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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."
for knowing every inane thought that crosses the mind of people I only vaguely care anything about.
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Cool! Now we can use you as part of the Human CentiPad!
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Where did he tell you to do anything but understand?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
He's not talking to you, you prick. He's raising public awareness. Get over yourself.
You need to stop putting words in other people's mouths.
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.
Well you're the one who chose to read that.
That is the benefit of having agencies like the CIA and NSA, right?
Truly only idiots think that anything that they put out on the internet is private. Once it's out there it's available to multiple organizations, legal and illegal. If you don't want anyone to see it, don't give it out.
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.
The fun part is that Assange is considered a criminal by most of the people he's trying to help. Oh, the irony.
We didn't sell it, we gave it away. We got absolutely nothing of value in return for it.
Where is he?
>>>Julian Assange needs to stop trying to tell me what I should and should not do.
(rereads article) Where was this? Actually the question was not about you, but whether Assange believed Facebook was used by the US and EU governments to "arrange" the revolutions in the Mideast. (I'm inclined to say yes, especially since the google CEO bragged about it.)
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
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.
The guy who wants all information to be accessible to everyone is complaining the biggest collections of information are too accessible?
No, you got it wrong. He stands for open governments, not people. That's a big difference.
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...
Using wires is completely voluntary.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
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.
On the plus side, well over 99% of the data on Facebook is garbage. At least they're suffering for the information that's worth extracting.
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
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!
My thought exactly :) ...*chuckle*
Openness goes both ways
He wants all information _which should be available to public_ to be available to public. And here, he is talking about private information, which, under normal circumstances, requires governments to go to court to be able to obtain.
Seriously - are you really that stupid or just trolling?
>>>is considered a criminal by most of the people he's trying to help
Well as he says, "Our No. 1 enemy is ignorance." Most of the people are simply ignorant of how they are being lied to by politicians, and controlled. - "And I believe that is the No. 1 enemy for everyone â" itâ(TM)snot understanding what actually is going on in the world. It's only when you start to understand that you can make effective decisions and effective plans. Now, the question is, who is promoting ignorance? Well, those organizations that try to keep things secret, and those organizations which distort true information to make it false or misrepresentative. In this latter category, it is bad media.
"One of the hopeful things that Iâ(TM)ve discovered is that nearly every war that has started in the past 50 years has been a result of media lies. The media could've stopped it if they had searched deep enough; if they hadn't reprinted government propaganda they could've stopped it. But what does that mean? Well, that means that basically populations don't like wars, and populations have to be fooled into wars. Populations don't willingly, with open eyes, go into a war. So if we have a good media environment, then we also have a peaceful environment."
This man sounds a lot like Alex Jones.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Since Facebook users volunteer up the information that pretty much makes it public information.
Seriously, I don't care if you know that I'm at the book store buying a coffee. If I don't want this information to be public I don't post it. Problem solved.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
He didn't tell you to do anything. He warned you. Be as proud of your own stupidity as you like, that seems to be popular with Americans these days, but try not to put words into other people's mouths.
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?
He isn't telling you what you should or should not do. He's telling you what you should KNOW before you hit that accept button.
As news have shown time and time again, most people do not read privacy policy of facebook, and do not think of consequences of facebook information availability.
That's philosophy of openness is fine, so long as you don't fall on the government's "undesirables" list. Like those folk who were blacklisted simply because they belonged to the communist party. Or had the unfortunate status of being japanese from 1942 to 46.
Or get "extra" attention by highway patrols because they are Harley riders, or DWB (driving while black). Or suspected downloaders of porn. "We don't know if he's a pedophile, but by god he's downloaded a lot of nude images. Surely one of those girls LOOKS underage, and we can frame him for it. Oh look - he's bought japanese comics of underage boys and girls from ebay. Book him."
Or posting a "sexual" photo to facebook when you're only 17 years and 11 months. Sexting is a favorite of overzealous prudes in prosecutors' offices. (Or horror - an 18 year old boy dating a 17 year old junior.)
Et cetera, et cetera.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
we offer this little video: http://www.albumoftheday.com/facebook/
The point is not in "hiding from government", but not allowing your personal friendships into easy view of people with potentially dangerous agendas.
You may or may not know that your friend is now an activist for a political movement that government doesn't like for example. Before, there was no way for them to tell about your level of friendship, and they wouldn't have the man power to investigate every human contact he has. Now, they go to facebook, collect the information on friendships and have a nice list of additional suspects to fine comb through.
In this regard, it's the ease of availability that is dangerous to the user. This is a change on similar scale to telephones, and wiretapping that came with it. It allows for centralised data collection on a level that was impossible before.
Where "should be available" means "he wants to be available". Seriously, who gave the right to decide national security policy to Assange rather than, you know, that government we elected democratically?
Also I don't see him providing any reliable source for this assertion. You're the leaker guy, Assange. Back your shit up with leaks or STFU.
I hit the accept button
And enabled a 20-something douchebag to make billions. Thank you for contributing to The Idiocracy.
I think I might have heard YOU are a rapist.
See, now you can be an alleged rapist too!
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Fallacy_of_division
Thanks for playing.
Right. But most (not all) of your examples have nothing to do with facebook. And not using facebook isn't really going to make the government stop bothering you, if it has decided that's what it's going to do. In fact, it's where one in that situation should go to best spread the message of one's oppression. It's where the most people will listen. (That, and twitter.)
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
Like you pointed out - a lot of the same could be said about telephones, but it's not reasonable to not use a phone because you're scared of the government. [[ Well, not THAT reasonable ;) ... You never know ;) ]]
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
No mod points, but have an agreement instead.
http://www.theonion.com/video/cias-facebook-program-dramatically-cut-agencys-cos,19753/
In my opinion, a lot of this is a self-aggrandizing operation and one in which he's successfully made himself a celebrity and taken credit for a lot of people's contributions.
Despite the fact that some of what he publicizes needs to be known, I'm not going to apply altruistic motives to someone who has done what he's done to great personal advantage, despite a spell in a jail cell.
>>>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"
You see, I've never been able to understand this sort of thinking. Why, if ignorance is such an objective evil, are there people actively trying to promote it? If populations never willingly go into a war, then why do we ever go into wars? Is it the case that the situations which justify a war never exist, but are some kind of fantasy? If so, why do people who supposedly have access to the "genuine" information still insist on going to war? Is it merely because it is in their best interest? If so, why is it always in the best interest of those who can be well informed without media intervention and always in the worst interest of people who cannot? It seems to me that this philosophy explicitly posits a good guys vs. bad guys cosmology, and the idea that the soul of mankind would be pure and lily white if it were free of these unseen Illuminati who have apparently raided the secret stash of evil that God keeps in the back of the fridge, out of reach of everyone below a certain income bracket. That worldview smells too much like shit for me to believe, no matter how much hippie-charisma it has.
Feature that will no doubt be added to Facebook soon: ghost profiles. They probably already have it for people who get tagged in photos but don't have a Facebook account, but I expect soon it will become an acknowledged process - you'll be able to say "I know that girl" and create a profile for her.. fill in any information you know about her.. and other people will do the same. Those of us who don't have Facebook profiles will first hear about it when someone says "hey, I sent you a friend request on Facebook and you didn't accept it!" and you say "I don't have a Facebook profile" and they say "oh, it must be a ghost profile."
Enjoy the total information society.
