John McAfee Airs His Beefs About Privacy In Def Con Surprise Talk

John McAfee made a surprise appearance at Def Con to talk about privacy: he's for it. Trouble is, he says, lots of companies feel otherwise, and he took the stage to single out "don't be evil" Google: “Google, or at least certain people within Google, I will not mention names because I am not a rude gentleman, would like us to believe that if we have nothing to hide, we should not mind if everybody knows everything that we do,” he said from the podium. “I have to take serious issue with that.” The BBC has video. McAfee also announced his new complaints website, The Brown List. (Good usernames are still available, and your complaint can be about anything, not just privacy violations by humongous corporations.)

Comments

Why?

[guygo]

Why would anyone listen to this paragon of paranoia?

Re:Why?

[redeIm]

Because his arguments stand on their own merits.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because you're not paranoid when "they" really are out to get you.

If you can't understand this, try removing the paychecks you get from shilling out of the way and read again.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would anyone listen to this paragon of paranoia?

Why would anyone care what YOU think ?

Other than your mom, I mean.

But even she is a bit preoccupied now, what with my swollen cock
gagging her.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice ad hominem.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

You should see a doctor about that. It sounds infected.

Re:Why?

[Smauler]

Come on.... which arguments?

This man has claimed shit loads of things that have been pure crap. Do you really need references?

Of course privacy is important, everyone knows it's important, we don't need some washed up crapware peddler to tell us that.

Re: Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because if you don't,he will murder you and your family

Re:Why?

[radarskiy]

Old man yells at cloud

Re: Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Your name is guygo. That means you go for guys. That means your a faggot. End of story.

Re:Why?

[houstonbofh]

Come on.... which arguments?

How about where he demanded Intel take his name off that piece of crap AV they sell? I find no fault with any of this... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a natural response, known as an "erection." Look it up. One day, when you're older, you might get them when you look at naked ladies.

Re:Why?

[smash]

This man has claimed shit loads of things that have been pure crap. Do you really need references?

Such as? If you're going to post such things, you need to back them up.

Re:Why?

[redeIm]

Come on.... which arguments?

That "Nothing to hide, nothing to fear" is nonsense, among other things. That's an absolute truth regardless of who says it. Ad hominems don't exactly make for logical arguments.

Of course privacy is important, everyone knows it's important

Who is "everyone"? Because that's just false. I've encountered numerous people who think things like the TSA, the NSA's surveillance, DUI checkpoints, unfettered border searches, constitution-free zones, warrantless wiretapping, or stop-and-frisk are okay if they think it keeps them safe. Most people either think they're okay, or not important enough to do anything about. So who is this "everyone"? I vote, protest, and write to representatives based on my principles, but other people don't seem to do the same.

Also, how could my GP comment ever be construed as a troll in any way, shape, or form?

Re:Why?

[Megol]

That isn't an argument?!?

If Intel bought the company and the product why wouldn't they keep using the name it already has and that still is associated with anti-virus programs? That would be ridiculous and potentially revenue loosing

If they would stop using the name of a drugged-out criminal, pedophile, probably murderer it would be for PR reasons. But the public mass doesn't really follow the "adventures" of this idiot like we /. readers are forced to.

Re:Why?

[GrumpySteen]

His 'arguments' here are just vague complaints about Google and privacy with nothing informative or substantive added. You'd get better arguments by reading the comments on a /. post about Google with moderation set to -1.

Re:Why?

[redeIm]

Fair enough, but attacking him based on his character is just stupid and won't debunk anything he said.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

So the same quality as your post then?

Re:Why?

[kheldan]

I think I like this John McAfee person.

You must be young.
You sound like someone who was raised in this surveillance culture we're now living in, and as such have been so thoroughly indoctrinated by the societal, corporate, and government propaganda and conditioning, that you actually believe that 'privacy' is something only sought after by criminals and the mentally ill. Either that or you just don't understand that we're being surveilled constantly, with plans to surveil us even more than we already are.

Re:Why?

[Bing Tsher E]

But the public mass doesn't really follow the "adventures" of this idiot like we /. readers are forced to.

Forced to? You were required by the Slashdot license to click on the link to this story? Wow, the terms of service for your account really suck. I'm glad I got a lower account number. I didn't have to click through a TOS page like that when I signed up on this account.

Re:Why?

[Bing Tsher E]

There are several whole generations coming up now who don't have a fucking clue.

Yes, I know. Every generational cycle goes like that. I didn't have a fucking clue when I was 20 either.

But the last few cycles have been filled with clueless fucks who think anybody who asks questions during a college lecture that won't be on Friday's test or the Midterm should SHUT UP because they're undermining the process. People who've bought into the system so far that they think brown nosing is a nested recursive process.

