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How to Become a Supervillain
plasmastate writes "Learn German. Proceed to SuPerVillainizer. Launch the SuPer Villainizer Conspiracy Client V 0.9 Beta. Join selected conspiracy. Proceed to Terrorism Information Awareness. Savor sweet, sweet irony." Send us a postcard from Guantanamo Bay.
I think this is funny...but is it really a good idea.
Cause seriously, it will take time away from tracking the real bad guy's...which could lead to disaster. I would hate to know that I was involved in making a terrorist not be stopped, possibly causing people to be killed.
There possibly are advantages for real bad guys. Once they were in this system, they would probably be ignored after they figured out that it was just the supervillainizer...letting the bad guy eventually do real bad things...doubt it.
Either you are trolling, or you don't realize the irony of this topic.
If you don't want someone snooping your mail or online activities, then use encryption.
That's exactly what "terrorists" will do (or already do) anyway. If they want to communicate in private, using "advanced technologies", such as email, they will find a way to do it.
What Villanizer fights against is a much more broader topic than security, or the lack of it. It's to show how useless these techniques are, specially since they're being used for political reasons (and 75% of the people agree with me on that).
It's placebo, nothing more than that.
Buy a Nintendo DS Lite
Hmm, if all e-mail is monitored then maybe terrorists and villains will go back to snail mail, contacts in dark corners, exchanging of notes through papers, and so on...
The current problem in U.S. and European legislations about these things is that these people do not seem to understand that setting up a conspiration does not need any high-tech or computer related technology. This means that once these measures are in effect, conspirators (?) can use all of the above techniques, which means that old tried-and-true police work will be necessary.
That is one of the reasons that the 11 September attack had success : American legislature thinks that for their safety, they should channel money from police forces to the army.
This is grotesquely irresponsible, but the thing about it that really turns my stomach is the fact that somebody spent time and effort on this. Time and effort that could have been spent on something productive, or helpful, or even entertaining. This is just monstrous.
On the contrary, it is grotesquely irresponsible to go around invading the privacy of millions of innocents in the hope that you might also be invading the privacy of a terrorist.
Being free is not about being free from possibly harm, it is about being free to say and think what you want, and to be free from unreasonable search and seizure, and to have freedom of association.
All this BS about protecting our freedoms while they are taking them away to give us some security really gets me pissed off. Assuming you're American, I want you to think about something: What is "the land of the free and the home of the brave"? I propose that we are no longer brave, and because of this we are throwing away our freedoms to get a little protection. Well screw that, I would rather take the chance of being killed by a terrorist (brave) than live in an authoritarian state (not free).
People doing projects like this are very noble indeed, they are discouraging the use of systems that destroy freedom by attempting to make them useless.
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
Being free is not about being free from possibly harm, it is about being free to say and think what you want, and to be free from unreasonable search and seizure, and to have freedom of association.
Right. None of which are being infringed.
I disagree. The supreme court has decided that free speech means that you have the right to anonymous free speech. All of this stuff about monitoring the populace removes the possibility of me being able to speak my mind without repercussion. If I say that I think 'bad guy x' is a wonderful person who should be supported, I am allowed to think that, but with all the surveillance that would get me put on a watch list which is equivalent to making my life a living hell.
Also, correct me if I am wrong, a warrant is needed for a wire tap because it is considered a form of search which must be determined to be reasonable by a judge. Why then shouldn't the same be true of other electronic communication?
So, this is both an infringement of the fist and a major infringement of the forth.
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
The right to privacy IS a right I actually have, it has been affirmed repeatedly by the supreme court, a body my founding fathers put in place to defend those rights.
Nope. You misunderstand our legal tradition. Grossly.
If you'd rather trade freedom for security, have at it.
I do. Very much so. Because without security, freedom is meaningless. You can't exercise your liberties if you're dead. The question is not, therefore, whether we should strike a balance between liberty and security. Obviously we must. The question is where that balance should be struck.
People like yourself who speak in terms of absolutes, who insist that liberty must never be abridged in the name of security, just aren't thinking. They're also blissfully unaware of how the real world actually works.
Just like phone taps, a warrant should be required for law enforcement to intentionally intercept communication between two parties OVER ANY MEDIUM.
Nope. If you have a conversation in a restaurant, and a cop overhears you talking about knocking over a bank, he's going to act on that. That's because a conversation in a public place carries with it no reasonable expectation of privacy.
Email is the same way. There's no reasonable expectation of privacy in packet-switched computer communications. This is blatantly obvious to anybody who has the slightest knowledge of how these systems work.
No reasonable expectation of privacy means no legal recognition of privilege.
Actually this is just a best realistic viewpoint, in truth they should actually have to notify me this is occuring before they can implement it AND notify every party involved in any communication they intend to record.
You're unclear on this whole idea of "surveillance," huh?
For the record, I'VE fought to secure those FREEDOMS we hold so dear, have you?
I served with the 224th aviation battalion from April of 1970 to February of '72. I was stationed in Long Thanh North. So I guess that's a yes.