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Comment by robbrown451 | Hacker News Reader

So I'm one of those who doesn't care if Google tracks me or sells me as a product. [ * ]

Is there actually some real, tangible harm that can come to me from using Google products? Not theoretical stuff, not stuff that is less likely than dying in a plane crash. Something that is actually likely to happen, that will affect me in measurable, negative ways?

I'm really trying to come up with something, and I'm really trying to care.

* actually I don't agree with that last one: ads are a product of Google, and various things like Gmail are products of Google. The latter is paid for with ad viewings rather than currency.

Really, there is no need to redefine "product" to include humans being advertised to and tracked. There was (and I guess is) a thing called "slavery," where humans were bought and sold....my voluntary use of Gmail is not comparable.

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Has it become some sort of fashion statement to be ignorant about privacy?

Whenever I discuss this topic people seem to almost take pride in giving their information to Google, Facebook and the thousands of other companies they have no clue about.

I think it's cognitive dissonance rearing its ugly head again: those people have tied their identity at some level with the use of the products and an attack on e.g. Google becomes an attack on them.

The concept of fairness also plays a role. Most people feel that Google should get something for providing their services and they also feel that it's ok if they are shown some ads. Fair deal. What they have no idea about is how much data is extracted from them, who it's shared with and for what purposes it's used. But we can be almost certain the answers to those questions is more and more data, more and more parties and more and more purposes, because data is forever.

And yes, real harm can come to you if you are promiscuous with your information. Additional information should be accessible through your favourite search engine. Hint: home invasion.

I find I'm having trouble arguing in a meaningful way with people who don't share the same concerns regarding the privacy of their data. I'm running out of arguments - no matter what I say, they'll respond with a shrug.

"So what? I don't have anything to hide."

"So what? They are a big company, surely they won't abuse my data."

"So what? How has Cambridge Analytica affected me?"

And for the ultimate capitulation: "So what? They already have so much data on everyone, you can't avoid it anyway."

Brave new world.

This is not only coming from folks with little understanding of tech, but also from "technologically literate" people who should know better. Sticking your head in the sand is just so damn convenient.

Even a comparatively widely reported privacy scandal like FB's can't seem to sway these folks... apparently because they feel like it hasn't affected them personally.

How do you deal with this kind of attitude?

The best distillation I found was that this is all a version of the "Nothing to Hide" argument. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_to_hide_argument

There are some points to counter with in the article. Bruce Schneier quotes Cardinal Richelieu: give me 6 lines written by the most honest man and I'll find something in there to hang him by. Has the benefit of historical perspective!

In general I frame the discussion so that I can emphasize the effects of surveilance on society and key members of society (judges, government employees, journalists, law enforcement, doctors etc). They could be blackmailed or reveal the data of many others through their carelessnes.

The average Joe is not clever enough to figure out what's happening and is probably not worth the effort to educate them. Try it on family and friends, but don't get your hopes up :)

IT workers are a special case: they think they're super smart but are just as clueless about the topic like the general population. And they help develop these systems, so it might be worthwile to try to use social pressure to get them to quit helping the abusers.

Ultimately this can only be solved through new laws and regulations, like the GDPR.

You deal with that by giving an actual example of something bad that has happened to someone who has not worried about what Google tracking them. I haven't seen one.

I mean, people who advise me not to text and drive can give real examples of people who died because they did that. That's tangible. All I hear is a lot of people telling me what I should care about but refuse to supply anything but intangibles and theoreticals.

And I'm talking about Google here, not Facebook.

Do you actually play an important role in society which gives you access to the information of many people or which would make others interested in blackmailing you? If yes, you'd hopefully already be aware of those risks and also educate your contacts on how to act in a provacy-conscious way.

Otherwise use Google, use whatever you want, nobody cares.

I usually link to this 2006 column by Bruce Schneier – it is both lucid and succinct:

The Eternal Value of Privacy

https://www.wired.com/2006/05/the-eternal-value-of-privacy/

I'm ignorant, I suppose, because you are unwilling or unable to list a single tangible potential harm. Home invasion? Please explain how Google tracking me is going to help a home invader.

Or are you talking about me posting stuff on Facebook? Because that's a very, very different thing.

My goal when commenting is to counterbalance overly pro-surveilance comments, not become somebody's privacy coach and patiently explain to them all the bad things that could happen.

That takes a lot of effort and offers me zero benefit - even in real life, people that I've known for years can be stubborn and they dig in when confronted with arguments.

