The Privacy Illusion 198
LoLobey writes "Scott Adams has an entertaining entry on his Dilbert Blog about the perception of privacy. He writes, 'It has come to my attention that many of my readers in the United States believe they have the right to privacy because of something in the Constitution. That is an unsupportable view. A more accurate view is that the government divides the details of your life into two categories: 1. Stuff they don't care about. 2. Stuff they can find out if they have a reason.' His post is written in response to some reader comments on another entry about privacy guardians and how swell life would be if we voluntarily gave up certain personal info."
What people really want (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What people really want (Score:5)
Re:What people really want (Score:5, Insightful)
Rights as they are defined in the constitution were people agreeing that those rights were a good idea. I think most people would agree that we have a right to privacy today. They would have agreed to it back when the constitution was being drafted were it a question. But it probably wouldn't occur to them that 200 years later, it would be so easy to see nearly everything that everyone does.
I wonder what rights we enjoy as a default today that will come into question due to technology in the next 200 years. Rights not to have your consciousness electronically amalgamated into a collective mind? Maybe we should put an amendment to that effect into place now. The Borg were pretty creepy.
proposition for new right (Score:2)
OK, based on what you wrote I propose following formulation:
Everybody has a right not to participate in some "progress". All progress needs to be done only with those people, and only to those people, who agree to it.
So, if you do NOT want a cell phone, nobody will force you to use it. If you do NOT to be a borg, nobody will force you to become part of it. Plus, for the borg case: to maintain the social contract, others will try to protect you in cases when borg will try to integrate you against your will
Re:What people really want (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is, enforcing the laws on the books is its fucking business.
Adams has a good point - there's 2 categories the government lumps your information into: stuff it doesn't care about, and stuff that it can find out if it has a reason. If it has a legitimate subpoena, it can get almost any information it wants to about you, and legal "fishing expeditions" are not that hard to mount.
So why not decriminalize all the stupid "victimless / harmless" crimes, get them off the books, and let the police agencies ACTUALLY go after the real criminals? They'll always going to have the power to subpoena your information if they have reasonable suspicion that you've committed a crime, no matter how much you stomp your feet and shout about privacy. Furthermore, it's not ALL that hard for the government to manufacture "reasonable suspicion" if they're really looking for a reason to nail you.
So instead of worrying about "privacy" (which is at the mercy of the government's lack of interest in you to begin with), limit the circumstances that would give them an excuse to start pawing through your personal information in the first place. They will always be able to violate your privacy - so limit the circumstances where they legitimately have that power.
"Reasonable suspicion"? (Score:2)
The standard in the Constitution is "probable cause". It worked then, no reason to change it now.
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Objection sustained - brain fart on my part led me to reverse probable cause & reasonable suspicion. s/reasonable suspicion/probable cause/g in my post above.
Re:What people really want (Score:5, Insightful)
is freedom and to be let alone, to live without fear
I'm sorry, but you're only half right.
half this country wants to dictate to the other half how to live.
no, you are wrong; 'people' mostly want to control each other. its only the rare person that has a live-and-let-live attitude.
I wish you were right, though.
Re:What people really want (Score:4, Insightful)
Now we're into the right realm...
I don't try to dictate how others live, and I with for the same from them - that they don't dictate how I live.
OTOH, some regulation is necessary, because we all live on this planet together. Your right to pollute air and water indiscriminately stops at my nose, mouth, and generally the rest of my body. Kind of like your right to swing your fist stops at my face.
I also believe that society has a general responsibility to protect children - the future of that society. But what you want to do with another consenting adult is none of my business. I don't particularly like the idea of gay marriage - so I'm not going to do it. But I also believe that that's your business.
As for "voluntarily give up certain personal info," the key word in that phrase is "voluntarily." As long as *I* get to choose to give up - or retain - that information, I'm find with that. If giving up some information improves my life, I may choose to do so. I'm a bit of a privacy bug, but I also recognize that I'm one of those "boring people," and if anything, my "privacy hobby" raises my profile some.
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As for "voluntarily give up certain personal info," the key word in that phrase is "voluntarily." As long as *I* get to choose to give up - or retain - that information, I'm find with that. If giving up some information improves my life, I may choose to do so.
What happens when giving up that information becomes the default cultural norm, and so choosing NOT to do becomes an inconvenience or barrier?
Really simple example - do you have health insurance? If you do, then there is a large insurance company out
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> What happens when giving up that information becomes the default cultural norm, and so
> choosing NOT to do becomes an inconvenience or barrier?
Certainly a valid issue - really yet another Tragedy of the Commons. Almost as applicable as a car analogy.
