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Assange: Facebook 'the Most Appalling Spy Machine' Ever
i4u points out an interview with Julian Assange in which the controversial WikiLeaks spokesman calls Facebook "the most appalling spy machine that has ever been invented." He continues,
"Here we have the world’s most comprehensive database about people, their relationships, their names, their addresses, their locations and the communications with each other, their relatives, all sitting within the United States, all accessible to US intelligence. Facebook, Google, Yahoo – all these major US organizations have built-in interfaces for US intelligence. It’s not a matter of serving a subpoena. They have an interface that they have developed for US intelligence to use. Now, is it the case that Facebook is actually run by US intelligence? No, it’s not like that. It’s simply that US intelligence is able to bring to bear legal and political pressure on them. And it’s costly for them to hand out records one by one, so they have automated the process. Everyone should understand that when they add their friends to Facebook, they are doing free work for United States intelligence agencies in building this database for them."
I know this and I choose to do this. The difference here is that I hit the accept button. Julian Assange needs to stop trying to tell me what I should and should not do.
for knowing every inane thought that crosses the mind of people I only vaguely care anything about.
This post comes with a double-your-money-back guarantee!
Any offense taken to this post is at your sole discretion.
We've sold our privacy for convenience, in the name of security.
Been there, signed that. Perhaps someone read it.
I don't feel so bad now for not jumping on the Facebook bandwagon. Maybe when I get a friend I might change my mind, don't think so though.
The guy who wants all information to be accessible to everyone is complaining the biggest collections of information are too accessible?
I suspect that the relatively brief period between the breakdown of the 'symmetric transparency' of village and smaller social groups and the rise of the 'asymmetric transparency' of rationalized, technocratic surveillance will be looked back upon as a curious historical anomaly.
I choose not to be on Facebook because I don't want my friends to see me doing something embarrassing.
I don't care what the faceless "agencies" know about me because I have nothing to hide from them, and it won't embarrass me if they know my dirty secrets, as long as they don't tell my dirty secrets to my friends.
Ehh... if you have any reason to hide than you can hide. FB is 100% voluntary so I see no reason to complain.
Wiretapping on the other hand...
Ok. So what? There's nothing on my Facebook account that couldn't be readily ascertained by speaking with a handful of my friends and colleagues. If Big Brother wants access to my Facebook information, I'd be more offended that my taxpayer dollars are being wasted on such a frivolity than any 'invasion of privacy.' I control what I put on my Facebook page. If others are too stupid to realize what they put on Facebook could be used against them in a criminal case, then, well, fuck 'em.
Where is he?
Mr. Faceless: Eewwwwwww can we arrest this guy for that?
Mr Faceless2: Nope, all we can do is tell all his friends about it.
Its funny but a device, the computer, that many clever people developed to free us and improve our lives is ruining our privacy and harming our freedoms. Even governments and their agencies are afraid, wikipedia allowed them to be spied on in an industrial scale, police are weary of cell phones with cameras etc.
Quit hiding people. YOu're far more likely to get the government to do what you want if you are willing to stand up and be counted.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
I know this and I still choose to use it. I'm hooked I tell you...HOOKED! In all seriousness though, I treat facebook like an outdoor restaurant. If it’s something that I don’t feel comfortable with someone overhearing I don’t post it.
Facebook is like a reverse Wikileaks, leaking the general public's personal information back to shady corporations and government organisations. They really do have a detailed map of your digital life, and they keep all of it - the record goes all the way back to when you joined. A database of the lives 640 million people worldwide... the fact this information is so poorly protected is deeply concerning. Once you put information up there you don't get it back. I've said it before: http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1946656&cid=34845420
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
It may be quite obvious with Facebook, but the fact is most people don't know how pervasive data-mining is. Still, me, I kind of trust our intelligence community at the moment. I expect CIA and SIGINT for National Security reasons, and I've met enough of them--higher-ups and lower-ups--that I know they're good people trying to do a good job. I still think we need someone with the keys, because in twenty years the culture could change completely, but right now, US Intelligence is staffed by fairly good people.
Law enforcement use is more normatively questionable to me, since I tend to take an expansive view of the Fourth Amendment. For example, if they lower constitutional rights in NY to allow cops to search bags for explosives, I don't think they should be able to arrest people if they find drugs, since their rights have been artificially suspended because of terrorism, unless they can point to reasons they would have searched the person anyway. (apologies for antecedent potpurri.) But unfortunately I think law enforcement use of Facebook and such is largely constitutional under Maryland v. Smith and related cases. (I don't have a reasonable expectation of privacy in information I communicate to others, like Facebook or the Phone Company.)
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
Ain't nothin' on my Facebook but my name, my friends, and my random attempts at being witty. I don't care if the gov't sees any of it. If I did, it wouldn't be on Facebook. The problem isn't Facebook, it's that people -- including Assange, actually -- have a binary idea of security and trust. They think something is either totally secret and revealing it would be a huge betrayal, or it's all out there in the wind open to everyone. If you think Facebook is a privacy threat, you don't have to stop using it: just stop posting private stuff to it.
Trust is multilayered. I have stuff I only tell my close friends. I have stuff I only tell my Warcraft guild. I have stuff I only tell my wife. I have stuff I keep entirely inside my head. And none of that stuff goes on Facebook. Facebook is fine for some sorts of privacy -- for instance, as a college professor, I don't Facebook friend my students, so I don't have to worry about saying something unbecoming of a professor. For other sorts of things, I use other sorts of communications.
But I've been living in this sort of multilayered online privacy world for two decades now. Hopefully someday soon the rest of the planet will figure out how it works, so I don't have to deal with Assange's paranoid ranting, or college students who can't get a job because they're naked and/or vomiting on their profile page.
"Everyone should understand that when they add their friends to Facebook, they are doing free work for United States intelligence agencies in building this database for them."
Excellent, so by playing Farmville I'm not only reducing my taxes (because they'd build the database anyway), but also contributing to the safety and counter terrorism efforts of my country.
It's not only addictive, but patriotic.
...duh.
And as a corollary... ...so?
we offer this little video: http://www.albumoftheday.com/facebook/
Do what I do. Only post things you want the government and corporations to know. Ex: Verizon has terrible customer service because they swear at me in Hindi. Ex: The government needs to give more money to schools so I don't have to deal with illiterate people. Ex: I wish more candies had peanut butter in them.
I think I might have heard YOU are a rapist.
See, now you can be an alleged rapist too!
Since when was Assange opposed to the idea of doing intelligence services' work for them? He sure was eager to hand American secrets over to the Russians, Chinese, Iranians, etc.
Ah well, it's good to see he's still more interested in attacking the USA than actually spreading openness in oppressive countries or anything.
I really don't care. Facebook and other social media tools, web-sites, location tracking cell-phones - don't really bother me. I've done nothing wrong, don't plan on doing anything wrong, so if they want to track my life - go for it. It's quit boring.
http://www.theonion.com/video/cias-facebook-program-dramatically-cut-agencys-cos,19753/
>>>alleged rapist
Only in Europe could 2 women voluntarily have sex with a single man, enjoy themselves, and then a week later say, "I was raped," and the police take her seriously. I thought Europe was more progressive than backwards USA, what with nude television and beaches and such, but I guess not.
Anybody with any intelligence (i.e. not you) realizes this was a FRAME job, because woman #1 learned about woman #2, got jealous, and they both decided to "get even" with the man. It's a classic case of buyer's remorse.
In the US this case would be laughed out of court.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Assange tries to drum up more media exposure so you don't forget to buy that autobiography he 'hated was necessary' to write! And pick up a T-Shirt too, to show everyone what an edgy armchair revolutionary you are!