We're glad you go that internship at Google (addressed to all the trolls flinging shit in this thread)

Re:Why?

[kheldan]

Yeah, it's true. I used to believe that I grew up in the 'Land of the free, home of the brave' that we were taught we were living in. Then I discovered that the U.S. wasn't so much the 'good guys' that I thought we were (although we have our moments) and that there are people like the entire Bush family of traitors (as in George and G.W., going back for generations) that have been actively working to *undermine* the U.S. Constitution for their own ends since shortly after the U.S. was even formed into it's own independent nation.

Re:Why?

[gweihir]

Indeed, they do.

Re: Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Get a grip. If you have to name an individual politician, you just don't get that most all of them, on each and every side, are responsible for this, and we are responsible for electing them.

So to name one, what has Obama done to curtail any of the things you say are "Bush's fault?"

Re:Why?

[gweihir]

Very much so. Asking question is not brown-nosing. It is having an actual interest in the subject matter and starting to thing about it independently. Anybody that does not manage to get there should drop the subject (and maybe college), because they will never be any good at it.

I think "mediocre" is the new "good" or "excellent" in many fields. I am not sure about the reasons.

Re:Why?

[guygo]

you have no idea what you're talking about. if I "must be young", you must be unborn.

Re: Why?

[BronsCon]

As much as the opposing members of Congress will allow. That is to say, not much, but more than nothing.

Re:Why?

[kheldan]

If you're not a millennial or thereabouts, then, as I already stated, you must not be paying attention, at all. Get your head out of the sand, son, and take a good long critical look at the world around you, read the news (NOT just from U.S. sources, either, from the BBC, Al Jazeera, and other foreign sources) and see the evidence for yourself: You're being watched, monitored, and profiled by your own government, and by corporations, and so far it's not getting any better, it's getting worse, and the current generation of young people, having been born into this surveillance culture we're rapidly becoming, don't know the difference. And by the way I'm almost 50 years old, and I, for one, have not had my head in the sand the entire time, and I remember what it was like to have some modicum of privacy in my day-to-day life, pre-Internet, and what it was like to live in a world where it was unthinkable to have CCTV cameras everywhere, and where it was looked down upon to pry into other people's lives. But please, go right ahead and continue to live in denial if that's what makes you happy, so far as the government is concerned, that just makes you a 'patriot' and a 'good citizen' anymore (as they pat you on the head like a well-behaved pet).

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Anybody who asks questions during a college lecture that won't be on Friday's test or the Midterm should SHUT UP because they're undermining the process.

Heck yes they should! Classrooms are places to absorb fundamental material which, if the curriculum is coherent, is what should be on Friday's test. If you want to have a conversation about the price of tea in China, do it on your own time instead of monopolizing the time of a captive audience. I'm not saying it's not interesting, or even worth knowing, but every minute spent on a tangent is one less minute available for the core material. If there's something you want to learn or share outside of the scope of the class, then more power to you, but again, do it on YOUR time.

Re:Why?

[beastofburdon]

"(as they pat you on the head like a well-behaved pet)"

Don't you mean fondle your crotch in search of "weapons"?

Re:Why?

[kheldan]

If governments and law enforcement had their way, that wouldn't be necessary because citizens wouldn't be allowed to posess anything more deadly than a small kitchen knife, and anyone other than police or military posessing weapons of any sort would be shot on sight and an investigation launched later. Also I'm sure all forms of martial arts would be outlawed as 'illegal killing techniques'. They'd probably also outlaw any forms of fitness training that actually builds significant amounts of muscle on people to keep them weak and compliant.

Privacy is an illusion

[cl3v3r]

A compelling illusion, but an illusion nonetheless. The metadata generated by even the most privacy conscious individual leaves a mark, and given the resources of an interested government, only the most dedicated living off the grid can escape their view.

The only thing we have going for us, is that the vast majority of us won't raise the eyebrows of any government employees in our lifetimes. The sad part is that a lonely few will, and they'll be dealt with unfairly and harshly.

The general masses don't have much to fear, but anyone who raises the ire of a nameless bureaucrat will.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

> A compelling illusion, but an illusion nonetheless.

Absolute privacy is an illusion. In the real world privacy is a spectrum. Just because your friends know something about you doesn't mean anyone else should know it too.

> the vast majority of us won't raise the eyebrows of any government employees in our lifetimes.

