4 ms·
I can see where both of you come from, but I'm tending towards ferdo's view. So far there is, to my knowledge, no historical precedent of a large data collectio
by sentenza 13y ago
I can see where both of you come from, but I'm tending towards ferdo's view. So far there is, to my knowledge, no historical precedent of a large data collection effort for the purpose of law enforcement* that has not ultimately led to a bad outcome for those whose data was collected. (I'm talking about non-ongoing, so full-picture historical retrospection.)
I mean, even my own state (which has about as good a rule of law as they come) has in the past implemented a dragnet that kind of went awry. At least, according to the people that lived through "Rasterfahndung", it seems inevitable that the presumption of innocence goes out the window pretty much as soon as eager law enforcement personnel has access to large databases[1].
* The inevitable asterisk: It seems that it might be possible to keep things from going awry if there is a specific warrant signed by a judge for every _individual_ act of "listening in". Not a warrant for tapping a service provider, but a warrant to look at the data of a single user at that provider. But this is moot, since we are already way past any point where it would have been possible to stop at that.
[1] http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fde.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FRasterfahndung http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&pre...
- tptacek 13y agoI don't demand that you agree with me, or even remotely expect it. How could I? You know hardly anything about what I believe. I fully respect people who have militantly anti-government perspectives on NSA surveillance; those perspectives make sense to me, even if I share them only partially. What I don't respect are people who have no earthly clue what they're talking about telling me how repellent my views are.
- foobarbazqux 13y agoIn practical terms, the problem with asserting ambivalent, balanced, middle ground positions is that white sees grey as black, and black sees grey as white.
- ferdo 13y ago> militantly anti-government perspectives on NSA surveillance This points to a flaw in the logic of governance that results in accumulated errors when it's used as a precept. The NSA is the interloper in American society and a latecomer to government. The existence of the NSA has no foundation in the so-called social contract that we all share. It's essentially a lawless institution at this point. The NSA and those that support it that are militantly anti-social. Citizens insisting on their rights aren't the problem. Those that demand or facilitate the infringement of our rights are the actual problem.
- tptacek 13y agoBy "militant" I don't simply mean strong-held beliefs, but also unquestioning acceptance of stories that reaffirm those beliefs. I don't think strong opposition to NSA surveillance automatically makes one "militant".
- ferdo 13y agoApply the concept of "unquestioning acceptance of stories that reaffirm beliefs" to those people that rationalize receiving a salary from some aspect of the Surveillance State.