What freedoms are being harmed?
You might as well say that the local rubbish tip is a valuable source of information. There's just as much garbage as facebook has, but at least you have the chance of picking up something usable.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
AreYouTargeted.com is a good resource
Why does anyone care about Assange any more?
If you HAVE to use a social network, use Crabgrass. It's developed by our friends over at riseup (we.riseup.net), so we know it's safe!
They see Facebook as a new technology, like cellphones, and they're treating it like a phone or SMS. So they're saying the same things they would say on a phone or send over SMS. The thing is, phone and SMS data are usually sent to limited-function devices that can't easily store and reproduce this data.
While the government may intercept phonecalls or text messages, the vast majority of people are much more likely to feel negative effects from a lack of privacy in their subsequent interactions with friends, family and employers.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
Your not being spied on for nothing. This week end 50 facebook pages from anti cuts and anti austerity movements were pulled down, so freedom of speech in this case.
Then why does wiki leaks have stuff on Sigma Chi? http://www.wikileaks.ch/wiki/The_secret_Ritual_of_Sigma_Chi,_2002
Seems like Wikileaks likes to leak anything that is secret, even if it is just secrets of a club.
this seems appropriate:
http://memebase.com/2011/05/02/memes-art-of-trolling-shoulda-been-on-mtvs-cribs/
In the US this case would be laughed out of court.
Except if Olivia Benson and Elliot Stabler are the detectives assigned to the case.
That is, until your dirty secret becomes illegal. Poker anyone?
If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
This will not protect your privacy against government intelligence, but at least against most else. Do the BIG logoff from facebook by disabling you account instead of just logging off. Data is kept, and you can enable the account just by logging back in. A few seconds extra to log out, and your information is not shared.
don't cut it off www.mgmbill.org
Is it me, or is he trying more and more to be relevant before he fades into the shadows of his 15 minutes of fame? He is no Mitnick or Goldstein and tries his best to be king of the hackers. Honestly other than drum up media attention over his website, I think he's the biggest hacker fraud ever known.
Personally, I worry more about what various businesses can find out about me and other FaceBook users than I do about the government. The 4th Amendment works fairly well at keeping the government from doing "fishing expeditions" and I don't have a problem with the government getting access to data if they have a warrant based on probable cause. These restrictions don't apply to businesses that buy their way into FB to do data mining or that create cute little applications that require that you reveal everything to them in return for accessing the application.
I consider very carefully whether or not to reveal any personal information on FB beyond what I need to "show" so that people can find me. Most of this information is publicly available (i.e., phone book type stuff). It just isn't linked to me on FB where it can also be linked to my "friends." I'm going to do what I can to keep it that way.
Cheers,
Dave
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
Hmm... at +3?
Kill the messenger, rather than the message. You must be from the US.
Nah, information analysis is easy now. It's 2011.
I can think of seven ways to do it and it's not even my field.
"Rudolf Flesch grade scale analysis grade > 11"
$Location_marker > 3
and more
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Only in Europe could 2 women voluntarily have sex with a single man, enjoy themselves, and then a week later say, "I was raped," and the police take her seriously. I thought Europe was more progressive than backwards USA, what with nude television and beaches and such, but I guess not.
My understanding is that Assange's enemies scoured the Swedish law books until they found an obscure, seldom-invoked clause that they could use against him. The charges are very unusual, even within their own jurisdiction.
Breakfast served all day!
Can someone post the api wsdl, url?
Who is spying on me? Facebook has their own rules and regulations on what is acceptable and what is not. If you violate their guidelines they will delete the page. They set that policy not the government. And finally no one is required to use Facebook. They are volunteering their life stories with no coercion by the government. Invoking freedom of speech on this type of activity is a distortion of the 1st amendment. Either obey the Facebook rules or go somewhere else. Facebook is not the only access point where you can exercise your freedom of speech.
He wants all information _which should be available to public_ to be available to public.
Correction: all information _which he thinks should be available to public_, regardless of what the person(s) who generated the info believes. It seems like he is doing pretty much the same thing that he accuses law enforcement and facebook of doing. Taking a private conversation and making it available to a third party without the consent of the original parties, and *without* the oversight and blessings of a court of law. How is his judgement any better than J Edgar Hoover's (infamous FBI director) with respect to what private into should be made public? Before you start referring to what he had done recently as being popular keep in mind that J Edgar's outing of communists was once popular with the public too. People who believe themselves above the law should always be regarded with suspicion.
And here, he is talking about private information, which, under normal circumstances, requires governments to go to court to be able to obtain.
Just like you could go to court and file a freedom of information act request, as many civil rights investigators do, in order to gain access to private government documents. Again he seem much like those he criticizes.
Don't give it to them. Seems pretty simple to me. I'd like to see anyone come at me for any info about me on facebook for anything other than ridiculous hairstyles and poor fashion sense.
I see you are ignorant of the art of traffic analysis and intelligence analysis. Each little piece of data posted to FB is useless, in itself. All of it together, in toto, is tremendously valuable. Who knows whom and who communicates with whom, regardless of what they actually say, is probably the most important part. Who does NOT communicate with whom, and what is NOT said, is nearly as important.
For example, let's say that the US gets some rabble rouser similar to Martin Luther King or Jesus, one who has not yet been assassinated. Let's say the FBI implements their standard 'Dirty Tricks' campaign, like they did against Dr. King (see History 101) and surely would against Jesus. One thing they would alost certainly do is monitor and harass her supporters. Local leaders would be tagged for special attention, up to and including violence, arrest, and extraordinary rendition. Facebook is the PERFECT tool to track down who is a supporter, and who is not. The fact that YOU, personally, are not a supporter, and that your FB profile shows that, makes it that much easier to track down her actual supporters. Also, don't think you could fool the data mining system: a person with leadership potential can be easily identified as such from the pattern of FB use surrounding their account; if many of your friends are identified as supporting a certain subversive idea (e.g. freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, right to bear arms, freedom from arbitrary search and seizure, opposition to torture, et cetera), then you will automatically be tagged as probably also supporting that subversive idea. If YOU are careful never to support a subversive idea, and never befriend anyone who does, you still make it easier to find those who do, by eliminating yourself as a suspect.
I suggest you read George Orwell's 1984, and consider what the Ministry of Truth and the Ministry of Love would do with Facebook. Then look around at your country and your government, and see whether it bears any resemblance to the institutions described by Mr. Orwell. Start paying attention & be honest.
I wish to second the 'Ghost Profile' concept mentioned above by another poster. It's probably already done. This has the clever effect of using citizens who are still foolish enough to use FB to act as informants against those people who have realized that FB, as it currently exists, is a very bad idea.
This author could provide a stunning and revelatory (to the Slashdot crowd) example of just what can be done through the clever use of a digital profile, and how this is connected to Julian Assange. This author chooses not to do so, at this time.
You do not sit around reading random facebook pages looking for the word "bomb".
You find 5 "terrorists" with facebook accounts, (Whether by interrogating other terrorists, busting a plot, or whatever.)
You look at their friends list, see who they have in common that's not already a known terrorist.
You investigate them.
If you think the CIA cares what you post (unless you're already a person of interest), you're missing the point. They want to know who's friends with whom, and you're just handing them that info. Unless you can be sure that none of your acquaintances is a terrorist or will ever be suspected as a terrorist, you've just invited them to investigate you, put you on the no-fly list, etc..
I put information on Facebook that I want other people to see. It's not spying when I purposefully disclose the information.
And the US Government is the last thing I'm worried about. I block certain things from coworkers and certain family members to keep people from being offended, but I don't care of the government wants to read my crude jokes. If the government wants to know what I'm up to, checking my tax information and calling Master Card, Verizon, or Comcast is going to be much more revealing than Facebook.
