Posts by JohnFen 2933 posts • joined 20 Feb 2015
"it is easily possible to avoid Google's services, and with suitable ad-blockers and the like to avoid their intrusion to our lives"
Avoiding their services is easy. Avoiding their spying is very hard. In order to accomplish that, you need a lot more than adblockers. You pretty much have to stop participating in large segments of society, including no longer using bank cards, no longer giving out information to any organizations, etc.
"They are technical architects and really should limit their punditry to things that they know more about than ordinary folk."
By that reasoning, almost nobody should be able to express their opinions on most things. That doesn't sound right. For one thing, it would mean the death of the comment section here (and everywhere else).
"Using something to make money is a GOOD thing."
It can be, but this isn't a given. Even in the absence of abuse, when the profit motive is introduced to a thing, it changes the nature of that thing, making it no longer appropriate for some of the things it used to be good for.
"Why actually care if this happens?"
I can give a lengthy list of why I care, but I won't -- because the "why" is 100% unimportant. The real, actual, important issue is about agency: what I object to is that this data is collected without my specific knowledge and consent. Worse, these companies put a great deal of time and effort into breaking through the defenses I use in order to enforce my wishes when it comes to who gets access to my data.
That's the issue. If I don't want my data to be collected, then it should not be collected, period. Why I don't want it collected is not actually relevant.
"Bread makers are an excellent invention."
Bread makers are what got me into making bread for real. I was given one and used it regularly for a month, at which point it broke. Missing fresh bread, I realized that bread makers don't actually do that much -- most of making bread consists of waiting, after all -- so I started making bread the old-fashioned way.
As good as the bread maker was, it never produced a loaf of bread that was as good as what I made "by hand". But I will be eternally grateful to the machine for leading me down the proper path.
"I've looked at Notepad++, and I see little reason to use it."
I see a reason to use it, but not as a blanket replacement for Notepad. As you say, Notepad++ and Notepad are different programs that address different needs. I always have a need for a very minimal editor with the fewest features possible. In Windows, that's Notepad and I love it for that. It's one of the applications I use the most.
Notepad++ is better when you need a "word processor lite" or an editor that understands code (and you don't want to fire up a full-featured one).
"Or walk around the place with a hi vis jacket and a clipboard, and request access to anywhere."
Yep, or as I learned from my younger years as a janitor -- if you push a mop bucket or garbage can, look irritated and in a hurry, look like you know exactly where you're going and that you would prefer not to go there, nobody will even notice that you're there, let alone confront you.
Yes, there are newer, better-looking FPSes around, but Doom occupies a space in my life that it shares with only a handful of other games from the general era: I still play them regularly to this day. The others? SimCity 2000, Civilization CTP, Redneck Rampage, Master of Orion - both 1 and 2 because they are very different games.
"The solution for every problem involves "cloud", "Google AI", and "iPads"."
I think it's a red flag anytime someone refers to any tools as a "solution". Tools aren't solutions. They can be used to create and implement solutions. There's a vast difference between those two things, but marketing people are doing their best to prevent people from understanding that.
"I mean, do think Google should keep supporting Allo, even though it hasn't gained much traction"
I don't use Google products, but I'm going to guess, based on the comments that I've read over the years, that people's problem with this is that it means that you can't really rely on anything Google releases (at least until it's a big hit) because it might go away tomorrow.
That's a really serious problem. Once you've invested in a particular platform, it's painful and disruptive to to change.
"What problems does the current system create that average users of the internet give a damn about?"
None, but I wasn't really talking about average users. I was talking about balkanization of the internet, where different groups of users are using different systems. Average users may well never use anything else, but they'd just be one of the different groups.
"Hell I'm glad new TLDs are mostly a failure, it was a stupid idea from day one and if they were in wide use the internet would be in a bigger mess."
I agree entirely. It's one of the reasons why I never use those TLDs to go anywhere.
"you sure aren't going to get a grass root campaign that causes a majority of individual internet users in the world to switch their resolution."