> Really simple example - do you have health insurance? If you do, then there is a large insurance
> company out there that has your entire medical record. You gave up your right to medical privacy
> (between just you & your doctor) when you
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"The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from the highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they make more comfortable neighbors than the first sort."
-- Robert A. Heinlein
Re:What people really want (Score:4, Insightful)
Frankly, at least government can be held accountable in democracy.
Good luck with the corporations though. And unlike governments, corporations don't have to take care of people either.
Re:What people really want (Score:5, Insightful)
Please try to pay more attention ... the corporations are the government.
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Depends on how you define "accountable".
The only two corporations I don't have a direct competitive choice are the power company & the water company (although both are very heavily regulated by the local government).
But to the GP's point, you ARE paying corporations, just doing it via your tax dollars. Your taxes are paying agricultural corporations via farm subsidies, oil companies via fossil fuels subsidies, automotive company bailouts, etc. So maybe you aren't choosing to purchase fuel at Exxon-Mobi
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Frankly, at least government can be held accountable in democracy.
Good luck with the corporations though. And unlike governments, corporations don't have to take care of people either.
Corporations are designed to avoid accountability. Legally, they exist to stop the owners and officers from personally feeling the (negative) financial consequences of their actions. Structurally, they're set up so that no one person, or group of people, have to take the blame for malicious actions.
If the malicious action happens to be illegal, it's possible to go after the people responsible, but most likely the company gets a pitiful fine and all is forgiven.
So it's no accident that corporations can't be
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Right to Privacy is Implicit in the 4th Amendment (Score:2)
I would argue that there is a right to privacy, and that it exists regardless of whether it is explicitly mentioned in the Constitution. As a justification, I point to the Ninth Amendment, which states "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." A right does not need to be in the Constitution to be had. No rights are granted. Rather, the Constitution states that rights already existing may not be infringed.
I don't know why people forget the Fourth Amendment when they talk about privacy and the Constitution:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated...
Surely your computer and your personal information are the modern equivalents of "papers and effects" as the founding fathers saw it? Although referring to government powers, and not explicitly about what corporations might be able to do, (since the found
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I don't know why people forget the Fourth Amendment when they talk about privacy and the Constitution:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated...
Maybe because even the Supreme Court doesn't see the 4th Amendment as conferring a general "right to privacy," and had to pull "penumbras" out of their Constitutionally educated asses: Griswold v. Connecticut [wikipedia.org].
Although referring to government powers, and not explicitly about what corporations might be able to do, (since the founding fathers could never have envisioned what the world would become), the very idea of a right to privacy is implicit in the Fourth Amendment.
(1) Implicit, not explicit. There you go. (Hence, "penumbras.")
(2) Yeah, the Founding Fathers could never have envisioned globe-spanning megacorps [wikipedia.org].
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But Scott Adams is right, nobody has such a right, but it's something that is worth fighting for nonetheless.
And thus you've basically affirmed the issues that the Federalists had over the Bill of Rights that at some point in the future idiots like you would claim that if it's not specifically enumerated in the Bill of Rights that the right doesn't exist. You, Scott Adams and the Supreme Court are all wrong on this issue.
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But Scott Adams is right, nobody has such a right, but it's something that is worth fighting for nonetheless.
And thus you've basically affirmed the issues that the Federalists had over the Bill of Rights that at some point in the future idiots like you would claim that if it's not specifically enumerated in the Bill of Rights that the right doesn't exist. You, Scott Adams and the Supreme Court are all wrong on this issue.
I agree, but do you really think things would be better if we didn't have a Bill of Rights? If anything, the Bill of Rights limited the damage that has been done.
The absence of a Bill of Rights would be the equivalent of only having the Ninth and Tenth Amendments. Since those were disregarded almost immediately, we'd have nothing positively affirming the first eight and it would be assumed that we had no rights at all except what the government decides we have.
is freedom and to be let alone (Score:2)
You don't get that many places. Conservative governemnts want to tell you to live your life the conservative way (things like, who you can sleep with, drinking laws etc), socialists want you to live your life the socialist way (things like, what you're allowed to do with your own money, the state will only engage with groups not individuals, one size fits all, etc).
Very few places have liberal governments who want you to be left alone to live your life *your* way, whatever that might be.
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I disagree with Scott Adams on the idea that the US Government could go Nazi- I think we saw the first stages just last night. Having said that, I don't see any way to avoid such a government using all means at it's disposal to invade your privacy- and I don't see any way TO fight this- other than to lie as much as you can to anybody asking you questions.
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That might be true for the U.S.. German citiziens do have such a right, labeled "Informationelle Selbstbestimmung" ("Informational self-determination"), by our Bundesverfassungsgericht (German "SCOTUS").
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Scott Adams is wrong then. The Fourth Amendment doesn't use the word "privacy", but it expounds on it.
