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Comment by McDiesel | Hacker News Reader

At some point you will just have to realize that this illusion of privacy you have is just that... an illusion.

Privacy exists in small pockets, and only in places that you control access to. Aside from that, you might as well consider it public.

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Thanks to drones and satellites, privacy no longer exists in private yards, even those with high fences lined with trees.

Thanks to infrared photography, structure-penetrating radar, cell phones, etc., privacy no longer exists indoors either.

This is not right.

Interestingly, the U.S. Supreme Court surprised many people in 2001 by putting limits on government use of infrared imaging. (They didn't ban it entirely, but they said that it would be regulated as a search, normally requiring permission from a judge.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyllo_v._United_States

This means that police may not be able to routinely use imaging technologies, including active radars, to look through the walls of people's homes.

(Interestingly, this is a way in which police now have fewer powers than the general public, since in most places there are no laws preventing you as a civilian from using infrared imaging to look at someone's house.)

Presumably citizens are allowed because they don't have the power to charge & convict you of some alleged crime. If the citizen's imagery were somehow brought into a legal matter, then it would be up to the judge to determine its legality. Conversely and unfortunately, law enforcement and government seem to enjoy a defacto legality until someone says otherwise. By limiting their use of this technology, hopefully it mitigates the defacto and clandestine nature of it, bringing it at least to a level of awareness during legal proceedings.

>This is not right.

This is reality though. Our expectations of privacy must adjust to changes in technology.

What is allowed with technology does not dictate what is right or even legal.

It comes down to a simple concept. You change with progress or you get left behind.

Even when progress is, in your view, undesirable... our world isn't a private place anymore... our expectations of privacy will seem silly to future generations... its jus how things work. Right or wrong are abstract concepts, and the marching of time pays no attention to them.

Only the truly privileged feel comfortable without privacy. Only once there is no such thing as an outcast, an undesirable, a freak, or a nerd, can a world without privacy be livable.

That assumes your vision is accurate, and that we have no control over our futures. Do only large computer industry companies get to decide the future?

When has the law ever been able to prevent the use of technology?

If we just assumed that whatever could be done (with technology or otherwise) should be accepted, what would the point of laws be in the first place?

People have expectations that the FDA will ensure the safety and efficacy of their medicines. Consequently, there are medications that I can't have in the US because of the law.

People have expectations of a level of safety on the highways. The technology under the hood of my car allows me to reach speeds of at least 100, and the law effectively prevents me from using it.

There are many ways in which people have expectations that technology could subvert. Automatically changing our expectations to allow for any technologically possible breach of those expectations isn't currently the way we do things.

Is there a suitable material for a lightweight "roof" you could put over your property that would block aerial photography but still allow sunlight and rain to penetrate?

One could even make it shielded against electromagnetic frequencies. No more drones hacking your wifi!

Is there a suitable material for a lightweight "roof" you could put over your property

Yes, well-placed trees, plants, and some lattice material.

I once visited the roof of the Limn building on Townsend in San Francisco. It turns out there was a lush garden, nice eating areas, and an Airstream trailer, all on the roof. Absolutely none of it was visible from the ground, and you'd be lucky to make out much of anything from overhead.

Camouflage netting is perhaps the only surefire way to do this, although I'm sure that will attract far more attention than doing nothing at all. Something that would work kind of OK would be to create a large radiometric difference in your property like having a dark black roof and making your lawn as reflective as possible (white cement or gravel, swimming pool). That way when the imagery is processed in an automated fashion it will render your area badly. It still would be possible to go back to the original images and enhance the area manually but can be quite a chore.

Build your property (partially) underground? Like this http://www.trendir.com/house-design/grass-roofed-home-built-... or similar. You'd need to deal with waste heat somehow for the infrared signature not to look suspicious. And ground-penetrating RADAR would pick you up as well, I expect.

I think something like this would be cool: http://twistedsifter.com/2012/01/camouflage-cali-hiding-air-...

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