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The elephant in the room that CNN doesn't want to talk about or admit to is that much of the problem lies in Big Media (of which CNN is obviously a part). US/W

The elephant in the room that CNN doesn't want to talk about or admit to is that much of the problem lies in Big Media (of which CNN is obviously a part). US/Western media companies are more aligned with the government of China than any notion of freedom when it comes to the interests they pour money into (as opposed to platitudes they might espouse). The push to lock down computers and make it hard/impossible to buy one that doesn't clearly identify you - so that you cannot "steal" big media content - is exactly what makes it hard/impossible to prevent yourself being tracked and surveilled. Can knowledgeable hackers beat the system...? Sure, somewhat, and increasingly this is harder and harder to do. But society is lost in the middle not on the fringes. We live in the Panopticon [1] and this is a problem for many reasons. When a small elite can strengthen its ability to pull the levers of power decision making is concentrated in a smaller and smaller group. Small groups make worse decisions than large scale collective "marketplaces" of ideas and thought. This is what allowed the US and the West to flourish for so long. But it's easily lost. We are moving to a world where elections lead to less and less change, where major problems are going unresolved and punted to a future on the assumption that exponentially growing challenges can be out-waited. The only hope is in the increased connectivity of the Internet, access to information, and ability to share dissenting views. As this is taken away, to preserve Hollywood profits, and in the name of "security", we run further and further off the cliff. Even Wylie Coyote has to look down eventually and see that it's time to fall to the canyon floor. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon

return0 14y ago
Now, you 're attacking the messenger and sidestepping the issue. The kinds of surveillance the article talks about are inherent in the structure of the internet, hardly anything to do with hollywood lockdowns.
- richardjordan 14y ago
  If a man bursts into the room armed to the teeth, points pistols at us and yells that the problem in society today is too many guns, it's okay to attack that messenger and point out that he is part of the problem. Yes for brevity I skipped a couple of steps in my argument that I knew/assumed most folks on HN wouldn't need spelling out >> surveillance can be beaten by various forms of anonymizing technology >> such technology requires control of your technology environment, hardware & software >> big media companies such as the one printing the article (albeit one by a respected security researcher whose articles I read - via Google Reader - le sigh) are among those entities most aggressive in restricting access, by you and I, to control over our technology choices. [Updated to correct imprecise language] So... the messenger - or at least the part I criticized, CNN - is not a neutral party in this story and as such it's perfectly legitimate to question their role and interests in the message. Clearer?
  - return0 14y ago
    People can be spied even with an anonymizing network. The reason why this is possible is the open and distributed architecture of the internet itself.
    - knowaveragejoe 14y ago
      No, as another comment pointed out better than I could, it's the exact opposite - centralized services.
- AnthonyMouse 14y ago
  >The kinds of surveillance the article talks about are inherent in the structure of the internet You're not talking about the internet, you're talking about Google, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. The internet allows you to share your public key with your friend in person and from then on connect directly to their computer and communicate securely. People can tell who you're communicating with but not what you're saying, and if you use an anonymizing service they can't even tell who you're communicating with. Distributed is good for privacy. The problem is the centralization. The fact that you get your email from the same company you do your web searching with and the same company that hosts your blog means that they have access to all that information about you. If it was all different companies -- or no companies at all, because you host your own email or blog from your house -- then that wouldn't happen.
  - intended 14y ago
    I suspect thats part of authors point. The Internet is not just the protocol, its what's built on it. So differentiating between google and Facebook vs the net is pointless. We can slice and dice definitions as much as we like, but the fact remains that the usable, daily net is a panopticon.
    - betterunix 14y ago
      That is largely a result of the efforts of governments and media companies. Encryption is not the default for email because of the efforts of the US government. People who run anonymity systems are routinely harassed by the government (try running a Tor exit not or an anonymous remailer -- you had better be ready for early-morning paramilitary raids). Peer to peer filesharing was effectivelly killed by the RIAA and MPAA. The world was forced to move to centralized, insecure systems because the more secure alternatives were all shut down before they could become entrenched.
  - goldfeld 14y ago
    I've been thinking about dumping Gmail for a few days now. What are good web-based alternatives, with an even better interface, that I can run locally and have it connect to a server on Heroku or something like that? I feel like I have relied on Google's software for so long, as a no-brainer, I don't even know what other good web mail clients there are, and I'd think there must be something great and open source out there.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
skrebbel 14y ago
I can't help but wonder about the top rated comment on HN being one that kindly shifts attention away from our beloved ad-powered Silicon Valley firms, to the Real Bad Guys all the way in LA and Washington.
- goldfeld 14y ago
  Exactly. When every other startup relies on ad revenue, they're nothing but furthering the goals of big corporations and big media.
  - pyre 14y ago
    While I do believe that all of the reliance on ad revenue contributes to the "Internet surveillance state," I wouldn't exactly say that the newspaper industry would agree that ad-supported blogs are 'furthering their goals.' I think that many big newspapers would disagree with you there.
- richardjordan 14y ago
  I think that's a valid point. Clearly the Silicon Valley firms delivering ads are building in metrics and tracking. However, my point was that this would not matter if one had capabilities at hand to control what information your own machine sends out about you for these ad trackers to capture. What Washington and Hollywood are doing is passing laws together that prevent this. There are situations where I am perfectly happy letting a company have information about me, on which it makes profits, but that I feel on balance is in my interests. (For example personalization algorithms in some services I feel provide me with added value). There are plenty of situations where I do not want this. When I have the option to disengage with services that track me in ways I don't want to, and thereby reduce my surveillable footprint I am fine with Silicon Valley doing its thing. When I don't have such options because Hollywood has lobbied to ban computers which don't identify their owner clearly to all in the foodchain, and by extension the government - and when I have no idea about the security of my own machine thereby undermining my own crypto choices, that's a fundamental undermining of my liberties. Silicon Valley firms may deliver services to Hollywood and DC but ultimately both of those are more powerful in the decision making hierarchy than is the tech sector.

