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> The justification for having them doesn't really apply to self-driving cars anyway.

You seriously believe that? You think the government makes common sense decisions? So ok, no more plates. How long until we hear about them logging the serial numbers broadcast by our tire pressure sensors? Or what about the unique magnetic signature of our vehicles detectable by all the loops already embedded in the road? If the government has the technical ability to do something that will expand power and responsibility, it will do it. It has been demonstrated time and time again.

> ... as long as we're not prohibited from defending against that spying we haven't lost.

Yeah we'll see. Tampering with NIST, clipper chips, export controls. This is not sustainable, people will eventually tire. Also, the argument sounds very similar to what was said about TSA security theater: "No, we aren't impeding your freedom of movement - you can take the bus!" Guess what, the TSA is at the bus station now. "No, we aren't violating your fourth amendment rights - if you want to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures than you can use encryption!" Guess what happens next. It is a bullshit argument - I shouldn't have to run myself ragged.

> Your argument seems to be that you can't effectively prohibit something that technology makes practical.

No, my point is that you can't prevent something technically practical while the government operates in secret, enjoying a monopoly on information. That is why warrantless home searches aren't extremely common, because it would be impossible to do in secret - old papers have very little to do with it.

> You seriously believe that? You think the government makes common sense decisions?

Decisions like that are made in the open. You can tell if your self-driving car has a license plate on it and keep lobbying to remove it until they do.

> How long until we hear about them logging the serial numbers broadcast by our tire pressure sensors? Or what about the unique magnetic signature of our vehicles detectable by all the loops already embedded in the road?

So it's a cat and mouse game. So what? If they want to log RFID tags they have to spend a billion dollars putting readers everywhere, at which point people rip the tags out and the readers are useless. Find some other way (and some other billion dollars) to fingerprint individual cars and people will realize that it's profitable to sign up their self-driving car to transport Uber passengers and suddenly tracking the cars is meaningless. And so it goes.

> Tampering with NIST, clipper chips, export controls. This is not sustainable, people will eventually tire.

All of those things failed. Nobody gets tired of winning.

> Also, the argument sounds very similar to what was said about TSA security theater

The analogous thing to not having TSA security theater is not having mass surveillance. You're arguing the opposite -- mass surveillance for everyone. You can't make the slippery slope argument when you want to start at the bottom.

> No, my point is that you can't prevent something technically practical while the government operates in secret, enjoying a monopoly on information.

Which I'm not disagreeing with. Government secrets should be aggressively minimized. But once again, governments being transparent to their people in no way requires people to be transparent to their governments. And there is apparently some dispute about what is technically practical.

> That is why warrantless home searches aren't extremely common, because it would be impossible to do in secret - old papers have very little to do with it.

Which is all we need to do here. Make it so that spying on you requires them to physically enter the space you're in so that it's only practical to do it according to the rules with probable cause rather than in bulk in secret.

> Decisions like that are made in the open.

Yes, and rarely. I've spent 5 minutes trying to think of such an example and failed, maybe you have something in mind?

> If they want to log RFID tags they have to spend a billion dollars putting readers everywhere, at which point people rip the tags out and the readers are useless.

Lol, you throw out a cost like it would be some sort of problem for them to spend money that isn't theirs. You know how you keep people from ripping the tags out? You require manufactures to install them in every vehicle manufactured after September 1st 2007. If people actually start tampering with this legally mandated safety device, lean on the states to add it to the vehicle inspection requirements... for safety. But few will tamper with the tracking, er, safety device - because it adds convenience to their lives and they can't even be bothered to install PGP.

> All of those things failed. Nobody gets tired of winning.

Only the clipper chip failed. Also, I'm tired - as are many of my friends and coworkers. Up until two years ago about 80% of my time was spent as a security researcher, I burned out. I'd like a systemic fix, because I'm tired of the game.

> ... not having mass surveillance. You're arguing the opposite ...

I argue the opposite as a method of harm reduction, I thought I made it clear in my top post that an end to state spying would be ideal. Where you and I part ways, I think, is that I believe that it is impossible to prevent and verify. You seem to actually believe the whole "consent of the governed" thing.

> ... only practical to do it according to the rules with probable cause rather than in bulk in secret.

Until they start monitoring power consumption, in the interest of finding grow houses. [0] Or monitoring sewers in the interest of catching bomb makers. [1] Please don't suggest that we add this to the cat and mouse game, where I now need to invite strangers over for pee parties and hook my dryer up to a noise generator that randomly turns it on in order to stay ahead in the privacy game.

[0] http://www.computerworld.com/article/2469854/internet/bitcoi...

[1] http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/sewer-sensors-detec...

> "The justification for having them doesn't really apply to self-driving cars anyway."

Because self-driving cars will be in constant contact with some central digital infrastructure that will be tracking everything ("for quality control purposes") and the authorities can far more easily and effectively tap into that data than place license plate readers along the roadside. Tying the "session" together between purchasing information (that's already centralized and freely accessible), car route, and user history, is a piece of cake.

or be rich like jobs was and be above the law in those mundane matters like license plates.