How we know is more important than what we know.
What freedoms are being harmed?
>>>But most (not all) of your examples have nothing to do with facebook.
Disagree. Facebook reveals:
- party affiliation (i.e. communist)
- race (asian)
- porn habit
- sexting photos
- you're a Japanese comic book collector
- posting "My boyfriend is a college guy" when you're only 16 or 17.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
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
Your examples suck.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
>>>If populations never willingly go into a war, then why do we ever go into wars?
Same reason Obama drug us into Libya (or Bush into Iraq).
Because he can.
And damn what the people think (most are against the war). Of course the real power to enter war is supposed to be with the People, as represented by their representatives in Congress. Unfortunately Congress is about as powerless today, as the Roman Senate was under the caesars. The Republic has fallen. The emperor has risen. (And I don't just mean this one example - the Executive has been ignoring congress a lot lately.)
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
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.
Says the almighty and infamous AC....swimming deep in the seas of irony I see...
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.
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
so how does he justify releasing secret information?
...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.'...
When you really think about the logistics and expense involved in tracking someone down and doing an investigation, having some young intel analyst sit behind a desk and with a few mouse clicks find out just as much information on you in about 20 minutes is likely a hell of a lot cheaper on the taxpayer than spending days or weeks doing intel gathering the "old fashioned" way.
Great! So now I have to go around with a cheesy fake handlebar moustache wherever I go.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
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
"Seriously, who gave the right to decide national security policy to Assange rather than, you know, that government we elected democratically?"
He's not an american citizen. He doesn't need to ask our government's position.
This space available.
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!
He can't get fame and fortune from revealing secrets if they're already all over Facebook.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
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.
Also, the info in question is (allegedly?) only open to the government, not everyone.
But I think Assange wants openness for people and institutions he wants openness for. They possess and have released documents belonging to publicly traded corporations, private clubs, etc. I'd guess that if he had medical records of a public figure he'd release those as well. In a lot of these cases, he may have a compelling argument that this data should be released, but it's not as simple as "only governments."
Ceci n'est pas un sig.
The same reason people use drugs, or go to religious services
The easiest way to feel good about yourself is to put down others. By putting down someone else you make them beneath you thus you are better than them, and thus you can feel better about yourself. Doesn't really matter if it is color, creed, or learned behavior. We go to war to self-enforce those beliefs. That is why War always boils down to us vs them.
We use mind altering substances(alcohol is included) to alter our perceived reality to the point where we can accept ourselves.
Most people can't accept grey, or accept responsibility for their own actions. They can't work with people in peace.
I know from personal experience that there are some people I just can't stand. It isn't they are bad people, or I resent them, but simply our personalities clash in a way that is difficult to tell why we argue when we both agree.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
The emperor has risen. (And I don't just mean this one example - the Executive has been ignoring congress a lot lately.)
If Obama could ignore Congress, he would have:
-closed Guantanimo (closure blocked by "bipartisan"--but mostly Republican--majority in House and Senate removing funding for any transfer, as well as forbidding the transfer to anywhere inside the US)
-passed a stimulus bill that actually invested the majority of its money into job creation, rather than half into tax breaks for the rich (a "compromise" made with Republicans to keep them from stonewalling more than they already did)
-given us a public healcare option (blocked by thirty-nine Republicans plus Joe Frickin' Lieberman whose state houses the headquarters of most major health insurance companies)
-written a banking reform law with teeth (again, rendered toothless by forty Republicans)
Politically, our biggest problem is that we have a two-party system, where one party is totally, openly evil and corrupt, and the other is slightly less evil and corrupt, but their non-evil tendencies are easily blocked because the evil one thinks nothing of playing chicken with the budget, the government, even the entire economy in order to get what they want, which is apparently more cash giveaways for their rich campaign donors.
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.
Won't work. See my comment above.
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..
OMG! I knew I shouldn't have posted my porn preferences for my family and friends to see. Oh wait. I don't.
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.
Ummm is this information accessible to you? No? But it's fully acessible to the Govn't.. And we trust them!
Have you fscked your local propeller head today?
Since Facebook users volunteer up the information that pretty much makes it public information.
Okay, so if I post information on Facebook (either editing my profile or posting a status) then I am voluntarily giving that information to Facebook, so that makes it public information? Even though I expect only people I have marked as friends to see such information by my privacy settings? What if I send a Facebook message? It has a clear "To" header like an e-mail; should that information be considered public? For that matter what about GMail? I am inputting information into a textbox on a website with the intent that (specific) other people will read that text. Should I therefore treat that text as public knowledge? For a physical analogue, suppose I write my text on paper (perhaps multiple copies) and put those pieces of paper into envelopes and send them to my friends via snail mail. I, once again, have written text and tendered it to a third-party for delivery to a specific set of private individuals. Should I still expect this text to be public?
The United States has laws about privacy and due process. New technology should not make it so the government no longer has to follow due process in collecting private information on its citizens. Unfortunately, due to the nature of network effects, a lot of information gets concentrated in the hands of a few entities (in this case, Facebook) who do not necessarily have much interest in dealing with the government, so they simply freely hand over the information. I suppose privacy laws could be written to make it illegal for Facebook to hand over information about its users to the government, but it is not clear what such laws would even look like nor who would be supporting them.
Seriously, I don't care if you know that I'm at the book store buying a coffee. If I don't want this information to be public I don't post it. Problem solved.
You are right that a lot of this information actually is not that important. At the same time, I do not like the idea that law enforcement personnel can peer into my private life as recorded by various services I use without even having to justify the invasion of my privacy to a judge.
Of course, see my sig: I dislike the idea of monolithic services that are able to collect such information and would prefer that social networking (and other) services be made up of collections of smaller separately administered nodes, each of which would have far less information. How to do that while still having a usable service is, unfortunately, an open problem.
Centralization breaks the internet.
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.
Hey, I do that daily, granted it's not fake...
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
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'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.
it should also be noted that there's a line "Follow us on Facebook" on this site...
http://www.wikileaks.ch/gitmo/
Which leads to here:
http://www.facebook.com/wikileaks
CIA's 'Facebook' Program Dramatically Cut Agency's Costs
Disagree. Facebook reveals:
- party affiliation (i.e. communist)
Mine says: Polical views: yes
- race (asian)
haven't been asked that one
- porn habit
No one need pester me with questions like "What do you want for Christmas?" anymore.
- sexting photos
Anyone who has met me in the flesh would be shuddering right now
- you're a Japanese comic book collector
What a horrible thing for strangers to know about you!
- posting "My boyfriend is a college guy" when you're only 16 or 17.
and?
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
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.
Security from your neighbors of course.
A loop, by its nature, continues. If that didn't make sense, start reading this sentence again.
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!
Assange comes from far too privileged of a life.
The "most appalling spy machines" I can think of are the North Korean/Soviet/Chinese/Ba'ath/Iranian surveillance systems, where they don't even have notions such as warrants and due process and right to reasonable privacy. Assange needs to read about some true issues in the world. We still have hundreds of thousands of North Koreans in physical labor reeducation centers, Chinese sending hundreds of citizens at a time to secret prisons, Syrian Ba'ath surveillance where a government informer is installed in every individual neighborhood, pervasive Iranian political police cracking down on dissidents... Come on now, there are far worse monstrosities in the world today than Facebook telling the world on accident that you cheat on your significant other or do drugs. Some people need to get a grip.