In the US this case would be laughed out of court.
You're talking non-sense. Judge Judy would have taken this case very seriously.
Facebook is an excellent spy machine. An appalling spy machine would be, say, my young son assigned to snoop on an Evil Corporation but instead found some interesting belly button lint.
The social graph is a very interesting thing to police and intelligence agencies. Just knowing who knows who can be very useful. That said, there are lots of dead-ends and rabbit trails on the social graphs....but it is a great place to start.
I don't care what the faceless "agencies" know about me because I have nothing to hide from them
I do. I have a lot to hide from them.
I want to hide the stuff from them that's NONE OF THEIR FUCKING BUSINESS.
If a Government makes it law for any entity that has data to to share it with them on request, that's spying. If they incentivize companies, with payments, thats spying.
Um no. Happens all the time here in the states too. And women who do this don't get laughed out of court. The men to whom this happens have to spend a lot of time and money to get out of it. So gentlemen, be warned that you need to think with the big head before sticking your little head anywhere.
Unfortunately the big head often is undergoing oxygen deprivation when it's most needed...
With Wikileaks, they decide what should be released about a company/government/etc and that person has no say in it. With Facebook, the individual decides what gets released. Anything you don't give to them, anything you don't post, doesn't get released. You don't want your phone number released? Don't give it to them. They don't go hoovering that kind of stuff up.
The problem with FB seems to come from people's false assumption that their weak ass privacy controls mean anything. No, not so much. Basically, you need to assume anything you post anywhere on the web is public, and that goes double for social networking sites. So, don't post it to FB if you don't want the world to see it. Real simple.
I have a FB profile, because there are things I'm ok with everyone knowing. All of it, with the possible exception of photos of me, is more or less public record anyhow. However there's not a lot on there. Many of their fields remain blank. That is because it is stuff I don't care to be public. I choose what to release and I don't really care where it goes, because I presume by posting it there I made it public to all.
I think you are missing the point. Your information might not be publicly available but it still exists in the database.
I'm surprised no other people are talking about this aspect of Assange's remarks. Having a graph of the connections between (almost) everyone allows you a great level of control over how rumours and ideas spread in that graph, and as a result allows shady government agencies to socially engineer the public more effectively. I bet somebody somewhere must already have a computer model with all the connections in FB and is using basic epidemiology-style graph theory to calculate how to most effectively mind-control the dumb unwashed.
For instance, if they want to indirectly influence some official in a certain country, they could try influencing the friends of his son, who will in turn influence the son, who will then exert pressure on the official. Or, if they want to influence the largest number of people possible, they work to influence the people with the most connections. You get the idea - except on a much larger scale (think six degrees of separation).
I also have to wonder how HBGary's fake online persona "clone army" is related to this sort of thing.
This tripe from the man who has put the lives of Americans, Britons, Australians, etc in jeopardy by leaking classified documents?? I hope the Navy Seals pay him a midnight visit.
Title should read, "Assange: 'Don't forget about me, I'm still super-relevant. Tell me I matter and you love me... please?!'"
CIA's 'Facebook' Program Dramatically Cut Agency's Costs
but Good Lord is it cheesy!!!
I've made it a point to avoid Facebook over the years for a lot of reasons. Chiefly because of privacy concerns. I've recently found myself single, and with a pretty lacking social network. With Facebook being *the* place to build these networks, I've had to reconsider the downside to whoring out my personal data. Perhaps the question should not be how we keep the data out of the hands of government and advertisers, but how to adjust to an age (and adjust a government) where nothing is personal.
You're simultaneously underestimating Facebook and totally missing the big picture. To say that absolutely nothing of interest to any intelligence organisation is on Facebook is laughable at best. (I would call you an oblivious, possibly short-sighted idiot, but that's just me.)
Facebook can be a good way to find out about people before you get to know them, and Julian Assange should look on the good side of Facebook as well. Like, when you meet a groupie online, you can easily search her background to make sure she's cool with going raw.
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
I'll wait until he leaks some documents to back up his wild, unfounded conspiracy theory.
or else!
Companies like Facebook base their income on the information they collect from you, and are therefore in a continuous arms race with you to lure you into giving out more information. I admire your absolute understanding of privacy choices on every level and nuance imaginable, but most of the other people in this world are less aware and more easily tricked... and even if they are rather smart, they make mistakes.
Is it therefore fair to put the onus on the person who has a Facebook profile to protect their privacy? Especially when the founder of Facebook has been on record a few times, stating that privacy is on a slippery slope anyway, and they'll just go with the flow? Especially when the "I've got nothing to hide" argument has been thoroughly debunked, because just about any information can be (selectively) used to incriminate you, even when you're entirely innocent?
As much as I am a fan of individual responsibility, I do believe that this tit-for-tat game of deception between social networking sites and their users is rather immoral on the side of the social networking sites, and that it is a cop out to say that the user is being stupid. This is where Assange draws the line, which is not paranoid, but realistic. They really are after eroding our privacy.
Are doing good work by throwing off the Feds. Not that my fake FB accounts do anything wrong; they're a small vibrant community of people I imagine live in the empty lots in my neighborhood. I call them The Alphabets. At worst, the majority of them are suspiciously Obama fans in the middle of a very red southern county.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
In theory, his comments might be spot on. But consider again the data mining nightmare this would be. I suppose if I happen to "friend" a known terrorist, then MY friend list might become suspect, since one would presumably surround one's self with the same types of "friends", and allowing intelligence services to build up a hefty watchlist. However, two important facts to consider. First, if your typical terrorist was so stupid as to leave a very public trail for the government to track, we probably would have gathered them all up by now. And secondly, Facebook only has one tier of "friends", whereas in real life we have family, friends with benefits, good friends, co-workers, aquaintances, people we pretend we like, but really don't, and a bunch of random people whom you see frequently and make mindless smalltalk with, but may not even know their name. Facebook doesn't make any distinction between the level of association with the different people you know, so it's quite possible (especially if you're one of the people that tends to friend EVERYONE) that you have a few people on your friend list who have backgrounds of a rather murky nature, and you've got no idea. Should that link be made, an attempt to isolate a terrorist cell would instead result in a list of 20,000 names of people who mostly have no idea the others on that list even exist. Besides, if there's any truth to the 6 degrees of separation rule, then you don't have to traverse very far before everyone's linked to everyone. This makes the process unrealistic and a serious waste of resources under the best circumstances. Better off just saving Facebook for the divorce laywers, who seem to make much better use out of it even without requiring the use of government intervention tactics.
-Restil
I'm really not sure what value they are going to derive from finding out that I am friends with a few college buddies and like MST3K.
"What are the differences between Mark Zuckerberg and me? Lets take a look.
I give you private information on corporations for free, and I'm a villian. Mark Zuckerberg gives your private information to corporations for money, and he's man of the year.
Thanks to wikileaks, you can see how corrupt governments operate in the shadows, and then lie to those who elect them. Thanks to facebook, you can finally figure out which Sex and the City character you are."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9LqnowYVQE
CAPS LOCK IS THE CRUISE CONTROL OF AWESOMNESS
The extra funny thing is that 1) Its voluntary, and 2) most people on facebook aren't thinking of themselves as criminals with things to hide.
People VOLUNTARILY share this information. Sure its a society where privacy can be beneficial, but this *society* is actually very social. People are driven to share their lives with each other, and while many a smirk is made by joking about the uselessness of facebook, the truth is we are drawn towards it like a magnet of interest! The truth is, the people on facebook aren't afraid of being called a 'criminal' because they probably don't consider themselves as such.
