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Mistrust of Google and Facebook is a 'Contagion' That Could Spread To Every Tech Company, Says Box CEO Aaron Levie (recode.net)
Aaron Levie isn't worried about his company, Box, being regulated -- but he is worried about what happens if the government has to do something about Facebook. From a report: "It's a contagion because it's going to reduce trust in these types of platforms," Levie said on the latest episode of Recode Decode, hosted by Kara Swisher. "The worst-case scenario for us is that Silicon Valley gets so far behind on these issues that we just can't be trusted as an industry," he said. "We rely on the Fortune 500 trusting Silicon Valley's technology, to some extent, for our success. When you see that these tools can be manipulated or they're being used in more harmful ways, or regulators are stamping them down, then that impacts anybody, whether you're consumer or enterprise."
Earlier the mistrust was for IBM and Microsoft. Then Oracle was added. And now Facebook and Google.
Also realize that the list just grows, the only way to get off the list is a liquidation.
What's worse is that the mistrust against the top companies is just the tip of an iceberg - you have a large number of companies that aren't visible the same way like doubleclick, cxense, ioffer etc that probably are even worse since they don't provide any benefit at all.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
I see no reason why any company holding any personal data should be trusted. They are the ones that resist any regulation of personal data. They are the ones that profit off of it.
You have to earn trust. Since when has any company done that?
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
Apathy is already a contagion that has spread. No one care how much data google and facebook have on them. And they shrug shoulders when it falls into hands of unknown shadowy theives. And they even feel to unmotivated to quit google or facebook when that happens.
Were all waiting for the shoe to drop and it never does. But we do see signs of things like voter manipulation or lots of hard to quantify privacy intrusions. Nothing you can really put a finger on. To hard to investigate.
Hey that sounds like the perfect rationale for regulation of an industry by a central watchdog.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
What happens if the Rust compiler decides to sell all your private information? Or at least some linked in library does.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Mistrust of the companies is not contagious. Abuse of user privacy by big companies IS contagious, apparently. If they don't want us to distrust them, they should start acting like trustworthy companies. You can't blame users when the root problem is shitty corporate policy.
Americans are a fearful people. We're literally taught to be fearful from childhood. Who in America hasn't had these sentiments slammed into their faces at some point in life?
All politicians want to be tyrants.
All neighbors are potential molesters.
All automobile drivers are blind and malicious.
Anyone will step on you to get ahead.
We're constantly at risk of invasion, attack, or harm otherwise.
Everybody wants what we want and they're willing to take it by force.
Of COURSE Americans distrust massive rich corporations that have a plausible desire to exploit them. We've been told to expect it. And in some scenarios (oddly enough like the Facebook and Microsoft ones), we shouldn't actually trust the companies. Given that it is one of our most important principals to be secure in our person and papers (aka - personal information) and these companies are in prime place to access that personal information, we have to continually ensure that the tentative trust of customer/vendor is sufficiently earned.
But never be surprised when Americans distrust a powerful person or organization. It's literally in our upbringing.
Domestic collect it all is not legal.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Honestly, what makes anyone think that trusting a huge faceless corporation is good idea to start with?
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
The "problem" is that the mistrust of the companies named in TFS is absolutely, totally, well-deserved.
Really. Just do it. Critical thinking is a good thing.
The thing is, it's ALWAYS been possible to manipulate these sorts of platforms. Recall the results that Google used to return for "more evil than satan himself" and "miserable failure"? No? Fine... go ahead and Google for "Santorum". You'll still get more than a dozen mixtures of lube and fecal matter before you get to the actual stack of crap that used to be a senator. And this is nothing new to the internet. Howard Stern used to engage in the pastime of having his listeners prank call news stations with "reports" blaming everything from the death of John Kennedy Jr. to the bomb attack in the old WTC's parking garage on his producer: "ba ba booey". And none other than Dan Rather once got fooled by a fake report wrt/ George Bush #2's national guard service.
The fact that media platforms can be manipulated and fooled doesn't make them inherently untrustworthy. It means that they're designed and operated by human beings. And humans are inherently prone to making mistakes; particularly when they're deliberately misled. That doesn't mean anyone should distrust legitimate and reputable media and run off into conspiracy theory and they're-out-to-get-me paranoia land. It means you should just check multiple sources and apply critical thinking skills to what you read and hear.
Imagine all the people...
First there were mainframes that offered lot's of power and high levels of privacy, but were limited in user access.
Then there were Personal Computers that offered limited power, but wide user adoption and maintained privacy.
Then there was the "Cloud" that offered virtually unlimited power AND wide user adoption but disregarded privacy.
The future is going to be to go back to personal computers/servers that control data locally and privately but now can offer virtually unlimited power and connection.
Sorry, but multi-billion dollar tech companies, startups, and everything in between is consistently demonstrating their business model is to harvest far more information about people than they realise, and then make money from it.
Yes, we distrust you, because we pretty much know you're doing the shady things you don't want people to know you're doing.
The distrust is real, and it's based on the actual fact that these companies are hoovering up tons of information about people.
Yes, Silicon Valley has a trust issue. But let's not pretend there isn't a damned good reason for it.
