Why It’s Easy for a Bounty Hunter to Find People
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Maybe I don't want to become a part of this community after all.
edit: then again, every single comment of yours appears to be dead?
edit2: what's with the lack of transparency?
I agree on this point - there is an important distinction here between "frequently" and "always". We should be vigilant indeed and seek to uncover the true purpose of those who are malicious and deceitful. The previous remark should perhaps be taken more as a statement of relief, that fortunately there is often an inverse relation between maliciousness and intelligence.
I think almost everyone has more to fear from someone they know (who is out to get them) than foreign governments. There's not a lot of Edward Snowdens in the general public.
Additionally the FSB could very well use this data in their persistent campaign of psychological warfare against the entire country. They're smart people, and if they're not using this resource already they probably will by the time the 2020 election heats up.
Lol
The Russians are coming!
Our adversaries and strategic competitors probably already
are looking to the 2020 US elections as an opportunity to
advance their interests. More broadly, US adversaries and
strategic competitors almost certainly will use online
influence operations to try to weaken democratic
institutions, undermine US alliances and partnerships, and
shape policy outcomes in the United States and elsewhere.
I see this sentiment a lot, and I've never understood the thought process that leads to it. Your own government is the worst possible party to have information on you, because they have a lot of power to do things to you. They are also much more likely to care about your activities or other things that concern you.
By contrast, the Saudis are way the hell over in Saudi Arabia, have very little power over Americans in America, and don't care what Americans in America do. In the immortal words of Achilles:
> I came not warring here for any ill the Trojans had done me. I have no quarrel with them. They have not raided my cattle nor my horses, nor cut down my harvests on the rich plains of Phthia; for between me and them there is a great space, both mountain and sounding sea.
You can change whether the Saudis care about what you're doing, if you try hard. But you can't bring them up to the level where they care more or have more power than your native government already does.
> the son of Atreus strode among the throng, looking everywhere for Alexander, and no man, neither of the Trojans nor of the allies, could find him. If they had seen him they were in no mind to hide him, for they all of them hated him as they did death itself.
Achilles is totally correct that, as far as he's concerned, Troy hasn't aggrieved him in any way, and would have a hard time doing it if it wanted to.
The internet and smartphones have been around for long enough for this to be a reality for today's leaders.
Adversarial foreign governments could choose to exercise surveillance and storage power over citizens of another country. That's one of many reasons why access to location data should be locked up tightly.
The analogy with Achilles doesn't hold up because it is possible to act at a distance in today's connected world.
So if you're Jeff Bezos, you might have a problem. For the rest of us who aren't Jeff Bezos, it isn't a problem. Tell me why I should care about security threats to the richest person in the world? There's far more pressing things to worry about than protecting the ultra-rich.
Imagine if a significant part of the leadership class of a society is under this sort of a threat. It can turn into a systemic issue.
- Going to a gay bar
- Going to an STD clinic
- Going to a therapist’s office (mental health unfortunately has stigma attached to it)
- Going to a legal cannabis store (I’m Canadian)
- Going in a date with someone who, years later, does something terrible
These are all completely innocent things that someone may still want to keep to themselves, and which could be used to put together a negative campaign against someone in the public eye.
I dont believe this is true, the Saudi's very much care about Americans in America. See their extensive lobbying efforts to effect American policy, and the possible hacking of Jeff Bezos (no way to know if this is real or not). I also think its somewhat of a red harring to say, "since country X doesnt care about us, we're safe from all countries." The difference between a foreign country and my own government is that in some respect I have the ability to change my own countries policy, I can vote people out of office and email my senators (who are supposed to have my well being in mind when making laws), however I have no control whatsoever over a foreign governments decision making and they probably dont care about my well being.
But, again, it doesn't matter that they don't care about your well-being and you can't influence them, because they can't influence you either. Between you and them there is a great space.
(The capacity of your government to harm you) minus (your ability to influence your government not to harm you) is much greater than (the capacity of the Saudi government to harm you) minus (your ability to influence the Saudi government not to harm you). The last three quantities are all small.
Certainly, if you're Jeff Bezos, you may have something to worry about from foreign governments, but you are also only .000000000167~% of people. Forgive me if I don't have the concern to expend on that proportion of people, especially when they are rich enough to buy a country.
Contrarily, I am terrified that in the event I am somehow wrongly charged of a crime, or rightly charged of a wrong crime in the United States, that my entire history of movement will be used to exploit me. The FBI and CIA have run many discrediting campaigns in their histories, to speak nothing of the McCarthy era.
However, if you don't plan to visit countries like this, this isn't something you should probably worry about. I have no plans to visit either of those countries until they have completely different governments, so I really don't care if they don't like me.
