Hacker News Reader

Comment by cynicalsecurity | Hacker News Reader

This sounds like an advice for living in a crazy authoritarian country, not in the West.

It's astonishing how people are supposed to have freedom of speech and freedom from being spied on, since they live in the West and not in a Stasi controlled state, but they are given an advice not to talk too much, or the Big Brother is going to get them.

View on HN

You can say whatever you want as a citizen, the advice is for criminals to avoid identification.

That freedom may disappear in the future. And you won’t be able to delete your trails then.

Well Big Brother is going to get you if you're a criminal. This advice was for cybercriminals who don't want to get caught, not some random person disagreeing with the government on the internet.

I do think there is some danger in writing anything publicly. Our next government could decide to jail you based on something you said. Society could decide that some widely held opinion you once had is now forbidden. Anything you write could be used by nuts to dox you and expose you to harm.

You might as well say there is some danger to going outside because any random person could just stab you in the street. There is some danger to eating because anything you eat may have been poisoned. Yes, theoretically, everything but the laws of physics are arbitrary, anything is possible, and everything is dangerous. But this isn't an insightful or interesting observation to make.

In a vacuum you might be right, but come next month the serial stabbers and food-poisoners will be in charge of the executive branch of the US government. So it’s correct to be concerned about it, if you live there.

That was advice for a criminal who wants to avoid getting caught, not what you are talking about.

Just follow the advice of The Wire and don't take notes on your criminal conspiracy, much less post them to the internet.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com