Now there might even be criminals using facebook to their own demise... Who knows... But unlike Assanage, most of us are living our lives without fear of some repercussion. And as we desire, we socialize.
Once Corporations and Government become the same thing -- maybe its too late to undo anything and we'll all get our tattoos and serial numbers... I just used the last of my tinfoil on a nice dinner, so... well... so much for worrying about being made out 'bad', lol.
As things get worse, just having a documented association with certain people whom you may not even be aware of as undesirables will be grounds enough to detain you. If you do any kind of social justice work or activism, then this database of relations is already being used against you.
So what if they know (whatever).. I hear a lot of this.. well.. how about this.. stocks and politics are driven by public sentiment. Being able to monitor, inject, and control these instruments allow for manipulation at levels never before possible. Simply creating algorithms to judge public sentiment can create opportunities that are at a scale that we will never see while we hide our heads in the sand that no one cares about our dinner at Chilis. This doesnt even touch the social tracking and potential for abuse. Make no mistake. FB is a very very bad thing in many ways. It is also social crack that the mindless masses are hopelessly addicted to. I see it as one of multiple facets on controlling and monitoring the masses. So.. keep posting about dinner..
http://chairreport.com/ is another website that shows how facebook can be used as such an evil spy mechanism! It's almost scary, just look what it does with the Humanscale Liberty Chair!
No "social network" accounts of any kind.
Perhaps even avoid email.
Maybe just stay away from computers and the Internet entirely, or as much as possible in this day and age.
A lot of people do some or all of those things.
Signed,
Anonymous Coward.
If I was a terrorist the first thing I would do is stop all my online activity and change my identity or more likely I never would have had a FB account at all. It's trivial to have your public persona look nice and normal and do all your illegal, secret, subversive communications done in ways that are impossible to track or intercept. Terrorists have a lot to fear from government intelligence agencies, but FB is not one of them.
What the government CAN use FB for is to spy on and pacify its own citizens. Say a radical politician that the government doesn't like is getting too popular, you can use his followers info on FB to intimidate them or dig up dirt to discredit their cause. Things like that.
If you build it, nerds will come. Soylentnews.org
CIA Facebook Project: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqggW08BWO0
Not a single fuck was given amongst the sheep.
Retrieving information from any Internet provider still requires a warrant. The US government has demonstrated this in their efforts to retrieve data on 3 particular users associated with Wiki-leaks. Even then they only petitioned for a limited amount of information on the accounts but not the content of any messages sent or received by these users. The users are appealing the decision. This doesn't look like any "spying" I am familiar with. Spying usually denotes some secrecy and these requests are out in the open.
Unfortunately the only way to go unnoticed is to use social networking. Just be very clever, create a very standard and boring cover. Wait...I already did! I am a boring nerd with only a few friends and completely obvious posts and chit chat. So as long as I keep my true identity secret I will be safe from our intelligence gathering overlords. All Jesting aside, there probably is something to this.
The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky
It seems to me that his claim that the US government has some kind of direct access to FB is totally unsubstantiated. Show me the evidence that this is the case and then I may be concerned.
Really? That pic my buddy posted of a huge burger with a text referencing me does include geo information and timestamp. That info does put us in a burger place 20 mins prior to a crime on the next door parking lot. That could cause the police to harass us even though we didn't see anything useful. Etc. That police isn't currently harvesting and using this information is simply an issue of cost and regulation, both which can change with relative ease over the next couple of years.
Relevant.
The computer was developed to make money. Lofty notions of freeing man from labor might be present in a few...but they need money in order to conduct their research (and to eat while doing development), and the investors only shell it out if there is a potential profit in it.
So...I don't see any irony in the problems that are arising in conjunction with our technological advancement. These problems are ultimately just consequences of the same motivations.
for knowing every inane thought that crosses the mind of people I only vaguely care anything about.
I wonder how much information there is of any use at all to any intelligence agency. Government can find out who I'm married too and who my family is through other means. Most people play idiotic farmville like games, and friend anyone they've ever known that they don't find completely annoying. At worst they could dig up private or public information on who I've argued with, or what console I'm playing. I'm not so sure the information is of much use to them or that I care if they have it. Of course I'm not a criminal and don't go around bragging about doing illegal things - if I were I might be more concerned (then again I'd be an idiot so oblivious).
The only trouble is I'm finding *I* don't care about that information either...pffft.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Very old news.
http://comedians.jokes.com/pete-holmes/videos/pete-holmes---privacy-is-uncool
....was the cone of silence.
I just 'liked' you
> Seriously (not trolling, I'm really asking), why would you expect that, if you're smuggling stuff, or have a few grams of cocaine on you, you can walk freely all over the country? I mean if the thing is illegal to do, posses, traffic or whatever, why do you expect that you can get away with it? Are you expecting the judge to believe you had a "reasonable expectation" that you weren't going to be arrested?
Our Constitution grants us the right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure. Originally it was meant to prevent the central government from having too much power. (May also have been one of grievances against the King we were rebelling against. We sent a list, and some of those wound up as things we promised our federal government would not do.) After our civil war, we amended the Constitution to say that people have a right not to be deprived of life, liberty, or property without "due process of law." Fast forward about a hundred years, and cops in the south were violating civil rights of black people in the south left, right, and center. In 1969, the Supreme Court decided that was not okay. But rather than formally making it about civil rights of black people, or about racist cops, it interpreted "due process of law" to include a guaranty against unreasonable search and seizure, like the guaranty in the Fourth Amendment.
So then cops were Constitutionally required not to search unreasonably. What happens when they do? Two things: (1) You can sue the gov. in a 1983 action. Most of these are spurious suits brought by prisoners, but we accept those as the cost of ensuring legitimate grievances are heard. (2) They cannot use the information against you in court. This means cops have a much bigger interest in respecting the right not to be unreasonably searched, since if they do and they find something, you will walk free.
The right expanded during the civil rights era and has been constricting since then, because it is always unpopular to have a rule that lets criminals walk scott-free, so the Supreme Court has been chipping away at it.
What you have, when you are walking down the street, is a reasonable expectation that a cop isn't going to stop you at random and check all your pockets for cocaine. But not always--there are different rules at the border, at places that are the functional equivalent of the border, etc...
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
Perhaps the best defense against being spied on by facebook is to incorporate lots of false information with your real information.
The people who have 5000 friends, use a fancy made-up name, and post thousands of inane song-lyrics as comments are the ones that have things right. If there is that much information there, either
1: It might not be worthwhile to even sort through.
or
2:The data might throw them off track completely. If I talk about my love of chocolate on facebook, noone is going to think for a second to steal my delicious recipe for vanilla ice cream.
Moral of the story? There is more than one way to achieve privacy.
most people on facebook aren't thinking of themselves as criminals with things to hide
Now there might even be criminals using facebook to their own demise... Who knows...
There have been plenty of stories of petty criminals (usually teenagers or young men), being caught by police because they bragged on Facebook.
http://www.google.com/search?q=criminals+caught+using+facebook
I agree all of the disclosures are voluntary and they got what they deserved, but you can't argue that some people on Facebook wouldn't be better served by keeping their mouths shut.
Of course nobody minds much when Facebook is used to catch someone who's accused of armed robbery or assault. How about using Facebook to catch tax evaders?
The real issue is not whether people "think of themselves as criminals", but that they don't think things they post online will ever be used against them. This is kind of an old story, but it bears repeating:
Teacher fired for having Facebook photo with two glasses of alcohol
So I think your implication of "nothing to hide, nothing to fear", rings a little false. Activities which used to be innocuous (having a few drinks), can now put your job in jeopardy, because we are driven to share everything online (like you say).
I find it funny that an entity like wikileaks, which routinely posts information without regards to individuals they may be putting in danger, is so concerned with a site that contains volunteered information.
