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This makes all the difference: "Yet India’s Central Monitoring System, or CMS, was not shrouded in secrecy" Doesn't make collecting all that data ok, but the

by scdoshi 13y ago

This makes all the difference: "Yet India’s Central Monitoring System, or CMS, was not shrouded in secrecy" Doesn't make collecting all that data ok, but the fact that it's not all cloak and dagger means that people know what the government is doing in their name and they can vote for a change if they disagree.

geekam 13y ago
India has a very bad history in dealing with such issues esp when they involve technology. Remember when they asked Google, Facebook, Twitter et. al. to preemptively delete undesired messages?
- scdoshi 13y ago
  To clarify again, I am not saying this is a good thing. I was just pointing out what seemed to be a major point of difference between this and the US situation. A lot of the unrest and anger here is because mass surveillance was approved to be carried out in secret and the companies were not even allowed to talk about what type of data they were providing to the government.
  - gits1225 13y ago
    The Government is trying to do the same thing with similar tactics as the US counterpart. They don't make any noise, or put any effort into making people aware of what is actually going to be done to them. As a result, there is virtually no media coverage, and only a couple of vigilant people who care about it are even aware of this. They just barely mention it in passing, is ambiguous and can be interpreted however they want it to: http://pib.nic.in/newsite/erelease.aspx?relid=70747 http://pib.nic.in/newsite/erelease.aspx?relid=70747, like: "Hey, we are going to monitor every aspect of your life, and keep the records forever, and will be used against you for the interests of various corrupt people; in effect, shutting you up. No big deal :)"
mpyne 13y ago
The capability to engage in PRISM was not shrouded in secrecy either. As I have to keep reminding people, PRISM wasn't even the scary system; do you know what the FBI calls their automated system to track their other (normal) warrants? Or you scared of that system? Metadata collection on massive scale is scarier IMO, but that's been in the law and case law for years as well (as 'pen traps' or whatever they call it). AFAICS the only real 'innovative' parts are a) collecting data about a crime before the government knows the crime has happened, without so much as a specific suspicion of wrongdoing, and b) collecting all data and then grepping for the data they're legally allowed to have. Even b) above has precedent in law enforcement though; just not at this scale.

by scdoshi 13y ago

geekam 13y ago

India has a very bad history in dealing with such issues esp when they involve technology. Remember when they asked Google, Facebook, Twitter et. al. to preemptively delete undesired messages?

scdoshi 13y ago
To clarify again, I am not saying this is a good thing. I was just pointing out what seemed to be a major point of difference between this and the US situation. A lot of the unrest and anger here is because mass surveillance was approved to be carried out in secret and the companies were not even allowed to talk about what type of data they were providing to the government.
- gits1225 13y ago
  The Government is trying to do the same thing with similar tactics as the US counterpart. They don't make any noise, or put any effort into making people aware of what is actually going to be done to them. As a result, there is virtually no media coverage, and only a couple of vigilant people who care about it are even aware of this. They just barely mention it in passing, is ambiguous and can be interpreted however they want it to: http://pib.nic.in/newsite/erelease.aspx?relid=70747 http://pib.nic.in/newsite/erelease.aspx?relid=70747, like: "Hey, we are going to monitor every aspect of your life, and keep the records forever, and will be used against you for the interests of various corrupt people; in effect, shutting you up. No big deal :)"

mpyne 13y ago

The capability to engage in PRISM was not shrouded in secrecy either. As I have to keep reminding people, PRISM wasn't even the scary system; do you know what the FBI calls their automated system to track their other (normal) warrants? Or you scared of that system? Metadata collection on massive scale is scarier IMO, but that's been in the law and case law for years as well (as 'pen traps' or whatever they call it). AFAICS the only real 'innovative' parts are a) collecting data about a crime before the government knows the crime has happened, without so much as a specific suspicion of wrongdoing, and b) collecting all data and then grepping for the data they're legally allowed to have. Even b) above has precedent in law enforcement though; just not at this scale.