CFP 2000 Wrapup

Roger Clarke, a computer scientist at Australian National University, was lucky enough to attend the Computers, Freedom and Privacy Conference this year, and has placed his notes online. CFP covered nearly every topic we address in the YRO section of Slashdot, so this is recommended reading for anyone interested in freedom of speech, privacy, encryption, domain names, or a host of other issues. It sounds like Neal Stephenson's address alone was worth the cost of attendance...

Comments

Re:What the hell?!

[Merk00]

I believe that he's trying to say that there is not an overreaching conspiracy to put the public under complete survelliance. Instead, it is more along the lines of a smaller groups that aren't seeking to control everything, just a small part of our lives. The cumulative effect is that our entire lives are under control, albeit different groups. He's trying to point out that they are more likely to occur even though they are less sexy to look for.

Matt Leese

Stephenson, Sterling and other ramblings

[B. Samedi]

Is it me or is Neal Stephenson taking the Bruce Sterling approach? They both write good stories and both throw out some rather interesting ideas.

The idea of small groups using video survelliance to fight their oppresors is a interesting idea as well as the idea of small groups banding together to help each other (see Diamond Age for a full fleshing out). Of course were these small groups are going to get the equipment neccassary is another question.

This is a better way to look at the world then the all pervasive mode of Big Brother. Because when you think about it trouble does come from all sides not just one titanic foe. And to fight it you need to be flexible and have lots of options open to you. The heroic last stand against overwhelming odds might be thrilling and interesting to hear and read about but it sucks as a option. So look and see who your allies are and make use of them. Remember that the enemy of your enemy is also not always your friend.

The idea that people do act better when they are being watched is nothing new really. Why do you think criminals were masks? It's not just so they won't be caught. It's so that people won't see them committing a crime and then shun them and people close to them. How about the old saying that the way to tell how good and honest a person is is to watch and see how they act when they think no one is watching.

Stephenson is throwing off some good mind workers and I can't wait to see where he is heading next.

Re:What the hell?!

[Joe E Sunshine]

I think that what he, more or less, is trying to say is that we need to look out for the evolving of too many watchdogs to keep track of, instead of the all-powerful all-seeing enemy that will some time soon, due to the possibilities of limiting privacy these days (echelon-type systems, surveillance cameras etc. ad infinitum), emerge out of nowhere (or, for that matter, an already existing one (e.g. NSA)).

In that I think he is indeed right. The biggest threat to privacy may today not be everybody's favorite No Such Agency, the Illuminati or whatever, but the enormous amount of small organizations all looking out for their little corner of the world, may it be just a supermarket, that together ensure that noone is ever unseen by everybody. Then there is no need for a big org. watching everything, since everything is already watched. You by then do only have to know who to talk to and pull some strings to find out whatever you want to know about whoever you want to know something about.

Although the projects of the NSA and all the other spook orgs give me the creeps as well, this is a more acute fear, that, moreover, is by all means justified.

.. or maybe it was just too long ago I saw an x-files episode.

Like YRO?

[Signal 11]

They addressed the same topics as slashdot did?

Flash forward to the future YRO Slashdot Summit...

Malda gets up on stage for the keynote and thanks his readers for attending the conference and promises that the schedule will be released to everyone real soon. "Don't ask me about it again though or I'll delay it another day!" he said. Then the stage is turned over to a random journalist who comments about how little privacy they have. Suddenly, 20 hooded trolls jump forward and shoot him with their petrification raygun. Natalie portman is caught in the crossfire and coincidentally was streaking across stage when this happened. The random journalist continues talking about the paradigm shift linux is going through and how it'll revolutionize the industry. Several people nod their head in agreement, except for a short guy in red with a tail who mutters something about heretical literature.

While Malda and Hemos are busy shooting their SuperMod guns at the trolls, the rest of slashdot is busy arguing whether ninja taco burritos are heated more efficiently with dual celerons or an overclocked Athlon processor. Eric Raymond and Richard Stallman sit quietly in a corner glaring at each other. The reporter finally finishes and is then promptly zapped into the -1 regions of the conference as a trapdoor opens, dropping him into the FUD Chasm.