The problem is that YOU won't be the one to decide whether you have anything to hide or not.
That's exactly the danger. FB and Google lower the effort and cost of snooping to such an extent that it becomes practical for snoopers to snoop on a massive scale.
Only in Sweden would be more accurate.
"But unlike Assanage, most of us are living our lives without fear of some repercussion."
So far so good, so far so good, so far so good.... splat.
Good thing I have no friend then.
:)
Ho. hum.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
Retrieving information from any Internet provider still requires a warrant
It most assuredly does not. It merely requires that service provider's permission. It does not require yours. If you have a Facebook account, you agreed, in writing (or the digital equivalent as the case may be) that everything you put on Facebook is property of Facebook. Facebook has no reason to respect your "privacy" if they are solicited for information on you by law enforcement. They can hand everything over without ever informing you. You already said they could.
If Facebook chooses not to hand over that information, then a warrant is, in some cases, required.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
What is there to hide that I should be scared about the government knowing? Pictures of my new cat?
Let me introduce you to a wonderful concept known as disinformation.
If you say almost nothing, and what you say is factual, but let the occasional secret slip, it can be presumed to be true.
If you say a lot, and most of it is fiction, but the occasional fact slips in, it can be presumed to be false.
Sometimes it puts you in a much stronger position to build up your fantasy online persona. It leaves people with lots and lots of information to sift through. The chances of them believing the leaked facts are slimmer than them believing the copious amounts of disinformation.
This message was sent from an unofficial DoD facility under an unnamed mountain somewhere in the American Southwest. :)
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Correction emphasized.
That's a very common misconception: privacy is not about criminals with things to hide.
It's about not giving some centralized entity an enormous power because they know everything about everyone. Such a huge power will be misused, sooner or later.
That's why you still need privacy and secrecy even (especially!) if you've nothing to hide. And, BTW, everyone has something to hide to at least someone else.
There's a hidden treasure in Python 3.x: __prepare__()
Good Thing I Spam the Hell out of Facebook. Good luck finding any signal in all the noise. I have over 4,000 friends none of which I know. What is that really worth?
Was this an old interview, or is he really this stupid? Everyone else figured this out 7 years ago when facebook launched.
So... because I desire privacy, I'm really just thinking of myself as a criminal with things to hide? :/
I guess when I had to pick up my new passport the other day and could only do so while leaving fingerprints, I really did feel like a criminal - or treated like one anyway.
Why did it take people so long to figure this out?
Simply dropping an "I" completely hid this in plain sight.
.. Assange is actually right here.
Insert
I shared this immediatly with all my fb friends :)
Most Western nations allow their intelligence services to access online data and communications without a subpoena (some of them even allow other parts of the government and police to do this). Many of them also exchange the information with others. The only thing that's different about the US is that its businesses are actually particularly successful at delivering services people want.
Yes, there is a problem. But the problem won't get solved by anti-Americanism, because it's a global problem. You of all people should know that, given how Europe treated you. The problem won't get solved legislatively at all. If you want reasonably secure communications, you foremost need a technological solution that governments can't easily intercept or analyze. Those solutions exist, but people need to start using them. Can you contribute positively to that, Mr. Assange?
"the truth is we are drawn towards it like a magnet" - who is this "we" of which you speak? I'm not and neither are the other 12 out of every 13 people on the planet (according to recent stat's http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-10720270).
It is our social-animal need causing it growth - the threat of being left out, of being sidleined by all your friends and family who have joined and are now organising their social lives in there, that induces a great many to join - not because they *want* to but because they feel they *have* to in order to stay in a society. There's lots of times people miss out on party invites, sharing of photo's, family news, etc. because they are not on Facebook. Recruitment through fear of isolation, of being cut off and peer-pressure. Retention through same, like leaving a cult.
http://www.theonion.com/video/cias-facebook-program-dramatically-cut-agencys-cos,19753/
Its voluntary,
for now. eventually the powers that be will make it mandatory. it might not be called facebook but the concept remains.
People VOLUNTARILY share this information.
most people are also fools. again a result of group think mentality. what is popular matters more than the truth.
Sure its a society where privacy can be beneficial, but this *society* is actually very social.
ah the newspeak use of the word social. of course this version of social means one must be complete open to everyone. being private is being 'anti-social' right?
People are driven to share their lives with each other, and while many a smirk is made by joking about the uselessness of facebook, the truth is we are drawn towards it like a magnet of interest!
people are drawn to it because they are insecure fools who judge their self-worth by how much they're connected to other people. facebook offers an external record of these links which let individuals track others' behaviors and thoughts. what better way for the insecure to reassure themselves that they are indeed still a part of some social circle? It is truly pathetic.
most people on facebook aren't thinking of themselves as criminals with things to hide.
doesn't matter what people think of themselves. with no privacy, all that matters is what other people think. this is why privacy and individual freedom are linked. the more public your personal bits are, the more likely they'll be judged by groupthink, which as you know is full of fallacies and emotional handwringing.
Once Corporations and Government become the same thing
the barriers that separate them even now are perfunctory at best. a nice side show.
This really is paranoia of the highest kind.
First, anything I put on Facebook was - shock, horror - put on Facebook by me. It's things I would voluntarily choose to put there, and would probably not feel uncomfortable writing on a street-survey, or telling people in the pub. If a person of interest is using it, you'd have to assume that anything on it was absolute junk. We didn't catch the Russian female spy because she gave herself away on Facebook. Anything "private" isn't on Facebook. Just because other people on Facebook have a different opinion on what's private or not, that's their problem, not mine. If the government are trying to use Facebook to identify individuals and do mass statistical / network analysis, they will fail as miserably as the adverts Facebook tries to target at me.
Secondly, if a government agency run by my country wants to know about me and gives my Facebook anything more than a passing glance, I want a refund on my taxes. In fact, fuck it, I'd emigrate just to get out from such an idiotic regime. If other country's governments are looking me up... so what? They won't be able to do anything without my country's co-operation and there's nothing on there that I wouldn't, for example, post on a public website and expect to have visible to everyone (because, duh, that's what I've done!). Not to mention, Europe would have a complete hissy-fit if the US got more access to stuff like that than they do - hell the US wanted the Earth with regards to traveller information and they got the bare legal minimum and even still the EU is planning to stop that too.
Thirdly, if I'm really "someone of interest" to a government agency then pretty much any information is fair game, whether the law says so or not, and you'd have to be stupid to think otherwise. But at that point, it won't be my Facebook they'll be interested in, any more than what restaurant I eat at, or what countries my old holiday photos show I was in. They'll (hopefully, if my tax is being spent anywhere NEAR properly) be interested in things that are actually of importance and would be getting phone records, phone intercepts, internet records, getting bugs onto my PC and trackers on my car and anything else they could do.
If I'm posting something "important" on Facebook, they should know about it not because Facebook store it or were co-operative but because they are inside my damn life so much I can't do anything without them knowing and they watched me post it and know my FB password because of the keylogger on my PC.
So, whether we're talking "1984-style" generic monitoring of everyone, or specific all-out surveillance of my person, Facebook is, was and always should be nothing more than worthless in intelligence terms.
In some countries, military intelligence actually has a meaning. One which does not involve in any way PRIVATES in an army leaking diplomatic cables, people knowing about what goes on inside foreign torture camps (with photos to prove it), or agencies looking up people on Facebook.
Some people think that the black helicopters and miles of underground supercomputers listening to every phone call are a) real and b) actually a decent way to perform intelligence. The sad truth is that those people are precisely the ones who rely on *real* intelligence from foreign countries to actually get their job done.