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.
I don't think it's entirely unreasonable to be concerned about such, I'm personally more concerned about what others post about me than what i post. Things like "really enjoying my time out of the country with @mywhitewolf" scare the crap out of me. I'm not an idiot, but my friends on the other hand...
The fun part is you LIE about what others think. I have yet to encounter 1 person in real life who thinks Assanges a criminal. Care to share which laws he has broken>? of wait of course you cant.
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.
he also didn't leak the information, he just published it, along with a whole host of other media outlets.
really, because the amount of information available about me on facebook seems pretty inconsistent with what i've put on there. I don't recall giving facebook my mobile number yet they somehow have it, and all those pictures i've been tagged in that i don't recall uploading.
the problem isn't the information you put on it, the problem is the information your friends put on it about you. sort of nullifies the opt out option.
"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.
If your friends are good friends they won't tell the police much about you if they get approached, they can speak to a lawyer and inform the person they are being investigated.
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!
He sure was eager to hand American secrets over to the Russians, Chinese, Iranians, etc.
and lets not forget the American public too... heaven forbit they get any access to the "secret gubberment information", we don't want them making informed decisions.
do you think the politicians fear china or the American people more? which one has the ability to strip them of their power?
also, Assange has no allegiance to the USA, he isn't a us citizen. any other non American news organization in the world who wasn't corrupt would have done exactly the same thing.
I'd say releasing hundred thousands of pages of secret war logs and government communication is hardly a small achievement by any measure.
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
I think you're talking about manning, not Assange.
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.
Must not be secret if he has it.
The reason we subjugate ourselves to law is to better procure justice. If law does not accomplish this purpose then it m
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
You have small political groups forming, with real pictures of people, their friends, friends of friends. Facial recognition, voice prints, ip's, email... all connected back to state, federal, private and international databases.
Loaded in from a city, state, local level in near real time by state, federal and their 'helpers' nothing is really hard work anymore.
Tracking 10 people at a peace group meeting in a small hall once a month was suffering. Adding your own agent into that group was suffering.
Now its all done for them.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
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.
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
If Obama could ignore Congress...
He would become a dictator. Simple as that.
Politically, our biggest problem is that we have a two-party system, where both parties are totally evil and corrupt.
FTFY.
Ask yourself - does he call himself a major hacker or is that what lazy journalists are doing?
Also this stuff is obvious to you and me but apparently not to all the morons on facebook that post incriminating items under their real name and where prospective employers can see them. It's not a bad thing to say if a microphone is shoved in your face by a journalist that really wants something about a very mundane sex "scandal" instead.
....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!
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).
Go check out OpenBook, way too many people do (ew!)
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.
...Chinese sending hundreds of citizens at a time to secret prisons...
in Poland? Afghanistan? Egypt? Where? Oh that's right.. it's a secret...
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
Yes.
It is a self-propelling system. The people in positions with power, utilize that power to stay in power. The most effective way is to control the fourth power. They convince the people that "do not have access to information without media intervention" that the activity resulting in enhancing their power is in the interest of the public. But it is not not. Because if it was, it would weaken the power of politicians and increase the power of the public. If they allowed that happen, the system would stop be self-propelling and it would not make sense to attempt to get in the power position.
</rant>
a lot of the same could be said about telephones
The last time I checked, my speed dial was not public knowledge.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
Unfortunately Congress is about as powerless today, as the Roman Senate was under the caesars.
Hahahahahahahahahahaha!
Oh man, that's a good one. That must be why Congress is actively ramming technical rocket designs down NASA's (read, top world organization of rocket scientists) throat with little to no regard about what actual engineers and scientists have to say about the design. That must be why Congress has been bobbling around various bits and pieces of corrupt corporation backing copyright legislation (what's it called this time around, COICA?). That must be why Congress cast the deciding vote on whether or not we (the U.S.) should go to war in Iraq. Best yet, that must be why Congress recently voted on the extension of the "Fuck Your Civil Liberties," errrr, I mean "PATRIOT Act" recently.
Yup, those poor powerless Congress-critters, whatever will they do?
Don't fucking kid yourself. Congress isn't powerless. It's simply a bought and sold organization that whores itself out to the highest bidder. You're right in one thing, Congressional members don't represent shit-all of their constituencies interests. But Congress is far from powerless. It's simply another tumor killing the country that the United States of America could have been in the 21st century.
Motorcycles, Robots, Space Gossip and More!
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
You're right. But >99% of the people out there are dumb, and when there's a question asked, they'll answer it.
Some of us blatantly lie. Well, unless people should believe that I live just outside the gates of Area 51, and I work for a secret division of O2STK. Let me give you a ride in my black van, to my unmarked silent black helicopter. I promise you'll make it home in one piece. :)
It can be fun though. Have you ever changed your high school to some random school, and then friended everyone who went to it? Guess what. Most of them will friend you, and give you enough conversation fodder to hold conversations with others that actually went there. After 20-some years, no one remembers everyone they went to school with, so it's pretty easy. It's kind of like party crashing the high school reunion, except you don't have to go anywhere, and the prank lasts an awful lot longer.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
I know you want to be the "I hate all politicians" guy, but it's not useful to ignore the substantial differences between the parties. There are substantial similarities, too, of course, but you don't have to look far to see all the issues on which the parties disagree. Considering the two major parties to be equal is similar to how certain people in this country want to consider evolution and creationism to be equally valid, arguing that they should be treated the same since they both are explanations of where species come from. It may seem like the diplomatic thing to do, but it doesn't make a damn bit of sense.
(Before you go attacking my analogy, let me say that I fully understand that the analogy is nowhere near perfect--after all, evolution is science and creationism is pseudo-scientific supernatural nutjobbery--rather, the point I'm making is that it doesn't make sense to draw a false equivalency to avoid choosing one over the other.)
From what I read, that was one of the dead giveaways. A million dollar house with no phones or Internet service. I would have suspected it for a grow house though. :)
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
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!
Of course the real power to enter war is supposed to be with the People, as represented by their representatives in Congress. Unfortunately Congress is about as powerless today, as the Roman Senate was under the caesars. The Republic has fallen. The emperor has risen.
Ironically, in the UK where wars are constitutionally a "royal prerogative" and theoretically undemocratic, they are actually declared by the elected government in the Commons. It seems political double-speak works both ways.
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.
Sociopaths.
If one good thing will come out of the current (disgusting and overblown) pedophile scare, it will be willingness to discriminate against people whose mental deficiencies pose serious threat to the rest of society.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
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__()
It is also not useful for you to ignore the simple fact that politicans from both parties are corrupt in different ways. Just because politicians from party R is corrupt for doing thing Y while politicians from party D is corrupt for doing thing X doesn't mean that party R/D is more corrupt than party D/R.
Both parties are similarly corrupt, and that's a fact. Saying that one party is less evil than the other one is pretty much stupid on your part. It is really easy to point out crazy things that politicians from each party does. Very easy.
Even though I expect only people I have marked as friends to see such information by my privacy settings?
If that's your expectation, I think you've failed to grasp Facebook's business model.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
Was this an old interview, or is he really this stupid? Everyone else figured this out 7 years ago when facebook launched.
Why did it take people so long to figure this out?
Simply dropping an "I" completely hid this in plain sight.
>>>But most (not all) of your examples have nothing to do with facebook.
