accept no matter what - DDT was innovative at its time but it was no good). Moreover the transcript reads: “With software patents the US has become a dangerous place for software development, including innovative software development, because when a program is innovative, that means it has some new ideas in it. But it also has lots of well-known ideas in it. A large program combines thousands of ideas. So if you have some new ideas and you want to use them, in order to use them you have to combine them with a lot of other ideas that are well-known. And if you are not allowed to do that because those other ideas are patented, you can’t use your new idea,” not exactly hostile to innovation. Anyway - he is Stallman and he's known for not being extra diplomatic or even smart at politics. Like you, he speaks the way he feels - point is that IMHO there is a growing problem with all the data that we - FB users - carelessly upload. (Moreover I'm not convinced that FB has all that much to do with innovation any more but that's an entirely different conversation.) PS: Sorry if I sounded hostile but the unabomber reference drove me mad. My bad. PS2: this was supposed to be an answer to a comment that's not there any more - anyway.

savramescu 15y ago

“The Anonymous protests for the most part work by having a lot of people send a lot of commands to a website, that it can’t handle so many requests. This is equivalent of a crowd of people going to the door of a building and having a protest on the street. It’s basically legitimate." No it's not. This is just a few persons coming in buses and stopping the entry. If you want to equal it to protest then all the requests have to come from real people, not some bots. I'm also not agreeing with this: "I won’t use the non-free software at all! I dedicate my effort to getting away from it! So if they stop making it – that would be great!" This is ridiculous. I understand that the current IP legislation is a load of crap but trying to get ALL software to be free is absurd. How are developers going to live? How about groceries? Can I pay for that? Or that should be free as well?

jiggy2011 15y ago
I agree that you can not always compare a DDOS to people blocking a street. I think there's 2 reasons for this. 1) If you are busy protesting by blocking a street this causes you inconvenience as you can only physically be in one place at once. Whereas leaving your computer on to DOS while you go out to a bar isn't exactly a hardship. 2) Many of the DDOSers would not even be remotely aware of what they are doing , see the JS worm that they used recently. This is ridiculous. I understand that the current IP legislation is a load of crap but trying to get ALL software to be free is absurd. How are developers going to live? How about groceries? Can I pay for that? Or that should be free as well? You've just opened up a huge topic there, has been discussed on HN lots of times and while I have seen good arguments for copyright-less software in many areas (OS kernels , web frameworks etc) there are others where I don't think anyone has thought of another viable business model (at least not one that isn't even more freedom restricting in some way). Some would argue that these areas should just disappear or be done only by hobbyists but I think I would miss professionally produced video games for example, indie or AAA. To clarify though, I doubt that Stallman would support Anonymous or people who want to pirate software. To him any software that is not libre is irrelevant and should be rejected regardless of monetary cost or who distributes it.
- idonthack 15y ago

VMG 15y ago

Except that it is completely voluntary.

muyuu 15y ago
People can be tricked into giving away absolutely everything. As Facebook so aptly proves.
- VMG 15y ago
  It still happened voluntarily. I'm not saying that this means that it is therefore morally good, I'm just staying that there is a qualitative difference between facebook and the secret police terrorizing people in dictatorships.
masklinn 15y ago
No. It's completely "voluntary" and the quotes are important: if your whole social environment standardizes on a platform, you're an outcast if you don't step aboard. If your professional environment standardizes on a platform, you're an outcast if you don't step aboard. It's only actually completely voluntary if you have infinite money and no issue (and no repercussion from) completely dropping whole social and professional circles out of your life. And that still requires the network/system is honest about it[0], when Google automagically creates a G+ account for you when you sign up for (supposedly) unrelated services or forces you to create one to access other content, "voluntary" is really debatable. Again, unless you have no issue shedding whole social circles instantly. [0] http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2012/01/google-doubles-plus-membership-with-brute-force-signup-process.ars http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2012/01/google-doubles-p...
- VMG 15y ago
  The thing is that surveillance should be reserved to people who lived under something like the Stasi regime and had to risk their life to escape. You only have to pick up the phone instead of using the computer. [edit] G+ doesn't change the surveillance situation at all. I have a G+ account and I don't do anything with it. Google doesn't have any additional information.

dotemacs 15y ago

What has to be noted here is that this is published on Russia Today. From my understanding of it, it tries to offset the US crazies like Fox and its ilk...

lunarscape 15y ago
To me RT is a Kremlin mouthpiece giving a voice to obscure anti-US and anti-EU voices. At one stage is was nothing but 24 hr anti-Georgia propaganda.
- narrator 15y ago
  I've seen the BBC and other western media quoting some random unknown Chinese or Russian intellectual and giving them the world stage because they agreed with the western perspective on China or Russia.
couchnaut 15y ago
RT happened to have the longest and most full presentation of the interview that I could find in a minute. I originally saw this in Free Software Magazine which linked to this piece http://www.deccanchronicle.com/channels/sci-tech/others/richard-stallman-facebook-surveillance-system-007 http://www.deccanchronicle.com/channels/sci-tech/others/rich... but it seemed too short for HN. Now (regarding other more strong notes on this thread) - Stallman has his opinions and he supports them in a very logical way (albeit a bit too passionate). Moreover, he tries to support personal freedom, which in my books is more of an American value than anyone's else. So, trying to dump the real issue here by referring to what RT may be (according to what sounds like post modern cold war psychosis) is at least cheap propaganda.

blueplastic 15y ago

It's interesting to me that in general Hacker News seems to be anti-Stallman and kinda think of him as a nut or don't deeply understand his position. You'd think if any subculture understood the threats he's talking about, it'd be here.