Jon Katz gets up to say how this is all because the troll outcasts were neglected during their high school career and are seeking retribution. Halfway through his speech, in a desperate attempt to save humanity his major intestine leaps up to strangle him to death. The trolls start cheering and Malda begins throwing perl scripts at them. At this point, the room lights go out and we hear thousands of tacos raining down on the audience.

And so here I was sucking down my 32nd can of mountain dew having been awake for about 60 hours staring at my laptop's screen which now had nothing but 30 pointers pointing to structures of pointers which in turn were calls to pure virtual functions.. and that's when the conference really got wierd. So I hit submit and posted my notes to slashdot.

Stephenson continues to impress.

[booch]

Just the summary of Stephenson's speech touches on so many things. I find it very interesting that he contrasts his ideas about threats to privacy with the Big Brother model. I think there's a good chance he will end up writing a work that will be seen as the "1984" of the 21st century. And I think he's already hit the nail on the head.

I think that corporatism will have a large part to play in this domination system. That seems to be where the biggest threat is coming from already. I've already seen a book or two on how opression has moved from the racial minorities to the working class in general, and how employers use various methods to keep workers from becoming too powerful.

Regarding corporatism, I find it rather sad -- I see so many workers with good ideas that work in corporate cultures where their ideas have no way to be expressed. If the Open Source community can somehow get their merit-based methods to be applied to the business world, I'll have a much more optimistic outlook on the future of this country (and ones like it).

Re:Stephenson continues to impress.

[GooseKirk]

Oppression hasn't moved from minorities to workers. They're not related that way. One, minorities are still slowly moving out from under mainstream oppression (here in America, anyway). It's an organic process. It's slow. But it's happening because people want it bad enough.

Two, employers have always kept workers from becoming too powerful. That's kind of the nature of the whole employer/employee paradigm. But again, if people want it bad enough, it doesn't have to be that way. Especially now. We live in a fine time to be an oppressed employee, at least relative to, say, 1880, 1920 or 1955.

The domination system can work in our favor. It's a better, more hopeful model for us than the old. We have opportunities, mostly thanks to the internet, that are practically limitless. Ain't no power like the power of the people, baby... yeah, it's trite. But like the Cluetrain, it doesn't necessarily make it not so.

And I don't necessarily even mean that "we" have the power collectively. Sometimes it works out that way, more often it doesn't. What's more important to me is that this paradigm gives us some remarkable opportunities as individuals. Have your wits about you and you can play one circle of domination against the other... you can be a conspiracy of one. Oh, man, I better stop now before I start rambling off along some rather obtuse tangents... but just use your imagination, and remember that human nature - whatever that means - stays pretty constant, and so far, domination systems require human oversight to function.

What I think Neal was proposing...

[farrellj]

He was trying to promote the idea of a global Neighbourhood Watch program using encrypted video streams. Basically, you can either have a friend watch over your house while they are on computer, and you return the favour...ideally, you are on opposite sides of the planet, or one is a night person, the other a morning person.

Another proposaal was that you take a videostream that is monitoring your home, and split it into multiple streams, so that all parties have to agree that it is nessisaarry to look at it. One goes to your local police, another to your ACLU ( or your countrie's equiv) and a third to your most trusted friend/relative. If there is a break in, for example, and all three parties agree, then you can have all the streams combined, and a video of the breakin to your house will help the police investigate things.