Disagree. Facebook reveals:
- party affiliation (i.e. communist)
- race (asian)
- porn habit
- sexting photos
- you're a Japanese comic book collector
- posting "My boyfriend is a college guy" when you're only 16 or 17.
Now you've made it worse by copying your profile on slashdot.
Both parties are similarly corrupt, and that's a fact. Saying that one party is less evil than the other one is pretty much stupid on your part. It is really easy to point out crazy things that politicians from each party does. Very easy.
Instances are not trends. Yes, it's true that the Democrats share a few of the Republicans' failings:, in particular an over-willingness to kowtow to the whims of the media/telcomm lobby (an unfortunate necessity in today's world, where so few media companies control so much of public opinion), which leads to their unfortunate shared support for strengthening imaginary property laws. They also have the unique failing of being especially enamored of the trial lawyer lobby, and thus aren't really looking that hard at frivolous lawsuits and litigation trolls. On the other hand, the Republican Party is at this point completely taken over by megacorporate interests, to the point that they no longer even consider the impact of their policies on any other group.
You don't have to look back any further than last December to see that the only Republican principle that they really care about is to give away money to wealthy campaign donors, and to take money away from any program that is not a giveaway to those donors. These Tea Party activists may have genuinely bought into the media campaign that Republicans have used for decades to get elected, but that's almost more frightening; the only thing more destructive to the country than what the Republicans are actually doing are the things that they *say* they're going to do, backed by the fanaticism of true believers.
.. Assange is actually right here.
Insert
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?
Politically, our biggest problem is that we have a two-party system, where both parties are totally evil and corrupt.
FTFY.
I thought one party was totally evil and corrupt, and the other was totally incompetent and corrupt.
I came here to point out the same thing. If Facebook is so evil, why does Wikileaks have a facebook presence?
I know this and I choose to do this. The difference here is that I hit the accept button.
That's nice, but even if you don't choose to do that and hit that accept button, your friends can still share quite a lot of information about you.
I think Assange's point is that Facebook is far more effective than any surveillance system oppressive dictatorships can dream up.
First off, nowhere in my post did I say that one party was corrupt and the other wasn't. Both certainly are. I didn't say that only one of the parties does crazy things. Both do.
Corruption and craziness are not the only components of evil, however. Of course you can come up with examples of evil from either party, but what you said is that "both parties are totally evil and corrupt". For a party to be "totally evil", there must be absolutely no redeeming qualities (i.e. not one thing that is not evil). For both parties to be totally evil, neither must have any non-evil component. Since there are some things that the parties believe in that are not evil, they are not totally evil. Also, pointing out one instance of crazy (or evil) does not prove craziness or evil. For instance, my mother is a generally nice person, but it's really easy to point out a crazy thing she's said and/or done. Very easy. That doesn't make her crazy or evil.
Since we seem to be calling people stupid now, I will contend that to say that both parties are "totally evil" is stupid on your part. Either you're willfully ignoring the things that are not evil, or you're letting loose with the superlatives a little too easily. I will also contend that you have absolutely no concept of "totally evil". Neither party in this country is anywhere near totally evil. Maybe Kim Jong Il is totally evil, maybe Hosni Mubarak is totally evil. If you mean to insinuate that the Republicans and Democrats are as evil as Kim and Mubarak, then I'm afraid you're too far gone to attempt to have any kind of reasonable discussion with you. If that's not what you meant, it's time for you to recalibrate your evil meter.
Both parties are similarly corrupt, and that's a fact.
It would be great if people learned the difference between fact and opinion. There is certainly evidence of corruption in both parties, but without hard data to back up your assertion, it's no more than a guess. I don't know whether it's right, but I'm certainly not going to state any comparison on that metric as fact without proof (and before you try, showing n examples of corruption on each side is not proof).
I stand by my contention that it's not useful to ignore the difference between the parties. Yes, both are corrupt, but unless a third party can manage to get a foothold in American politics, you're going to have to choose between the two. It's extremely likely that one party matches your views more than the other party does. I can prove it, too.
Let's say there are n issues that the parties disagree on. We will make an independence assumption (in reality, many of the issues depend on others, which should tilt the scales even more in favor of one party or the other). With this independence assumption, we will let X be a random variable representing n random samples drawn from the binomial distribution, representing a person with random opinions on each topic. If n is odd, one party will always be favored over another. If n is even, there is a possibility that a sample will fall exactly at the midpoint, where the number of issues agreeing with each party is equal. As n increases, this converges to the Gaussian distribution, where while the maximum likelihood estimate is indeed the "center point", the probability of landing exactly there approaches 0. For finite n, it is trivial to show that with n>=3 (in other words, just 3 issues to consider), it is more likely to fall closer to one party's views than to land on the midpoint. At n=2, you would be equally likely to be in the middle as you would to agree more with one party or the other. At no point, however, for positive n, does the midpoint have a probability mass greater than 0.5.
Don't worry, I'm sure sure they can make up one. After all, our Swedish prosecutors managed to put out an arrest warrant for rape because he allegedly broke the condom when having consensual sex...
usually the ignorant aren't so quick to make themselves known, nor are the morons too stupid to understand the difference between information and orders. go back to fox news website moron, this place isn't for you.
Most likely true. People do "heroic" things for all kinds of reasons: fame, ego boost, being desired by the opposite sex, and so on. As long as they don't act irresponsibly, I'm ok with it.
I'm always shocked when I see the "There's much worse places in the world, so what we do is alright" argument.
Let me put thing this way:
- If any democratic country needs to be put side-by-side with the worse countries in the world to look good, then it's a failure.
Beyond that, there's also the issue of direction - as in, "What is the direction things are taking?" - which seems to be quietly ignored by the apologists of "We're better than North Korea" style of argument.
Given that in the US (and also, to an extent, in most Western Democracies) things are getting worse when it comes to respect for people's rights while, for example, in North Korea they're not (in fact, they can only get better over there), then the US looks worse (going down) than North Korea (not going anywhere).
If you want to be a real patriot, I suggest you look at the road ahead and try and get the driver to avoid driving you down a deep canyon rather than spending your time looking at the car seats and comenting on how wonderful it all is.
Why should I hide from my government? It's not like they don't already know who I am.
I think the point is that sites like Facebook enables the government to do this on a massive scale. It means they will have more time to go after you, if you happen to do something illegal or undesirable. But more importantly, it gives the government too much power. Everyone has done something wrong. Those who have the resources to dig deep enough, can jail or destroy the reputation of anyone who opposes them, from Joe Public to Mother Theresa.
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.
Come on now, there are far worse monstrosities in the world today than Facebook telling the world on accident that you cheat on your significant other or do drugs.
Just because there are worse monstrosities doesn't mean we have to accept all the lesser monstrosities.
"we are all atheists about most of the gods that societies have ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further."
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.
So if I were to submit corrupt and stupid things done by politicians by both parties, you don't want to accept it? Then there is no reason for us to have any reasonable discussion then.
Both parties are totally corrupt and evil, and there are no redeeming qualities at all from them. There are no difference at all between them. If I were you, I will vote for a third-party candidate, or do not vote at all if none of the candidates and parties deserved my vote. No need to come up with silly formulas to determine which party is less evil than the other. But I think the concept of exercising your voting right is beyond your comprehension.