Government is not the problem, imbalance of power is the problem. The lose of privacy is ultimately the loss of personal autonomy -- it doesn't matter if you lose that autonomy to a government bureau or to a corporation, you've still lost it to an organization that is more powerful than you.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

It's only an illusion if you don't care that the government is harvesting that meta data in the first place. Warrantless government spying is what needs to be outlawed and severely punished.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

Privacy isn't the absence of information. Privacy is the consensus not to look. That's why we call it "respecting privacy". In that sense, privacy is dead, because that consensus doesn't exist anymore. When privacy advocates recommend ways of keeping ones data private, they are not trying to keep the data from a determined attacker. Instead the goal is to make violations of privacy more expensive and/or less useful, so that those who abandoned the consensus will realize that the "advantages" of abandoning privacy are imaginary because they result from people acting under the assumption of privacy when it isn't actually respected.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[martin-boundary]

A compelling illusion, but an illusion nonetheless. The metadata generated by even the most privacy conscious individual leaves a mark, and given the resources of an interested government, only the most dedicated living off the grid can escape their view.

That's a pretty trite comment, if you don't mind me saying so. We already know that *if we don't fight for it*, then privacy is at best an illusion. Duh. If I don't enter the lottery, I can't win either. My god, are you sure, really? I actually have to enter? I never knew that!

Privacy is a set of rights that must be demanded to be built into the system of government and society at large. It's one part of Liberty, and it's up to us to make it happen. We can make it happen through laws, we can make it happen through free software, we can make it happen through education, we can make it happen through threats and violence, etc. No single option is a silver bullet. All options can advance the cause in some small way. Figure out where your talents are then you'll start to see where you can help out (assuming you want privacy).

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[sirlark]

The only thing we have going for us, is that the vast majority of us won't raise the eyebrows of any government employees in our lifetimes. The sad part is that a lonely few will, and they'll be dealt with unfairly and harshly.

Which means it falls to us as the vast majority to hold those who abuse their governmental power to account when they deal with someone unfairly. A duty, I'm sad to say, we are all falling woefully short of...

And before anyone bitches about me just bitching, here is the first and most important step you can take. Inform Yourself! Check your putative representative's voting records, and compare it to what he's saying. Go out and but a newspaper from the "other side", to get balanced view of things. Challenge your friends when they make wild, or even just unsubstantiated, statements. A phrase I like personally (from CSI) "state your source". It's gentle, and mostly non-offensive, and goes down well as a pop-culture reference. And lastly, if you don't have the resources to fact check something, suggest it to a fact checking agency. They don't work for free often, but if you put something on their radar, they can at least look in to it when some suitably close paid for work comes in. Better yet, tip off the opposing politician's campaign, and get them to pay for it.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

"Government is not the problem, imbalance of power is the problem."

Really?

I understand that those of you who feel powerless and believe in liberty are so easly decieved into placing all blame on the corporation, but you must realive that you have been conditioned to think this way.

Indeed, the large corporation has significant power. The larger the organization the more power they have.

But what is this power and where do they get it?

Money. The non governmental organization that is able to direct policy and otherwise 'do whatever they want to' only does these things with money.

But what of the state? That is the general state, I am not referring to the individual states in the US? You say in plain language, 'Government is not the problem'.

Ayn Rand:

"No individual or private group or private organization has the legal power to initiate the use of physical force against other individuals or groups and to compel them to act against their own voluntary choice. Only a government holds that power. The nature of governmental action is: *coercive *action. The nature of political power is: the power to force obedience under threat of physical injury—the threat of property expropriation, imprisonment, or death."

No amount of money can compete with a gun.

No organization can weild power over the state. Yes, a corporation can influence the government to act in the interest of the organization with money, and they do. But in the end the coproration is subservient to the power of the state; the state will only act on behalf of the corporation when the state decides that the action is not contrary to the ends of the state. No amount of money will force the state to act against its own interests, why should it when the state can take all the money it wants from the other party if using force is called for.

So your statement that the state is not the problem is false on the face of it.

And let me ask you a question; Obamacare is the single greatest power grab by a state that has even been subjected to a population in the history of our civilization, taking untold amounts of money (power) and the rights and liberties of the people and putting it in the hands of the state. And your vague call for a check on the power of corporations indicates to me that you like the idea of individual liberty (a guess on my part I admit), so I ask you this question; did you support Obama and the state in this, that is do you approve of Obamacare and the Obama administration in general? Do you factor this in at all in your concern for the preservation of the rights and liberties of the people as you call out the excesses of the power held by these corporations?

Because limits on the power of corporations at this point are beyond meaningless while the state has such a vast chokehold on the people in this way. Truth be told the constitution is for all intents and purposes nothing but a piece of paper at this point. The state has all the power. Does this not concern you at all?

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[QuietLagoon]

If only media-whore McAffee were an illusion as well....