Americans are a fearful people.
To an extent this is true. It certainly explains the success of the gun lobby. It also explains the desire (by some) for a border wall, much racism, and quite a lot of other features of our society. On the other hand we can be an incredibly brave and adventurous people too if properly motivated. We're complicated...
Of COURSE Americans distrust massive rich corporations that have a plausible desire to exploit them.
Except they do trust them. If they did not trust them then they wouldn't act the way they do. If you do not care enough to actually act on that mistrust then that is indistinguishable from in practice trusting that organization. And there are huge swaths of our voting public that may on occasion distrust corporations but they definitely distrust government - even under circumstances where they probably should fear the corporations more since they are less accountable. There are also huge swaths that feel exactly the opposite. Both are right at times and wrong at times. The truth is that some caution is always warranted and some trust is always necessary.
Given that it is one of our most important principals to be secure in our person and papers (aka - personal information) and these companies are in prime place to access that personal information, we have to continually ensure that the tentative trust of customer/vendor is sufficiently earned.
That's a nice theory about what we should do but it doesn't explain what we actually do. In reality we hand over our personal information quite readily to unknown parties without even
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Waxman: Well where do you think you made a mistake then?
Greenspan: I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interest of organizations specifically banks and others were such is that they were best capable of protecting their own shareholders.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
I don't even use Box. Not like they'd have my trust to begin with
Depends on what you wanted to use Box, or Dropbox, or Google+, or.. whatever, for.
In the case of Box, I posted up things that I specifically want to be distributed to anyone who might be interested - resume, some classic statistics charts, and so on.
When I have stuff I don't want distributed to the known galaxy, I send it direct to the intended recipient. Of course, once I do that, I"m still at the mercy of said recipient -- and all of us always have been, ever since people learned how to copy things.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
Also you have a horrible understanding of the word profit. You use it as an insult. A company does not survive long without either making a profit or taking out more debt and selling more securities. The second option of debt or securities only lasts for a while. There are plenty of tech companies long gone who thought they would get by without taking profits for years or decades. They were very wrong.
Please do try to educate yourself before posting nonsense.
Snapchat filed an IPO last year. In their public offering paperwork, they blatantly stated that they've never made a profit, and may never actually make a profit in the future. Naturally they valued themselves north of $20 billion.
THAT is what is "very wrong" with capitalism today. Forget basic business 101; I'm talking about the kind of Greed that allows companies to even exist with that kind of stupid mentality about profitability. THAT is the kind of stupid shit that makes profitability (and common-sense capitalism) irrelevant. And you're right; it doesn't make sense, but we've reached that infamous crossroads again where selling hype is more valuable than a sound business plan.
Oh, and don't think we're going to see Dot Bomb v2.0 come along to reset this stupidity. We now have shit like Too Big To Fail to thank for removing the logical options for companies that should fall over and die.
Which well regulated militia are you a member of again?
Well, I've been in the Navy for 24 years, so... Also, there's plenty of literature that "well regulated" means that the people ought to be a match for any standing army (cf. Hamilton, The Federalist No. 29).
I have to jump through more hoops to get a drivers license than to carry a deadly weapon whose sole purpose is to kill...
A driver's license is not a right. Nor is a firearm's sole purpose to kill. I've shot thousands of rounds over the years and not one has killed a single living thing. As far as regulating without abridging, I suggest you look in places like CA, DC, and Chicago. I find it useful to compare the tactics of gun-grabbers with those of anti-abortionists; they may not push for an outright ban, but they'll certainly try to regulate it out of existence.
Unfortunately, it would be dangerous and misguided to consider this question solely from the perspective of "Can you trust Facebook?" or "Can you trust Google?"
The reason for this is simply because of the legislative framework under which any company incorporated in the United States [and similar controls apply in other countries - this is by no means a US-centric issue] are legally obliged to operate.
For example, the US Government can issue an "NSL" - National Security Letter to any US Company and that company is legally obliged to cooperate and legally prohibited from even admitting that they have received such an NSL. In the UK the equivalent notification is the "D-Notice", and disclosure of being under the direction of a D-Notice can be considered a breach of the Official Secrets Act, which carries some very strong punishments indeed.
The second reason that it is important to understand context concerns what we already know.
Disclosures from Edward Snowden have taught us that:-
1. Physical modifications have in the past been made to equipment from Cisco systems between that equipment being released by the factory and arriving with the client.
2. Systems have been compromised by specially-made USB cables, which included micro-transmitters that gave access to agents operating using a "remote control device" the size of a briefcase, from a range of up to 8km.
3. etc...
Does this suddenly mean that all (US/UK/Australian/Canadian/New Zealand) companies are suddenly to be considered untrustworthy? No, of course not. It just means that you have to walk into business relationships with all parties [no matter the country of origin] with your eyes open.
Aaron Levine is right to be concerned, but the issue isn't "Google" or "Facebook" alone, it is the fact that any company to whom you give data can be compelled to give up that data to the government under which that company is incorporated. And from the perspective of the government in question, it is far cheaper to get some commercial entity to do all the hard work, then subpoena it for next-to-nothing, than it is to spend a fortune attempting direct connection...