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There is a huge amount that can be done in the solution space outside of "criminalization of privacy".

forgetfreeman 3y ago
There -is- no privacy, why does this still keep coming up in conversations literally decades after it became trivial for AD AGENCIES much less sovereign governments to identify an individual online? Are you part of an astroturf campaign or something?
- hooverd 3y ago
  Why are you anti reclaiming privacy?
  - forgetfreeman 3y ago
    For the same reasons I'm against flat earthers as a concept. The premise is nonsensical from a practical standpoint, you'd have to completely dismantle the internet economy AND re-engineer the network from the ground up. Furthermore, continued rhetoric on this point provides cover for bad actors without meaningfully impacting the privacy landscape for run of the mill users.
    - ETH_start 3y ago
      Classifying all erosion of privacy as equivalent is dangerously reductionist. Being able to track someone's internet activity by buying information from commercial data brokers is not the same as a government forcing everyone to follow a regimented disclosure process, under pain of imprisonment. In the former, there is considerably more consent, some level of flexibility in how data is disclosed and some possibility of user mitigation. In the latter, none of these things are possible. It's a straight jacket for society, with the net effect being massively less fundamental liberty and more centralization of power around the state. Just look at mandated KYC processes in finance, and the enormous costs they impose — in time wasted and intimate private information involuntarily exposed — on hundreds of millions of law-abiding consumers and businesses, while massively constraining the space for innovation in finance, by mandating a regimented PII disclose process that precludes the development of better processes for providing safety and accountability. This is not the same as people's voluntarily disclosed financial data being available to buy from commercial data brokers, that incurs none of these costs on society.
      - forgetfreeman 3y ago
        Ok so now we're proposing that financial regulations that hamper funneling resources to terrorist organizations and make money laundering and tax evasion a massive pain in the ass are "time wasted"? Weird take but ok. And miss me with that "consent" fig leaf. You damn well know ToS (what would the plural be there?) that notionally establish consent are intentionally designed to be impenetrable walls of legal verbiage designed specifically to provoke end users to click through without reading a damn thing. Furthermore, to truly opt out of all forms of digital tracking, which I think we agree most people would do if given the option, would require completely disengaging from the economy as brokerable electronic records are produced every time you use a cellphone, view anything on the internet, or perform a financial transaction with anything besides cash.
        ETH_start 3y ago
        There is zero evidence that financial mass-surveillance, in the form of KYC/AML mandates, hampers the flow of funds to terrorist and criminal groups. There has been no demonstrable reduction of criminal and terrorist activity since the G7 embarked on widespread financial surveillance in 1989. As for the ToS, they provide some level of accountability, which can, for example, take the form of a mass exodus of users when a company changes its ToS to make them more invasive. And people can ultimately choose what data they share with web services, whereas mandates like the ones being promoted by the Commerce Department eliminate that choice altogether. There is undoubtedly a lot of space for improvement in the privacy realm but clearly we're not going to go in that direction if we institute overt mass surveillance programs that criminalize privacy.
- ETH_start 3y ago
  It's a spectrum. There can be greater or smaller degrees of privacy. And there can be giving up privacy voluntarily, or being mandated to give it up. These are fundamentally different propositions.
  - forgetfreeman 3y ago
    Nonsense. Either you're anonymous or you aren't. And you most certainly aren't.
    - ETH_start 3y ago
      It's meaningful whether you consent to the information disclosure or not, and what information is being disclosed. Claiming there is no privacy, so nothing is an invasion of privacy, is apologia for mass-surveillance.
      - forgetfreeman 3y ago
        Refusing to humor the claim that digital privacy is even possible in the modern era merely recognizes the existence of mass surveillance.
        ETH_start 3y ago
        No one is claiming absolute privacy is possible. It cannot all be reduced to an indistinguishable mass of surveillance. There is an enormous amount of nuance in the privacy picture, and laws like the one described in the OP are a meaningful step in the wrong direction for that picture.
        forgetfreeman 3y ago
        There is literally zero nuance to the privacy picture. Either you have it or you don't. You don't. This discussion is bullshit.