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

Lol, I totally read that as "punative representative". Now I'm not sure which word is more accurate.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[houindcon]

zactly.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[kheldan]

..only the most dedicated living off the grid can escape their view

At this stage of the game, the best bet for anyone wishing to be left the hell alone is the 'hide in plain sight' tactic: Leave enough of a digital footprint and paper-trail to appear ordinary, and this be left alone. At least for now, that'll work and will keep you safe, because they (governments, corporations) still don't have the processing capacity to bring the signal-to-noise ratio up to the point where they'd even see the patterns in that well enough to realize you are using surveillance countermeasures like that, and focus on you specifically. I still hold out the hope that this situation can be turned around before it reaches the point that everyone is always under the high-resolution microscope like that though.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

A compelling illusion, but an illusion nonetheless. The metadata generated by even the most privacy conscious individual leaves a mark, and given the resources of an interested government, only the most dedicated living off the grid can escape their view.

So have you put your tax return on your facebook page? If not, why not?

What that has to do with anything? If you have to ask, I'd be right to think you have no idea what you're talking about.

The only thing we have going for us, is that the vast majority of us won't raise the eyebrows of any government employees in our lifetimes. The sad part is that a lonely few will, and they'll be dealt with unfairly and harshly.

The general masses don't have much to fear, but anyone who raises the ire of a nameless bureaucrat will.

Which is just about everybody. Consider that a certain bunch of bureaucrats already look askance at you if you don't have a facebook page. Or for any number of other reasons, just about guaranteeing that everyone is going to be flagged for some reason or other, most of them carefully kept secret. Acting on these "indicators" thus cannot be anything but entirely random. This is not "rule of law", since it is arbitrary, and therefore untenable. If anything it is an object lesson in the need for privacy.

There are many things one would prefer to keep private, even if one hasn't done anything wrong. The ability to do that is called privacy. Take it away entirely, and you'd get a situation where any random onlooker can learn absolutely everything about you. If that isn't the case, you have some privacy left, however little. Thus, it exists, and is not an illusion.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

If you thought that your Constitution was ever more than a meaningless piece of paper, I've got a Japanese internment camp to sell you, fully stocked with natural born US citizens.

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

Ironic example, since playing the lottery is one of the worst ways to "win."

Re:Privacy is an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

No amount of money can compete with a gun.

except you know... when you can hire bigger and better guns.

Why would DefCon have him?

[Anonymous Coward]

This man is a murdering, deranged drug addict. He's off his rocker to the point of becoming a killer, and he's quite literally warped his once-brilliant brain into drug-addled mush.

Why would anyone want to listen to him?

Re: Why would DefCon have him?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because it's fascinating

Re:Why would DefCon have him?

[Anonymous Coward]

He's innocent and exposed the corruption of the Belize government.

Re:Why would DefCon have him?

[Anonymous Coward]

He may have done some drugs, but we all have. As far as murder, well, let's just say you'd have to be a complete idiot to think he killed anyone.

Re:Why would DefCon have him?

[wonkey_monkey]

He may have done some drugs, but we all have.

No we haven't.

you'd have to be a complete idiot to think he killed anyone.

How do you know he didn't?

Re:Why would DefCon have him?

[Anonymous Coward]

No we haven't.

So no caffeine, no aspirin, no cigarettes, no alcohol, no marijuana, no LSD, no antibiotics, no medicines and/or no prescription drugs? When you go to the dentist, do you have them work on you without Novocain (ie. synthetic cocaine) or nitrous oxide? Sorry, but you're a liar.

How do you know he didn't?

Because the Belizean government nor the Guatemalan government nor the US government ever charged or even named him as a suspect to the murder. The murder also occurred after police raided his home but found nothing to pin on him, which casts a lot of suspicion upon the Belizean government itself. By contrast, your vilification of Mcafee is utterly baseless.

Re:Why would DefCon have him?

[wonkey_monkey]

Sorry, but you're a liar.

Ooh, ouch. Called a liar by a pedant on the internet.

By contrast, your vilification of Mcafee is utterly baseless.

I've never villified him. I have no idea, and no real opinion, on whether or not he killed anyone. I do have an opinion of those who - with likely little more knowledge of the actual facts than anyone else - go around spouting invective against anyone who dares to disagree with them.

Re:Why would DefCon have him?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ooh, ouch. Called a liar by a pedant on the internet.

What, do you believe that the legal status of a drug makes it a non-drug and therefore harmless? If not, then thanks for the admission of guilt.

I've never villified him. I have no idea, and no real opinion, on whether or not he killed anyone. I do have an opinion of those who - with likely little more knowledge of the actual facts than anyone else - go around spouting invective against anyone who dares to disagree with them.

You were defending the stance that McAfee is a murderer. You know who do have more of the facts? The Belizean, Guatemalan and United States governments and they say he's not even a suspect.

You have zero privacy now, get over it

[Anonymous Coward]

Sun Microsystem's Scott McNealy made that prescient quote back in something like 1998. He may have been thinking partly about Google, but he was really talking about a trend that would occur regardless of whether Google was around to help lead the way.

