The Government Protects Our Food and Cars. Why Not Our Data? | Hacker News Reader

The Government Protects Our Food and Cars. Why Not Our Data?

nytimes.com

53 pointstroydavis64 comments

Probably because the threat is relatively new. It took hundreds of thousands of deaths and decades to get us to the current mandated safety standards for cars. It’s going to take a while for tech to catch up.

The perceived impact is much less noticeable than deaths. When the bodies pile up you invest in seatbelt regulations, and may even create jobs making them. What if there's no bodies to count?

> The perceived impact is much less noticeable

Especially after the data is laundered with machine learning and other opaque algorithms.

There will be bodies eventually. Just, you know, at scale.

Heck, most people in government simply don’t even understand the issue, let alone figuring out how to solve it.

AFAIK only one US 2020 presidential candidate atm is even talking about data rights.

This is a good argument for term limits. The old timer's holding on to their power is not doing anyone any good.

There are arguments for term limits, but this isn't one of them. No person can be an expert in everything the government can potentially regulate.

Term limits don't seem to stop old timers from getting elected though, they just mean a variety of old timers get elected.

(Not that there aren't other good reasons to prefer a variety of politicians getting elected over a single one)

> AFAIK only one US 2020 presidential candidate atm is even talking about data rights.

Are you talking Yang [0]? I think he's taking it most seriously but even as a Yang Ganger I do see other politicians talking about it, but I would say that they aren't taking it seriously [1]. I can't find anything about data privacy rights on Warren's, Sanders's, or Biden's issue pages. I did find mentions on Buttigieg's[2], Klobuchar's[3], and Gabbard's[4] (which is more anti-NSA than anything else). But yeah, I would say that Yang is the only one that I'm aware of that is making a very clear statement on this issue (since he ties it to his UBI issue).

[0] https://www.yang2020.com/policies/data-property-right/

[1] https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/2020-democratic-candidates-i...

[2] https://peteforamerica.com/issues/#ConsumerProtections

[3] https://www.klobuchar.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/consumer-p...

[4] https://www.tulsigabbard.org/tulsi-gabbard-on-civil-libertie...

The FDA was formed just years after the Jim the horse incident[0]. The issues from poor data practices has existed for a decade or more. It has more to do with the poor functioning of the political system these days.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_%28horse%29

Just after the Jim horse incident. Which was at a time when food and medicine adulteration was already old as the hills.

And yet Churchill saw how Turing's work on Enigma was promising and gave him a lot of support.

There are many other examples.

Politicians are perfectly capable of understanding the social impact of technology... when they need to.

Churchill was not an ordinary politician

Because our food and our cars are something made by someone else that we will buy in the future, at which point the government’s involvement ceases. “Our” data is something that is generated by us, about us, and is ongoing. The last thing some of us want is the government even having access to it much less charged with “protecting” it.

How come access to the data is needed to protect it?

This "directionality" is the first thing I thought of too. Unlike these other things, data originates with the consumer. Also, the transfer between consumer and platform usually does not include a financial component so it's not "commerce" in the usual sense. The issues involved are just as important despite these differences, the need (however great or small) for regulation doesn't change either, but such differences definitely affect what kinds of regulation might be appropriate or how they might be applied.

Largley because of a paralyzed legislative branch, heavily indebted to corporate donors, compounded by a polarized public that is largely too distracted to focus on this fundamental problem.

Plot twist: zooming out of the USA, you've just described most countries.

Incidentally, countries as a concept may greatly distract the so-fragmented public from many a no less fundamental problem...

These days I can't help but read every NYT piece as a desperate plea to the govt for a rescue operation from its tech usurper.

Also, the govt is demonstrably worse at protecting information than any FAANG, and they are all abiding by GDPR which is the right regulation IMO

GDPR is literally the government protecting people's privacy and data. That's what this article is advocating for.

It's gov regulation of what one can remember, with some forced speech thrown in.

In practice, aren't FAANG giving same protections to Americans? I know they didn't have to, but I thought they would since it would be easier to maintain in long run

This argument only holds if it wouldn't affect their profit.

Protecting data via regulation doesn't require the government have access to the data.

