Privacy is fundamental to Humane Tech (and Democracy)!

Freedom Privacy
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22

Your assessment is correct, privacy in regards to the problem being bigger than Facebook Cambridge Analytical. However, people are having a hard time identifying what the underlining problem is in regards to privacy, cyber security, and consumer exploitation threats that were brought to light by the Facebook Cambridge Analytica revelation.

The privacy, cyber security, and consumer & child exploitation threats brought to light by the Facebook Cambridge Analytica incident are systemic to all online services such as social media and connected products supported by predatory surveillance and data mining business practices rooted in “Surveillance Capitalism”.

Lawmakers, the FTC, FCC, DOJ, and other relevant agencies need to address Surveillance Capitalism as a whole due to the fact that data driven technology providers such as Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Samsung, Amazon and other tech giants have adopted the Surveillance Capitalism Business Model.

For more information please read this topic: Surveillance Capitalism- The Need for an Electronic Bill of Rights

Regards- Rex

23

The loss of privacy will be all-pervasive if we do not act to protect it:

Three things that should frighten you:

  1. In China, the government is using data to control the country’s population…
  2. The recent coverage of Cambridge Analytica and Facebook shows just how much corporations in the West know about us without us knowing.
  3. Quantum computing will soon be able to break modern encryption, laying open everything we so far thought was private and safe, and more powerful computers will be able to search and map this data going back through digital time.

Most of all, I feel for our children. They are growing up in a world where everything is connected, viewable, shared. They obsess over their image, worry about their following and who likes their posts. […] We should anticipate a moment when a future version of Google can search for every image with your face in it. […] A generation back, you could make mistakes, do the stupid things teenagers do, and let it be buried by time. That is over.

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Agree- I reviewed a Vice news report that was focused on China’s use of surveillance technology, surveillance data, and sensitive user data to apply a social ranking to citizens.

There are other security solutions than encryption that may provide a breakthrough in protection such as the use of cognitive ID.

I agree with your assessment in regards to child privacy. My biggest concern is the use of “Digital Discrimination” to lawfully discriminate against people based on their data rating much like China is doing today.

Lawmakers, the FCC, FTC, and privacy advocates really need to focus on Surveillance Capitalism which is the root of all evil in regards to the threat to civil liberties such as due process and privacy- Rex

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25

The cognitive ID idea :wink: is interesting… I bumped into this commercial website before (is this what you are referring to?): http://cognitive-id.com/

I am wondering if - while this may solve the problem with passwords - this is a privacy nightmare in itself. Because anyone can (and will) be using this to identify the person behind the screen, even with them not being aware of this, as all that is needed is add a ‘single line of Javascript in your webpage’.

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I’m wondering about the role of societal norms. Reading Harcourt’s book on the expository society (http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674504578&content=reviews) made me reflect not just on insidious business models and surveillance, but so too the normalisaiton of sharing, ‘transparency’ (in a very singular way), being surveilled, and yes, surveilling others up to the point where we encounter sousveillance and quanitfied self. We can change the business models and the settings, but is society in a place to pull back from this laissez-faire attitude towards privacy and sharing (which are different, as one implies control and choice)?

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27

So everyone’s all about privacy - which I agree I’m also not into people with nefarious agendas knowing all about me-or is it that I don’t want them using it for nefarious agendas ? Meaning it’s not my privacy that I care about - it’s how you’re using it as a tool in a way that hurts me and helps you. I bring this up because I feel that in some ways anonymity has actually been the most destructive aspect of the internet and I want it to go away! There’s a difference between privacy and anonymity. You shouldn’t be able to talk to people without revealing your name or likewise post or influence or troll.

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The facebook scandal involving cambridge analytica is only the latest of ethically questionable business practices by a tech company and hardly be the last. Google confirmed in 2014 that its gmail system read all the emails and uber admitted that pesonal infomations of drivers and customers were compromised in 2016 but choose not to inform them fo more than a year. The public reactions remain the same those techs need oversight. governance and accountabiltiy. We cannot let them continue to self regulate themselves. What I am trying to say is there must some sort of regulation about privacy.and much better if it is a worldwide privacy regulation because tech companies reach knows no borders. The stakes are to high. Our lives and future generation lives under constant surveillance.

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This continuing saga of data collection by tech company like google inspite of the backlash and this time better data gathering is like the good old days once more.

“As Facebook becomes increasingly synonymous with the tech backlash, a growing chorus of voices is urging more focus on Google’s data-collection and -analysis practices, which The Wall Street Journal warns could be worse than Facebook’s. But consumers may be too busy Googling to care”

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I cannot even tell you how strongly I believe in this issue. It’s a civil rights issue.

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As much as I respect Stallman, I worry that “the only safe database is the one that was never collected” is loosing way to go. Why? It is simply so beneficial for many reasons from personal / family perspective, that even if e.g. Europe could with its more strict laws keep massive data collection somewhat in control, pressure in e.g. health related services would be huge. Think about it this way: one day we learn that China has really advanced AI in health care, it is superior to what others have to offer - because they had billion people database for deep learning (and other kinds of AI that benefit from all the data one can feed to them).
So: we should probably try to come up with solutions that guarantee that researchers have good access to anonymised data, keep AI community as open as possible and still try to keep quite strict laws. It will be tricky, but I think we have to do this well, or much is in danger. I will be writing more about this at dreamsorientedcomputing.com , “Own our own data” is drafts title (owning data is kind of funny way to put it, on purpose - the term takes us further than only thinking from privacy viewpoint).