return0 14y ago

Now, you 're attacking the messenger and sidestepping the issue. The kinds of surveillance the article talks about are inherent in the structure of the internet, hardly anything to do with hollywood lockdowns.

richardjordan 14y ago
If a man bursts into the room armed to the teeth, points pistols at us and yells that the problem in society today is too many guns, it's okay to attack that messenger and point out that he is part of the problem. Yes for brevity I skipped a couple of steps in my argument that I knew/assumed most folks on HN wouldn't need spelling out >> surveillance can be beaten by various forms of anonymizing technology >> such technology requires control of your technology environment, hardware & software >> big media companies such as the one printing the article (albeit one by a respected security researcher whose articles I read - via Google Reader - le sigh) are among those entities most aggressive in restricting access, by you and I, to control over our technology choices. [Updated to correct imprecise language] So... the messenger - or at least the part I criticized, CNN - is not a neutral party in this story and as such it's perfectly legitimate to question their role and interests in the message. Clearer?
- return0 14y ago
  People can be spied even with an anonymizing network. The reason why this is possible is the open and distributed architecture of the internet itself.
  - knowaveragejoe 14y ago
    No, as another comment pointed out better than I could, it's the exact opposite - centralized services.
AnthonyMouse 14y ago
>The kinds of surveillance the article talks about are inherent in the structure of the internet You're not talking about the internet, you're talking about Google, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. The internet allows you to share your public key with your friend in person and from then on connect directly to their computer and communicate securely. People can tell who you're communicating with but not what you're saying, and if you use an anonymizing service they can't even tell who you're communicating with. Distributed is good for privacy. The problem is the centralization. The fact that you get your email from the same company you do your web searching with and the same company that hosts your blog means that they have access to all that information about you. If it was all different companies -- or no companies at all, because you host your own email or blog from your house -- then that wouldn't happen.
- intended 14y ago
  I suspect thats part of authors point. The Internet is not just the protocol, its what's built on it. So differentiating between google and Facebook vs the net is pointless. We can slice and dice definitions as much as we like, but the fact remains that the usable, daily net is a panopticon.
  - betterunix 14y ago
    That is largely a result of the efforts of governments and media companies. Encryption is not the default for email because of the efforts of the US government. People who run anonymity systems are routinely harassed by the government (try running a Tor exit not or an anonymous remailer -- you had better be ready for early-morning paramilitary raids). Peer to peer filesharing was effectivelly killed by the RIAA and MPAA. The world was forced to move to centralized, insecure systems because the more secure alternatives were all shut down before they could become entrenched.
- goldfeld 14y ago
  I've been thinking about dumping Gmail for a few days now. What are good web-based alternatives, with an even better interface, that I can run locally and have it connect to a server on Heroku or something like that? I feel like I have relied on Google's software for so long, as a no-brainer, I don't even know what other good web mail clients there are, and I'd think there must be something great and open source out there.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

skrebbel 14y ago

I can't help but wonder about the top rated comment on HN being one that kindly shifts attention away from our beloved ad-powered Silicon Valley firms, to the Real Bad Guys all the way in LA and Washington.

goldfeld 14y ago
Exactly. When every other startup relies on ad revenue, they're nothing but furthering the goals of big corporations and big media.
- pyre 14y ago
  While I do believe that all of the reliance on ad revenue contributes to the "Internet surveillance state," I wouldn't exactly say that the newspaper industry would agree that ad-supported blogs are 'furthering their goals.' I think that many big newspapers would disagree with you there.
richardjordan 14y ago
I think that's a valid point. Clearly the Silicon Valley firms delivering ads are building in metrics and tracking. However, my point was that this would not matter if one had capabilities at hand to control what information your own machine sends out about you for these ad trackers to capture. What Washington and Hollywood are doing is passing laws together that prevent this. There are situations where I am perfectly happy letting a company have information about me, on which it makes profits, but that I feel on balance is in my interests. (For example personalization algorithms in some services I feel provide me with added value). There are plenty of situations where I do not want this. When I have the option to disengage with services that track me in ways I don't want to, and thereby reduce my surveillable footprint I am fine with Silicon Valley doing its thing. When I don't have such options because Hollywood has lobbied to ban computers which don't identify their owner clearly to all in the foodchain, and by extension the government - and when I have no idea about the security of my own machine thereby undermining my own crypto choices, that's a fundamental undermining of my liberties. Silicon Valley firms may deliver services to Hollywood and DC but ultimately both of those are more powerful in the decision making hierarchy than is the tech sector.