Will Trump's Presidency Bring More Surveillance To The US? (scmagazine.com)

An anonymous reader reports that Donald Trump's upcoming presidency raises a few concerns for the security industry: "Some of his statements that industry professionals find troubling are his calls for 'closing parts of the Internet', his support for mass surveillance, and demands that Apple should have helped the FBI break the encrypted communications of the San Bernardino shooter's iPhone," writes SC Magazine. One digital rights activist even used Trump's surprise victory as an opportunity to suggest President Obama begin "declassifying and dismantling as much of the federal government's unaccountable, secretive, mass surveillance state as he can -- before Trump is the one running it... he has made it very clear exactly how he would use such powers: to target Muslims, immigrant families, marginalized communities, political dissidents, and journalists."

Edward Snowden's lawyer says "I think many Americans are waking up to the fact we have created a presidency that is too powerful," and the Verge adds that Pinboard CEO Maciej Ceglowski is now urging tech sites to stop collecting so much data. "According to Ceglowski, the only sane response to a Trump presidency was to get rid of as much stored user data as possible. 'If you work at Google or Facebook,' he wrote on Pinboard's Twitter account, 'please start a meaningful internal conversation about giving people tools to scrub their behavioral data.'"
Could a Trump presidency ultimately lead to a massive public backlash against government surveillance?

Comments

Funny how that works

[IWantMoreSpamPlease]

>>...suggest President Obama begin "declassifying and dismantling as much of the federal government's unaccountable, secretive, mass surveillance state as he can -- before Trump is the one running it..

When Obama got into power, I assumed he'd be the typical liberal. Little did I know he'd get very friendly with the expansion of the police state. He's enjoyed using the presidential powers at whim. Now that he's leaving, someone else gets to pick up the parts he so willingly put into place and use them.

Should have thought of that before you put it into law eh there mr. president?

Re:Funny how that works

[Feral Nerd]

By any measure Obama is center-left. That said, he did deport more illegal immigrants than his predecessor, he did not close Gitmo, and he kept executing wars of aggression against other countries.

Still, let's review this quote from TFA: "I think many Americans are waking up to the fact we have created a presidency that is too powerful,"

I think that was true already even before Obama was president. But, of course much of the debate stopped because the ones making this argument liked Obama and his center-left policies. If electing Trump keeps this debate going that is a good thing - but I suspect most people are just in opposition because their candidate lost, and would not be discussing it if Clinton had been elected.

By any US American standard Obama is center-left, in Europe he'd be center right to moderate conservative. Just about the only US leftie I can point out that would register with a European as a moderate Social Democrat is Bernie Sanders and he scared the whits out of the so-called leftist Democrat party with his beliefs. By European standards vast sections of the Republican party bring back unpleasant memories of fascism and witch-burning 17th century protestant fundamentalists.

No they didn't, did completely

[raymorris]

They didn't contradict themselves; they *certainly* did. :)

Seriously though I took it as not contradictory meaning:
--
We can only speculate.
I'm willing to speculate that she almost certainly would have.
--

She's actually been in politics, observable by the public, since 1977. In those 39 years, she has manifested a belief that the elites like her are better than common plebes. No more reason they shouldn't watch us than a parent shouldn't watch a six year old; based on what her view seems to be.

Trump's public life has been all about drumming up publicity for his buildings and his brand, not about policy. I doubt he's thought much about public policy at all. He DOES have a huge ego. Such a big ego that he thinks a) he should be president and b) most of America will agree he should be president. Unfortunately all presidents have that megalomania.