I'm more concerned about the effects of mass corporate surveilance on society itself and key members of society than any particular individual.

My question was regarding the individual, not society in general. I'm not so convinced the use of Google services and the way they get revenue is such a problem for society either, but that wasn't my question. I am interested in knowing whether using these alternatives instead of Google is in my self interest, when all things are taken into account and rationally balanced. I have yet to hear a convincing argument that they are.

You don't have to explain all the bad things that happen if you don't want to, but it sure seems like you are avoiding the question.

Ditto.

> My goal when commenting is to counterbalance overly pro-surveilance comments

And yet answering his question directly instead of avoiding it with a strange remark (home invasion, wtf?) would done a much better job at that.

I've heard the Brave New World speech many times and I buy into the concept... but I'd also like to be educated on reality. Spouting the former when someone asks for the latter is just annoying.

Everything you have said there is completely intangible. Show me one real world example of where my use of Google products has actually hurt me.

Okay, let’s think about some side effects of having lots of potentially sensitive data nicely stored at one location:

* Propaganda: Because you understand what people need to hear, it’s a perfect tool to influence opinion. Of course, this doesn’t happen in your country (it never does). A recent popular example is the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Thankfully this evil cooperation does not exist any more (by changing its name).

* Reinforcement of monopolies: You need to hit a critical mass to use data effectively. Therefore, big players will have an advantage over competitors and can provide better products. Therefore big players …

* Reinforcement of dictatorships: If things turn bad they turn really bad. User data is gold in the hand of dictators. One reason is that is helps with propaganda, but it also helps to identify resistance. If for some reason your country ends up in a regime, it is going to be hard to get out of it.

* Self-censorship / freedom of speech: There is plenty of evidence, that we constrain ourselves because we know nothing online is anonymous. This also depends on which country you live in.

There must be a plethora of side effects I didn’t think of right now.

You have to decide how “theoretical” these issues are for you. Maybe it is more a thing of “believing” – such as vegetarianism (although we all know eating meat is bad for the environment).

I don't see how any of this applies to Google. Are you saying that dictators can steal my data from Google?

I'd think they'd have an easier time breaking into my house and stealing my computer. By a factor of maybe a thousand.

Not only can they, they already do it, via MLAT and via Google's voluntary disclosure. Google even makes money with it.

On a voluntary basis, we may provide user data in response to valid legal process from non-U.S. government agencies,

Just go to the Google transparency report, select Russia, Egypt, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, and you'll get plenty of requests that Google has fulfilled.

You don't see how "Reinforcement of monopolies" applies? You don't see how "Self-censorship" applies? The Cambridge Analytica scandal was involving facebook -- do you think they are really far apart from each other? The point "Reinforcement of dictatorships" would apply as soon as the government of the US would be in a less healthy state.

The overall point is the following: Google might provide nice services for you as and individual, but there are larger-scale societal implications, which we should consider and weigh in as well.

Self-censorship certainly doesn't apply to me.

Reinforcement of dictatorships? Uhhh.... I actually think Google is a force for good against dictatorships and would-be-autocrats such as the current US administration. That's just the impression I get.

Monopolies is a different issue, it really has nothing to do with privacy. I do care about that one, but it's completely separate and it is not a self-interest issue, but a society at large one. In that sense, I suppose I'm being asked to participate in a boycott.

But the payoff from breaking into Google is much larger than stealing your computer. One of those provides mass access to data and the other only involves data about a few persons. So comparing that is not really valid.

I think the average worst thing that could happen is that you end up going to court against someone (since we are thinking about averages, I'm thinking divorce), they obtain your data, and use that to build a case against you. If you were cheating, for instance, your location info could be used to show all your meetings in quite some detail. And even if you weren't, you can always bend your stats a little bit to make it look as if you did. Enjoy discussing p-hacking and statistical significance with a judge.

If you live in the US this may not be a problem now, but you also have to think ahead: courts may not be allowed to obtain your information right now (although that's probably not true if you are in a murder trial), but they might in the future.

And even then, someone close to you could provide that information to the other part: a (soon to be ex) friend of yours downloads all your information* thanks to the new GDPR tools and provides them to the other part.

*: I think this evidence would be admissible in court, since it's not the police the one who obtained evidence with illegal means. But even if it were not directly admissible, parallel construction is also a thing.

So how would this happen? Google gives them my data? I'm sorry but I don't get it. Google can't do that. Even if they work at Google they can't get it.

I just represented myself in a week long custody trial (I won primary custody, and yes I went up against an attorney), and there were lots of risks involved, but this sort of thing seems to be about the smallest one I could imagine.