Except we know that's not entirely accurate. The Russian propaganda effort in 2016 really needed to know a lot about a few hundred thousand or million Joe Whomevers, they did, and they were able to use that information fairly effectively. I think it's arguably easier to get a decent amount of information on a lot of random people which is actionable as opposed to a lot of information on one person that is actionable, regardless of their relative wealth and power.
Jeff Bezos actually, recently, makes a good case for this. If you had, for example, a compromising picture on Joe Whomever, it could be useful, used correctly. Jeff Bezos on the other hand, can likely go toe to toe with you.
This doesn't discount your argument, but I think we do have something to fear with the complete loss of privacy we now have from both domestic and foreign powers.
Note: I'm not interested in having a discussion here about Comey, collusion or any of that, just noting that Joe Whomever does matter, in aggregate.
Just because a country is apparently remote, does not mean that they have no agency here, and vice versa.
Globalization extends far beyond mere transnational corporations & supply chains. Even when there is not reason for specific revenge as in Saudi & Trump vs Bezos, govt/corporate espionage has a very broad array of useful targets, going well beyond military contractors & subcontractors.
With a casual attitude like that, it'll be far too late by the time you realize that it has gone too far.
Even if you're OK with your own government having access to your current location at all times
For anyone else searching for it in your podcast app, it's actually called "The Privacy, Security, & OSINT Show".
The existence of bounty hunters is in some ways just a bizzare commercialisation of what should be a government function.
For example, get involved in a messy divorce, get out-lawyered, end up on the hook for astronomical amounts of retroactive child support. If you're not careful you might be dealing with a lot more than just the repo man.
Plus the way the legal system is in the US, a single unpaid parking ticket could spiral completely out of control into tens of thousands in late payment fees, fines, and jail time.
The issue is that these tools 1- exist 2- aren't kept under the tightest lock and key possible. Because any schmuck can get access to them for the right price, nobody should have a cell phone if we put the onus on the victims.
Or an abusive partner..
You can carry one if you don't use it to contact people you know. But of course you will, ignoring the advice from the tough guy that's trying to save you, according to every movie ever touching the subject.
More sophisticated attacks would identify your usage pattern, the date you bought the new phone, the train that sounds in the background or even the fact that you log in in your favourite cat videos site.
In Germany specifically, it's likely that operating such a database wouldn't just involve fines for the company, but also criminal penalties for the people involved. Especially if they continued after the data protection authorities became aware of this and told them to stop.
To a first approximation, my guess would be "probably not." No more so than, say, a train station dropping a dime on you if you try and buy a ticket on a train and your name comes up as wanted.
asking for a friend :-)
He doesn't "work for" the FCC, he's a commissioner [1], which is a political position for which he was nominated. The role is inherently political and he's there to provide leadership. He's a Democrat, if anything this means he's more likely to find a higher role in the future.
Indeed, the structure of the Commission is designed for that. Although Commissioners are appointed by the President and approved by the Senate, by law no more than 3 of the 5 can be from the same party. Traditionally for the two Commissioners not of his party the President nominates whoever the Senate leader of the other party recommends, and traditionally if that party is the minority party in the Senate the senators from the majority party pretty much rubber stamp it, so in practice the party that controls the White House gets a pretty free choice for three of the seats, and the other party gets a pretty free choice for the other two seats.
What if you substitute "bounty hunter" for "the private investigator your ex-wife hired". "The stalker who's willing to put a couple of hundred dollars into an internet grudge", etc. At some point you have to realistic that perfectly innocent people can care about their privacy too.
A male with a violent ex wife should be just as afraid.
Or indeed anyone of any gender with a violent ex of any gender.
Most probably haven't, yet we treat them as though they have when we apply a punishment..
In some cases they already are, e.g., killing someone by accident or in a fit of passion vs a premeditated murder are usually charged differently.
Beyond that, it seems not unreasonable to apply the maxim that "maybe you should stay in jail here as if you'd thought it through, so you might actually think it through next time...".
I don't have a solution or a better alternative, just saying that punishment only really makes sense if agents in the system are rational.
Assume that the criminals are 100% irrational, random, and not influenced by external inputs; even then, inprisonment has a value to society of containing the possibility of bad actions by those bad actors during the prison term.
The fact that the recidivism rate is far less than 100% also tells us that criminals are not 100% random, irrational, and unresponsive to external inputs. A significant number do actually rehabilitate, whether by taking advantage of counseling, rethinking their choices, or simple fear of re-inprisonment.
So yes, it seems that until we come up with something better, making the system more accurate is the way to go.
I used to work for a company in the mobile phone space, we had access to triangulation APIs and my ex-boss, often requested we track people who owed him money, just because we could.