Just commenting on the conference...I probably lost more sleep than I do at a Science Fiction Convention! There were more interesting things that started at 8:30 and others that didn't finish until after midnight...wow! Kudos to the organizer's! I just wish there was more programming that was Canadan specific...

ttyl
Farrell

Domination Systems are Big Brother

[ltcordelia]

One of the observations that didn't seem to be drawn (or wasn't in the notes at least) is the idea that "Big Brother" (to most of us, this seems to be the US gov't) is just a collection of Domination Systems.
Sure, the NSA and the CIA and the FBI are out there monitoring things, along with a lot of other TLA's. Most of the time, though, they won't talk to each other (a lot of this is for legal reasons; the NSA isn't supposed to be monitoring US citizens (Title 10), but the FBI is pretty dedicated to that). The backstabbing and infighting within US federal agencies is pretty extreme - there isn't enough money for everyone to get what they want, so they fight over shrinking budget dollars.

I think we can see good examples of "surfing the fringe" in the battle between M$ and DOJ; or Napster using the DMCA (an MPAA tool) to defend itself against the RIAA.

And personally, I really like the Virtual Neighborhood Watch idea - I put a videocam in my house, and stream its data to 5 friends, who are each streaming their data at me. Every week, unless something happened, we all delete the data.

Information wants to be free

Freedom without responsibility?

[chazR]

--BEGIN RANT MODE
Sometimes I get angry. I have read the 'notes'. And I can find *no* reference to responsibility anywhere. This is worrying. I am concerned that a growing number of people have no idea what freedom means.

A lot of people rant on about 'freedom' and 'privacy'. Why do none of these people talk about responsibility?

Freedom is an abstract concept that only a minority of the human population currently enjoy. When you talk about freedom, what do you mean? Let's start with Roosevelt's four:

Freedom of speech and expression

Freedom to worship in your own way

Freedom from want

Freedom from fear

A *lot* of people don't have these. And many of them would be grateful for any one of them. Try living in Burma, Somalia, Serbia or China if you find it hard to believe.

I get tired of hearing skript kiddies on this forum saying things like 'Information wants to be free' as they deprive an artist of money by using closed-source Napster to rip of another mp3. What about the artist's right to 'freedom from want'?

I get tired of seeing the 'troll' posts about a certain young lady. Does the troll's 'freedom of expression' outweigh her freedom from fear?

I am increasingly irritated by the same hormonally-challenged kiddies burbling on about 'information wants to be free' insisting that they have a right to strong encryption for *their* information.

Here is my point: Freedom brings responsibility. If you can't handle the responsibility, don't abuse the freedom

-- END RANT MODE

Do to others as you would be done by. Trite, but true.

Re:Freedom without responsibility?

[Signal 11]

There are some legitimate reasons why we cannot add responsibility. Take, for example, an online forum dedicated to helping people recover from rape/molestation. It's an unmoderated forum (for legal reasons) and an anonymous one (for psychological reasons). It's anonymous for a damn good reason, actually - it's to *prevent* people from disclosing their identities.

Now, obviously a forum like this could be easily abused. Somebody could post snide insulting things. Somebody might masqarade as someone/something they are not. This is true for any anonymous forum.

However, nothing short of providing methods to uncover the identity of all involved parties will provide /any/ responsibility. Yet, the freedom is there. As is the potential for abuse.

You see, freedom and responsibility aren't attached at the hip. One can exist without the other. Ask any teenager. Or anyone who uses crypto. There's alot of examples where it works in reverse - you get the responsibility without the freedom. I have to pay taxes every year.. for stuff I'll never use. Maybe even stuff I find morally reprehensible. Conversely, I'm a mouse-click away from posting this anonymously. Will my clicking that box affect your judgement of me?

One might argue we don't have much freedom in the Real World, hence the strong demand for it here in the online one. In the Real World, speaking your mind can get you slapped with a lawsuit. Acting on your morals can get you thrown in jail.. and sometimes even doing something as simple as making a copy of your Matrix soundtrack so you can put the original in a box at home (incase your car gets stolen!) can be illegal..

I'll leave you with a quote... "A free society is one in which it is safe to be unpopular". Given the global political climate.. anonymity may be the only way to ensure you can be safe.. and unpopular.

Re:Freedom without responsibility?

[KahunaBurger]

However, nothing short of providing methods to uncover the identity of all involved parties will provide /any/ responsibility. Yet, the freedom is there. As is the potential for abuse.