I'd like to hear if this has actually happened to anyone anywhere.

Even if they work at Google they can't get it.

They can and have:

"in at least four cases, Barksdale spied on minors' Google accounts without their consent, according to a source close to the incidents. In an incident this spring involving a 15-year-old boy who he'd befriended, Barksdale tapped into call logs from Google Voice, Google's Internet phone service, after the boy refused to tell him the name of his new girlfriend, according to our source."

http://gawker.com/5637234/gcreep-google-engineer-stalked-tee...

> Google can't do that. Even if they work at Google they can't get it.

I'm not sure I understand this point, so let me make my point clearer. It's clear that Google(TM) can access your data. You probably mean "most google employees can't", which I agree with. But someone can access your data for sure, and in fact you can access your data: if you are a European citizen, you can request all of your data right now, thanks to the GDPR and Google has to comply. There are also other general tools to access the data[1].

So I'm not saying "a Google employee will go behind your back". I'm saying that either "Google(TM) could be compelled by a court order to give your data if laws change", or "someone could use your unlocked PC, click on 'Download my data', and give it to the other part" (again, more likely if the other part is tech savvy and planning on divorcing you).

> I'd like to hear if this has actually happened to anyone anywhere.

Someone getting in trouble because someone took their private information? It happens quite often in the Legal Advice subreddit. Here's one example[2]:

> "My wife uploaded screenshots from my Ashley Madison account, hotel receipts and non-nude but sexual photos of me online before she moved out and filed for divorce. Do I have any legal recourse under Delaware law? (...) They were not public. The photos were from my phone and were not anywhere online and the credit card was in my name only. She had no right to access either one (nor my Ashley Madison account)."

My specific case? No idea. But supposedly private information biting someone back is a regular event. Here's a page some lawyers in Orange County wrote on that [3] with some examples.

* Edit: rethinking my point, I think you meant "how is this a Google problem, rather than an infosec problem". To that, my point would be: the fact that the information exists forever in one central place.

[1] https://medium.com/productivity-in-the-cloud/6-links-that-wi...

[2] https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/5b895c/my_wife...

[3] http://orangecountydivorce.com/divorce-technology/

Yeah I don't see the connection to Google or how using these non-Google services helps with that kind of thing. It's completely unrelated.

You say "Google can access your data." What exactly does that mean? No single employee of Google can. They put immense protections in place because of just how costly it would be if this happened....it would destroy trust in the company that they have spent billions of dollars building up.

This is a fundamentally different thing than someone's wife logging into their device and seeing their Ashley Madison stuff.

Then you must assume one of:

* No one can get access to Google's data * Those who can get access cannot harm you

In addition to trusting google not to be evil. What are your assumptions that lead you to that conclusion?

Or are you assuming that no matter who has access to your data, there is no one could ever do any harm to you with that data? (That's the 'I have nothing to hide' argument)

> * No one can get access to Google's data * Those who can get access cannot harm you

Maybe it's more about will than can if you're a bit more pragmatic? Anyone on the street can harm you, but not many will....

I think Google has a very strong incentive to protect my data from that sort of thing, and a lot of layers to ensure this. One rogue employee can't get access to my email. Why? Because if it happened and the press got wind of it, Google would see their market cap drop tens of millions of dollars overnight.

Meanwhile, why should I trust that that guy living on the sidewalk won't jump up and bash my head with a hammer? Or that the person driving the car in the opposite lane won't swerve into my lane and kill me? I just try to keep risks in perspective.

If you don't know why you should care about privacy, there's no one who can explain it as eloquently as Edward Snowden. Read https://www.businessinsider.de/edward-snowden-privacy-argume... or - preferably - whatch the video at http://hooktube.com/watch?v=WRzm7wrk_FA

I like this comment. It's not beeing ignorant about privacy but I also value my free time a lot more than searching and dealing with all sorts of Google alternatives. I think that security and uptime at Google are outstanding and better than all sorts of alternatives which can shut down any time. And in comparison to Facebook Google is not selling your single soul or your direct private information to outside advertisement companies. It's not like Google never thought about privacy... they have deep thoughts about it and how they still can make money with you.

In the 1930's (and before) people in Germany were asked (as they are today) to specify their religion in certian dealings with their government. Nobody thought anything of it. And then the Nazis came to power, and there was no ability to undelete anything.

So basically if shit hits the fan then we're even more fucked than we would have been had we not used Googles and Facebooks?

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