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I have visited the blog page a number of times today, and he has censored nearly all of them that were made today. They were there, now they're not.
Smooth move, Scott. That was sarcasm, if you could not tell. I guess I'll stick with XKCD rather than Dilbert from now on.
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What people really want is shelter, food and safety.
No.
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Re:What people really want (Score:4, Interesting)
Sorry , but yes.
"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Its a nice often quoted soundbite from Franklin, but it doesn't make him right. And as has been said, we already gave up liberty in certain forms long ago. In fact any social animal does - there has never been any such thing as complete do-as-you-please liberty anywhere anytime except in the minds of deluded anarchists.
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The operating word here is "essential". Giving up liberties is one thing but giving up essential liberties is the problem. Of course "essential" is a subjective word and what constitutes essential is open to discussion.
I'd say that a government that has to get a warrant to access your data already is a step of from a government that knows everything without regulation. I also think we should abolish gag orders for anything that doesn't endanger life for instance.
The government is people, and people are corr
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You may not think it right, but many of us agree with the sentiment.
Especially when you throw in the strife and loss of life that lead us to freedom.
Re:What people really want (Score:4, Insightful)
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Said the slave owner.
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He also freed his slaves and made it his business to promote the abolition of slavery in America. (Analogous to this -- Who do you think gave women the "right" to vote? Hint: It was men.)
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They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Said the slave owner.
I believe this is a Benjamin Franklin quote, and to the best of my limited knowledge and quick research, he did not own slaves. http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin [wikiquote.org]
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According to http://www.pbs.org/benfranklin/l3_citizen_abolitionist.html [pbs.org] he did own two slaves. However, his opinions evolved to the point that later in life he was the president of the Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery and the Relief of Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage
Re:What people really want (Score:4, Insightful)
Nice quote.
They want the shelter, food and safety.
Yes, but then what? I think Maslow's hierarchy of needs comes into play here. At base people need food, shelter and relative safety. But once those things are secured, people start looking to things like self-esteem and self-actualization. That's where the freedom comes into play.
No one likes the feeling of being watched or judged. But constant surveillance and evaluation of actions is the dystopian conclusion of a world without privacy. But as Mr. Adams points out, we have already lost our privacy. So what we really want and need is restraint and accountability. Mr. Adams talks about all the great things we could have and do if we gave up our privacy. But he predicates all that on having an incorruptible guardian of our information; nuns in his case. But that's the problem; we don't have incorruptible nuns. The reason we are so protective of our privacy is that we don't trust the government to not abuse the power and information it is given. It comes down to trust. That's why we actually need restraint and accountability, not the privacy we have already lost.
Unfortunately, with the rise of the national security state, especially after 9/11/01, the citizenry is treated more as potential criminals than responsible citizens. The safeguards of accountability and restraint are being stripped away in the forms of warrant-less surveillance, TSA checkpoints far from the border, and Presidential kill lists. So people trust the government less and less as the government trusts the people less and less. People naturally become wary and afraid of the government, as they would any entity that was much more powerful than them and not trustworthy. I think that's what people are really expressing when they talk about privacy and Big Brother.
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No.
What people really want is shelter, food and safety. Freedom and to be let alone are priorities only for a handful of us-ian traditionalist.
The problem with that is that the population hasn't figured out that the people who would take away your shelter, food and safety don't use email or credit cards or Facebook.
The real problem here is that nobody feels they can fight the government on a personal level. Most of government is opaque and they get one vote every four years in a general election. What they really need is the ability to vote on individual issues.
The technology exists to give them that vote but I'm not holding my breath. I'm startin
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What they really need is the ability to vote on individual issues.
That could create more problems than it solves. Unfortunately, your average citizen just doesn't have the skills to evaluate the pros and cons of every single issue. That is the sad failing of democracy. Joe Citizen seems to use a limited set of retarded tools to make voting decisions, such as what the media or institutions (eg churches) tell him. You only have to look at quagmired, emotive but sensible issues like banning the death penalty, drug decriminalization, gun control, and criminal justice/pena
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Joe Citizen seems to use a limited set of retarded tools to make voting decisions, such as what the media or institutions (eg churches) tell him.
How is that different from senators and other house representatives?
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If the system had some way to tie the cost (and subsequent tax figure) to the benefit and stuck to the actual figure bound to the legislation it's tied to this wouldn't be a problem. Of course, it would mean that someone would have to do work up front to figure out the cost and who gets the bill. Then comes the fun of making sure those that are paying the bill don't leave the country.
