Well if you think a tech giant that’s partnered in a surveillance program with the NSA isn’t going to share anything they feel like with the government, then go ahead as use that as the basis of coming up with your own opinions.
But you’re right though, the possibility of the list being leaked and ruining countless innocent lives is the much more likely of the two scenarios I described.
And I agree with it. I was addressing a different view altogether. There seems to be a very widespread paranoia that the worst possible event is the one that is occurring and that all entities but the user are collaborating willingly to make it happen. What is surprising is that most of the people here are US citizens who at least have some of their rights intact, enough for the companies to fight back as they have publicly acknowledged that they do to as much extent as possible. I am more worried about the legal requests from US government for data about non US citizens. Does there even exist a legal system to prevent mass unmonitored snooping on them?
Yes it would be okay because I could choose a company that didn't sell the information to the NSA, but that's not possible because government surveillance is forced on everyone. The government is preventing market solutions to privacy.
An article that waxes poetic, yet is so very hollow and devoid of realism.
What would you have these companies do? Band together in a mighty ring of technological resources and begin a Privacy Revolution?
This is unrealistic. As an American, I am saddened and angered by the recent news of the past two days. I am disgusted with what our government has done - what it has hidden from us, to take advantage of us unawares.
But we need to consolidate our anger. We have to aim it precisely, and arm ourselves against the proper enemy. It will not help the tech community to bicker amongst ourselves and be disappointed with CEOs for what the NSA has done. This community has great resources. Let those resources stand. Experts from every tech center in the country, across industries spanning finance, security, engineering, and many more - we are all pooled here. We can make an impact.
But not if we are busy attacking those whose positions we cannot possibly corroborate. Their hands were tied. In an ideal world, every man and woman would be consumed with a righteous fury and ignore whips, imprisonment and even death for the greater glory of what is right.
This is not that world. This is not idealism. The government wronged us. The government made the first move. The government forced their hands, made them cooperate by ratifying unethical conduct and making it illegal (and treasonous, as a violation of national security) to resist. Who would have acted differently in their position? And what would it have achieved?
I recognize that it is discomforting that we cannot simply believe tech leaders after what today's events have shown us. I get that. But they are not the ones who violated our privacy. They were the medium. That is not fair to them. If they made a mistake, it was only in trying to navigate perilous waters somewhere between honor and law. Unfortunately, the law is not on their side.
With Mark Zuckerberg jailed or Facebook sued by an insurmountable public agency, or Google's assets seized and its constituent leaders punished, who would be benefitted? Should we ask them to suffer and violate laws just for a truth that has come out only hours later?
If you want a takeaway from this, it's simple. It's unfair to hold people to expectations of high moral standing when they have unknown pressures put upon them. And in light of that, we need to remember who the true wrongdoers here are. If Larry and Zuckerberg have made mistakes, so be it. But know that they paled in comparison to the NSA, and that is our prime prerogative.
That is wrong way to approach the issue. These companies should not be gathering personal information worse than NSA. Personal information is personal, and free people in a free society should not be followed by multinational corporations.
I agree with your point entirely but I wonder if more people outside of tech would care if only they understood what these companies were doing with their personal data.
Their business - like that of most tech companies - is built on data (so is every business to some degree) they can't forgo data, that is stupid. If the NSA is your main concern then it's government policy you want to be changed, not the engineering decisions of private companies. Also worth mentioning that unless you're speaking of telecom companies there is no profit motive to cooperating with government but mainly legal obligations.
If those tech companies decided to release all of their information nothing would stop them (not even the U.S. government).
If the U.S. decided to take down every one of those companies or indite their CEOs/Boards the would have an uproar from the populous that would likely be comparable to the 60's (or worse).
Essentially, the populous would be more loyal to a company who's honest than a government which is dishonest.
Wait... But... I mean... Of all the companies I can imagine having a legitimate interest in private information, the government seems to be at the top of that list. Please help me understand your perspective.
I think a comparison to tech companies is quite apt - there are people at Facebook, Palantir, Oracle, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, etc. who are quite genuine about doing some open-aource stuff to improve the world, but for each of those companies you will find plenty of people who quite earnestly believe the company's wider mission will hurt the world. Do you accept network stack acceleration patches from Facebook if they'll accelerate mining personal data? Do you applaud improved V8 performance if it drives people from local apps onto monitored and monetized webapps? etc.
I think it makes sense to be cautious about all of these. I don't think the NSA is an abnormal risk to society, compared to the other major OSS contributors out there.
Surveillance is arguably part of these companies' business models. However we are talking about their own stuff, their own products, their own servers and I expect them to be upfront about it (e.g. hey, we are using your data for ads targeting) and to fix vulnerabilities that may allow third-parties to access my data ilegaly or to harm me.