Pulled down by whom? Pulled down why? Where did you get your number? Your post is too devoid of information to mean anything. Nice insinuation, however.
When everybody and their dog are on Facebook, those who are not, have certainly something to hide. :-)
Like the house where bin Laden was reportedly hiding - had no phone and internet connection - evil!
...a stunned silence fell upon the hall.
You know we here at the CIA listen to Slashdot too. We have your IP, your email list, your banking details...
Honestly who cares. What will the CIA learn from ordinary people that they don't already know?
A far great concern is Facebook's ruthless approach to deleting accounts if you become involved in political comment. I'm on my 4th FB profile thanks to these deletes, the last one they claimed was blocked because I wasn't me even though they had my credit card details and student email. This was what they required to 'consider' restoring the account, no guarantee...
Hi,
Thanks for providing this information. At this time, we cannot verify the ownership of the account. Please reply to this email with a digital image of a government-issued ID (e.g., driver's license, passport). If possible, save the file in JPEG format. Make sure the following information is clear:
- Full name
- Date of birth
- Photo
You may black out any personal information that is not needed to verify your identity (e.g., social security number). Rest assured that we will permanently delete your ID from our servers once we have used it to verify the authenticity of your account. Note that we will not be able to process your request unless you send in proper identification. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.
Thanks,
Liam
User Operations
Facebook
Why the fuck would Facebook need from me 'Government Issued Photo ID'. It is the sussest request I have ever seen.
I work in Europe for a computing American Corporate (Nasdaq). They have a Facebook page where they have photos/profiles of employees. They encourage employees to share their facebook pages, and a lot of them like to show where they were last weekend with their snotty babies and friends(!). Unfortunately, even in computing, a lot of people are ignorant in relation to privacy, or choose not to care, as long as they look good with upper management...
OTOH, I have 3 sisters that have non computer related jobs and it's a battle to explain this exact issue here in /. because they too are so naive that fear nothing from their "harmless activities". (As happened to a friend, someone recognized some friends in photos that is a known [pick one - communist, gay, black, pot smoker, etc, bla] and he was stalked for some time...
I lost contact with some friends because they don't look at their emails anymore, but are on facebook every day. I even considered opening a fake account just to contact them, but I too will not bother...
I have never had a facebook/tweeter/myspace/bla,bla account and never will, but I'm a computer programmer...
I'd mod parent Insightful, if I hadn't already posted in the discussion.
They can't use the information gained from spying in a court of law, since it would be inadmissible evidence. Even if an intelligence agency has full access to someone's Facebook details, the prosecutor needs to obtain the information a second time through legal means.
Also, intelligence agencies are careful not to reveal exactly how much they know. Keeping your sources hidden is one of the basic principles of intelligence.
When he is running Wikileaks and does not believe in secrets?
Everyone has something to hide.
Are you embarrassed about the type of porn you view? How about if your friends knew about it? If a prospective employer could check up on it? If your ex-wife's lawyer brought it up in a custody case?
Have you ever had any mental illness, veneral disease, or other condition you don't tell everyone about?
Have you ever left anything out when doing taxes?
I have nothing to hide from them, and it won't embarrass me if they know my dirty secrets, as long as they don't tell my dirty secrets to my friends.
It's called "blackmail". Favorite dish of faceless agencies.
The women weren't even sure themselves they had been raped. They went to the police to "consult", not to file a report, and the prosecutor decided to warrant an arrest based on their story. Incidentally, the prosecutor happened to know one of the women since before.
The arrest warrant was subsequently thrown out by a second prosecutor, and then reinstated by a third.
Also note that the women admit the sex was consensual. One of them accuses Assange of breaking the condom during consensual sex, and the other one accuses Assange of molesting her while she was sleeping in the same bed as him after the consensual sex.
And, yes, even Swedish lawyers think the allegations are ridiculous.
He sure was eager to hand American secrets over to the Russians, Chinese, Iranians, etc.
So... there is the glorious U.S.A. and other countries which no one cares about? Wow, you're fantastically narrow-minded.
I recommend watching the episode "Non Sequitur" of the series Star Trek Voyager for some insight into how creepy things can get.
And at the darkest hour of the humanity we, tinfoil hatted basement dwellers, the only ones unaffected by this social "thing", will arise to fight dark agencies and corporations for freedom... and free porn!
I used to work for one of the organisations listed in the summary. I'm not saying they don't have some nifty interface, but from everything I saw there, I seriously doubt that "interface" is any better than an email to a minion followed by said minion doing whatever digging is required and sending it back. That's a long way from having a secret room which only the spies know about that has a screen saying "Who do you want to spy on today?" written on it.
If nothing else, we can rely on human inefficiency to save us ;-)
The problem with facebook is that whatever information you post there can be used against you. So the best approach imo if you want to use it is to learn to truly understand the consequences of posting there and what you should avoid doing. This requires more than a regular common sense because everything you post there can be and is judged by someone and it is far from always clear how this can put you into disadvantage in different irl situations.
What people don't understand, including those defending their FB addiction here, and those who think they control what goes into FB, is that FB is not a free service. You pay for it with the explicit permission for them to use your data any way they see fit. What you are paying FB makes them a 50 billion dollar company. They couldn't care less about the consequences for you, when they monetize that information. They care about the bucks your information is worth to them. This is fundamentally immoral. If I decide my phone service has become too expensive, or too intrusive, or for whatever reason I want to stop rewarding them with my money, I just look for a different carrier, or I stop using a cell phone for a while. With FB, you can never take it back. What you give them, you give them forever, regardless if you use their service, or not.
Tell us something we don't know... for once, Assange.
One of the confirming factors of the hiding place of a certain recently deceased was that the compound had no telephone and no internet. Do you think in the future if you tried to live 'off the net' by not having a facebook account, twitter, gmail and whatever else, you might come under more scrutiny by DHS, FBI and so on?
I already get strange looks if I pay cash for anything over a ten in the shops (but then this is the UK, competing for the title of the most-surveilled population on the planet)
?.
The cops questioned me during an investigation on one of my friends, they kept asking me shit like "How do you know such & such."
It was obvious they were looking at my Myspace page at the time. They thought they were being clever too, like I would think it was just their great powers of investigation that brought them this knowledge. Fags
Yes, In some cases the government or other law enforcement agencies can just ask for the information. However, the entity can challenge that request and fight it in court. 3rd parties can also challenge the request in court. The phone companies who provided data to the government recieved critisism because they did not challenge the request and kept it secret which prevented any one else from challenging the request. The US has a sepration of powers and one thing that allows is for the courts to get the final say on whether information can be obtained or used in prosecuting someone accused of breaking the law. This whole thread was about people supposedly losing their "freedoms" and I still don't see any evidence to support this.
I choose not to be on Facebook because I don't want my friends to see me doing something embarrassing.
Just do what I do, and don't have any friends. Then you can put what you like on Facebook.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
This guy is the biggest fearmonger. I won't even start on how useless the data is on my Facebook. Next he'll tell us not to fill out the census because it's a spy tool.
twitter also deserves a mention, as it's designed to be compatible with text message analysis algorithms
mmm, condensed patterns of human thought *salivates*
This is old news. The Onion already thoroughly covered this. :-D :-D
http://www.theonion.com/video/cias-facebook-program-dramatically-cut-agencys-cos,19753/
Your not being spied on for nothing. This week end 50 facebook pages from anti cuts and anti austerity movements were pulled down, so freedom of speech in this case.
So use something instead of Facebook then. There's a whole internet out there.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Of course nobody minds much when Facebook is used to catch someone who's accused of armed robbery or assault. How about using Facebook to catch tax evaders [wsj.com]?
