Why Privacy & Security Are Not a Zero-Sum Game

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Ars Technica has up a nice article on why security consultant Ed Giorgio's statement that 'privacy and security are a zero-sum game' is wrong. The author reasons that, due to Metcalfe's law, the more valuable a government network is to the good guys, the more valuable it is to the bad guys. Given the trend in government to gather all of its eggs into one database, unless more attention is paid to privacy, we'll end up with neither security nor privacy. In other words, privacy and security are a positive-sum game with precarious trade-offs — you can trade a lot of privacy away for absolutely no gain in security, but you don't have to."

Comments

Oh, it's much worse than that

[Rogerborg]

It doesn't even take malicious access. In the UK, some low level government peon recently snail-mailed the financial details of 25 million people on discs that went missing. Since that broke, a slew of other government agencies, from health through to defence have dumped "me too" admissions into the shitstorm.

The government's response? They'll put "new procedures" in place to ensure that it can't blah blah again blah fight them on the beaches blah.

They're still pressing ahead with the National Database, misnamed as a National ID card (the equivelant of the USian Real ID). It's Total Information Awareness with a fluffier spin on it, but exactly the same goals: to know everything, about everyone, all the time, and Goddamn the consequences when (not if) the black hats get their greasy fingers on it.

Re:Yes, well ...

[Anonymous Coward]

No, power is not the motive, it's profit. The "security industry" is profitable and unlike any other real industry has no motive to deliver, quite the contrary. We have a name for this, it's called a protection racket.

Re:Right, in theory...

[rtb61]

Security and privacy have always been a struggle of the common man over autocrats. That is the history of democracy, the struggle of slaves, serfs and servants to gain control over their own lives, whilst the autocrats attempted to force servitude out of them. In order to maintain that servitude those slaves, serfs and servants had to be carefully watched and monitored , as the are inherently lazy, they are of low morals, they would steal bread off their masters table, they would dare to work together to ferment rebellion against their righteous masters rule and seek obscene things like freedom for themselves and democracy for all.

Privacy and the security of that privacy preserves the ability to share ideas with others, to discuss problems and possible solutions, so that when those individuals feel secure they can broach those ideas with the public for further discussion and not be targeted for repression before they achieve a measure of security that a caring and involved public provides. Privacy also provides an opportunity for individuals to anonymously inform the public when they do feel insecure and know there would be severe ramifications for informing the public of the truth.

Those corporations that would steal an individuals privacy and sell it for a profit are contemptible. Probing into a persons likes and dislikes, their personal preferences, analysing their personality, doing psychological break downs and associations, establishing extended family and friend associations and connections, establishing a full extended profile of a person as they mature from child hood to becoming an adult. All so they can be more effectively manipulated into liking what they are told to like, into believing what they are told to believe, and of course in hating who they are told to hate. They and their supporters are the greatest threat to freedom and democracy, as has been demonstrated by their for profit activities in autocratic countries, censoring and monitoring all freedom motivated democratic activities. I wonder for example how google audits the success of it's censorship and monitoring activities, does it count the cost dollars spent per successful prosecution of a democratically minded individual so that it can demonstrate the value of it's activities and software to autocratic governments.

His 'saying' was not an equation

[finity]

"Giorgio warned me, 'We have a saying in this business: 'Privacy and security are a zero-sum game.'"

This was not meant to be a hard and fast equation, folks. Just like, "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink" isn't meant to be 100% true all the time. I can force that damn thing to drink if I want it to, I guarantee you. It won't be pretty. I'm not that mean though.

Not everyone in your government is out to get you. This guy is working with the national intelligence director, you better believe he wants to get all the intelligence he can. It's his job to go as far as he can to get the most benefit for his job. I'd agree this is definitely not the best way to get intel, and it probably won't be secured well enough when they get it. At the same time, someone really intelligent is probably telling Giorgio and McConnell the exact opposite. Really, it's the lawmakers we've (Americans, here) voted into office that are the ones to blame if this type of insanity passes. They're the ones that are supposed to make sure that the tenth amendment is upheld... "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people."

Remember that when you vote for President, that's one man that represents 330 million people. When you vote for a senator, he/she represents only 3.3 million. When you vote for a house member, they represent 785 thousand. Get down to state and local government and the numbers drop even more significantly. Vote for a smaller government... It's too bad Ron Paul has no chance to get elected.

Re:Yes, well ...

[alexgieg]

. . . power and profit are the exact same motive. People/corporations/governments seek more power as a means of acquiring more profit and more profit as a means of acquiring more power.

This isn't quite accurate. The desire to be rich and "powerful" in the economic sense isn't the same as the desire to be powerful in the proper, political-military sense.

To be more precise, you need tough, ruthless, "comfort is for sissies" guys to tame and mostly pacify a society as a necessary, although not sufficient, condition for the soft, efficiency-minded, "me wants monies and beautiful shiny things" to start being viable. That's because it doesn't matter how much money you have, a bullet, or a sword, a knife, two strong hands at your throat... are still pretty efficient at finishing you. And those soft enough to be good at managing money, not weapons, can only do so when the risk of being killed is low. On the other hand, the tough ones don't need to be nice in any way to the soft as a means of acquiring what they want, just think "taxes".

So, no matter how mixed things seem to look like, the relationship between business and government is always one of complete and total submission. Violence (and the monopoly on violence) alway, by definition, controls wealth. The rich know this very well, and that's why they resort so much to bribing as a way to appease the actually powerful: because their only hope of continuing to be rich (and comfortable, and feeling important without actually doing what true power requires) is by making themselves, as they currently are, desirable to the powerful. Remove this factor and the powerful have no reason anymore to not just take what they want and be done with it.