With NSA we are talking about something different. If the NSA can engage in subverting encryption standards, there's no end to what they can do. If they ask Google to plant a backdoor in the Chrome binary, or Microsoft to plant a backdoor in Windows, or Apple to plant a backdoor in iOS/OS X, thus removing Google/Microsoft/Apple in the connection between me and them - I'll never find out about it and my software will be defective "by design" and as I've said, my personal fear is not the NSA, but rather organizations that are closer to home. For example, if backdoors in the software that I use exist, then they can be discovered by organized crime syndicates that say, are in the business of stealing credit cards, or whatever.
Can Google/Microsoft/Apple/Yahoo promise to do the right thing with such possible exploits? Can they promise to fix them, as they are discovered? Of course not. Hence, I cannot trust them anymore, because it is not in them that I have to trust.
> The problem is that these demands are possible to fulfil in the first place.
Well, shit happens all the time, mail accounts get hacked and so on. To me the real problem is that the software that I use may be defective by design and I cannot trust these providers to fix it or to tell me about it. Voting with my wallet also doesn't work anymore, as long as the alternative is still a US-based company and in this regard I now feel that all US-based companies are equal. Yahoo even tried fighting warrantless spying and failed and we found out about it only because of Snowden's leaks. So even if they want to do the right thing, they can't.
Also there's a big difference between 1) a company collecting and selling your data to other companies 2) a company giving authorities access to your data for complying with anti-terror laws.
I'm not implying i agree with how far governments go to intrude into peoples privacy. Just pointing out that i agree with OP that there's a big difference between for example Googles and Apples stance towards privacy.
I used Google as an example but it could very well be any corporation - local or international - and unless you believe every company in the world is a part of PRISM or is handing data to the government, my example holds but without the specifics.
Thank you for bringing up this point though, I was hoping someone would (and you can choose to not believe me if you like). Making the connection of major companies to government surveillance outside of the security-minded (ie. people who keep up or are educated on the Snowden leaks) wouldn't make this connection. Which I treat as supporting evidence for my speculation on why the "common layman" doesn't care.
An example of how this could play out is how easily Google and other big tech cooperate with government requests nowadays (compared to, say, a decade or so ago, when Apple was openly fighting the FBI in court to not be forced to make a tool to unlock locked iPhones).
It allows the government to censor things without having to explicitly deal with legal challenges, and in exchange the company gets good will and favors holding back regulation. That easily leads into things like election manipulation.
There's also the massive target it paints on their back in terms of data breaches.
There are also other things to consider. IIRC with one of the NSA related leaks, there was the story of employees abusing the data collection for personal purposes. Private companies have even less oversight towards the public on how the data is being used.
1) Big tech colluded with government, and got nice advantages for their participation with the surveillance system -- they're getting raked over the coals at dog and pony show anti trust hearings.
2) completely immoral act of gathering very private information without consent -- you literally gave these websites this information, and there's legal privacy policies that no one reads describing how it's used. If you don't want them to have your info, simply don't give it to them.
3) Authoritarianism can creep up on you -- ok and? The fact that Google's ad auctions are more efficient isn't going to cause authoritarianism.
4) Could it be that you can not understand the harms because you actively took part in creating this reality? -- lmao no
If there's one thing we've learned from all this it's that the tech companies should be viewed as collaborators and can not be relied upon to assert our privacy rights.
>In a joint statement, Shawn Turner, spokesman for the director of National Intelligence, and Judith Emmel, spokeswoman for the NSA, said:
>The articles describe court-ordered surveillance – and a US company's efforts to comply with these legally mandated requirements. The US operates its programs under a strict oversight regime, with careful monitoring by the courts, Congress and the Director of National Intelligence. Not all countries have equivalent oversight requirements to protect civil liberties and privacy.
>They added: "In practice, US companies put energy, focus and commitment into consistently protecting the privacy of their customers around the world, while meeting their obligations under the laws of the US and other countries in which they operate."
Does anyone else get the impression that this is an attempt by the government to limit commercial damage to these companies that may result from the revelations and subsequent exodus of customers? I imagine that, while they're certainly lobbying for increased transparency, tech companies are putting a great deal of pressure on the government to take the blame for the programs and emphasize that the companies had no choice.
So we should help a company that is known for gathering as much information on us getting into a different business line all the while giving them the benefit of the doubt that they will not spy on us with those devices ?
Those might be good devices but the downside is simply too dangerous to be ignored so .... Hell no.
But you’re right though, the possibility of the list being leaked and ruining countless innocent lives is the much more likely of the two scenarios I described.
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