And there is really no need to look past this year where the Democrats congressional members pressured the Obama administration so hard over the Israel-Palestinian peace process in favor of the former just to show how Netanyahu has the Democrats on their balls. And that's only one instance of Democrats stupidity of pandering to the interests of a foreign power.
Should I really list the moronic things that the Democrats and Republicans, exclusively, has done in the past. Do you really think one party is more evil than the other? Are you really that naive?
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 have yet to encounter 1 person in real life who thinks Assanges a criminal
Go to any mainstream new site. Find a story about Wikileaks. Go to the comments section. Then return to your real life and be very glad that you don't have to interact with those people on a daily basis. Then remember that their votes each count as much as yours...
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
You're missing the whole point. assange isn't telling you to do anything.
You really need to look more closely at the McCarthy era. People lost their jobs and were ostracised by their friends when they were called before the Committee on Unamerican Activities. Typically, they were not members of the Communist Party, the evidence against them was usually something along the lines of having been to a left-wing meeting while a student or similar. Some were called simply because they gave money to charities to help Russians during World War II while the US and Russia were allies. You go on Facebook, and someone tags a photograph of you at a vaguely political meeting. That tag is now associated with enough information to uniquely identify you.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Porn habit? No. You don't view porn through facebook.
Are you sure? If any of the sites that you visit has a Facebook beacon or a like button and you visit it with a web browser that has your Facebook cookie, then Facebook knows the URLs that you've visited.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
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...
Assange is not "deciding national security policy" for anyone. Nothing stops your government from trying to keep anything they want secret. It just can't expect the rest of the world to play their game for them.
Governments and powerful organisations should be open and accountable. Individuals should have strong privacy. What's so hard to understand?
If someone hacked into my e-mail account at work and used it to expose something illegal my company had done, I'd be okay with that. If someone hacked into my private e-mail account, I'd think they were a jerk. The first is ok, the second is not.
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.
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?
Yes it's odd... Everybody wants to be famous which implies others knowing what the hell you are doing. If I don't want to share something that I don't want others to know then I'll simply not share it. C'mon kids, is that so hard? Or are you simply that stupid?
What's wrong with sharing? Seriously I still controll what I share and when I want to share it, even if it means my freaking geolocation. If I'd be doing something that I want to keep secret then I'd simply leave my Android phone at home.
If the government were to somehow misuse all of our data to screw us all over in ways we truely definately don't accept as a society, then there is also this thing called riot and revolution, which happens to be possible because of the very existence of FaceBook itself.
Now there is also this thing called control. As the reaches of the individuals broadens then the government obviously needs to control this. Why? Oh I don't know... wanna go back to slamming each others heads in with sticks and stones?
Here be signatures
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.
Revealing secrets to other nations is kind of unavoidable if you want the public to know about them.
I'm sure Wikileaks would be happy to publish secret papers from China if someone mailed them to them. They're not actually breaking into government installations themselves -- they're depending on what other people send to them.
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!
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.
If Obama could ignore Congress, he would have:
-closed Guantanimo (closure blocked by "bipartisan"--but mostly Republican--majority in House and Senate removing funding for any transfer, as well as forbidding the transfer to anywhere inside the US) -passed a stimulus bill that actually invested the majority of its money into job creation, rather than half into tax breaks for the rich (a "compromise" made with Republicans to keep them from stonewalling more than they already did) -given us a public healcare option (blocked by thirty-nine Republicans plus Joe Frickin' Lieberman whose state houses the headquarters of most major health insurance companies) -written a banking reform law with teeth (again, rendered toothless by forty Republicans)
You're dead on! It could have been a lot worse. But, don't give up we still have QE. They are printing money like you wouldn't believe, driving up the price of oil, which is tied to the U.S. dollar, and inflation at the same time. All on a global scale. The effort he has put into bankrupting our economy is so impressive I'm not sure we'll make it to the next election. So, don't worry, Obama may just stay in power forever.
As far as progressive taxes go, I'm not a thief and believe stealing is a sin. If you do believe in stealing and took everyone's income including all corporate income it would cover the budget for about one year. Enjoy Eat the Rich. Then the U.S. is bankrupt again with no source of income, which isn't a problem, because, that's the plan.
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.
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)
Good points. *I* remember if someone is from my high school or not. When facebook got popular, I simply moved my yearbook next to my computer. And it's not like there aren't lists online. People just don't do their due diligence (with anything, not just facebook). Makes me sad.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
And my facebook friend aren't public knowledge either. The public does not have access to that info.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
When he is running Wikileaks and does not believe in secrets?
Because governments and corporations aren't people, and so don't have any right to privacy?
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I've seen people get into big personal tiffs that destroy friendships, then seen people claim, "This wasn't possible before facebook." It's an extension of the same fallacy that this post is mostly about. Because of course nobody ever got in a big flamewar before FB came along! (rolls eyes)
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
On the other hand, the Republican Party is at this point completely taken over by megacorporate interests,
Like letting GE write their own legislation so they don't pay any tax. Or, setting the payouts for Fannie and Freddie to UNLIMITED? Or, continually rewarding friends on Wall Street for failure. Unlimited payouts means unlimited corruption. Sure seems like the current guy has "magacorporate" interests. Which party got all that legislation through?
What you'll find with corruption is that it is a see-saw which swings back and forth. Since 1776 it has been a war. When one side becomes too corrupt American's swing the other way. It is a check and balance the Forefathers didn't plan for but turned out well.
If your friends are good friends they won't tell the police much about you if they get approached, they can speak to a lawyer and inform the person they are being investigated.
I would never assume that any of my friends would not succumb to the tactics that several law enforcement agencies use to obtain information (threatening them with a criminal charge of interfering with a police investigation for not "cooperating" is a classic example).
Besides, I was talking more about passive surveillance. You can either spend several thousands of dollars of taxpayer money to sit outside someones home 24/7 for a month, and physically tail them everywhere they go....or you can just look at their Twitter account for 5 minutes, which pretty much tells you the same thing.
That man has my gratitude for exposing some of my own government's corruption.
Also, I highly doubt the leaked documents have caused any significant danger to American, Brittish or Australian soldiers.
If your government doesn't want its secret information leaked, it shouldn't try to cover up its mistakes in the first place. Actions have consequences.
Don't forget that Facebook also has logs of how many messages you send to people, if you appear in the same photos as them, if you share many interests, and so on. With statistics, you can single out the most likely candidates.
This may not be efficient against terrorism, since it's so extremely rare. For example, if the error rate is as little 0,1% (one in a thousand), and one in ten million people is a terrorist, it means you will still get ten thousand false positives for every true positive.
However, it can be very efficient against more common crimes, or to single out dissidents.
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 don't think many whistle-blowers are going to be publishing their leaks on Facebook. Anyway, who claims Assange wants all information to be accessible to everyone? That is just made up.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
But all he did is restate what people already know about Facebook using scary words.
Why do people use Facebook? There are many reasons, but for most "so people I wouldn't keep in constant touch with can find me" would be on their list of reasons. Does that include the government? Yes. Are most people hiding from the government? No. Can the government see your whole list of friends? Yes - only most people would just say that ANYONE can see your whole list of friends.
I'm not sure what he's up to, but I'm not a big fan of people using fear for their own agenda.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
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
But all he did is restate what people already know about Facebook using scary words.
