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From: Randall Assworth on 3 Feb 2010 16:40 On Wed, 3 Feb 2010 18:03:42 +0000, Rowland McDonnell wrote: > You stond little other > chance of hiding yourself. "stond"... Tsk! Tsk! Tsk! I suppose he will pull out his dictionary and prove it's correct. -- "The number of people from the USA you come across out there `on the net' who seem utterly detached from reality is astonishing." Rowland McDonnell dissing Americans - August 27, 2007
From: Jim on 3 Feb 2010 16:50 Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig(a)flur.bltigibbet.invalid> wrote: > > If you want anonymity, go to an Internet cafe. > > Anonymity is exactly what you will be denied if you do that. Really? How so? Jim -- "Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
From: James Taylor on 3 Feb 2010 17:21 Peter Ceresole wrote: > But be careful about the idea of our surveillance state being a Big > Brother state. Remember that the Big Brother state wasn't just universal > surveillance; that was just the first stage. Remember, Minilove, rubber > truncheons and boots smashing into faces forever, Room 101 and the > rats... That was the *real* Big Brother state. Routinely. And it really > happens in North Korea, Burma, China, even Japan. But not here. I admit to having not actually read the original book, although I am familiar with the ideas from having seen plenty of stuff based on it. > This may be a pedantic point- this isn't a literary (or literal) > discussion of Orwell's work. Indeed. I was merely using the term as a quick way of encapsulating a range of things about pervasive surveillance that everyone agrees are a bad thing. My central point being that too much surveillance is bad for society as it restricts and unhealthily cautions freedom of thought, speech, and expression, and also places too much power in the hands of the authorities and, regardless of whether it can be shown they use it for good or evil, this is still too much power in the wrong place. > But I think that people too easily slip into a knee-jerk description > of the surveillance system here, to attack it. Remember that the > criminal acts, an extraordinary number of them, all the time, are > committed by members of the public, causing far more suffering than > anything the police ever do. It's the reason that the surveillance > was put into place. And this is where I start to disagree with you. The level of surveillance is excessive, and I question how much crime is solved that couldn't be solved another way. Even for those crimes it does solve, there are only a small number of people mugging people in front of cameras, or planning terrorism by unencrypted email after researching bomb-making on the web, whereas the surveillance affects us *all* in an insidious way as it slowly tightens its grip on our very thoughts. Therefore we are all paying a price, having our basic human need for privacy eroded away, and straying dangerously into a Big Brother world, all because of an irrationally enlarged fear of crime and terrorism which I suspect governments are only too happy to perpetuate. > I'm thinking of 'The Power of Nightmares'. Adam Curtis is one of the > cleverest (and funniest) people I have ever met, thinks hard and > agilely, and gets an astonishing amount of stuff right. Then you must already see how irrational the fear of terrorism is, and already see that surveillance of the degree we're subjected to is excessive and unnecessary. The only element you seem to be missing is that so much surveillance is actually harmful to our basic freedoms of thought and expression, and thus ultimately harmful to our democracy. If you do not see why privacy is so important, please read this: <http://www.schneier.com/essay-114.html> and this: <http://www.schneier.com/essay-261.html> -- James Taylor
From: James Taylor on 3 Feb 2010 17:39 Jim wrote: > Rowland McDonnell wrote: > >> Geoff Berrow wrote: >> >>> If you want anonymity, go to an Internet cafe. >> >> Anonymity is exactly what you will be denied if you do that. > > Really? How so? The fact that so many are riddled with keylogging spyware collecting your account usernames and passwords? In some countries, Thailand being one that I'm familiar with, it is a legal requirement for Internet cafes to log the web activity of their users. There was a recent case in the UK where a publican was charged for online crimes committed by a customer who had used his open wi-fi. In other countries I've had to allow my passport to be photocopied before being allowed to get online. Internet cafes are not as safe or as anonymous as you might expect. -- James Taylor
From: Geoff Berrow on 3 Feb 2010 18:16
On Thu, 04 Feb 2010 05:39:09 +0700, James Taylor <usenet(a)oakseed.demon.co.uk.invalid> wrote: >>>> If you want anonymity, go to an Internet cafe. >>> >>> Anonymity is exactly what you will be denied if you do that. >> >> Really? How so? > >The fact that so many are riddled with keylogging spyware collecting >your account usernames and passwords? I meant with respect to a computer fingerprint. It hardly matters if the computer is not yours :-} No one forces any of us to use the Internet. -- Geoff Berrow (Put thecat out to email) It's only Usenet, no one dies. My opinions, not the committee's, mine. Simple RFDs www.4theweb.co.uk/rfdmaker |