An alternative is to never run in debt and only allow legislation that's already paid for... meaning the country/states nee
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That could create more problems than it solves. Unfortunately, your average citizen just doesn't have the skills to evaluate the pros and cons of every single issue. That is the sad failing of democracy. Joe Citizen seems to use a limited set of retarded tools to make voting decisions, such as what the media or institutions (eg churches) tell him. You only have to look at quagmired, emotive but sensible issues like banning the death penalty, drug decriminalization, gun control, and criminal justice/penal system reform. The right way to go on those issues has been validated by countless studies - even proven in implementation in other countries - but rational thought is simply ignored in the popularity contest and the old "against" arguments marketed as truth.
The thing is that this is partially by design. The elite have never wanted a truly educated and enlightened citizenry. A few is okay, but the "masses"? No way. As the late great George Carlin pointed out shortly before he died:
"...I'll tell you what they don't want. They don't want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don't want well-informed, well-educated people capable of critical thinking. They're not interested in that. That doesn't help them. That's against their interests.
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Joe Citizen seems to use a limited set of retarded tools to make voting decisions, such as what the media or institutions (eg churches) tell him.
That seems like a silly comment to me. In a small town, the people can actually know their elected officials. Everybody else usually depends upon some form of media to make a decision on each candidate and whether or not that candidate has similar values. I actually used wikipedia to research some of the state candidates for this election. But there's no proof that any wikipedia article is any less biased than any other source. Most people make voting decisions based upon their own prejudices, which are rei
They're right, sort of. (Score:4, Insightful)
At the heart of the Constitution is the notion that the powers are government are derived from the people. That is to say, the government can only do what the people consent to allowing it to do. The document makes various references to this principle, some direct, others inferred. The Declaration of Independence was quite a bit more blunt on the topic. That said, the truth is... we're not all equal. Some people have more influence than others. Others have more money. And while we are afforded the right to vote, it's almost always voting who will represent us. We have no significant control over our government; Which was deliberate. The same people who said powers not expressly enumerated in the Constitution are reserved for the people also wrote in the so-called elasticity clause and created the electoral college.
So when people say there's no right to privacy in the Constitution, they're right and they're wrong... as is the other camp. The truth is, human rights are not derived from any legal instrument. They have always flowed from the same source -- a willingness to fight against their removal.
Re:They're right, sort of. (Score:5, Insightful)
The electoral college was created primarily because there's no requirement that states allow their citizens to vote for president. And in fact that was the common case in the early union -- electoral college delegates were often chosen by state legislatures. It wasn't an attempt to redirect power away from the electorate, it was an attempt to redirect power away from the federal government, insofar as states were all free to make their own choices about how to select a president.
Re:They're right, sort of. (Score:4, Interesting)
One thing I do know is that all geeks should go out of their way to read "science and the founding fathers", science was far more significant to their politics than Ben Franklin's lucky escape from a kite flying incident.
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Except you're wrong.
It is possible to win the electoral college with ~24.5% of the popular vote.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wC42HgLA4k&feature=plcp [youtube.com]
Unlikely? Maybe. But the mere fact it's a possibility means the EC has outlived itsusefulness, especially since it's purpose no longer exists thanks to modern technology. If we are to retain the (horribly horribly flawed) simple majority system then the EC has got to go.
Re:They're right, sort of. (Score:5, Insightful)
Human rights are not derived from any legal instrument. They have always flowed from the same source -- a willingness to fight against their removal.
A most precise and excellently worded observation. My hat off to you.
Re:They're right, sort of. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not that simple in practice. Wealthy and poor people tend to break -different- laws, and it's thus hard to say if the law proscribes the same punishment for equally serious transgressions.
What's worse, stealing a car, or manipulating financial records to benefit your own wallet while befrauding investors to the tune of $1 million ? Who's more likely to do actual jail-time ?
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A mere million? They'll do time. Now steal a *billion*, ans no one will touch you, but instead you'll be celebrated as an entrepreneurial genius.
the constitution (Score:2, Informative)
The first block of ammendments to the US constitution called the Bill of Rights is just an enumeration of the more abused natural human rights in the time of the US Revolutionary War until it's passage.
The Bill of Rights was mostly opposed at the time by those who feared that unenumerated natural rights would later be denied.
Privacy is a natural human right that must be defended by the courts and populace even if it didn't end up in the rights sampler called the Bill of Rights.
The US constitution only enume
Why the government? (Score:5, Insightful)
While somewhat off-topic it puzzles me why these questions about privacy deal mainly with the government abuse of power (in the US at least). Living in a "socialist" country in the Northern Europe I can honestly say that I feel the government is protecting my privacy against companies and other private entities that might try to abuse this information about me rather than it being the big threat. While certainly not perfect or run by perfect people at least in theory the government represents the people for the people and is regulated by the people themselves while the private entities serve only the interests of a few and are in fact required to try to "maximize the profits for their owners" and thus to abuse their power to the full extent they can within the law (or slightly outside, which they can try to influence).