Because some of us want our government not to protect our Food and Cars as well. Data is one area where humanity has made the fastest progress compared to Cars and Food.

Care to elaborate? Outside of unleaded gas, most externalities in the car industry seem to progress slowly in the absence of regulation.

Technology in cars can be rapid but seems to ignore those externalities

> Technology in cars can be rapid but seems to ignore those externalities

Many regulated risks in automobiles are not external, which is I think where they're out of bounds. I think a certain amount of regulation to ensure consumers are informed of the internal risks of an automobile is reasonable; but the government really oughtn't tell you how safe your car must be for you. Externalities, as you say, are the appropriate domain of regulation.

For some people, it may be preferable to have better fuel economy at a lower price (i.e. Honda can make the Honda Insight again) even if the operator risk is higher; but they should not be allowed to drive a vehicle without adequate stopping, acceleration, and speed, or one which poses excessive risk to fire and rescue workers, other motorists, or pedestrians, or has excessive emissions in their use case.

Right now, emissions regulations on automobiles focus on manufacturer fleet emissions (which is an unabashed pro-incumbent regulation), and emissions on a fixed test cycle; but this means you can pay for the privilege of being in the upper section of a fleet's emissions. Similar with the regulations on stopping speed, acceleration, and pedestrian safety: it seems to often depend on the class of vehicle, and so you can pay for the privilege of worse safety externalities.

I think the issue is one of pragmatism. CAFE standards are meant to be an average to allow some vehicles to be designed to meet very different end use needs. Same with the test beds. There's definitely room for improvement.

My point was that automotive manufacturers are not particularly incentivized to improve on areas that don't align with their bottom line. Are you advocating for more regulation in terms of performance parameters?

> Are you advocating for more regulation in terms of performance parameters?

I'm saying I'd prefer consistent (between vehicle classes) regulation of performance parameters which have externalities; and the abolition of non-normalized fleet-based targets (since they privilege the largest manufacturers). If the goal is to reduce external risk, the threshold of acceptable risk should be the same for all motorists as a matter of fairness.

A possible alternative to CAFE is a specialized cap and trade market. I get that they did think a bit about this stuff when they implemented it, but I feel like it has weird effects in practice, especially when gaming it enters medium-long term corporate strategy.

I think it would be spectacular if inefficiency was purchased on a per-vehicle or per-lot basis from manufacturers who exceed the target, and efficiency was sold in turn to those. Not sure how these transactions would be cleared, but I'm sure something reasonable could be worked out. This would do away with adjustments/exemptions based on vehicle footprint (CAFE targets currently differ based on mean vehicle footprint).

I think I agree in an idealized sense, but also think if this approach was taken it would decimate the ability to create certain vehicles, especially those used in heavy-duty applications. I don't know the history of CAFE standards but it may very well have been a practical choice...either get some form of progress or dig our heels in on an idealized version that never gets adopted.

Progress for whom?

> not to protect our Food

What system would you prefer to protect your food?

I just don't get where this type of ideaology comes from. There are plenty of countries with weak governments and not one of them is successful.

I think OP might have meant that weaker regulation/government is a necessary condition, not necessarily a sufficient one.

Then I would expect to see a counterexample to my point.

I don’t follow? It could be that your counterexamples include the necessary condition, but don’t have the sufficient conditions.

In the abstract, if conditions A, B, and C are stated as required to achieve a desired outcome, the fact there happen to be examples of undesirable outcomes with condition A (but implicitly lacking conditions B and/or C) is not enough to prove that condition A is NOT a necessary condition for a desired outcome.

Is it true regulation slows progress?

History shows regulation speeds technical progress.

    - Manhattan Project
    - Apollo program
    - Public university research
    - ARPANET
    - Aircraft
    - Spacecraft
    ...

>Because some of us want our government not to protect our Food and Cars as well.

This. Sure I would like some protection for our food but i hate the too much protection that currently US government has right now.

Maybe because of population growth. Food and car failure is directly linked to mass deaths and diseases, potentially decreasing the population, free data flow is linked to better business decisions, and therefore wealth for starting families, potentially increasing the population.

So if population growth is your priority as nation, it could make sense to allow free data flow if you ignore potential long term side effects that could counter this.

