Comment by baddash
3 days ago
My thoughts as someone who doesn't know much about these types of things:
1. Terry Albury calling this list the "Panopticon" could have merit since he's a former FBI agent. However, I'd have to research more into him to figure out how credible he is, and why he is framing it like this.
2. Amazon and Facebook being in the title is most likely clickbait. They're literally only mentioned once in the article and the rest of it has nothing to do with them.
3. It's concerning that the National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM) can potentially cause this network to be used to label protestors as "far-left domestic terrorists", however, that is more of an issue with the NSPM than this network. Understanding the NSPM and the effects of it is probably worthwhile.
4. The article mentions that there's no oversight program for Seattle Shield. Is that a problem? Is it typical to have oversight for a program like this, or necessary? What would the program be like?
Overall, the article feels sort of sensationalized. It frames Seattle Shield as suspicious and questionable due to its secrecy and the fact that it performs surveillance. However, there aren't any strong facts or evidence of this program being abused in some Big Brother-type way. Terry Albury framing it in this manner might be the most credible point against it, but I would have to look into that to determine how credible it is.
> The article mentions that there's no oversight program for Seattle Shield. Is that a problem?
Any government body with no oversight program indicates that rule of law is optional.
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The rule of law is and always has been based on a monopoly of violence. That monopoly is increasingly tenuous, frankly. Even the word "oversight" implies that, if said entity being overseen ventures out of the bounds of the overseer, violence is the mechanism by which compliance is attained.
> The rule of law is and always has been based on a monopoly of violence.
There is no such thing as a monopoly of violence. Weber's work, which you reference, talks about states claiming a monopoly of legitimate violence.
However, legitimacy and law are two different things: while every state claims they are the only ones allowed to use violence legitimately, not every state codifies their functioning in laws ; and fewer structure themselves in such a way that these laws are sovereign.
My point is that merely codifying the state's actions in laws isn't enough to get functioning rule of law. You also need functioning government oversight (and a few other things, but that's not the current topic). When government's action is not overseen, respect of the law happens at the whim of government agents.
The rule of law isn’t based on the state’s monopoly on violence. Its entire purpose is to protect citizens from state violence by subordinating it to law adjudicated in courts.
What is supposed to be the point of this comment? Poor cops have terrible violence unleashed them by having civilian oversight? Or that we should ditch rule of law and structures and instead go with what the most violent local warlord wants?
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The thing is... under the laws as they're written today, if US Gov wants to take a peek at your stuff on FB and friends servers, FB can be barred from informing you that such a request has come in under the National Security Letter (NSL) guidelines.
It's a very complicated thing :/.
Unfortunate but true, I feel we could rise up and stop things like this but most people these days are either unaware or are too busy struggling to do so
I don't mean to be some annoying contrarian or something, but couldn't it be the case that if the govt was investing someone who was planning a terrorist attack, then notifying the person being investigated could work against stopping them?
Not saying it wouldn't get abused though, which seems like the primary concern of most people in these discussions..
You mean like those Minnesota soccer mom “terrorists”? It’s hard to assume good faith after repeated bad faith behaviors, hence the reason our justice system is supposed to operate on evidence and a presumption of innocence, rather than “treat everyone like they aren’t a terrorist…yet..but will be if i decide they are”.
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The actuality is that there is reason to believe it has been virtually nothing but outrageous abuse from inception to now.
In general the need for secrecy is liable to be inversely related to the time required for it to be secret from what we do know and this is under comparatively sane regimes. Our current regime wants to build concentration camps and imprison journalists for reporting on their foibles.
What you SHOULD do is have sane limits with truly independent oversight by parties accountable to congress and the people. After a comparatively short duration virtually everything should become public and any misuse of said systems should result in prison. It's not like we couldn't build a system that with appropriate checks and balances but we certainly don't have one now.
Literally anything that protects people from the law will protect criminals and terrorists too.
Fourth amendment? A terrorist might have a bomb in their trunk that the police aren't allowed to search.
Jury trial? A psychopathic murder might charm the jury into thinking they're not guilty and get released.
Prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt? What if the person is actually a horrible criminal but there's reasonable doubt?
We have these protections not because they save ordinary people while still letting the government do everything possible to catch criminals, but because we think it's worth reducing the government's ability to catch criminals in exchange for fewer abuses of non-criminals.
If the target were being investigated for terrorism, then the govt could inform the company of that and - if the company tipped the terrorist off - prosecute the company for being an accessory / aid to the terrorist.
However, if the govt claimed that the person was a terrorist and the company knew for 100% fact that the person was innocent and the investigation was in bad faith... they could tip off the victim.
The NSLs only really help in the latter scenario. As long as the govt has a plausible story, there will be a 50% chance that the target is a criminal and the company will not risk notifying the target. With NSLs they can prosecute the company even though there was no legitimate basis for the investigation and everyone knew it.
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Oh yes, the Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse.
Better to wiretap everyone just in case. Why stop there ? After all there a chance any privacy could be used to conceal some terrorist plot, better to record every meat-space conversations too, let's not take any risk.
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Isn’t it better for all parties if the user is informed that they’re being investigated?
This way they might stop from doing the act for which they’re investigated instead of actually carrying it out.
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I think what gets lost in these conversations is that the government is using very lazy methods to catch low hanging fruit. Instead of extrajudicial spying they should be creating undercover identities and infiltrating criminal organizations. If law enforcement was competent Facebook wouldn’t even know it was happening.
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Won't someone please think of the children?!?!
Oh, sorry I thought we were pretending we cared about nonproblems in order to destroy individual privacy.
The panopticon reflects the trust I have in society.
It seems like an incredibly bad idea right now, but I can imagine machines of loving grace that would do only good with such a powerful tool.
I don't want any secretive surveillance, I don't care if you can prove whether its malicious or not.
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ok. explain why we should care about your thoughts as "someone who doesnt know much about these types of things", then?
its a message board. people post their opinions. its how they function.
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If not knowing who somebody is weighs into your consensual model of interactions with them, just wait until you hear about surveillance! :-)
This isn't reddit man, no need for this kind of reply. They were speaking in-context of the article in this post.
It's like you never heard of Snowden.
You don't need to try to force yourself to believe it not being that bad because it has been worse for like 20 years already.
A significant chunk of today's HN readership were less than 10 years old when Snowden leaked.
That's not an excuse. I also heard of Socrates despite being born a few thousand years late.
Your comment doesn't address any of the issues in the comment, and isn't adding to the conversation.
The Snowden revelations explain very well why we need the oversight and much more. They are relevant here.
> Secret + surveillance + no oversight : Is that a problem?
You've gotta be shitting me.