Tax evasion is a crime, so who the fuck cares if the criminal was stupid enough to get caught?
Oh, sorry, I forgot. On slashdot, not paying tax is the act of a fucking freedom fighter against teh tyrannical gubmint.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
People VOLUNTARILY share this information.
How can it be voluntary if you do not really know who you share it with? Do they ever tell you exactly who they shared your data with or will?
I dont read
NO. Not the device. SOME idiotic uses of the device. Idiots have always had access to computers, and they will always do stupid things with them.
Before Facebook, your website wasn't private. Anyone could see it. Any webcrawler could index it.
With Facebook, you can have a website, invite the people you know and like to see it, and, while some of that information might be shared with corporations for marketing purposes (although I question the extent to which this is true).
So I hope everyone who is so critical of Facebook also applies this doubly so to, say, Geocities, Google Pages, Blogger, and any blog or website hosting site that will make whatever you choose to share on it available to the entire world with no easy way to control its dissemination.
Show me the giant government database that the FBI is drooling over that contains naught but social networking information. Something like, what, 1 in 6 people in the world use Facebook or something? If that's the case, there should be MILLIONS of documented cases of governmental abuse of authority connected to Facebook data. Let's see them.
This is tin foil hat nonsense.
People are CHOOSING to share information on Facebook, the same way every academic chooses to share their CV on their website and their research with the world, the same way every geek had a publicly accessible website in the 90s. It's fun to share information. If the government wants it, more power to them. If it helps them catch the real criminals out there, go for it. If they want to abuse their authority, they don't need Facebook. They're not going to build an extensive case. They're just going to arrest you on bs charges and get you to take a plea with the threat of an outrageous sentence.
An agency that knows enough about you can impersonate you.
You can be falsely implicated in incriminating activities, as long as there is enough background information about you to make the charge credible.
Personal information is often used to intimidate. "Would you like to see your children alive again? We know exactly where they are"
If your children ever found out how lame you are, they'd murder you in your sleep
Either that, or some new technology takes over.
In the short-term future there's Twitter.Twitter is pretty hot right now, and since everything about it is public it's easy to get into conversations with people you don't know. You can hope and pretend that the stuff you post on Twitter isn't being mapped by someone, but it probably is. You might almost almost as well get on Facebook too.
In the mid-term future there could be free (freedom) services like for example Diaspora which would give you full control over how and when and to whom you choose to release your data. I'm not saying Diaspora will be the network that wins. I think what will actually happen is that there will evolve a free set of de-facto standards for communication and networking.
Let me see. You were never late for school, always did your homework, are too fat to expect to have an affair (are you married even?) always do what you are told and can't see the wood for the trees. You always pay bills on time and never contest them. You are only too willing to pay for services which tie you in to long term obligation to the Television/phone/ISP company and you don't mind what the small print says because you are willing to cough up no matter what. If the government increase its taxes you just pay up like a good puppy.
No wonder you don't mind being monitored. Your sad dull life is entirely acceptable to the powers that be.
The extra funny thing is that 1) Its voluntary, and 2) most people on facebook aren't thinking of themselves as criminals with things to hide.
People VOLUNTARILY share this information. Sure its a society where privacy can be beneficial, but this *society* is actually very social. People are driven to share their lives with each other, and while many a smirk is made by joking about the uselessness of facebook, the truth is we are drawn towards it like a magnet of interest! The truth is, the people on facebook aren't afraid of being called a 'criminal' because they probably don't consider themselves as such.
Now there might even be criminals using facebook to their own demise... Who knows... But unlike Assanage, most of us are living our lives without fear of some repercussion. And as we desire, we socialize.
Once Corporations and Government become the same thing -- maybe its too late to undo anything and we'll all get our tattoos and serial numbers... I just used the last of my tinfoil on a nice dinner, so... well... so much for worrying about being made out 'bad', lol.
The extra funny thing is that 1) Its voluntary, and 2) most people on facebook aren't thinking of themselves as criminals with things to hide.
People VOLUNTARILY share this information. Sure its a society where privacy can be beneficial, but this *society* is actually very social. People are driven to share their lives with each other, and while many a smirk is made by joking about the uselessness of facebook, the truth is we are drawn towards it like a magnet of interest! The truth is, the people on facebook aren't afraid of being called a 'criminal' because they probably don't consider themselves as such.
Now there might even be criminals using facebook to their own demise... Who knows... But unlike Assanage, most of us are living our lives without fear of some repercussion. And as we desire, we socialize.
Once Corporations and Government become the same thing -- maybe its too late to undo anything and we'll all get our tattoos and serial numbers... I just used the last of my tinfoil on a nice dinner, so... well... so much for worrying about being made out 'bad', lol.
Well Said, 100% agree
I've recently found myself single, and with a pretty lacking social network
In that situation, the best thing is to go out, get drunk and have meaningless sex with people whose name you can't even remember while you're fucking them, never mind ten minutes after you have passed out in their bathroom.
Slowly building up meaningful relationships online is vastly over-rated IMHO.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I already get strange looks if I pay cash for anything over a ten in the shops (but then this is the UK, competing for the title of the most-surveilled population on the planet)
As someone with absolutely no medical training, I am quite confident in diagnosing you as paranoid.
Hint: you're not getting strange looks because you're paying in cash, as almost everybody I know still does that. It would probably be unusual to buy a new car with cash, but that's about it.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
police are weary of cell phones with cameras etc.
Yes, the police are tired of cell phones with cameras.
That just exploded my irony meter.
I already get strange looks if I pay cash for anything over a ten in the shops (but then this is the UK, competing for the title of the most-surveilled population on the planet)
You must go in some strange shops then. £20 is nothing these days, I often pay for items up to about £30-40 in cash and never get 'strange looks'. Now if you tried to use a £50 note of course that *would* be suspicious!
(NB I don't know why, but slashdot sticks an 'A circumflex' in front of my GB pound signs.)
In some cases the government or other law enforcement agencies can just ask for the information. ...
This whole thread was about people supposedly losing their "freedoms" and I still don't see any evidence to support this.
How you can put those two sentences in the same paragraph without collapsing in self-ridicule, I have no idea.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
Don't people just post stuff they expect the NSA to read? Why does everyone assume that people don't manage their profiles?
When everything is assumed to be "on the grid" it is amazing how much privacy can be achieved by simply not participating in that grid for the aspects which demand privacy.
Put another way, if privacy was really in danger, people wouldn't still be so busy conducting PRIVATE drug deals and whatnot on a daily basis. /shrug most people keep their secrets private, they do not post to facebook that they need another bag of weed to smoke...
No, and here is the itinerary for tomorrow.. If I step on one more toy!
Why else? Money.
Joe Rogan talks about the military industrial complex
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
I have two words for you:
com-pro-mise [kom-pruh-mahyz]
- verb (used with object)
to expose or make vulnerable to danger, suspicion, scandal, etc.; jeopardize
lev-er-age [lev-er-ij]
- noun
power or ability to act or to influence people, events, decisions, etc.; sway
The extra funny thing is that 1) Its voluntary, and 2) most people on facebook aren't thinking of themselves as criminals with things to hide.
1) Wrong. Membership in Facebook is voluntary, but (at least those who care) users do not share their status updates and wall entries with government agencies. The issue is that Facebook can very easily be convinced with mild pressure to share those data with those agencies.
2) Wrong. Not sharing with everyone (i.e. privacy) has nothing to do with being a criminal.
