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> Most people don't care because they're not culpable enough to feel paranoid. Maybe you didn't mean it literally but it's a popular expression in this context

> Most people don't care because they're not culpable enough to feel paranoid. Maybe you didn't mean it literally but it's a popular expression in this context. I don't think a desire for privacy is paranoid; it is normal, healthy behavior. But to address the gist of what you say, I think you assume an understanding of data security that is far beyond most end users. How many even know what "metadata" means, or how 'cloud' computing actually works? Go down to the mall (assuming you are not in a tech hub) and ask. On top of that, they would need to understand the confidentiality implications of the system, and then the political, social and other implications of confidentiality. The public is not able to make an informed decision, and government and industry are taking advantage of that: If people don't mind, why are so many of these practices kept secret or obscure?

Karunamon 12y ago
A normal, healthy behavior is to be aware of what the devices you own are capable of. Insane paranoia is hearing "cloud-based audio processing device and service" and instantly jumping to "the NSA" absent a single damned fact to support that conclusion. Downvotes don't make me wrong or you right.
- grey-area 12y ago
  Insane paranoia is hearing "cloud-based audio processing device and service" and instantly jumping to "the NSA" absent a single damned fact to support that conclusion. Cell phones are routinely used as listening devices, what makes you think this device would not be? If I were a government agency intent on omniscience (i.e. the NSA), this device, along with televisions and computers with always-on microphones controlled remotely, would be a very welcome development - all it takes is one secret order to the company concerned, with a warrant covering the entire country, and their entire product line is useful for surveillance on demand. Given the world we live in, where GCHQ for example claims the right to capture all information, including privileged communications between lawyer and client, wondering about how our devices protect against government intrusion is not insane paranoia at all.
  - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
    >Cell phones are routinely used as listening devices // Citation? I'm really interested, presumably there's a hacker convention talk or somesuch where they install a hidden service on a standard phone and upload all voice input even when the phone is off? Clearly I use burner non-smart phones for my criminal activities (that's a joke!) so they're going to have to use other means. Obviously they can still sniff the data at the operator for phone calls.
    - grey-area 12y ago
      It's an interesting video for other reasons, but at 1:47 here Binney mentions it: http://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000001733041/the-program.html http://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000001733041/the-pro... Here's another article about real-world use: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3522137.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3522137.stm
      - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
        Daniel Ellsberg [Pentagon Papers whistle-blower]: "Somebody told me that they can listen to what we're saying by my having this cellphone {waves what looks like iPhone} even though it's turned off." William Binney [ex-NSA]: "Yes. [... goes off on a tangent about data analysis] He doesn't really mention it. Indeed the vid is considering electronic communications and information which is put in to the public sphere. Other than that one question which Binney responds to only with "Yes" there's no other mention of private audio being covertly sniffed. The BBC article is very sparse and jumps from being able to eavesdrop mobile->basestation and decrypt that to being able to listen in on all conversations within range of a phone. Clearly ludicrous. I don't at all doubt that phones can be modified remotely to covertly listen and that some phones could enable this when switched off (though that seems unlikely to meet with normal design requirements, it seems that this covert listening would need to be designed in). I guess maybe you could make "off" only appear to be off whilst listening - my phone gets hot when doing anything extended like recording a talk or something and drains the battery quite a lot - even with the screen off. Seems that using this sort of surveillance on a widescale is highly unlikely. >"all it takes is one secret order to the company concerned, with a warrant covering the entire country, and their entire product line is useful for surveillance on demand" [grey-area, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8569217 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8569217] Only, IMO, if it's already been designed in and you can hide the power usage (and data-store usage). Anything better?
anigbrowl 12y ago
I'm not saying a desire for privacy is paranoid, but the assumption that the government will engage in passive monitoring and archival of everything that can be captured through the microphone and use it as leverage later, even if it doesn't involve criminal liability, eg 'assist us without nefarious purpose or we will use something we recorded to cause you acute embarrassment with devastating social consequences.' I'm not saying this won't happen, but that it won't happen enough for most people to care. But to address the gist of what you say, I think you assume an understanding of data security that is far beyond most end users. I don't think I do. I've met plenty of non-technical people who worry about the possibility that their phone could record them when its swtiched off or suchlike - you don't need to understand how something functions in order to understand its potential as an instrumentality. But unless you have a fundamentally antagonist view of government (which most people in the US don't) then there's little overlap between the set of 'stuff the government could do me' and that of 'stuff that would advance the government's purpose' for the average person. This is what I mean when I say most people don't feel culpable enough; there isn't anything sufficiently illegal going on in their lives that they perceive a significant government interest in intruding upon them in the first place. When I talk about paranoia I mean the idea that government is going to fuck with you no matter how blameless of a life you lead, and that the more blameless you are the less leverage you will have to push back against the inevitable intrusion. In other words, they overestimate the probability of oppression just as optimistic or authoritarian people may underestimate it, depending on context. While that possibility certainly exists, I think something like this Amazon product only marginally increases it because anyone who buys this probably already has a smartphone and keeps it close by at all times already.
- freshhawk 12y ago
  "the more blameless you are the less leverage you will have to push back against the inevitable intrusion" That's really well put. People seem to miss the fact that in a surveillance society it's not necessarily your privacy that you will most regret losing, it's the privacy of those groups you agree with who are opposed to some powerful faction.
- agentultra 12y ago
  > This is what I mean when I say most people don't feel culpable enough; there isn't anything sufficiently illegal going on in their lives that they perceive a significant government interest in intruding upon them in the first place. I hear this refutation quite often. I find it typically comes from people in a place of privilege that the system largely ignores. I've read far too many accounts from people who are not Caucasian or are Muslim to believe that innocent people are not the targets of mass surveillance and do not notice its effects.
baddox 12y ago
> I don't think a desire for privacy is paranoid; it is normal, healthy behavior. I think it's healthy to choose how private you keep each aspect of your personal life. I make tradeoffs all the time. When I think that sharing some aspect of my personal life (whether with an individual or an organization) will give me more benefit than the cost of losing that privacy, I'll do it.
superuser2 12y ago
>I don't think a desire for privacy is paranoid; it is normal, healthy behavior. We on Hacker News spend our free time criticizing anyone we perceive as complicit in surveillance, bemoaning centralization, and championing Bitcoin and Uber for disrupting authority. To HN, a desire for privacy is literally normal: it is a social norm of this community. That doesn't mean that people outside this community do (or should) care nearly as much as we do.
- mkal_tsr 12y ago
  Keep in mind, within this community, there is a large portion of developers, and thus, more likely than the average person to be able to affect positive change through their work / side-projects. As such, it's a critical issue that I think HN is smart to not shy away from. The same systems that can gamify an action can be used oppressively. Thus, one has a varying degree of personal responsibility to what one builds or contributes to.
- unclebucknasty 12y ago
  >That doesn't mean that people outside this community do (or should) care nearly as much as we do. Part of the reason we care more is because we understand more. But, in general, I think there is not nearly enough emphasis put on what's right vs. what people care about. That is, the former doesn't dictate the latter.

