How and why the government is stalking you
applieddatalabs.com
applieddatalabs.com
How many of you Googlers and Facebookers (and the legions of you working for Facebook/Google wannabes) have really thought hard about what you're doing? How many of you care? How many of you honestly want to do something to stop the pissing away of privacy to corporations and the government?
I would venture to guess that it's a vanishingly small percentage. Most just want to make money, and let others worry about the consequences. Or they delude themselves in to thinking they're "changing the world" with some monumental cow-tipping app.
First, few of us have taken the time to read accounts of how the political groups of history have used information against people. So we don't know to do addition when we have one and one.
Combine that with the fact that most of us aren't engaged in any sort of activity that incumbent power would like to disrupt. You get a false sense of security, because no one is presently leveraging any of the information they have against you. That could change the moment you had an exciting or disruptive political idea, but for now 'the system' is happy with you keeping your head down and working.
If anyone wants to read a sad tale of how groups of men can use information to hurt each other, check out Out of the Night by Jan Valtin
I question that assumption. Even people with a superficial knowledge of history are familiar with the existence of the Gestapo and the KGB; even if they're hazy on specific methods, they get the concept of a police state just fine. Just because they may not consider the US to be a police or surveillance state to the same degree that you would does not mean that the idea is alien to them.
Put simply, he played with fired and got burned.
I don't have a problem with cow-tipping apps, I just want people to avoid actively harming the world.
Government agencies sometimes have reputations for employing people not smart or competent to work in the private sector. Only a handful of agencies in the U.S, such as the NSA and the CDC, have reputations for hiring highly intelligent people. The chance to work with some of the best people in your field is attractive to many people.
Not all intelligence and defense contractors are created equal, and some people want to work for these companies or agencies because they think it is "cool". Most of these people find out that the job is not as "cool" as they thought it would be, and soon find employment elsewhere.
I'm one of the few people I know who did this. (I used to be a Navy officer and spent time at the NSA.) By far, the vast majority of friends I had in the Navy wanted to go into defense contracting/spy agencies after they got out. Once your in the military industrial complex, there is a huge cult atmosphere about staying. Few escape.
Most people realised what nefarious bastards they were within a couple of weeks but once you've got cash coming in, its hard to shake them off and find another job as no one wants a government tainted employee. I had to sleep in my car for 3 months as a result of quitting.
They are also not the best in the field: they are the easiest to manipulate.
Your case analysis is missing some cases.
However it's worse than just web sites. I've worked for a nefarious company who feeds of data like theirs. I came to my senses when asked to do things which destroyed my ethics and quit to make amends.
At risk of promoting a fanatic, stallman was right for many years. Once a fanatic, then a told you so, then a visionary. I genuinely was brainwashed to think the guy was nuts until I saw it all with my own eyes.
Some things you can do:
* sign out of Facebook forever. There is no point in deleting your profile. Real friends meet you in real life.
* close your google account. It just follows you like a leaky passport.
* get a dumbphone and turn it off all day unless you need it for emergencies.
* read books instead of use e-readers.
* host your own mail and web services at home. Use SSL (with own CA), SSH and encrypt your email if sensitive.
* ask yourself is your employer really doing ethical work. No? Find somewhere else. This is the hardest bit - it took me 10 years to find somewhere ethical.
* use cash, particularly when shopping in large chains or on public transport systems.
* use Firefox only, with adblock and ghostery.
There are probably more.
We make apps for children, and don't put ads, IAP, or content that might cause bad behavior, for example one of the apps I took out a character holding candy before lunch.
Too bad this gave no competitive advantage, but lots of disadvantages, thus I must be happy that the money people in the company let this strong ethical opinion.
How necessary is that? Does it depend on the eReader? I use a Sony 300 series (which I personally think is about the high point of the eReader evolution, with the exception of the 350 for more screen space in an almost identical sized casing) which is as thankfully dumb and disconnected as eReaders get. It plugs in like an external hard drive and I simply copy epub files onto it.
You couldn't pay me to have a kindle (well, you could, but you'd have to pay me a lot and I'd just sell it and get another Sony).
1. e-readers like the Kobo, Kindle, Nook etc (ones tied to a store) phone home and report reading progress and are DRM encumbered. The Kobo even gamifies reading which is just insane if you ask me.
2. The second issue applies to all e-readers and that is that they promote distribution of epub files. The source of epub files is usually illegitimate (as everyone pushes stuff through stores) and the hosts are about as dodgy as can be as well.
Books can also change hands easily.
If you're going to get an e-reader, your approach is the best.