I am aware of the differences in the history, the fact that government used to be about the only entity with enough resources (but would claim this is not even close to being the case now) nor am I saying the government should be given free hands to do whatever.
But there seems to be such a difference in the standard mindset I would be interested in hearing some explanation for this.
Re:Why the government? (Score:4, Informative)
Spiegel had a very good series of articles on different forms of governance, their strengths and weaknesses. Here is a link to part 4 (China) and you can find links to introduction as well as parts 1-3 (Brazil, US, Denmark) in the preamble of the article:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/putting-the-plan-into-action-how-china-s-leaders-steer-a-massive-nation-a-843593.html [spiegel.de]
Re:Why the government? (Score:5, Interesting)
This is indeed a blind spot in USA. Many, perhaps even most, see government as fundamentally opposed to their interests, while giving corporations a free pass - despite the fact that government atleast in principle represents the interests of the people while corporations represents the interests of the owners. (which are a tiny fraction of the people)
Google and Facebook knows more about our private lives than the government does, yet this seems to bother nobody. It's true that you can opt out of those - but it's also true that network-effects make social media a natural monopoly.
Re:Why the government? (Score:4, Insightful)
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That is true.
But it's also true that while the government *can* kill you, they're fairly *unlikely* to.
Meanwhile Facebook *can* use all the information you give them for their own personal profit -- and they're *very* likely to do precisely that.
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Because I can easily opt out of not giving my data to Facebook or Google. If I feel that Microsoft has abused my privacy, I can switch to Apple, or to Linux. If Amazon sells my personal information, I can buy from Barnes and Noble or my local bookstore. It's (usually) an entirely voluntary relationship.
My relationship with the federal government is not voluntary. When Congress passes a law I don't agree with, I can't take my business elsewhere without moving to a different country. I'm stuck with it. It's a
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Yeah I know that in principle dealing with corporations is voluntarily, and this *does* make a difference. But in a world where infrastructure is increasingly privatized and monopolized, doing so has high social and practical costs.
Let's say I don't want VISA anywhere in my finances. I'm not aware of -any- Norwegian bank whose debit-cards aren't also visa-cards, quite possibly it'd thus mean foregoing paying with plastic alltogether, and foregoing ATMs too, in favor of withdrawing money in the actual bank,
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By the way, Scott Adams repeatedly mentions what data government could procure "upon presenting a
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Governments posses the authority to use force to compel people to do their bidding while corporations mostly don't try to force you to do anything. When corporations _do_ try to force you to do something, they employ government to do it for them. When one person has a gun and has demonstrated a willingness to use that gun to compel people to do their bidding while another has a whole bunch of money, I fear the guy with the gun more than the guy with the money.
Even simpler answer: during the 20th century g
Loss of privacy is not ancient history (Score:3, Insightful)
According to Wikipedia, the current lineage of domesticated dogs diverged approximately 15,000 years ago. Our current American situation of lost privacy depends greatly on the electronic digital computer, which is around 75 years old. Therefore, Scott Adams was exaggerating by a factor of 200, and - more relevant - a difference of 14,925 years.
The pervasive surveillance society, including facial recognition and the networking of ubiquitous video cameras, is being implemented at present. Today is much more recent than 15,000 years ago -- 15,000 years more recent, in fact.
By suggesting that a national debate on our right to privacy is somehow not timely, and implying that we should instead accept that we have never had privacy, Scott Adams has deeply disappointed me. I really thought he was more intelligent than this, because his cartoon routinely makes fun of certain types of people for their stupidity. I figured that meant he was smart.
The appropriate time to have a national conversation about our rights to privacy and to be "secure in our persons" is now. Today.
What about the Ninth Amendment (Score:5, Insightful)
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
What that amendment means is that "just because we did not list that right here, does not mean it does not exist as a right. There are many rights we did not list here, and this amendment is intended to protect them as well as those we did list already". And yes, it is very broad. It is supposed to be broad because it is supposed to be a check on government power and a protection of the publics general rights. The Tenth Amendment is written along a similar line. Both are intended to say "any power or right we did not explicitly give to the federal government, we give to the people and the states". They are supposed to be very very broad because they are supposed to have a very broad interpretation in order to protect personal freedom and the autonomy of the states. And I think a right to privacy easily passes the test for inclusion under the Ninth Amendment.
I disagree with anyone who says that the Constitution contains no right to privacy. It contains one, by virtue of the Ninth Amendment, by not explicitly denying it.
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Not to mention that the Fourth Amendment is about privacy.