In the scenario I was thinking, there would be no need for such a grass roots campaign. It would happen like similar shifts have happened in the past -- gradually at first, adding a small number of users over time, until it hits a critical mass and lots of people start using an alternate. No campaign of any sort is needed.
Also, I don't think it would be people jumping en mass to a single other DNS service. It's more likely, I think, that we'd see many competitive DNS services, each with their own userbase.
I agree, this looks unlikely -- I'm just speculating -- but as of right now, I don't see a path that leads to the current DNS system getting fixed. I don't think lawsuits will do that. But, if I were a betting man, I'd bet that I'm wrong.
I'm thinking that the day may come when an alternate system becomes popular. There is literally no technical reason that everyone has to use the DNS operated by ICANN, and alternative systems do exist (although they're not widely known or used).
This is yet another fault line that the internet can fracture on, and I'm not saying that it's a good thing at all. But as the governance of the established critical infrastructure increasingly looks like it's failing, that may eventually become the lesser of evils.
"If you are traveling, it's not a problem. Your OTP's are exchanged before you travel down under."
One time pads are awesome -- Properly done, it's the only truly unbreakable encryption we have. However, they can only be properly done if you already have a secure means of distributing the pads.
As you note, this is no problem if the parties that want to communicate start off all physically in the same room together, and they have generated in advance enough numbers to cover all the communications that they may want to engage in later (since you should never use the same sequence twice, as Germany found out in WW2 when their inability to generate and distribute enough random numbers later in the war caused them to reuse pads, which led directly to the encryption being broken).
In any other circumstance, though, this key exchange is a very serious weakness. That's the entire problem that PKE was invented to address and is why, even though it isn't technically unbreakable, it is widely used. Any weaknesses inherent in PKE pale (outside of specific and uncommon circumstances) in comparison to the key exchange problem with other methods.
"This perhaps is why we should always roll our own for maximum secrecy."
If by "roll your own" you mean "apply your own encryption and don't rely on that built into applications", then I agree.
If you mean "invent your own encryption", then I don't agree at all. That would be foolish. Strong crypto is really, really hard to get right (and very, very hard to tell if you've gotten it right or not). Unless you're a mathematician with a focus on cryptography, you really are much better off using crypto that's already been vetted.
"The state doesn’t “tap” your phone. Your telco does. It has equipment in its core network for the task, and is legally required to have that equipment."
Why do you think people here don't understand what LI is? I suspect most do.
I would note, though that when it comes to things like CALEA in the US, that's the state tapping not just your phone, but everyone's. The state is just using the telco as its agent.
"In the USA, we can exercise our 5th amendment privilege, thankfully"
Yeah, probably not. I'm not sure if the Supreme Court has ruled on this or not, but I've seen a few cases in lower courts where the court ruled that being forced to provide a password is not a 5th amendment violation, as the password itself is not incriminating testimony.
"That wont help if Android and iOS have been required to provide an access portal to the devices keyboard and screen."
That's true (although there would be ways to mitigate it), but that's not what the legislation requires.
"I'm off to start a One Time pads company!"
If you can solve the major problem with one-time pads (key exchange), then you'll be a billionaire.
"Microsoft intends to let six principles to guide the company's use of facial recognition going forward. They are: fairness, transparency, accountability, nondiscrimination, notice and consent, and lawful surveillance."
Hahahahahahahahaha!!
Oh, sorry, I meant
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!
"End of metrics collection experiment."
First, you're using "metrics" in an overly broad sense here. Google purchases this data in order to match up online activity with physical purchase activity. That's a whole lot more than what people tend to think of when they think "metrics".
Second, I don't see anywhere that this effort has ended. I may have missed it, but even the article you linked to doesn't say they've stopped.
Third, it's not just credit card information. Google also has deal to collect Wifi & Bluetooth pings that stores increasingly use to track you. Google has expanded their already overly invasive spying activities into the physical world on several fronts.
I'm not seeing how their behavior is better than Facebook's.
"they're making it increasingly difficult to go back to Windows once you're using something else."
Yeah, that's always been the case, though. When I show up at work and have to start using Windows, it always feels like I've gone from driving a sports car to driving a Gremlin.
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