Comment by JoshTriplett
7 hours ago
I think the position can best be approximated as "companies should not be able to do this, but you should trust your government to do this to you". (That's a bad position that needs to be defeated every time it arises, but it's a consistent position.)
Given the choice of trust between, lets say Amazon/Meta/Google and the EU (or some European government), 9 times out of 10, the EU is the lesser evil.
You don't have to use Amazon/Meta/Google. You have to use the government.
Let's not forget that these are the people and laws that are supposed to represent and help you, not the other way around. While private companies have no such obligation.
Amazon/Meta/Google is sometimes required, nobody in the real world can get away from that.
> supposed to represent and help you, not the other way around. While private companies have no such obligation.
Exactly my point.
I've moved countries 5 times in my life. I still haven't been able to fully degoogle.
For now none of Amazon, Meta, or Google can jail you or legally do violence on you, separate you from your family, etc. Your sense of threat is extremely miscalibrated.
Not really. I know what you are playing at. The probability of the government being vindictive towards a single family, whilst not truly zero, is for almost all practical purposes zero.
The probability of a (my or your) child enduring harmful content, perpetuated and enabled by Meta/Google (in particular) is almost a certainty.
We are not required to pick amongst evils. We could, in fact, say private chats are private and end to end encryption is sacrosanct.
If you are purist and you don't live in the real world with real evils. I don't want pedophiles to have privacy.
6 replies →
what a crazy turning of the tides to see this comment in the gray.
i suppose the times have changed from when most people on the internet were cypherphunk. now it's common to see people say "i have nothing to hide, please scan all of my communications", unironically invoking "please think of the children".