The governing Supreme Court precedent at the moment is that there's a right to privacy.
Scott Adams is a troll. (Score:3, Insightful)
Scott Adams is trolling. Not for the first time.
Something he doesn't seem to worry about is that government (or large organizations) have a lot more power than ever to process information "they don't care about", to get information that they do. And use it.
For instance, by itself, it's very uninteresting for government to know that I read Dilbert. But if it knows of my Dilbert reading habits, it can correlate that information with other things about me. Maybe they can even draw causal inferences, like that people tend to change their political attitudes ever so slightly after reading Dilbert for years. With enough data and processing power, that's feasible.
The government can then decide to do something about Scott Adams. Not murder him, that's overkill. But maybe give him some personal problems, so that he becomes less influential. Or manipulating his attitudes, so that his role as an opinion-shaper becomes more to their liking. Again, with enough data and processing power, they can probably figure out an effective, non-violent way of changing Adams' behavior.
This wouldn't be cost-effective, you may say. I say it might well be. Influencing a lot of people ever so slightly is really a very powerful thing to be able to. Most governments though history would have leaped at the opportunity to have this level of control, in a non-intrusive manner - compared to the clumsy heavyhandedness of harassment and ruling through fear, it's both less risky and potentially more profitable (given enough data and processing power).
I think it's not feasible to keep processing power and data out of the government/big organizations' hands. Data is just too flightly - if it doesn't actually want to be free, at least it's very hard to contain. But we can get this flightly quality of information to work for us, rather than against us, by demanding radical transparency, and taking it if we don't get it (see Wikileaks).
As a foreigner... (Score:5, Insightful)
...who has never read the US Constitution (something I have in common with probably 99% of US citizens), and whose primary knowledge of the Consitutional amendments extends only to the 18th and 21st Amendments, and the 5th amendment because I used to watch so many US lawyer shows (Perry Mason, LA Law, Ally I cannot comment on what, if any, privacy protections are given to the public in those documents - I suspect nothing explicit is included (, and further I suspect that any implied protections are based on individual interpretation of the wording.
From my perspective, the biggest issue is not that Law Enforcement agencies can conduct surveillance and gather information on citizens, but that that the checks and balances to allow investigation while preventing authoritarian abuses (i.e. the need to apply for a Judicial warrant before engaging in said surveillance beyond certain well-defined boundaries) have been eroded to the point where there seems to be no judicial oversight and no ability for the public to scrutinise the process after the fact.
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Depending on who you ask, courts have effectively bypassed either half or all of the articles of the bill of rights. Judicial oversight only works when they intend to act in that capacity.
He's a cartoonist, after all (Score:2)
Constitutionally guaranteed privacy? NOPE! (Score:4, Insightful)
there is no express Right to Privacy in the US Constitution. Period.
HOWEVER...
Ninth Amendment states:
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Tenth Amendment states:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Government is strictly limited to doing those activities which are specifically authorized to it by the Constitution.
Everything else is left to “the States, respectively, or to the People.“
Constitutionally, the specific right to privacy does not exist. It is a privilege granted by local Statute. Data Protection Act, wiretapping restrictions, US Postal Service regulations and limitations, the Copyright Act and the Federal Reserve Act are but a few examples of Statutes that bestow privilege on certain types and methods of information, but for that information only - nothing in there even about personal privacy.
All that said, there is an ancient Anglo-Saxon saying from the time of King Alfred (9th c.), which goes "A man's home is his castle". This is in fact part of the Code of Alfred and about the closest you'll get to an actual Constitutional statement about the absolute right to privacy. Back then, if you even turned up outside the walls of a fort uninvited or unannounced and flying the pennant of an alien House, you stood to be run through, and deservedly so. In England these days we have as closest analogue, section 4A of the Public Order Act 1986 which provides for intentional alarm, harassment or distress but still no specific *right* to privacy. People have tried to apply section 8 of the Human Rights Act 1998 in civil Law but this Act only applies against Public Authorities, which are immunised from prosecution (civil or criminal) under HRA by section 71 of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 which provides complete immunity if said corporate body turns evidence in *any other proceeding*.
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yes.
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Statute *grants* or *denies*. Constitution *guarantees*. "WE THE PEOPLE" do not make Statute. "THEY THE STATE" do. "WE THE PEOPLE" are subservient to Statute (hence to "THEY THE STATE") by implied acquiescence. "THEY THE STATE" are subservient to the Constitution by condition of Union.
An illusion indeed (Score:2)
I hope those who comment on Scott Adam’s article take note of his caveat, “written for a rational audience that likes to have fun wrestling with unique or controversial points of view”. It’s a thinking-out-loud piece, which coming from Scott Adams, I enjoy.