Karunamon 12y ago

A normal, healthy behavior is to be aware of what the devices you own are capable of. Insane paranoia is hearing "cloud-based audio processing device and service" and instantly jumping to "the NSA" absent a single damned fact to support that conclusion. Downvotes don't make me wrong or you right.

grey-area 12y ago
Insane paranoia is hearing "cloud-based audio processing device and service" and instantly jumping to "the NSA" absent a single damned fact to support that conclusion. Cell phones are routinely used as listening devices, what makes you think this device would not be? If I were a government agency intent on omniscience (i.e. the NSA), this device, along with televisions and computers with always-on microphones controlled remotely, would be a very welcome development - all it takes is one secret order to the company concerned, with a warrant covering the entire country, and their entire product line is useful for surveillance on demand. Given the world we live in, where GCHQ for example claims the right to capture all information, including privileged communications between lawyer and client, wondering about how our devices protect against government intrusion is not insane paranoia at all.
- pbhjpbhj 12y ago
  >Cell phones are routinely used as listening devices // Citation? I'm really interested, presumably there's a hacker convention talk or somesuch where they install a hidden service on a standard phone and upload all voice input even when the phone is off? Clearly I use burner non-smart phones for my criminal activities (that's a joke!) so they're going to have to use other means. Obviously they can still sniff the data at the operator for phone calls.
  - grey-area 12y ago
    It's an interesting video for other reasons, but at 1:47 here Binney mentions it: http://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000001733041/the-program.html http://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000001733041/the-pro... Here's another article about real-world use: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3522137.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3522137.stm
    - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
      Daniel Ellsberg [Pentagon Papers whistle-blower]: "Somebody told me that they can listen to what we're saying by my having this cellphone {waves what looks like iPhone} even though it's turned off." William Binney [ex-NSA]: "Yes. [... goes off on a tangent about data analysis] He doesn't really mention it. Indeed the vid is considering electronic communications and information which is put in to the public sphere. Other than that one question which Binney responds to only with "Yes" there's no other mention of private audio being covertly sniffed. The BBC article is very sparse and jumps from being able to eavesdrop mobile->basestation and decrypt that to being able to listen in on all conversations within range of a phone. Clearly ludicrous. I don't at all doubt that phones can be modified remotely to covertly listen and that some phones could enable this when switched off (though that seems unlikely to meet with normal design requirements, it seems that this covert listening would need to be designed in). I guess maybe you could make "off" only appear to be off whilst listening - my phone gets hot when doing anything extended like recording a talk or something and drains the battery quite a lot - even with the screen off. Seems that using this sort of surveillance on a widescale is highly unlikely. >"all it takes is one secret order to the company concerned, with a warrant covering the entire country, and their entire product line is useful for surveillance on demand" [grey-area, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8569217 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8569217] Only, IMO, if it's already been designed in and you can hide the power usage (and data-store usage). Anything better?