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Yes, I agree, @Mikko. Stallman’s database that was never collected could be done in part by regulation, but for other ways to have real control of your own data other, better technology is needed to offer that control and protection. Of course it would also help if people knew in what ways they leaked data, and actively tried to minimize this data leakage.

34

Especially in the workplace people are subject to increasing privacy invasions by their employers (it’s the boss’ time after all, right):

Tech companies are coming up with ever more bizarre and intrusive ways to monitor workforces.

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How to balance freedom and safety? Start by ensuring that the digital world, like the real one, has places where law-abiding people can enjoy privacy. Citizens of liberal democracies do not expect to be frisked without good cause, or have their homes searched without a warrant. Similarly, a mobile phone in a person’s pocket should be treated like a filing cabinet at home. Just as filing cabinets can be locked, encryption should not be curtailed.

And the discussion on Hacker News: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17247288

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Some great alternatives to most used Google products and services that invade your privacy:

Some of these tools are more involved to set up properly, more targeted to developers. A thing for improvement… more techical discussions here on Hacker News:

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Thank you for sharing this. I agree that the average consumer has a role in this change. Yet, I’m not sure how we make them understand why this matters. Is it stirring up anger against against the tech plutocrats that are making billions on the backs of purloined data? Connecting the harvesting of attention to pulling us away from what matters in the works? Tying it to targeting kids? Something else?

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People are in a tech nirvana not realizing that they are being exploited for financial gain at the expense of their civil liberties, privacy, cyber security and safety by the very companies they are patronizing with their loyalty, trust and money.

Sometimes I feel like I woke up in the movie “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” and Americans don’t care about their civil liberties any more due to the fact that they are addicted to intrusive, exploitive and harmful connected products.

I feel like if I try and open their eyes, they are going to go signal to Google to point me out for discussing how important privacy is to one’s freedom:

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The expression on Donald Sutherland’s face is the same look someone has when you ask them to put their addictive smartphone down- : )

I’m here to offer people the opportunity to take the red pill and learn the painful truth about Surveillance Capitalism and that is we are all already living in an Orwellian society that George Orwell could not of imagined.

We live in an Orwellian society centered on connected products supported by the android OS, Apple iOS and Microsoft Windows OS enabling Google, Apple and Microsoft to sell access to their product users to companies such as Amazon, Facebook, BAIDU and other tech giants who employ predatory surveillance and data mining business practices rooted in Surveillance Capitalism.

The problem is that Google, Apple and Microsoft have monetized their product users plus all companies concerned dominate the OS market which makes it is impossible to buy a private, safe and secure connected product that is not supported by predatory surveillance and data mining business practices.

Do You Want to Take the Red Pill?:

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If so, I just had an article published by The Wireless Messaging News titled “Surveillance Capitalism- The Need For An Electronic Bill of Rights”. You should read it, it is on my website My Smart Privacy at: http://www.mysmartprivacy.com/articles.html

Once you are done reading that article, you will be fully unplugged from the Silicon Valley Matrix and ready to take action.

If you want change, get pissed off and take action. Go to the Take Action page on my website to read complaints that I’ve filed against AT&T, T-Mobile, Google, Apple and Samsung with the FCC plus law makers: http://www.mysmartprivacy.com/take-action.html

I will be filing more formal complaints with other agencies such as the FTC this week so keep posted.

The complaints that I’ve filed can be used as templates for other people who feel that they are oppressed by “Cyber-enslavement” due to the fact that connected product users have become “uncompensated information producers” who are being exploited for financial gain by companies such as Google, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook and other tech giants..

I appreciate your reply. Now it is up to you to take action.

Also spread the word by sending the link to my site to other folks who care about civil liberties, privacy, cyber security, safety and good business ethics.

Regards- Rex

39

I wonder if the radio and TV remain our exemplars of entertainment. First we listened, then we watched. Now we are being listened to and watched.

Thanks for the great picture of Donald Sutherland. It says so much about people’s resistance when they are being warned they need to change their behavior.

As I’ve written, people have been so programmed by their smartphones, they automatically accept–without reasoning or questioning–the information it delivers. Even when the information is “You’re going to die in the next few minutes.”

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There are alternatives but few are brave enough to take action.

https://websonarlibraries.net/pressrelease.html

Visit My Library

41

This article outlines in 10 articles how we are harmed by unseen privacy infringements that with our tech use:

  1. Fintech and the Financial Exploitation of Customer Data

  2. Profiling and Elections — How Political Campaigns Know Our Deepest Secrets

  3. Connected Cars and the Future of Car Travel

  4. The Myth of Device Control and the Reality of Data Exploitation

  5. Super-Apps and the Exploitative Potential of Mobile Applications

  6. Smart Cities and Our Brave New World

  7. The Myth of Free Wi-Fi

  8. Invisible Discrimination and Poverty

  9. Data and Policing - Your Tweet Can and Will Be Used Against You

  10. The Gig Economy and Exploitation

42

Think about the following scenario.

A very powerful company takes a special interest in you. They hire dozens of private investigators to follow you everywhere, round the clock. They interview everybody you know, take pictures of you, your loved ones. They build a detailed psychological profile that includes all your sexual orientations, your most private thoughts. They do this for years and years, every day, accumulating a vast trove of data.

Then they proceed to selling this information to whoever is happy to pay for it. Everyone with financial means can access all this data, and use it to get involved in certain aspects of your life to extract money through manipulation.

You would freak out.

Well, isn’t it what we have now? Tech companies have accumulated mountains of data, connecting the dots between all available data sources, and now with AI, the next step is nothing short of extortion: using all this data to manipulate users into acting in accordance with tech companies’ wishes.

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