I think he is wrong on two important points. One, I believe the Constitution does protect privacy, and I do not think Hitler analogies are self-refuting arguments. Hitler analogies are overused and too easy to make, which makes the
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To me he made a very weak argument and then intentionally misunderstands the commenters who point out the flaws in his argument.
The U.S. system for dealing with government privacy concerns is like the U.S. government system in general - it's based on checks and balances. Some of them are more 'generally understood' than 'explicitly codified', but even that caveat doesn't apply to many, and he blithely ignores that.
He simplifies massively when he says 'the government already knows all these things about you'
automatic cars solve drink driving (Score:2)
If we had automatic cars, then the whole drink/drug-driving problem would be solved as you wouldn't be driving the car.
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of course at least in the early days it would be a good idea for some sort of signal that the car is in "disabled driver" mode just so that the police can deal with it correctly (by maybe pinging the car and activating some sort of "Follow Me" mode??)
Privacy (Score:3)
Privacy starts with protection from illegal search.
It's a shame that it wasn't extended further in the Constitution.
I'm from the government and I'm here to help you (Score:4, Insightful)
"Tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. The robber baron’s cruelty (and) cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." -- CS Lewis
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Ruling over other people's lives is one of the most petty thing one can spend time doing, which is why there can be no good leader, ever. Life is nonsensical, obsessing over others' lives is nonsense squared.
Also, it's painfully obvious you're not a parent if you think you can lord it over your kid any way you think fit. A parent can have over his or her kids nowhere nea
Law Abiding Citizens (Score:3)
The author insinuates, like most other police states, that everyone suspected by law enforcement is really a criminal, and power is rarely abused.
for the record the name man trusts catholic nuns to guard his data
"I would trust nuns to guard my personal information in the cloud. I would also trust nuns to keep the government from getting my information and using it for evil. But I would limit the job to nuns who have been in the habit, so to speak, for at least twenty years"
http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/guardians_of_privacy/
Because the church does not evil. I mean they are a church. You must be a communist to think the church is evil.
Anyone who thinks that living in a police suvailence state, could you please link to another country on earth where it has worked, well, and the police do not abuse their powers? Link to biased outside media if you could.
But if you want to know what a police force, conducting secrect survaillence on US citizens looks like, you can google "Church Comittee"
https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Church_Committee_Created.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Committee
Then there is "COINTELPRO"
https://www.google.com/#hl=en&sugexp=les%3B&gs_nf=3&tok=gukAibuebXq64nmwN-zOUw&pq=church%20committee&cp=6&gs_id=h4&xhr=t&q=COINTELpro&pf=p&safe=off&tbo=d&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&oq=COINTE&gs_l=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&fp=5339a8ff113dcf96&bpcl=37643589&biw=1108&bih=647
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO
http://vault.fbi.gov/cointel-pro
What we will have is that federal law enforcement will use their powers to undermine our democratic values by eliminating dissent/otherwise giving an unfair advantage to political canidates they agree with.
Anyone who comes accross damning evidences or otherwise criticizes the system, if not arrested, the FBI would have enough dirt that it could leak and destroy people's reputation. It could send neighbors against people, get people fired. Harrass spouses, friends, girlfriends.
You see the "things the FBI doesn't care about", changes when they want to single you out and make an extra-judicial example out of you. As Mario Savio, of the Berkley Free Speech movement.
And if you think that "congresstional oversight" is a magic bullet, when it just gives potentially unscrupulous members of congress something else to keep them in office.
Then we get to this:
https://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/29/opinion/sunday/terrorist-plots-helped-along-by-the-fbi.html?pagewanted=all
How long has the FBI been doing things like this before they got caught? This is a mainstream paper that in more modern times doesn't generally like to dig further than they need to. Good investigators like the FBI don't routinely get caught by half assed ametures link pro-journalists.
What a load of junk by Scott Adams (Score:2)
What happens when the government doesn't have the privacy? They say "oh no, we need the privacy that we deny you"
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/11/minneapolis-police-pushing-for-more-license-plate-data-privacy/ [arstechnica.com]
If we shouldn't have privacy from governmnt because "oh who cares it's boring", then neither should any police, fire, rescue vehicle, or any politician from the public. It is not in the public's interest to make governmnt managers a higher class of citizen who can see all but not be seen.
Golden rule (Score:2)
The so-called "right" to privacy, I think, boils down to practicing whatever type of treatment that one would prefer the people around them practice.
It's quite reasonable to desire some privacy in some matters, even if one has done nothing wrong, and I see privacy as being more a matter of treating those around us with plain old human respect and decency.