I disagree. Responsibility can be provided within the forum even if you cannot link it to outsiders. I consider everyone on /. to be annonymous with the exception of kisrael, who's handle I recognize as an ex-housemate. I don't know who anyone else is in "real life", I cannot impose any sactions on them outside this forum.

But, except for the anonnymous cowards, slashdotters do take responsibility within the forum. I put my handle on everything I write. If you want to come at me for saying X on one thread, when I said Y on another, I have to reconcile those or lose respect. If you challenge something I say, you will know that it's me responding. If I make a total ass of myself and you want to informally killfile me by skipping everything else I write, that is responsibility for my actions. That responsibility would exist even if I was completely untraceable back to my real life identity.

Also, responsibility (like freedom) doesn't have to be something imposed from the outside. You take responsibility for your actions, you don't just wait for someone to force it on you. I think that this may be what the original poster was most concerned about - that everyone is talking about free this or untraceable that, but no one was talking about how a person could or should use technology responsibly. Without that discussion, ethics degenerate into "just don't get caught".

Freedom and responsibility are not opposites. They have to be discussed together for either to be meaningful.

-Kahuna Burger

Re:Freedom without responsibility?

[ruin]

Okay, one last time.

'Information wants to be free' refers to the following set of facts:

-- information can be easily duplicated at basically no cost to the holder.

-- humans enjoy sharing information.

Because of the above, information duplication is widespread and quick. In fact, observing the immense speed and scope of information transfer, one might anthropomorphize it, saying that it has the quality of "wanting to be free."

Keeping information secret is difficult. Sometimes, the cost of keeping a bit of information is secret is less than the value of having the secret information.

Sometimes the cost of keeping information secret (ensuring that nobody who possesses a copyrighted mp3 shares that information with anyone?) is greater than the benefits.

(just my two cents)

--

Re:Freedom without responsibility?

[PatientZero]

Upon reading

Freedom and responsibility are not opposites. They have to be discussed together for either to be meaningful.

the following thought ripped through my mind: Freedom is what naturally arrises when everyone acts responsibly.

If so, then freedom is merely an effect (albeit a highly desirable one) of responsibility. We are taught this by our parents as children, although it tends to be used as a reward for doing what you're told or a punishment for doing something "wrong."

By trying to create freedom without first creating widespread responsibility, that freedom will be inherently unstable.

Slashdot is the perfect example. Everyone has the freedom to say what they want, anonymously if they desire. That usually works out well for those that take responsibility naturally. However, one need not read far to encounter numerous trolls and first posts.

Is Slashdot stable? Given that only a small increase in the number of irresponsible posters could make it almost unreadable speaks enough to that point. That a large amount of moderator time is put into weeding out the crap does, too.

The question then becomes, how can we teach others to act responsibly? Obviously, the first step is to do so ourselves as doing something is a method of teaching others to do the same.

Another question is, do people really not know how to act responsibly, or do they simply choose not to? I've met many of the latter.

-- PatientZero

Re:Freedom without responsibility?

[guran]

There are some legitimate reasons why we cannot add responsibility. Take, for example, an online forum dedicated to helping people recover from rape/molestation. It's an unmoderated forum (for legal reasons) and an anonymous one (for psychological reasons). It's anonymous for a damn good reason, actually - it's to *prevent* people from disclosing their identities.

Yes take that forum. Remove responsibility. Then *someone* is bound not to respect anonymity and disclose someone elses identity. (I'm sure my friends recognize my real identity even when I use an alias, especially if I talk about personal things)
*Someone* is bound to post false charges on the forum, effectively destroying someones life...

I'm sure the original poster did not mean responsibility forced upon you by technical measures and law, but *moral* responsibilities.

However, nothing short of providing methods to uncover the identity of all involved parties will provide /any/ responsibility. Yet, the freedom is there. As is the potential for abuse.

An alias provides some responsibility. An alert moderator/administrator as well.