There -is- no privacy, why does this still keep coming up in conversations literally decades after it became trivial for AD AGENCIES much less sovereign governments to identify an individual online? Are you part of an astroturf campaign or something?

hooverd 3y ago
Why are you anti reclaiming privacy?
- forgetfreeman 3y ago
  For the same reasons I'm against flat earthers as a concept. The premise is nonsensical from a practical standpoint, you'd have to completely dismantle the internet economy AND re-engineer the network from the ground up. Furthermore, continued rhetoric on this point provides cover for bad actors without meaningfully impacting the privacy landscape for run of the mill users.
  - ETH_start 3y ago
    Classifying all erosion of privacy as equivalent is dangerously reductionist. Being able to track someone's internet activity by buying information from commercial data brokers is not the same as a government forcing everyone to follow a regimented disclosure process, under pain of imprisonment. In the former, there is considerably more consent, some level of flexibility in how data is disclosed and some possibility of user mitigation. In the latter, none of these things are possible. It's a straight jacket for society, with the net effect being massively less fundamental liberty and more centralization of power around the state. Just look at mandated KYC processes in finance, and the enormous costs they impose — in time wasted and intimate private information involuntarily exposed — on hundreds of millions of law-abiding consumers and businesses, while massively constraining the space for innovation in finance, by mandating a regimented PII disclose process that precludes the development of better processes for providing safety and accountability. This is not the same as people's voluntarily disclosed financial data being available to buy from commercial data brokers, that incurs none of these costs on society.
    - forgetfreeman 3y ago
      Ok so now we're proposing that financial regulations that hamper funneling resources to terrorist organizations and make money laundering and tax evasion a massive pain in the ass are "time wasted"? Weird take but ok. And miss me with that "consent" fig leaf. You damn well know ToS (what would the plural be there?) that notionally establish consent are intentionally designed to be impenetrable walls of legal verbiage designed specifically to provoke end users to click through without reading a damn thing. Furthermore, to truly opt out of all forms of digital tracking, which I think we agree most people would do if given the option, would require completely disengaging from the economy as brokerable electronic records are produced every time you use a cellphone, view anything on the internet, or perform a financial transaction with anything besides cash.
      - ETH_start 3y ago
        There is zero evidence that financial mass-surveillance, in the form of KYC/AML mandates, hampers the flow of funds to terrorist and criminal groups. There has been no demonstrable reduction of criminal and terrorist activity since the G7 embarked on widespread financial surveillance in 1989. As for the ToS, they provide some level of accountability, which can, for example, take the form of a mass exodus of users when a company changes its ToS to make them more invasive. And people can ultimately choose what data they share with web services, whereas mandates like the ones being promoted by the Commerce Department eliminate that choice altogether. There is undoubtedly a lot of space for improvement in the privacy realm but clearly we're not going to go in that direction if we institute overt mass surveillance programs that criminalize privacy.
ETH_start 3y ago
It's a spectrum. There can be greater or smaller degrees of privacy. And there can be giving up privacy voluntarily, or being mandated to give it up. These are fundamentally different propositions.
- forgetfreeman 3y ago
  Nonsense. Either you're anonymous or you aren't. And you most certainly aren't.
  - ETH_start 3y ago
    It's meaningful whether you consent to the information disclosure or not, and what information is being disclosed. Claiming there is no privacy, so nothing is an invasion of privacy, is apologia for mass-surveillance.
    - forgetfreeman 3y ago
      Refusing to humor the claim that digital privacy is even possible in the modern era merely recognizes the existence of mass surveillance.
      - ETH_start 3y ago
        No one is claiming absolute privacy is possible. It cannot all be reduced to an indistinguishable mass of surveillance. There is an enormous amount of nuance in the privacy picture, and laws like the one described in the OP are a meaningful step in the wrong direction for that picture.
        forgetfreeman 3y ago
        There is literally zero nuance to the privacy picture. Either you have it or you don't. You don't. This discussion is bullshit.