DanBC 15y ago

There are people who are uncomfortable about the intrusions of various websites, but who use those websites anyway. These people "just" need a better alternative to switch. But I have no idea what to do about the people who just don't care. For example, OKC recommended a person to me recently. EDIT: Redacted a bit more. She lists her blackberry pin; her facebook account; an email address; her cell / mobile phone number; and her twitter account. That's enough information to find her profiles on a wide range of websites.

iamjustlooking 15y ago
Even though you redacted that information it's quite easy to find that person still because of the poor spelling and grammar. Perhaps you should remove it.
- DanBC 15y ago
  Yes. You're right. I have done.
slig 15y ago
You'd be surprised to see how easy is to find all that with just the OKC username. Lots of people use the same handler for all kinds of services.

ppod 15y ago

Is it true that sites with a facebook like button send the IP address of hits back to facebook?

tikhonj 15y ago
If the like button is hosted on Facebook, your browser requests it from there when you visit the page. So the site doesn't have to do anything except include an img tag with a Facebook url in it; everything else is a consequence of how the internet works.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- mike-cardwell 15y ago
  Google Analytics creates the same problem. This is why I use server side analytics instead. I don't want to send a list of everybody who visits my website to Google.
  - SoftwareMaven 15y ago
    What do you use for those analytics? Is it something you built or a third-party thing?
    - 18pfsmt 15y ago
      My guess is that he is using Piwik (wikipedia has an entry), as that is the best OSS package that I know of. It's LAMP-based, so YMMV.
rmc 15y ago
The webpage doesn't send IP address, your browser contacts facebook for the icon and hence sends IP address and cookies to facebook, in the same way that image hotlinking would work. Remember it's not just IP address, but could be cookies. Facebook can set a cookie that will be stored in your browser and will be sent to facebook each time. So if your laptop moves around, then the facebook cookie follows you. Since this is at the browser level there are browser extensions that will block this for you if you want.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

tezza 15y ago

I just don't see what the big deal is... The set of information people publish on their own about themselves (like blogs) is almost exactly the same as the set of information they disclose via Facebook. Anyone can datamine people's blogs for similar surveilance. . From Stallman's blog & email history on newsgroups I could work out: who he knows what projects he participates in his age infer his sexual preference infer his religion (may even be explicit there) where he lives where he was on any day (conference speaker history) People shout and scream about themselves as often and loudly as they can. Facebook is just the medium du jour. Those concerned with privacy have oodles of crypto-tools to do so with. It's just people can't be bothered. That's the root problem.

pessimizer 15y ago
Stallman is an intentionally public person who wants you to know these things.
- tezza 15y ago
  Many many people besides a public figure like Stallman have written a blog or participated in a newsgroup. -- Let's just see what can be done without Facebook: You (pessimizer) have listed your email address pessimizer@xxxxxx . You have an HN comment history. Your email pops up in google under Arkansas You commented on a Django topic. I could infer your set of HN buddies (maybe not including myself now!). All those methods are almost as bad as facebook for disclosing information. If you use a pseudonym to hide from those - why don't you use a pseudonym as your facebook account?? -- I haven't listed my email, but I'm pretty sure people could work out who I was and where I lived from my comment history. But I am reasonably happy that the reward of not having to screen all my comments for incriminating info is worth the risk of someone figuring it out. (edit with an example)
  - flatline 15y ago
    You make some good points, but I think there's a difference between having a few personal details about someone and surveillance. The clincher with Facebook is the amount of detailed information about the time and place that you are doing things, all in the hands of a single private entity. There's no telling what kind of analysis this data gives them and perhaps law enforcement (if not today, tomorrow?). For example, a few weeks ago there was a post circulating about how FB inferred the location of a photo without any location information in the exif data. Even if you use their ever-changing privacy controls to hide your data from people you don't know, Facebook still has access to all of it.

lelele 15y ago

RMS: "Free software literally gives you freedom in the area of computing. It means that you can control your computing. It means that the users individually and collectively have control over their computing. And in particular it means they can protect themselves from the malicious features that are likely to be in proprietary software," Open-source, proprietary or not, gives you control over your computer compared to closed-source software. It's not free software versus proprietary software. Free software goes beyond open-source, and besides safety gives you freedom.

Craiggybear 15y ago

There are a lot of people here who don't seem to understand you can earn money and a good living with 'free' software. The term 'free' is very misunderstood in this context. Its free as in freedom/free speech, not (necessarily) free as in beer. Although sometimes (most times) its both. This doesn't stop you using it to earn a living. It allows you to freely use and modify it to your own purposes. Contrast that with non-free (i.e. locked, obfuscated and proprietary). I've written freely available stuff that people have (never the less and willingly) paid me rather handsomely for the privilege of using or modding to their own needs. They didn't have to, but people can be inherently decent that way. I could have made it entirely closed and I think I'd have made less out of it if I had. I would have had to market it for a start -- and that's a fucking headache. I'm not a salesman and don't want to be. Anyhow, Stallman is 100% right. Everything he's been warning us about for years is already upon us. With much worse to come.