Comment by ocdtrekkie | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ocdtrekkie | Hacker News Reader

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It doesn't need to be about "secrecy", it's about "security". Even when you ignore the employee trust issue, and assume everyone at your company would never betray you, "least privilege" is still not just best practice for security, it's common sense.

People should not be able to access data they don't need. If they need it, you can grant it. But the assumption should be that someone who doesn't use the design server shouldn't have access to the design server.

I don't want to know about or see information I don't need to have at work. It's not that I'm not trustworthy. It's not that I would abuse it. I just don't need the liability that it gets out through me.

Because your account credentials could get stolen. Your laptop could get stolen. Your laptop could get hacked into. Your laptop could get malware. Reducing the list of people who have access to a resource insulates against all of these things... automatically. And sure, all of those risks have other ways to mitigate them as well. But layers of security is key. And hey, it also stops employees from sneaking off with your data too.

Stealing a Googler's laptop or account credentials don't get you access. At best, you might get temporary access to my gmail in the browser. I could give you my username and password and you could accomplish nothing.

Googlers all have to use 2-factor access via hardware tokens, so you'll need to steal their laptop and steal their token, and murder the employee before they report it to security.

Google laptops only permit the installation of software from Google, they are locked down and don't allow arbitrary installation of software, much like an iPhone. Those using Chromebooks are even safer.

Having to ask permission for every thing not only adds huge overhead, it inhibits global code gardening and technical debt reduction, and it inhibits learning, because you don't even know if you need to ask permission for something until you see it. You don't know what you don't know. If I want to learn about Google Translate because it might benefit my project, asking permission is bureaucracy, because I don't even know if what they have will help until I see it, and if I had to write a long justification for access rights, I probably either don't have a clue why I really need it, or might just not bother because of the hassle and seek out other open resources.

I feel sorry for you if you work for a company that operates internally like North Korea. One of the rewarding things about working at Google is the constant learning experience of exploring other people's stuff.

Having access to code and data you don't technically "need" is often how people learn new skills and advance their careers without leaving the company. It's an important part of the culture.

Why is "the culture" always used in Silicon Valley to justify incredibly bad decisions?

Again, "bad" is your opinion. People aren't machines: how much trust you place in them affects your relationship with them. Culture is about your team's interconnected relationships.

For example: Smaller companies often have the luxury of more trust / transparency. As companies such as Google grow, they have to resort to things like sending internal notice of big announcements very close to when the actual announcements come out (because leakers). If you have 10 people, you can usually trust the whole team.

Google tries very hard to allow as much transparency and openness as is allowable for its size. It fosters a culture of trust. Logging access rather than restricting it is one of those culture moves. It makes employees feel trusted, and puts responsibility on them to behave ethically. When they don't, the other end is that Google can still take legal action.

Culture isn't a fake floofy thing, it's real.

Their model was "trust the employee, and use the courts to enforce punishment if that trust was misplaced."

We are in phase two of that right now.

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