There's a lot of surprising consequences of the Internet, big data, mobile computing, and robotics that help and hurt people and professions and entire industries. It's an upheaval not unlike the Industrial Revolution in the first half of the 19th century.

They want privacy to be an illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

That is why we should strongly favor, promote, encourage and demand the development of a mixnet type internet to protect our freedom and privacy. Better than focus only in guns.

Troll

[Anonymous Coward]

This guys is no privacy advocate, he's still a fucking charlatan

- If you are still bitching about "Don't be Evil" as a bad slogan, you need to move the fuck on.
- If you are still whining about a Eric Schmidt's quote "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know", you need to move the fuck on. That was 5 years ago and out of context. Look it up if you are really curious what it meant.

Most importantly if you are some fucking drug addled has been who used scamware to make your money, you should just fucking go away.

If he was a brave man he would have taken on the hard topic recent Google and MS stories of volunteering user information to vigilante organizations to hand over to police. Repeating whines about company slogans and out of context misquotes from 5-10 years ago doesn't make you an advocate for privacy, just an attention whore.

Google, Facebook, MS, and Apple should all be held accountable. As well as ISPs and telcos. Especially in this post-Snowden era. You want to help restore privacy? Donate to the EFF. Contribute to easier to use PGP email and messaging software. Help audit and fork truecrypt.

But this guy does not help that cause.

Re:Troll

[Anonymous Coward]

- If you are still whining about a Eric Schmidt's quote "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know", you need to move the fuck on.

I fucked Eric Schmidt's wife on a beach on Martha's Vineyard.

She kept moaning about how much bigger my cock was than Eric's and how
his cock was never really hard.

I told her that this was because Eric prefers a dick up his ass, and she moaned louder
and wrapped her legs around me and began thrusting like a jackhammer. I tell you,
the woman has needs which were being ignored by her husband. ....

Re:Troll

[Anonymous Coward]

I fucked Eric Schmidt's wife on a beach on Martha's Vineyard.

Careful, or someone might label you a "rude gentleman."

Re:Troll

[Khyber]

" You want to help restore privacy? Donate to the EFF."

They're about as useless as the ACLU.

You want to help restore privacy? Start by burning down the Google offices and NSA headquarters.

Re:Troll

[russotto]

You want to help restore privacy? Start by burning down the Google offices and NSA headquarters.

That won't do anything. Step 1 would be getting CALEA and any similar laws requiring networks to be built in an insecure manner repealed. Once that's done, rebuild telephone and email networks to support easy to use end-to-end encryption. And make sure any storage devices encrypt all data at rest. Any services which require you to store data on a third-party server, or transmit through a third party server, unencrypted (or encrypted with a key outside your control) must be considered less private; that's not the fault of the third parties, that's just a fact.

The idea would be to make bulk collection infeasible, and individual privacy violation difficult enough that the violator does actually have to work at it, and has a good chance of being caught at it.

I don't get the point of this site

[Trepidity]

You can complain about literally anything? So it's the superset of all reviews sites/forums on the internet? How accurate do you expect the results to be?

Re:I don't get the point of this site

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a new business venture. Once the masses give them data the company will be able to sell said data. That's it's sole purpose.

I call.

[Anonymous Coward]

" I will not mention names because I am not a rude gentleman" - alright, how much?

I have a complaint

[Anonymous Coward]

My hotcakes are cold... and the waitress won't give me any extra butter.

Re: I have a complaint

[cbiltcliffe]

You 'ave a complaint!? Look at these shoes! I've only 'ad 'em three weeks and.....

Hilarious

[Anonymous Coward]

That out of context quote about having nothing to hide has persisted for years despite corrections. It's really quite amusing how easy it is to irreparably tarnish someone's reputation. That or it's depressing.

Slashdotted?

[cliffjumper222]

As of 9:32PM PDT the brown list is down. I would say it is slashdotted, but given the dwindling number of readers of this site and the server error it tossed out, I expect it's either been hacked, or is just broken.

The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

It's job is to spy for the united states of america. As a usian, I am proud of the great job the NSA has done spying. Snowden is traitor. Spying keeps the body count down. The more you know about the enemy the less likely it is that you will destroy a country based on false information. I do have a problem with the law enforcement side of the United states. Unlike the NSA and CIA, whose job is to engage in covert and partisan operations in favor of the unitied states of america, the job of law enforcement is to place as many usian citizens in jail as possible. They engage in covert and partisan operation against usian citizens in favor of the prison industries of America(sic). There is a big difference. I for one want the NSA is spy as much as they can on everyone, including myself; that way they can prevent the next act of terrorism, and prevent our politicians from destroying two countries that had nothing to do with the act (like they did with Iraq and afganistan). I do not want them to share the information with and law enforcement who will just use the secret information to concoct a totally bogus case against a family who let their kid play in the street too long so they can round up the kid send him to CPS to be molested, and send the parents to jail for 10 years to raise the stock value of the prison industries of america. They will also round up all the hackers who try to do the right thing and expose security holes so that they can keep the prison beds filled

When you are in dept to someone you are a slave to them. Currently the USA owes money to the same people that own our major news agencies, and hollywood, mainly China, and Russia. You do not have to conquer the USA militarily, you just have to buy out their politicians.