Why do people use Facebook? There are many reasons, but for most "so people I wouldn't keep in constant touch with can find me" would be on their list of reasons. Does that include the government? Yes. Are most people hiding from the government? No. Can the government see your whole list of friends? Yes - only most people would just say that ANYONE can see your whole list of friends.
I'm not sure what he's up to, but I'm not a big fan of people using fear for their own agenda.
I think what Assange was saying was that governments have more access to Facebook information than most people do. Probably up to the level that Mark Zuckerberg has.
You might not be a big fan of Assange using fear, but I'm not a big fan of people not realising how much of their personal and private information they're putting up online. Yes, its their fault - but Assange is giving a good warning; far more so than the fear and lies put around by other media and governmental outlets.
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
Ok, how about this specific: About five years ago, it was revealed that the National Security Agency had a massive database containing hundreds of millions of phone calls. Not from terrorists, not from suspects, but from tens of millons of ordinary American citizens. Why would the NSA go to all the trouble of doing this - illegally, I might add - if they didn't think they could glean useful data from it? (USA Today)
Another specific: In the former communist states (the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc) the government systematically eavesdropped on people's phone calls. This had the effect of scaring people into submission (you could never feel safe saying or doing something critical against the government). It is estimated that in the DDR (Eastern Germany), about half the population were informants, i.e spied on their family, friends or neighbours for the government.
And yet, even the Soviet government needed an excuse before they imprisoned someone - they couldn't just send someone off to work camp without a trial. Supposedly treasonous comments picked up during conversations were one way of providing such excuses.
I think you're wrong in assuming you can avoid incrimination by being careful with what you say. There is one piece of advice lawyers give their clients over and over again: Don't talk to the police. You may think nothing can go wrong if you're innocent, you may think you're smarter than the police, you may think your statements are completely innocuous, but it doesn't help. What you say will be misunderstood, taken out of context or simply misheard, as many regretful suspects can testify to. Even a simple and innocuous statement like, "Sure, I didn't like the guy, but I wouldn't kill him!" can and will be used against you ("I remember hearing the suspect say he didn't like the victim").
That's what GI Joe and NBC keep telling me.
I8-D
World War Two reshaped the U.S.A into a world class military power and wholesaler of tools of death.
War is incredibly profitable and the U.S.A. is the number one producer of arms on the planet. All wars are good for the stock holders. And now the D.O.D is fond of privatizing processes that were once its purvue. Halliburton and Blackwater have made a small number of individuals a lot of money doing things that used to be done by the military. Vietnam was pointless but it sold a shit ton of agent orange and naplam. As long as you like your "Dancing with the Stars", "Knight Rider" or "All in the Family" and don't pay attention to the slaughter of innocents in the name of money, you will be too satisfied to examine your culpability in the murder of children. Innocent children absolutely die from the actions of soilders from the U.S.A. I have little doubt you haven't already considered this and rationalized it as being a necessary evil. That makes you a willing piece of the larger killing machine (the military-industrial complex) and you don't consider yourself evil, do you?
It isn't evil, sir. It is greed and ignorance. "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
Sounds like you are on the verge of a major teenage rebellion. Gonna die your hair green, turn up your speakers, and cruise the mall parking lot?
I8-D
Your address my point exactly: This information can be mined without anyone ever using Facebook. It's not Facebook-specific. Facebook (voluntary) is no more evil than the telephone (technically voluntary) or browser cookies (also voluntary).
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
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
And damn what the people think (most are against the war).
Saying things don't make them true: Poll for Libya Airstrikes. A plurality (47%) think the airstrikes were the right decision while only 36% disagree with them. Your falling into the same trap as the Caesars of old you're railing against, because you don't support something you automatically assume the people don't either.
I almost agree with you. Julian Assange has become irrelevant due to his egocentric and self-serving ways, why would anyone actually do what he says anyway. He only says things that get him attention, nothing he does really has meaning. He got his 15 minutes of fame and should just go away.
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
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
Facebook collects all that information, and more, in one place where the government can conveniently access it. While you could theoretically collect all that information using an army of civil servants monitoring people's phone calls, e-mails, bank records, and so on, and entering them into databases, social networking sites makes it possible in practice.
Of course the government can get the same information through other means if they target one person specifically. It's the scale of the surveillance which makes it dangerous. A government which can scare 100 million people into submission is more dangerous than one which can scare 1 million people.
but I'm not a big fan of people not realising how much of their personal and private information they're putting up online.
Isn't that just a little condescending? When people put their address into a web form, I think they understand that it is going "online". It's like warning people that putting their listing in the phone book will give the government access to their address and phone number. I think if you asked people whether they thought the government could get their hands on the data that you put into facebook, most people would answer yes. Maybe I'm giving them too much credit, but if most people know that the government can tap your phone and fly helicopters into other countries to kill people, they can certainly pull data from a website.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
With people's websites all over the Internet in different places, the government couldn't ask "websites" for all the information about you without a lot of work, and they certainly couldn't go to the head of "website" and ask for a copy of their database to analyze at will. Facebook is all on one place, letting them do this easily.
but I'm not a big fan of people not realising how much of their personal and private information they're putting up online.
Isn't that just a little condescending?
Going by the numbers of people that are doing it and not realising the effects it will have on their life and career, maybe its necessary?
Maybe I'm giving them too much credit, but if most people know that the government can tap your phone and fly helicopters into other countries to kill people, they can certainly pull data from a website.
You'd think so, but I think most people are thinking too little to realise. You'd think your personal information was safe with Sony, but that's not true. Now for most criminals, getting caught is a good thing to society; but we know that's not the case for everyone.
I don't think Assange is doing a bad thing by warning people; in fact, it's a fairly honourable thing for him to do.
We go to war because it benefits some very rich and powerful people. These days those people are the ones who control the weapons and banking industries. When there is war, they supply both sides with what they need; weapons and money. It is never these powerful people's children who actually go and fight, so what do they care? But of course, the public has to buy in. So that's where the media lying comes in. That, in a nutshell, is why we go to war even though people don't really want to.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
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
And actually -- it's the ones *not* using facebook are the ones scared into submission by the government. The ones using facebook are living our lives with the tools at our disposal and not being chased away from them by big brother's scary shadow.
And believe me - I'm a distrustful motherfucker when it comes to the government and the technology war (my set of collected links on the topic). I just think that in this case, it's neo-Ludditeism. Which I admit I cannot spell.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
Isn't that just a little condescending? When people put their address into a web form, I think they understand that it is going "online" [...]
you're kidding, right? Please say "yes" so that I can keep faith in humanity...
how many people thinks that they are helping a poor guy in Congo getting his heritage money safe by giving them their bank account numbers? How many people agree to "share" a video link on facebook to be able to see a stupid video of a girl having an orgasm while doing the SlingShot and are not realizing that they are giving access to their data to whoever put that online?
Most people don't understand how to protect their privacy and they don't even know how important that is until they are actually caught in some sort of financial fraud. Recently, a lady got some jail because the first thing she did after hitting another car, she wrote that on facebook instead of getting out of her can to see if the other driver was severely injured (he was). The "timestamps" of the facebook's posts were used as proofs. Now I'm actually happy that it went that way, but most people who read that article went: oh! I didn't realized it could go that far!
People are ignorant. I'm not saying this in a condescending way, I'm myself ignorant on many many topics. Being ignorant isn't a problem in itself (although it is a limitation). The real problem is that "pride" chimes in when you're trying to educate someone and they don't listen because they don't want to admit their ignorance.