One [freedom/responsibility] can exist without the other. Ask any teenager.

"I won't get caught" is *not* the same as "I am not responsible"

I have to pay taxes every year.. for stuff I'll never use.

You pay taxes every year... for the *freedom* for anyone to use that stuff (Lets take the discussion about govenmet efficiency some other day OK?)

I'm a mouse-click away from posting this anonymously. Will my clicking that box affect your judgement of me?

"Signal 11" carries a bit more weight then "Anonymous Coward" dont you say?
If you had clicked that box it would have influenced my judgement of the post. Not primarily because it would no longer be from Signal 11 but because I generally rank AC posts lower than signed posts, as long as there is not an obvious reason for the anonymity.
If you had clicked that box it would *not* have influenced my judgement of you, since I wouldn't know it was you.
Since you did *not* click it, my judgement of you is influenced (either way). Merely marginally, since you have a track record, but somehow influenced.

In the Real World, speaking your mind can get you slapped with a lawsuit.

In the online world, I'm virtually powerless against slander. Today someone cracks CSS and distribute it so the action can never be undone. Tomorrow someone cracks NN's encrypted mail, where she talks about how she was molestated and distributes *that* the same way.

"A free society is one in which it is safe to be unpopular"

Let me rephrase: "A free society is one in which the unpopular does not need to hide"

There are very real problems concerning the freedom we currently enjoy on the net. Some people even think that those problems outweigh the advandages of the freedom.
I do not agree, neither do you (I guess), but refusing to admit there are problems instead of adressing them will only make *their* case stronger. Therefore this rant.

Neal Stephenson got it backward

[Zigurd]

If Roger Clarke quoted Neal Stephenson accurately, Stephenson got Conan Doyle's story exactly backward: Holmes did not like the countryside because the influence of society was less there than in the city.

The influence of law enforcement was never part of Doyle's point. Quite the opposite. His point was that social norms operate better in the city crowd than in the isolated countryside, implying police have little influence in crime prevention. (In most of Doyle's work, depictions of police range from well-meaning boobs to completely hopeless boobs.) This is a relevant point: current police obsession with crime prevention drives intrusions into privacy. Police should stick to being good at quickly and reliably catching the bad guys.

To go a bit OT here: Getting, and keeping, the high-productivity criminals off the street is very effective. If the system did this reliably, the remaining crimes would be much fewer in number, and traditional, non-intrusive police methods would be more than sufficient, not to mention the overall reduce tolerance for crime.

Litman on 'Piracy'

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder if Litman's talk on 'piracy' was adequately reported.

Recently at another conference, she spoke in favor of changing the rhetoric in these debates. I suspect her talk this time was an attempt to do that. In other words, we have to invent better ways of describing our good activities, instead of reusing the words of the enemy. And 'piracy' is exactly the word that Jack Valenti of the MPAA uses to describe us. (It's like the 'hacker' vs. 'cracker' rhetoric, only more extensive.)

Peggy Radin of Stanford used this expression, "You can't use the master's tools to take apart the master's house." (from feminist theory). Read more on that conference at NYU March 31 to April 1 at http://www.law.nyu.edu/ili/conferences (and check back later for the webcast archives and transcripts). Roger Clarke might wish to update his notes too.

Catching the OT thread...

[guran]

Getting, and keeping, the high-productivity criminals off the street is very effective

True. Most efforts to do so have also been very, very unconstitutional. (pretty much any constitution, not US-specific)

My uncle is a small town cop. He and his collegues generally knows /exactly/ who is behind most car thefts and break-ins. Nevertheless they must prove the 100'th offence as careful as the first. That is called equality in front of the law and is IMHO a good thing.

Yes, it sucks not to be able to catch the guy you *know* did it.
It sucks even more to get sent to jail because someone "knew" you did something you didn't.

So while I agree with you in general (focus on a few "high-productivity criminals" being effective), achieving that focus with legal means is not that easy. Especially if the "targets" are aware of their rights.