Layer on top of this what we already know about the close relationship between mobile providers and the government, and it’s a safe bet that if the government wants to know where you and what you’re up to right now, they know.
IOW the headline is just linkbait; the government can stalk you more easily than ever before, but in the text of the article comes the admission that it's not necessarily bothering to do so. Before people throw up slippery-slope arguments and claim these things only go one way, please take a moment and ask yourself how much freedom you realistically enjoy now vs. in previous periods like the Red Scare of the 1950s when the US was in the grip of anti-Communist paranoia. I suggest that we enjoy a great deal more.
The stated goal [OEV] of this technology is to support, “classified blogging activities on foreign-language websites to enable Centcom to counter violent extremist and enemy propaganda outside the US." But Isaac R. Porche, a researcher at the RAND corporation, claims it would not be easy to exclude US audiences when dealing with internet communications.
You could make the exact same argument about Voice of America. A few countries like North Korea still make it illegal to possess radios capable to tuning into to broadcasts from frequencies other than the official propaganda channels. The US has leveraged broadcast and print media to promote its own interests for about as long as those technologies have been around, as do most other governments. I've watched quite a few North Korean propaganda videos on YouTube and somehow I've managed to avoid joining the Kim family personality cult. There's no reason to think that encountering some US government propaganda by accident is going to short-circuit the brains of Americans and turn them in mindless drones - we already have 24 hour sports and shopping and soap opera channels to take care of that.
I'm distinctly underwhelmed.
"The government knows a bunch of stuff about you that you choose to publicly disclose! Panic!"
I would also like to ask some of you who seem to take it as av given that any erosion of privacy, any knowledge about you by government is bad: outside of edge cases are we seeing big negative effects from the huge amount of data being collected about the population at large?
There are a lot of upsides to this infrastructure. I give Google a lot of info, but I get a lot in return.
As someone else mentioned, we have probably more personal freedom than any previous era in the us. Many US citizens lived during times when racial discrimination was codified in law!
There has always been an elite power structure in human society. The idea that the executive branch has to obey the law is pretty new.
In general, I think the ideas of human rights are so powerful, that any technology that has the power to vastly increase communication will be instrumental in their spread. It's because they are powerful, and have an obvious appeal to humans. The powers that be cannot undo the truthfulness of ideas, by any means. This is my pet theory anyway.
But I really am curious. There are a lot of super smart folks on here raising alarm bells about this. What are the scenarios where the average American brings calamity on themselves by posting a bunch of stuff online?
This might sound absurd but I think it's plausible. And it's exactly this kind of worst-case-scenario preparation and fear which gave us the great documents and principles our country was founded upon.
Operation Earnest voice is built to allow 50 real users to manage 10 fake accounts each. These 500 accounts appear to be from anywhere in the world they user would like, “replete with background , history, supporting details, and cyber presences that are technically, culturally and geographically consistent.” What it does, effectively, is create a network of online personas that, when working in a coordinated fashion, can control the tone and direction of just about any online conversation.
This brings to light an important consideration about the current state of social media and whether or not these massive social networks are really the answer - could be argued that it is better to be apart of smaller-scale, referral based, private networks where there is less likely to be 'infiltrations' of the variety stated here.
Unfortunately, I suspect, that HN is no exception to a program like OEV.
(1) mostly, somewhat, has our best interests in mind, not totally, but somewhat, and
(2) not only uses fake accounts and taps lines, but has presence and/or influence at pretty much any major company like Google, Facebook, etc.
I think the right thing to do is to:
* Periodically speak up and support privacy legislation, semi-anonymously. (They can find out who you are, but don't be blatant or overly noisy, even from different accounts or locations, because that is more of a threat. Don't use Tor, Redphone, etc.)
* Realize that we have limited to no privacy when anyone can post info about you and credit card, phone/GPS data, etc. can be used/stolen.
* Know that there are politics, power trips, psychosis, and evil.
* Know that most people feel the same way you do. They don't want people killing their families and friends, and want to respect your freedom. Whether they are in government, military, or not, they are 99% trying to help. If you have family in government and military, think about them. They have your best interests in mind, usually.
I think it is fine to have these posts, but don't get too worked up about them. There is no reason to be paranoid. Just do your best with the knowledge you have, and don't act like a straight lace or a wierdo and you'll fit right in and probably won't be a victim.
If you join the militia, sell your house and build a bomb shelter in the woods full of guns, or start using cash-only without a recent purchase of a Dave Ramsey book, that's a red flag. Also, don't buy fertilizer in bulk, or from a bunch of different locations. Basically, don't be a moron.