anigbrowl 12y ago

I'm not saying a desire for privacy is paranoid, but the assumption that the government will engage in passive monitoring and archival of everything that can be captured through the microphone and use it as leverage later, even if it doesn't involve criminal liability, eg 'assist us without nefarious purpose or we will use something we recorded to cause you acute embarrassment with devastating social consequences.' I'm not saying this won't happen, but that it won't happen enough for most people to care. But to address the gist of what you say, I think you assume an understanding of data security that is far beyond most end users. I don't think I do. I've met plenty of non-technical people who worry about the possibility that their phone could record them when its swtiched off or suchlike - you don't need to understand how something functions in order to understand its potential as an instrumentality. But unless you have a fundamentally antagonist view of government (which most people in the US don't) then there's little overlap between the set of 'stuff the government could do me' and that of 'stuff that would advance the government's purpose' for the average person. This is what I mean when I say most people don't feel culpable enough; there isn't anything sufficiently illegal going on in their lives that they perceive a significant government interest in intruding upon them in the first place. When I talk about paranoia I mean the idea that government is going to fuck with you no matter how blameless of a life you lead, and that the more blameless you are the less leverage you will have to push back against the inevitable intrusion. In other words, they overestimate the probability of oppression just as optimistic or authoritarian people may underestimate it, depending on context. While that possibility certainly exists, I think something like this Amazon product only marginally increases it because anyone who buys this probably already has a smartphone and keeps it close by at all times already.

freshhawk 12y ago
"the more blameless you are the less leverage you will have to push back against the inevitable intrusion" That's really well put. People seem to miss the fact that in a surveillance society it's not necessarily your privacy that you will most regret losing, it's the privacy of those groups you agree with who are opposed to some powerful faction.
agentultra 12y ago
> This is what I mean when I say most people don't feel culpable enough; there isn't anything sufficiently illegal going on in their lives that they perceive a significant government interest in intruding upon them in the first place. I hear this refutation quite often. I find it typically comes from people in a place of privilege that the system largely ignores. I've read far too many accounts from people who are not Caucasian or are Muslim to believe that innocent people are not the targets of mass surveillance and do not notice its effects.

baddox 12y ago

> I don't think a desire for privacy is paranoid; it is normal, healthy behavior. I think it's healthy to choose how private you keep each aspect of your personal life. I make tradeoffs all the time. When I think that sharing some aspect of my personal life (whether with an individual or an organization) will give me more benefit than the cost of losing that privacy, I'll do it.

superuser2 12y ago

>I don't think a desire for privacy is paranoid; it is normal, healthy behavior. We on Hacker News spend our free time criticizing anyone we perceive as complicit in surveillance, bemoaning centralization, and championing Bitcoin and Uber for disrupting authority. To HN, a desire for privacy is literally normal: it is a social norm of this community. That doesn't mean that people outside this community do (or should) care nearly as much as we do.

mkal_tsr 12y ago
Keep in mind, within this community, there is a large portion of developers, and thus, more likely than the average person to be able to affect positive change through their work / side-projects. As such, it's a critical issue that I think HN is smart to not shy away from. The same systems that can gamify an action can be used oppressively. Thus, one has a varying degree of personal responsibility to what one builds or contributes to.
unclebucknasty 12y ago
>That doesn't mean that people outside this community do (or should) care nearly as much as we do. Part of the reason we care more is because we understand more. But, in general, I think there is not nearly enough emphasis put on what's right vs. what people care about. That is, the former doesn't dictate the latter.