Why monopolies make spying easier | Hacker News Reader

Why monopolies make spying easier

newyorker.com

51 pointstpatke22 comments

New title: Why backbones make the web centralized and therefore make spying easier.

From a satellite's view, the internet does not look like "mesh", as it would if it were decentralized.

It looks more like several pieces of thick rope, unravelled into many strands at the each end. The "rope" portions are the "backbones".

With all traffic funneled through these backbones, the internet is quite centralized. This make surveilance quite easy.

If you "wiretap" the internet nearest the backbones (the thick rope), upstream from where the rope unravels, where the tier 1 ISP's connect, you can get a complete copy of everything they get, and thereby everything their customers[0] get.

0. The monopolies: Facebook, Google, etc.

What could be easier? Could any network engineer say "no" to a spy agency asking to install a wiretap?

There seems a preoccupation with "direct access" to "servers" (e.g. ones receiving your personal info). But (perhaps) there's no need for direct access to any web company's servers under PRISM. (Perhaps) this is not how PRISM works.

(Perhaps) PRISM targets upstream routers close to the backbone. If so, it copies everything coming through those routers. The web companies don't control those routers. Major ISP's do (like AT&T). The web companies, the "monopolies", are their customers.

A prism deviates the path of a light beam, such as the light travelling through a fiber optic cable that plugs into a router near a backbone. If you divert the bit stream flowing out of a backbone, you can get a copy of all the bits headed for all the monopoly web companies. A company called Narus makes devices that can sort out the traffic for you. It would be quite easy.

If you want details, including a photo of the door to a room where (perhaps) some "prism" tapping is being carried out right now, read the sworn testimony made by former AT&T employees. The lawsuit was covered by Wired years ago.

https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/att/presskit/ATT_onepager...

https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/att/SER_marcus_decl.pdf

https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/att/SER_klein_decl.pdf

http://cryptome.org/scott-marcus.pdf

Credit: Steve Gibson Jeff Jarvis (quoted in newyorker article) provided a link to Gibson's disclosure: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/17/chilling...

Don't get hung up on the word "monopoly" here. The relevant issue being discussed is centralization vs decentralization.

I sincerely apologize for the distraction from the central thesis of the article. I brought up the point about their use of the word monopoly being incorrect because bad economics is a pet peeve of mine.

The author suggests one of the remedies to the monopolies is "At the federal level, this means vigorous antitrust enforcement"

That's a great idea, really. Sadly it's unlikely that the feds will bust monopolies when those same monopolies are so damn convenient for them for spying.

We've got a problem here. The government, which is supposed to be trustworthy, isn't. And that means that some of the other checks and balances that the government is supposed to provide will be defeated internally. And we're stuck with the consequences. Rad.

Corporate executives often enter politics, write laws affecting their former (and/or future) employers (or hand them contracts), then retire from politics to take very well-paid jobs in the very industries they were regulating -- often at the very same companies they gave sweet deals to while in office.

There are other direct and indirect ways useful politicians, their friends and families can benefit from corporations that they help. Some of these ways have been made illegal, but corporations and their beneficiaries in politics are very good at finding loopholes in the laws they write.

Another way corporations wind up being exempt from regulation is through defunding of regulatory agencies, or by pro-corporate-welfare ideologues being placed in charge of these agencies -- after which they fire the career officials at these agencies and replace them with loyal lackeys who will unquestioningly pursue the agenda of deregulation, defunding the government, and looking the other way at corporate malfeasance. Then, after breaking the government, they can blame the government for not working.

But the underlying problem is that government and corporations are not really two separate, independent entities. They are quite tightly integrated and interwoven, with one hand washing the other, scratching each other's backs, and giving each other kickbacks and bribes.

It's a real wonder any major antitrust actions have ever happend, that there are any worker protection laws or unions left, that the Envirionmental Protection Agency has any teeth, and that the National Parks haven't yet been sold to logging, mining, oil, and natural gas companies.

Even though the intent of this article is good, I dislike that the article starts out with the false premise that monopolies exist on the internet. A majority or even dominant market share does not imply that a monopoly exists.

A monopoly is properly defined by the lack of an ability to introduce competing options. If it was illegal to build another search engine or competing social network, then a monopoly would exist. There are clearly competing options for all of these services and it is legal to introduce competitors, therefore, no monopoly exists.

By your standard, Microsoft was never a monopolist.

You would need to define a monopoly differently than I to view Microsoft as a monopoly.

According to the US antitrust laws, Microsoft was found to be a monopoly that abused its power contrary to the Sherman Antitrust Act. In that lawsuit Microsoft's position as a monopoly was barely questioned, the lawsuit being about whether or not Microsoft abused its monopoly.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor...

The definition of a monopoly is of course, an entity that lacks economic competition. Having 90% of a market qualifies.

* Your statement about a monopoly being defined as an entity that lacks economic competition and then clarifying that owning 90% of a market qualifies is an obvious contradiction.

* Legally speaking, you are correct that the government defined Microsoft as a monopoly. The government can use laws and edicts to define "monopoly" in any arbitrary way that it wants to. If the government declared that 80% ownership or even 51% ownership of a market was a monopoly, legally they would consider themselves to be correct. But this fact does not necessarily imply that their definition is objectively correct and based on a proper understanding of economics.

Considering this is an absolutely huge global market, which includes countries that have an aversion towards anything made in U.S. - and considering that more than 90% global market share really means 100% in local markets, Microsoft's Windows monopoly has been one of the biggest and most powerful in human history, being actually a textbook example in economics courses. Many other historical monopolies were only local.

It's also a well known fact that Bill Gates invested in Apple in 1997 and ported MS Office to Mac OS to keep their main competitor (that was also largely irrelevant in 1997) from dying. Bill Gates is one hell of a strategist and this happened before the anti-trust case being brought against them. Bill Gates foresaw that with Apple dead, they'd be in one hell of a rough spot.

Don't weasel your way out of a broken definition by hiding yourself behind phrases such as "legally speaking". In the making of those laws the legislators do have good input from economics researchers. Sometimes laws are inaccurate, but they sure as hell beat an individual's personal feelings.

You're talking about government-granted monopolies. Those aren't the only monopolies around - there are also:

1) natural monopolies: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_monopoly

2) monopolies (or oligopolies) that happen due to anti-competitive strategies, such as controlling supply and demand through price fixing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_fixing

You're thinking of an artificial monopoly.

These days, America has one dominant search engine, one dominant social-networking site..

Correction:

These days, the world has one dominant search engine, one dominant social-networking site...

China and Russia would both disagree.

That's two governments out of 100+. And I'm not weighing in number of users per country because, in most cases, each country has it's independent government.

I could imagine this article being talked about in the preschool, to teach little fellas, but on HN?

Of course it is easier to subvert 1 company than to subvert... well n>1.

If only humans were utterly rational computer-like beings that you just had to tell a truth once, and they'd never forget it, and always perfectly apply it when it was relevant..

What, you mean the web isn't Facebook and Google?

We've seriously let the centralization of the net get out of control, and nobody seems to really care.

Why is this surprising...the nature of a capitalist system is to have one winner.

A capitalist system is supposed to make the buyer and seller into winners, while all other potential buyers (and potential sellers) get nothing.

The real winners get paid to facilitate transactions.

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