The downsides of free data flow and the permanence of personal data are mostly affecting the mental health of people which could result in more deaths from drug abuse and other self destructive behaviors, or even civil wars long term.

This of course could contradict free data flow as a viable strategy for long term population growth.

A battle between short and long term politics, with long term politics being clearly at a disadvantage because they're less obvious and harder to predict/measure, and harder to sell in political campaigns.

If the US government protected your food, people would not be sold so much crap full of carcinogenic additives or cooked up in chemical vats.

As for cars - the government protects car _manufacturers_, if at all. And that's also in the form of "anti-protection" of public transport...

Finally - how would the US government protect your data if it's intent on getting its hands on a copy of as much of it as it can, then mining it and searching it for various purposes? (Snowden revelations)

PS - The firewall blocks me :-(

Because that would grant the government the power that enables it to become a worse perpetrator even than the big tech?

I think Snowden showed the government already is a much worse data privacy perpetrator.

That is a confusion if shared words being assumes in the same meaning. Data protection is fundamentally nothing like car or food safety. The other two can literally directly kill you. Data also acts "at a distance". If I smash a cooy of your car or poison a copy of your lunch it won't harm you in any way. Not so if sensitive information leaks.

Not to mention the abuse potential is fundamentally massively different. It isn't apples to oranges but apples to formica countertops

Financial products exist only in databases and they can't kill you, yet they're heavily regulated for good reason.

That’s because the data there counts the amount of money they owe their customers.

"Data protection" goes against the spirit of free software and it is similar to patents and copyright.

> The Government Protects Our Food and Cars.

I wish they would stop protecting cars and start protecting people. 40,000 die every single year due to cars, and over 4 million injured or disabled.

Many people die in car accidents and die from food poisoning. How many people die each year from unprotected data?

Disclaimer: cannot read the article

The great public works of the 21st century, the Hoover Dams of our time, will be privacy-preserving digital infrastructure.

Why not our information? Nationalise the New York Times!

I've seen one instance where the NYT seemed to recognized their complicity in the problem

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/18/opinion/data-privacy-trac...

I was pretty proud of them then

I know that HN’s libertarian views often conflict with the top down EU bureaucracy. But when I heard about GDPR here in europe I thought to myself - that looks very close to what all those people have been wishing for - and its actually here now.

It remains to be seen if it holds up in practice what it offers in spirit. But the idea that companies are forced to think about my personal data as if it was payment credentials, with similar rigor, and penalties, just sounds so awesome to me as a customer.

In the EU personal data _is_ protected as if its cars, food, trains or planes. And honestly its great :)

One would wonder.

I am pro this idea. I am not sure it can be done via technical means alone.

But, govt is super dysfunctional too.

We, as people, have work to do in the US.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) could not even protect the information of people with security clearances.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Personnel_Management...

Trey Gowdy's questioning of the people in charge of the OPM is a classic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK-zEGjxuAA

The GOP is anti-government and spares no chance to demonstrate that.

That doesn't forgive the failure, but instead of saying "let's fix it then", the answer is always: private enterprise!

Uhm, no. I'm anti-government; the GOP likes having the government erect monuments to their favored religion, spy on every US citizen, invade other governments to prop up the petrodollar, make it difficult for people to get abortions, etc.

The American left and right both support government invading different facets our private lives to varying degrees. Neither are anarchists, or anything close to it.

Other than Trey Gowdy being a member of the GOP, not sure what you're criticizing here. His line of questioning was not partisan, and got to the heart of the matter - their lack of competence and ability to follow regulations and/or written contracts.

The OPM had a serious data breach, and demonstrated a marked lack of ability to do their job. To date, they have not been held accountable, unless you count the stern questioning.

What remedy would you prescribe to fix OPM? How would you hold them accountable?

The NSA ostensibly provides "cybersecurity" support and services -- they should be partners in securing government infrastructure. Maybe they were with OMB (but clearly not enough).

Accountability is good and should happen. Thus far we've seen very little accountability for data breaches in the private sector, so they're not alone.

I don't know the answer as to how to make accountability really work in general -- because it becomes game theory of how to create that space without becoming paralyzed by fear to act.

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