Re: The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck you shithead. You and your kind are the reason America sucks now.

Re:The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure thing there IDF.

Re:The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a traitor to freedom and to the USA. Go kill yourself.

Re: The NSA is s spy agency

[Thong]

Wow! I'm impressed with how citizens of the U.S. support freedom of speech. One guy comes out in support of NSA and gets a "fuck you shithead" in response. Wow.

Re: The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

When someone is trying to quash the freedom of speech, that is what you should rightly expect. Nowhere in that response did I see anything telling GGP that he couldn't express his opinion, just that he's a shithead.

Also what? You extend the freedom of speech to the GGP but not the person you replied to, Mr. Hypocrite?

Re:The NSA is s spy agency

[houindcon]

Why is this modded down?? I hate the NSA as much as any of you, but his/her comment actually makes sense (tho I don't necessarily agree with it 100%)

The info will be collected no matter what. We simply have no say in it. If you don't like it, create your own chips, write your own code, manufacture your own products. It's what is DONE with that info that we should be focused on.

Casting a wide net is a good strategy. Giving the punk ass fuckin police and other gubment agencies freedom to do whateverthefuck they want with that info, including harassment, torture, black mail etc, is just fucking despicable.

I for one, would prefer the NSA not exist, not collect data AND not share it, but let's get real... I also prefer that guns not exist, but guess what, they DO. And so I'm glad I have the freedom to purchase one to protect my family because it's already too late. GUNS EXIST. NSA EXISTS. Now let's deal with this shit.

Re:The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

It's what is DONE with that info that we should be focused on.

Nope. The mere collection of the information is a violation of the constitution. Furthermore, by allowing them to have the data, you must trust all people who will ever be in government to not abuse that; a foolish level of trust, given history.

Re: The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't seem to understand free speech, nothing the AC said in any way interferes with the exercise of free speech. You are free to say it and others are free to respond, you may not like their response, but they are free to speak it.

Re:The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

When you are in dept to someone you are a slave to them. Currently the USA owes money to the same people that own our major news agencies, and hollywood, mainly China, and Russia. You do not have to conquer the USA militarily, you just have to buy out their politicians.

The largest holder of US debt is the Social Security fund, which, using your "logic", explains why Fox News exists.

Social Security: 16%
Fed Reserve: 12%
China: 8%
Japan: 7%

Re: The NSA is s spy agency

[Khyber]

Apparently you don't know how the fuck freedom of speech works, nimrod.

Re:The NSA is s spy agency

[BronsCon]

I don't have an opinion on Snowden, honestly. Part of me wants to call him a traitor, as he did reveal information about clandestine operations, but part of me thinks him a hero for revealing the same information about homeland-based activities. I love this country, but I hate its government with a passion... and, as I'm related to a federal employee, I'm not worried about this post landing me on any watch list; I'm already on most of them. God Bless America.

Re: The NSA is s spy agency

[Anonymous Coward]

Hint: Freedom of speech doesn't mean others have to accept what is said. Quite to the contrary, it means others are free to say things like "fuck you shithead," which equally qualifies as free speech. There seems to be an increasing trend of people attempting to equate vocal disagreement with some sort of repression of free speech, and this habit appears to be especially prevalent among those who like to use terms like bigoted, racist, or intolerant to cast aspersions upon the speech of those who in fact merely vehemently disagree with certain views or practices. Does the last sentence describe some of your social interactions perchance? Are you still still unclear on the concept?

In short, you can kiss my ass.

(philip.paradis posting AC because I don't log in on this machine)

Re:The NSA is s spy agency

[beastofburdon]

Have you forgotten that every dollar that exists is a debt to the Federal Reserve, plus interest?

Black Fly in your Chardonnay, etc, etc...

[Zanadou]

It's somewhat ironic that after his rant against Google, I go to sign up for brownlist.com and I see a "Login with Facebook" link, along with pages and pages of 'Terms of Use' buried in a pdf file.

Re:Black Fly in your Chardonnay, etc, etc...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's somewhat ironic that after his rant against Google, I go to sign up for brownlist.com and I see a "Login with Facebook" link, along with pages and pages of 'Terms of Use' buried in a pdf file.

Honeypot?

