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During a revolution, those organizations would be burning their own data because when those organizations lose power the data becomes a liability rather than an

by Crito 13y ago

During a revolution, those organizations would be burning their own data because when those organizations lose power the data becomes a liability rather than an asset to them. It becomes evidence of their crimes. When the Berlin Wall fell, the Stasi began burning and shredding everything they could. German citizens stormed their buildings and much of the documents were saved, so that the crimes of the Stasi could be documented for prosperity. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stasi#Recovery_of_the_Stasi_files http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stasi#Recovery_of_the_Stasi_fil...

hershel 13y ago
This time they'll just encrypt everything.
- Crito 13y ago
  Yeah, and destroying the key will be much easier than destroying paper by the ton.
  - a3n 13y ago
    So when you storm the barricades make sure that you keep the electricity on, so that all those disks and data will be decrypted at that moment. (And remember in your home and biz life, if you do whole disk encryption, you need to hibernate or shut down to get your disk/data back into its encrypted state.)
    - Crito 13y ago
      I fear that this will never happen. In the best case scenario that I consider realistic, the TLAs will sense their impending doom well in advanced and will safely and quietly destroy all the data that might incriminate them of anything. This destruction might be punishable, but I think it is more likely that we will never even realize that it occurred. The only way to take out a TLA and seize the incriminating data is swiftly and without warning. With warning times on the order of minutes, I don't think this is possible politically or otherwise. The best we can hope for is to shut them down, and the best we can do afterwards is punish those responsible in absence of specific evidence against them (but I don't think that we have the guts necessary to do that. However as a real-world example of that sort of response, consider the show trial and execution of Nicolae Ceaușescu: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceau%C8%99escu http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceau%C8%99escu)

by Crito 13y ago

hershel 13y ago

This time they'll just encrypt everything.

Crito 13y ago
Yeah, and destroying the key will be much easier than destroying paper by the ton.
- a3n 13y ago
  So when you storm the barricades make sure that you keep the electricity on, so that all those disks and data will be decrypted at that moment. (And remember in your home and biz life, if you do whole disk encryption, you need to hibernate or shut down to get your disk/data back into its encrypted state.)
  - Crito 13y ago
    I fear that this will never happen. In the best case scenario that I consider realistic, the TLAs will sense their impending doom well in advanced and will safely and quietly destroy all the data that might incriminate them of anything. This destruction might be punishable, but I think it is more likely that we will never even realize that it occurred. The only way to take out a TLA and seize the incriminating data is swiftly and without warning. With warning times on the order of minutes, I don't think this is possible politically or otherwise. The best we can hope for is to shut them down, and the best we can do afterwards is punish those responsible in absence of specific evidence against them (but I don't think that we have the guts necessary to do that. However as a real-world example of that sort of response, consider the show trial and execution of Nicolae Ceaușescu: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceau%C8%99escu http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceau%C8%99escu)