It doesn't make an inalienable right though.... more of a social privilege that we ought to grant eachother because we desire the same privilege for o
Flaws in the logic (Score:2)
2nd Flaw "It isn't a real risk to law-abiding citizens" . There is no such thing as a "law-abiding citizen"; You probably broke several laws already today that you don't know about..
as if the government is the only entity... (Score:2)
Privacy is in the Constitution (Score:2)
The right to privacy might not be explicitly stated in the Constitution, but case law has firmly established that it was implied by things such as the third, fourth, and fifth amendments. See Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965), Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), and Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003), just to name the most significant.
Most of what is written into the Constitution is explicitly a reaction to a specific abuse the British were engaging in at the time of the American Revolution. Th
news at 11. (Score:2)
A teenager cracker, up for a thrill finds that the central server's are guarded by a weak password, have an open port they did not know about. Or exploit a bug that has not been patched yet. Causing millions of dollars in damages by causing cars to careen out of control into obstacles they thought were not there killing hundreds if not thousands in one stroke.
Historically (Score:2)
Obligatory Quote (Score:2)
-Thomas Jefferson
Medical (Score:2)
Mr. Adams says:
>"The government doesn't know your medical history. "
Sorry, but this is 100% wrong.
I have worked in the medical industry for 24 years, and I can tell you that if your payer is Medicare, Medicaid, or Tricare, every single diagnosis code of yours is being sent to the government, regardless of where you obtain care. These codes completely describe your exact conditions, what procedures were done, and are combined with lots of other demographic info: name, birth date, address, gender, social
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Just select your favorite movie star, your next door neighbor, that girl from your childhood dreams, and boom, the rich get a full contact reprogrammed you who's going to do exactly as demanded.
What the hell are you talking about?
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The UDHR is not legally binding and there are no signatories. The US routinely ignores such international toothless efforts.
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I follow his blog for a long time now.. his idea of an ideal society is a bit similar to what's been pictured in the Demolition Man movie.
A pieceful world without crime, partly because everyone is being tracked (without this being used against someone).
You don't want people to be tracked. His opinion is the total opposite: track everyone everywhere (but don't misuse that information). ..) knows who was around and who did it. So people wouldn't do
If a crime happened, someone (police, government, a computer,
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The technology will get cheaper and easier - it's inevitable that ubiquitous surveillance will be in economic reach of large corporate players soon. Since it's inevitable that such a system will exist, you may as well have it serve us, rather than rule us. The hard part is knowing where that line is and ensuring that people do not cross it.
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Well in that case when technology can detect a problem, it could also warn about it. Entering a room with the wrong protective gear ? Have the door tell you or even block you out. That would be even better than fining you automatically afterwards.
Scotts ideas are mostly just brainstorming what-ifs which just do not work in reality. They're thought-provoking, but sometimes imo he thinks of the wrong solutions/consequences.
A recent example he had was about selfdriving cars, flexible speed limits and tickets.
F
The problem with tracking everyone. (Score:2)
The problem with tracking everything is that criminals know they are being tracked, and so use subterfuge when they are committing crimes with the added benefit of having a squeaky clean (boring) tracking record for an alibi, and everyone else is afraid of LOOKING like a criminal because of the possible hassle so they don't do anything interesting.
You need privacy to be able to let your hair down and be yourself. Without privacy there's no keeping it real.
Tracking won't stop anyone from doing anything ille
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I really do think he was just playing Devil's Advocate with this -- the obvious real solution is to evolve humanity to a point where the idea of committing an abhorrent crime is, well, abhorrent.
Sadly I think that we're going to lose any semblance of real privacy before we get even close to that ideal world though.
May as well get used to living a public life now...
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The other take I've seen on this is by howstuffworks.com 's Marshall Brain ; his ""Manna" [marshallbrain.com] short story portrays two visions of the future.
* One is a future what automation has taken over so many jobs that there is a large underclass of impoverished unemployed who are rounded up into social security camps, chemically sterilised, and guarded by robots.
* One is a future where automation has taken over so many jobs that everyone can have a basic income that ensure they can live "comfortably" doing whatever the h
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* One is a future what automation has taken over so many jobs that there is a large underclass of impoverished unemployed who are rounded up into social security camps, chemically sterilised, and guarded by robots.
* One is a future where automation has taken over so many jobs that everyone can have a basic income that ensure they can live "comfortably" doing whatever the hell they like - and the increasing efficiency of the technology means the level of comfort increases every year.
The privacy angle is that in the utopian version of all this, people voluntarily have implants that record and process all their sensory input, and AI agents watch to see if they are about to commit a violent action, and switch their motor neurones off to prevent them from doing it.
So both societies are prisons guarded by robots? The AIs will never abuse the power to shut down people's brains by interpreting more and more things (like cheating in a computer game) to be violent actions (or ignoring that rule altogether)?