In summary: FAIL
As we allow Facebook to expand an permeate other aspects of our lives (news, school etc...) the "choice" whether to be a part of Facebook becomes much bigger. Moxie Marlinspike states that it is akin to "choosing" to buy a cell phone now. It's not merely a choice of whether or not you want to own a piece of consumer electronics is more a choice of whether you want to be a part of society. As Facebook expands, choosing to not be on it means choosing to become less relevant. That situation is perfect for Facebook.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qzldtKV1PY
http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/2846ca1b6bee64e1
"As I see it, there is a race going on. The race is between two trends. On the one hand, the internet can be used to profile and round up dissenters to the scarcity-based economic status quo (thus legitimate worries about privacy and something like TIA). On the other hand, the internet can be used to change the status quo in various ways (better designs, better science, stronger social networks advocating for things like a basic income, all supported by better structured arguments like with the Genoa II approach) to the point where there is abundance for all and rounding up dissenters to mainstream economics is a non-issue because material abundance is everywhere. So, as Bucky Fuller said, whether is will be Utopia or Oblivion will be a touch-and-go relay race to the very end. While I can't guarantee success at the second option of using the internet for abundance for all, I can guarantee that if we do nothing, the first option of using the internet to round up dissenters (or really, anybody who is different, like was done using IBM computers in WWII Germany) will probably prevail. So, I feel the global public really needs access to these sorts of sensemaking tools in an open source way, and the way to use them is not so much to "fight back" as to "transform and/or transcend the system". As Bucky Fuller said, you never change thing by fighting the old paradigm directly; you change things by inventing a new way that makes the old paradigm obsolete."
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Of course nobody minds much when Facebook is used to catch someone who's accused of armed robbery or assault. How about using Facebook to catch tax evaders [wsj.com]?
Tax evasion is a crime, so who the fuck cares if the criminal was stupid enough to get caught?
Oh, sorry, I forgot. On slashdot, not paying tax is the act of a fucking freedom fighter against teh tyrannical gubmint.
I wrote the post you quoted. I don't personally support tax evasion, but like it or not, I'd guess that lots of people don't perceive tax evasion to be as serious as assault or property crimes.
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/03/how-common-is-tax-evasion/
“Various estimates put the tax cheat rate at 80 to 95 percent of people who employ baby sitters, housekeepers and home health aides.”
Anyway, as others said, it's not about whether someone is a criminal, it's about whether stuff you post will ever be used against you, and whether that kind of information should be concentrated in the hands of the government or huge corporations.
You don't get it. You just don't.
This guy is way out there
They voluntarily shared it with FB. You're supposed to understand (by careful reading of the EULA) that FB's intent has always been to share that with any and all they can.
"Tongue tied and twisted, just an Earth bound misfit
So the government or other law enforcement agencies cannot even ask for information up front when investigating a crime? I suggest you take some remedial courses in how to use your brain.
Maybe it's because there is nothing to get? This whole thread has been about US citizens losing their rights. I asked for some examples of this horrible situation and have got nothing but people trying to justify their opinion with 100% BS. Trying to get information when investigating a crime is not taking your rights. If the information is offered up freely what is the problem? If the information is not offered up freely the person being asked for the information can seek redress from the courts which is exactly what happens. People have been acquitted of charges when the the judicial system overrides the enforcement agencies when it is determined that the information was obtained by violating the well defined legal standards.
The biggest fearmonger ever. I won't even begin on how useless the data on my Facebook is. Next he'll tell us not to fill out the census because it's a spy tool.
I've got a dirty little secret.
I don't like facebook *gasp*.
But alas, I don't have a national platform to voice my opinions on how much I despise the service.
Shut up Julian, you're a douche.
It's about not giving some centralized entity an enormous power because they know everything about everyone. Such a huge power will be misused, sooner or later.
This is why I see it as so appalling how our own governments are proposing the notion that "if you've nothing to fear then you've nothing to hide". This is the same argument regimes like N.Korea, China, etc. use.
When a government legislates to shift a boundary as to what "something to hide" is, you don't want that to immediately imply "something to fear". Nobody should fear government, even a criminal. Ideally, a just punishment for a wrongdoing should be expected as a natural result of it. You know the rules. When the rules are clearly unfair, you should expect an avenue to pursue change.
Unfortunately, the "hard line" approach seems to be becoming a little more prevalent in western culture.
Once again because there is nothing to get. Your innuendos,weak equivocations, and unwillingness to confront reality leaves your arguments meaningless. If you "get it" why can't you prove it?
So why did facebook provide an interface for the government agencies? I know it didnt start with it but is it a law that once your site reaches more than x% of citizens then the government needs to have access to it?
They surely can, if you're enough of an idiot to give all your information to somebody else who doesn't give a shit about you. That's what I've been saying this whole time.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
This entire thread has been about US citizens supposedly losing their "rights". This theory was supported by arguing the government can take any information they want at any time and use it against you. My reply was that this is a false accusation that can not be supported once you look at the law and the protections you have under the law. Your last response does not enter into this discussion in any way and I should probably have ignored you from the start.
You are incorrect. This discussion is about people giving their rights away.
You are also extremely rude.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
So I'm not guessing about whether or not I'm on a watchlist, I *know* that I'm on someone's list!
Life is much easier when you know and accept that you are being watched.
Put an image on your PC and be connected to the internet... and the government can get it one way or another.. or show up at your house and take your stuff. Let me guess, you've got some 'plan' where you run some quickly crafted batch file to delete stuff right when they're banging the doors in.... haha.. yeah right.
If the government ever had interest in what you are doing it never took facebook to find it all out.
As I said before, it is totally voluntary. The internet in all its forms and security layers should always be considered public domain. Do you realize your slashdot debates and quips are adding to your portfolio?
Also, your response to my #2 assumes way too much. What I said was true... What you think I implied -- that privacy is for criminals -- is not at all what I said. What I said is true, read it without your assumed implications and in the thought process regarding TFA.
Put an image on your PC and be connected to the internet... and the government can get it one way or another.. or show up at your house and take your stuff.
Right, but only with a valid search warrant. And in the case of non-US citizens, the US government has some more troubles to come to the house (well, some exceptions lately....)
If the government ever had interest in what you are doing it never took facebook to find it all out.
As I said before, it is totally voluntary. The internet in all its forms and security layers should always be considered public domain. Do you realize your slashdot debates and quips are adding to your portfolio?
Sorry, that's not true. The Internet is all its forms and security layers include public Web sites, private Web sites (login/password), Shopping sites incl. payments, backup sites, cloud computing sites, torrents and whatever. So, some should be considered public domain, some should be considered private groups, some should be considered really private.
Facebook has the option to set your privacy level (awkwardly, but it's there). The issue is that if this level can be easily circumvented by the government that it's really a privacy issue. And as other mentioned: Another big problem is that you might show up in Facebook without even being a member. Having chatty "friends" is enough.
Also, your response to my #2 assumes way too much. What I said was true... What you think I implied -- that privacy is for criminals -- is not at all what I said. What I said is true, read it without your assumed implications and in the thought process regarding TFA.
If you did not imply this, then it is like the "and when did you stop beating your wife?" question, which does not (?) imply that you did actually beat your wife.
Step back into reality, please. Everything on the net is public and it is reckless to think you've got any security at all even in the most 'secure' places.
Also, please work on reading comprehension. Not all what YOU ASSUME to be implied is implied - nothing I wrote is akin to the poor example you gave. Try reading it AGAIN without your assumptions... Good luck, because I can tell you've already decided what it says, lol.
Here.. let me make things obvious:
http://it.slashdot.org/story/11/05/05/1831217/LastPass-Pasword-Service-Hacked
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/04/27/142238/77-Million-Accounts-Stolen-From-Playstation-Network
or better yet... http://yro.slashdot.org/index2.pl?fhfilter=security+breach ..............
Oh right... SUING people gets all your data back... You're totally secure! Lol. Welcome to reality. It is all accessible.