First post

[Anonymous Coward]

First post is always stupid because it's rushed and not thought out, in order to be faster than everyone else.

Should have listened to that person within Google

[Anonymous Coward]

Well before the Snowden relevations, Eric Schmidt got on TV and told everyone that if they had something they didn't want to government to find out about it, they probably shouldn't do it online. Maybe he should have listened.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

[hsthompson69]

I smell an infinite regress - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q...

Government has power over people to keep them from doing wrong.

Government watchers have power over government to keep them from doing wrong.

Government watcher watchers have power over government watchers to keep them from doing wrong.

So on, and so forth. It's not just a question of making abuses of the surveillance state/corporation illegal, it's having any sort of system in place that can possibly ensure that those abuses are prosecuted.

We've made some progress on this with FOIA and sunshine laws in general, but those systems are still gamed by those willing to destroy evidence and fight transparency.

Pretty impressive, actuallyâ¦

[Aryeh Goretsky]

Hello,

Most people would likely get thrown off the stage at DEF CON for using it to promote their business in such a fashion. Instead, Mr. McAfee gets applause and people lining up to take photos with him.

Aside from that, the whole concept of simultaneously railing against the erosion of privacy while creating a web site that encourages people to share private information (without much information about how it will be safely secured) that is possibly libelous and may even be criminal at times is, well, going to be interesting. Especially with a FAQ which states things like " Yes, any entity can respond to a complaint. However, if the entity is not a subscriber, the response will not be featured in the official response section." and " It must not be possible for information on the site to be altered for any purpose."

It is going to be very interesting to see how this latest business venture of Mr. McAfee's turns out.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

Re:Pretty impressive, actuallyâ¦

[Anonymous Coward]

Basically McAfee is just pointing out the obvious:

metadata is a powerful tool,

and that you think the NSA can abuse it (and has), it is just ONE entity--and can be controlled (by a gov't if it wants to) compared to the thousands of corporations that can equally abuse that metadata, hence you should worry about Google, Facebook, and MS.

Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Just like the McAfee AV software:

[danknight48]

http://www.brownlist.com/
- Slow
- Pointless
- Buggy

Nothing new. The guy is still making crap software, for pointless projects.

Re:Just like the McAfee AV software:

[Anonymous Coward]

Just like Google+

Re:Just like the McAfee AV software:

[danknight48]

Just like Google+

Just like Anonymous Coward's.

Re:Just like the McAfee AV software:

[Anonymous Coward]

Just like Anonymous Coward's.

It's more like your knowledge of English grammar, or lack thereof.

Re:Just like the McAfee AV software:

[danknight48]

It's more like your knowledge of English grammar, or lack thereof.

I take it your American and cannot comprehend correct English. Let alone your inability to log in and stop yourself trolling.

Peter Norton

[antdude]

He needs to show up too!

Re:Peter Norton

[Bing Tsher E]

Peter Norton has been dead for decades. He was inadvertently killed the day that they slapped a big piece of glass over him (similar to the cover glass in a microscope slide) to make a fresh Peter Norton(tm) bitmap for the new packaging.

Re:Peter Norton

[antdude]

Prove it that he is dead. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P... doesn't say so. :P

Re:Peter Norton

[Anonymous Coward]

Peter Norton is alive and well, he's retired from the software industry and now sings in a rock band that does Elvis Presley tributes.

Last week I saw him dressed up on the way to a gig.

Re:Peter Norton

[antdude]

Prove it. :P

He wasn't thinking of Google...

[Anonymous Coward]

He wasn't thinking of Google in 1998.

Re:He wasn't thinking of Google...

[Another, completely]

Why not? I'm pretty sure it was my search engine of choice by some time in 1998. It was just better than Yahoo! (exclamation point is theirs, not mine). Not sure I ever remember liking Alta Vista. You couldn't trade shares in a company called Google, but something called Google was clearly gathering a lot of information and sorting it effectively.

Re:He wasn't thinking of Google...

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only that, but McNealy didn't even say that until 1999.

Privacy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Within brownlists terms and conditions, section B, 2nd paragraph last sentence. "You hereby consent to the Subject contacting you directly regarding any of Your
Content that you post about a Subject" - hard to imagine how that would happen without them passing on your private details...

Welcome to the party John..

[Anonymous Coward]

You're a bit late.

The idiot bandwagon

[Anonymous Coward]

This guy is in league with Microsoft and Apple and parrots their talking points because he can see the writing on the wall for his crapware when people stop using windows and apples OS. Its the same talking points Microsoft and Apple constantly chant to try to stop people from migrating away from thier products. Best advice is to just stop listening to their crap and tell the media to stop reporting crap as stories cause they get paid by gates and his mob of bastards.

A repository of secrets.