The obvious answer here is that you have not given it enough thought. You have not actively participated in discussions with real people who hold different views and been open to listening to those views. Here is one simple word that answers a lot of what you claim you don't understand: POWER.
Here is a simple way of describing it that involves a huge amount of nuance and complexity behind the scenes -- those who have it want to keep it; those who don't have it, want it. Now, think about what it takes to get that power and how many palms you have to grease along the way. You will be owned by those interests in the future -- how will you pay them back?
Blaming the media is a stupid, currently favored bogeyman approach to keeping one's eyes closed. If you don't trust an "independent" (yes, there are lots of issues with that word) third party, then who are you supposed to trust? Give me another entity that can delve into every facet of government, business and personal life and disseminate knowledge to the entire population? Many countries have carved out specific protections for the media to be able to do this and have given the media unprecedented access just so a semblance of "truth" (ouch, another problematic word) can get out.
Why do you suppose religion exists? Why would people willingly submit themselves to the authority of a small, privileged group (or individual) and then take the word of this group, or person, as (pun intended) gospel? Why don't they ask questions? Why don't they confront their leaders?
One key thing to remember is that the majority of the World's population is too busy trying to survive to be worried about politics, or why wars are started. They are manipulated by the information brokers into believing the cause is just and they don't have time to adjust their lives to accommodate fact-checking the allegations. Those who do have the time are wealthy (relatively speaking) and they aspire to be power/information brokers themselves, even if only in small ways.
At a basic level, we are all the same. We identify with our peers and our community. Our "truth" is built around the place we were born and where we grew up -- even today. It is easy to manipulate us because we are human, not fact-checking, emotionless computers. Wars start because, just like on the playground, you hurt (kill) my friends and I am now going to hurt (kill) you back. That's what the power and information brokers have been pushing to the people for as long as human societies have existed. We just have really, really, sophisticated ways of doing this now.
It isn't a bad guy vs good guy thing, it's a belief/faith thing. You have a faith that you may not even understand in your own society (Western). It is easy for you to believe what you are told by *your* leaders. Now, for a moment, why don't you try to believe everything said by some other authority -- say, the Chinese. Let's see how far you get. But, if *you* were Chinese, you would have an amazing faith in those leaders -- even if you did not like the Chinese form of government. Making Americans look evil is easy, if you are not American.
Keep thinking about it. Maybe you'll get there one day.
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!
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
how many people thinks that they are helping a poor guy in Congo getting his heritage money safe by giving them their bank account numbers? How many people agree to "share" a video link on facebook to be able to see a stupid video of a girl having an orgasm while doing the SlingShot and are not realizing that they are giving access to their data to whoever put that online?
A tiny fraction of the population - but with big numbers of internet users, even a tiny fraction is a lot of people.
The people that you are talking about aren't going to have any idea what Assange is talking about. They certainly aren't going to know who he is or why they should listen to him. And frankly, the last thing those idiots need to worry about is the government. Talking about the big scary government boogyman is also not the mark of an honest guy. Generally people using that line are just trying to scare people to promote some kind of an agenda. Think a politician saying "the democrats/republicans are trying to take away your social security" to a bunch of seniors. It's laughable on the face of it, but they say it because it promotes their agenda.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
I don't think Assange is doing a bad thing by warning people; in fact, it's a fairly honourable thing for him to do.
Except that he's warning them about the wrong thing. The ignorant sort of people you are indicating is his target audience are far more at risk from Nigerian scammers and phishing attacks then from some big brother threat. He's not interested in these people at all, other than it seems scaring them furthers some kind of agenda of his. I have no idea what his agenda is, but scare tactics are pretty textbook.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
You're an idiot if you think the political parties are as evil as third world dictators. If you agree they're not, then they're not totally evil. No difference at all between them? Well, for one, the Republicans favor pretty much unrestricted gun ownership and the Democrats don't. Another example is that Democrats generally favor gay marriage (or civil unions), whereas the Republicans generally don't. It's easy to prove you wrong when you speak in extremes such as "totally evil" and "no difference".
It's no surprise that somebody as stupid as you would fail to have the basic ability of reading comprehension. I certainly do accept that both parties do stupid and corrupt things; what I do not accept is that mere examples of stupidity and corruption prove absolute evil. To argue that it does indicates that that you probably belong in the loony bin.
As for third party candidates, I'd vote for one if one ever had a chance of winning. A third party vote, however, is a wasted vote. Sure, I could vote for one and then somehow celebrate the 0.3% of the vote he got, but it makes more sense to use the vote in a way that actually makes some difference. Since the third parties generally don't have a chance, I'm going to vote for the one that falls closer to my ideology. Yes, both do stupid and corrupt things, but there clearly are differences in ideology, and to ignore that is tantamount to putting on a blindfold, sticking your fingers in your ears, and screaming "lalalalalala" (which is what you seem to be doing here). And until one party starts murdering the people that disagree with them, neither party is "totally evil".
It's really easy to ignore all the issues at hand and dismiss both parties as the same. I can understand the temptation; after all, one day of watching cable news will lead anyone to just go "screw them all" and try to shield themselves from politics. Behind the pervasive corruption and stupidity, however, there are differences.
At this point, I can't believe that you're actually being serious in your argument, as your assertions are patently nuts. Therefore, I will cease discussion here so that you can find another thread to troll. (And if you really are serious, I know a good psychiatrist who can help you.)
I am well aware of how Facebook actually works and do not post any information about myself (other than the occasional friend request) on Facebook for that reason. I was trying to argue that the expectation of privacy on Facebook is reasonable, not that it actually corresponds to reality.
Centralization breaks the internet.
Because he is not, alone, WikiLeaks. There are others who make decisions in the organization.
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.
You don't get it. You just don't.
This guy is way out there
Traffic data (who calls whom) is automatically collected from the phone network, but you can't process the contents of the calls automatically, at least not very efficiently. With Facebook messages, likes/dislikes, etc, you can also scan the contents of the messages.
Still, you've got a point that collecting telephone traffic data is probably more dangerous.
I agree, most surveillance laws are passed with the idea that its expensive to investigate a single person, so we give them "extra" power as the means to abuse that power are really expensive / not worth it.
now we rapidly moved into the digital age, surveillance is very cheep, so the laws need to change to prevent abuse.
I don't think Assange is doing a bad thing by warning people; in fact, it's a fairly honourable thing for him to do.
Except that he's warning them about the wrong thing. The ignorant sort of people you are indicating is his target audience are far more at risk from Nigerian scammers and phishing attacks then from some big brother threat. He's not interested in these people at all, other than it seems scaring them furthers some kind of agenda of his. I have no idea what his agenda is, but scare tactics are pretty textbook.
Who says I'm indicating those people? There's 250 million people on Facebook. Thats more than just a few idiots giving out their bank details. Slight fear here should be real, we've all seen the effects having all your information on the internet can have. Mark Zuckerburg, arguably has the most amount of data about the public in one place; it *is* a spy machine. Shouldn't that be something to be at least slightly aware of?
I do not live in the US, here in Australia we dont buy into the loopiness of Americans.
2) Gee, I couldn't possibly use another browser or computer, could I?
3) Beacon was shut down in 2009. But even then, it could be disabled.