[Anonymous Coward]

How can this be abused. Perhaps by selling the whistleblowers revelations back to companies that they are against or to the government?

Complaints?

[darkain]

I've got a complaint... The site is slow as shit and buggy as hell. After a long wait, the homepage FINALLY loads. Click on anything, and get a spinning little "loading" thing pop up in the middle of the page, and then nothing happens. After some minutes, and error box popped up in the top-right corner of the page saying there is some technical issues.

OH wait, this is McAfee we're talking about... yeah, shit's gonna suck, forgot.

Re:Complaints?

[Anonymous Coward]

Given that MacAfee modifies your kernel and remains active, preventing "re-entrant" processes from starting even when disabled, is typical of insidious intrusion. There used to be an option to disable *this*, but they yanked the control of it a few years back. The only way to clear it is to not just disable MacAfee, but remove it from the host.

That's when I found out about the secret, ninja, entirely undocumented "-r" option for sshd, that prevents it from doing a 're-exec" and allows it to run on CygWin with MacAfee installed. For people who value their security and openness, it's *amazing* how the OpenSSH maintainers can fail to ever document one of the command line options for their most critical daemon.

Think I'm kidding? Check the source and feel free to add the option to your sshd daemon in your init script as a test.

Re:Complaints?

[Anonymous Coward]

The whole site is down now. Nice going McAfee!

Maybe wait a little till judgement

[gnalre]

He may well be right...However John McAfee has a well earned reputation of drugged out paranoia, so I think I will reserve judgement for now

and

[Anonymous Coward]

This is why we can't have nice things.

Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

John McAfee is not a great posterboy for why privacy should exist at all...

the truth comes with great sacrifice

[Anonymous Coward]

Get involved with DOD. Guess who provides the search engine for NSA? I'll never tell...

Web privacy a illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think many like Google see data privacy the same way they see privacy with physical mail, or paper documents, or physical documents or files. People in Google see opportunity with personal data that can supposedly better your life by using your data to help you. I don't know how much is malice and how much is just being naïve on Google's part? McAfee is hardly a person with legitimate credentials to make many take notice of privacy issues with companies like Google.
I think the shear ease of having so much information that can be manipulated and compared on a grand scale through data storage is just too tempting for agencies like the NSA, Google and any other entity that can benefit from personal data. Its like a kid in a candy store that has unlimited free samples. Why would you ever buy any?

Re:Web privacy a illusion

[Anonymous Coward]

What a myopic, child-like view you have of the situation. Google isn't reading your mail or harvesting your data to "better your life"; they couldn't give less of a shit about you or your life. They're doing it to make themselves even richer by SELLING YOU off to the highest bidder.

Runtime Error

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.brownlist.com/ = Server Error in '/' Application.
-Ignacio Agulló

I have to agree

[Anonymous Coward]

I have been ungoogling myself. Took the app off my phone.
Changed to duckduckgo and switching email.

You cant scan and have end to end encryption their just cant be both. So I switched.

I might also pay for a proxy as ISP's are all up in your business too.

brownlist.com very, very private

[seniorcoder]

Typed www.brownlist.com URL into my browser and after a long wait got:
Server Error in '/' Application.
Runtime Error
Description: An application error occurred on the server. The current custom error settings for this application prevent the details of the application error from being viewed remotely (for security reasons).
[...and some more]
Slashdotted?

Considering his crimes..

[hairyfeet]

Such as banging underage girls while ranting for hours how bath salts give you massive boners, followed by having to bribe his way out of a murder charge that, and lets be honest here folks, there was more than enough circumstantial evidence to be fairly certain he'd be on trial now if it happened here, its really no surprise he is beating the privacy drum. I wonder if he sent something incriminating through Gmail and is now spooked?

Agree with Google

[Anonymous Coward]

The benefits of shining sunshine on evil doers far outweighs the minor "privacy" inconveniences.

One hypothetical: What if the murder or rape of a loved one by a perpetrator that had committed similar acts prior could have been prevented by a lookup against national DNA database taken from every resident at birth.

whoosh

[Anonymous Coward]

You didn't hear that sound, did you?

John McAfee?

[mcvos]

Didn't he retire to a life of sex and drugs, preferably of the illegal kind?

I'm all for privacy, but I'm not sure if that argument gets more weight if it's John McAfee who says it.

Re:John McAfee?

[Anonymous Coward]

You say that like it's a bad thing....

Google's 'Do No Evil' policy...

[Tajas]

Ever since Eric Schmidt was hired, fired and paid off, then brought back, Google's 'Do No Evil' policy has flown out the window with little hopes of return. He is more profit over quality and does not care about what that does to Google's customer's. They use nothing but Apple products in their daily lives, instead of Google products to improve, and this is one of many reasons Google has down so far down hill.