Basically, my view is that you are utterly full of shit and have yet to submit any evidence to the contrary.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
I could try some absurd comparisons here. Black people got beaten for holding hands with white people in the 1960s. Therefore, nobody should do that now. Something bad might happen. But such comparisons probably lead the conversation astray. I'm glad the american populace isn't so easily coddled into cowardly irrelevancy as you are.
As if an employer could find my FB photos. First off, I don't use my real name. Second off, if anybody tags me, the photo is automatically only available to my friends. Third off, making all of this irrelevant: I already post public photos that tell a LOT about me. But again, it's hard (but not impossible) to figure that out. And googling my name does not get to them. And it's not a common name, either.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
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.
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.
Shouldn't that be something to be at least slightly aware of?
Yes - I would never object to educating people to real dangers. When he starts talking about "spying" and "government", he's being disingenuous and full of hyperbole. As you yourself pointed out, the largest threat most people face from Facebook is blowback from stuff their boss or friends don't like that they made public.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Shouldn't that be something to be at least slightly aware of?
Yes - I would never object to educating people to real dangers. When he starts talking about "spying" and "government", he's being disingenuous and full of hyperbole. As you yourself pointed out, the largest threat most people face from Facebook is blowback from stuff their boss or friends don't like that they made public.
It is "Spying" though, and I don't doubt that the Government are using their access for individuals information as well as aggregate information of the population as a whole. Calling it 'disingenuous' implies Assange knows more than he's letting on. Hyperbole is a matter of opinion, I think the problems of Facebook have been underblown, not exaggerated; and Assange is right to bring this up - no-one else is in the mainstream media.
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?
It is "Spying" though, and I don't doubt that the Government are using their access for individuals information as well as aggregate information of the population as a whole.
It's not "spying", but I don't really care what you call it. First, I'd love to know what his source is - law enforcement should be getting warrants for any domestic surveillance. Second, I'm not putting my information on Facebook for the benefit of the government, terrorists, divorce lawyers, advertisers, or anyone except my friends. That others find it useful is a side effect of having such a useful thing. For most of us with reasonable governments, having a huge database where I can find, contact, and keep up with all my friends far outweighs any kind of danger of data mining by others. And if I did live in some place with an authoritarian government where I might think twice about putting my friendships online, there are dozens of other ways they could locate me and spy on me, with varying degrees of difficulty.
Hyperbole is a matter of opinion, I think the problems of Facebook have been underblown, not exaggerated; and Assange is right to bring this up - no-one else is in the mainstream media.
Then we disagree. Facebook cannot exist without the information they collect. That it is the most popular site on the internet just screams how useful people find it. That a giant database containing relationships is useful is more of a boring restating of the obvious - not an OMG NOW THE GOVERNMENT CAN SPY ON US! No one else is bringing this up because it is ridiculous.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
It's not "spying", but I don't really care what you call it. First, I'd love to know what his source is - law enforcement should be getting warrants for any domestic surveillance.
You just defined what 'spying' is. With a warrant, it wouldn't be spying.
Second, I'm not putting my information on Facebook for the benefit of the government, terrorists, divorce lawyers, advertisers, or anyone except my friends.
No, but Assange isn't aiming this at you. Plenty of other people are. Sure Facebook is useful for some things; but this is just a warning that it could be misused.
Facebook cannot exist without the information they collect. That it is the most popular site on the internet just screams how useful people find it.
Agreed.
That a giant database containing relationships is useful is more of a boring restating of the obvious - not an OMG NOW THE GOVERNMENT CAN SPY ON US! No one else is bringing this up because it is ridiculous.
It's not ridiculous. When all that information is available in one place, questions should be asked as to who has access to it.
Whats your problem with raising awareness?
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!
Whats your problem with raising awareness?
Again, I have no problem with that - it's the use of fear as a tool that I find distasteful. More alarmingly, it just screams "I have a hidden agenda!" If Assange were making statements that sounded as reasonable as yours, I wouldn't be having this discussion with you :)
Also, I think his comments are directed more towards non-US people. The US can lawfully spy on anyone they want outside of the country. Inside, they need warrants. Since all worldwide Facebook data eventually transits to the US, I imagine that the US government could grab all of that that they want - though they still have to watch it so they don't wind up in another AT&T wiretapping controversy.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
um thats not how it works :-)
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.
So, populations are never willing, individuals just are? I'm pretty sure all those individuals add up to become a population after a while. That wars are often fought without the direct consent of the people, I can believe. (we actually entrust the president with the power to make war on our behalf, the real power to enter war is in fact NOT with the people, it is with the people's congress, and the power to engage in military actions begins and ends with the pres.) That wars are by definition something a population does not desire, I cannot. You've got it backwards: people are stupid and evil, a person is good, not the other way around.
Whoops, didn't notice you pointed out that democracy is representative; I read to fast. I meant to highlight that a representative democracy is merely the most convenient way to represent the will of the people, but a entrustment of politicians with power. The vote endows congress with the power to vote how they see fit: that may or may not be what the people want. The theory is that if it pisses "the people" off, they'll just vote accordingly.
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.
No. I mean Assange. Notice how the first three letters of his name spell ASS. That is all he ever will be is an arrogant ASS.
I see I'm trying to convince a child.
Manning was under strict instructions to keep shit secret. He leaked the documents, he was an authorized personnel who leaked to non authorized personnel.
Assange is an Australian citizen living in the UK with no ties to the united states, he is under no moral obligation to keep Americans secrets in the same way that American news sources have no obligation to keep North Korean or Chinas secrets...
an international news company should not have to hide secrets because its embarrassing to a single nation... that is unless you disagree with freedom of the press? in which case your right, Assange should not do what journalists do and instead of fighting corruption should be encouraging cover ups by reporting on benign information like what one black eye peas band member said to the other black eye peas band member because that's real journalism.
stop drinking the cool-aid and think for your self.
Even Fox News Network would not do what Assange has done to endanger so many people. I think you are the one drinking the green Koolaid. Learn to spell the words as you go along.
an american news company has reason not to release sensitive american information because it would be unpopular, not out of any real moral reason.
not only that but fox news also released the information to the public, so by your definition fox news editors are just as bad as Assange then? but lets focus on all the lives that Assange has endagered:
1) can you point out who exactly is at risk?
2) wouldn't the person who was trusted to keep the secret be the one who endangered the lives by releasing the secrets if lives were indeed at risk? not some 3rd party that informed the public on their behalf?
here is an example for you: You're a Pedophile and you tell your good friend "Bob" that your a pedophile, bob then tells the police about your actions which in turns plasters all over the news that your a pedophile, whose fault was it that your secret got out, bobs or the police? is having the secret even justifiable in the first place when revealing it benefit the rest of the community? your real beef should be with bob but you're blame the police for telling everyone? Its understandable if you now hate bob and want revenge, a person in the position of trust abused it, but similarly to the current situation with the leaks the rest of the community is estatic that bob came forward (even at the cost of your relationship with bob) to improve the community as a whole.
in this analogy, you are America, Bob is manning, Assange/The Press is the police, and the community is the rest of the world.
I see this debate has no future and I quickly tire of a war of wits with a half-wit. Go troll a different thread.
I WIN!
good luck with ever getting a job requiring a security clearance then it that's your attitude
I believe the phrase they would wish to apply here is "reset your expectations."
Read their terms of service and look over all of the little notes and caveats displayed under the "security and privacy" settings and rethink that expectation of privacy.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.