2015-06-25 19:07 GMT+09:00 grarpamp :

"If I take your picture on the public street, I do not need to give you any notice, and you have no basis to complain about it."

Really?

If it's just some random fuck with a camera in your face, you can just as well discuss planting your fist hard in their face until they understand and delete it.

I went on this trip to the South of South Korea. It was organized by some enthusiasts/travelers that regularly organize stuff. I thought at first they were a semi-company (unregistered doing travelling agency like activities) that don't pay tax and make a little buck while travelling, especially as they mentioned no insurance and also carried a brandname and logo, and had very regular activities. Operating through meetup.com, though, always skirts the fine line between professional and amateur. Certainly, though, the notion that they might make a profit even with cheap tours (hint: no taxes) or that acting like a company kind of makes you into one, was certainly lost on them. The trip I went on was half paid for by the Boseong government. Given that county was far away from anything touristic and, well, there was probably hardly anything there, I thought they were just getting some try-out-and-spread-the-word tourists. This was definitely true, the housing was brand new (and empty). They managed to herd us into a "Boseong-Kazagstan sister city project" presentation televised in Kazakhstan (note: countries can be cities). During the main activity a photographer's event was coincidentally planned. Naturally, I was very unhappy about all this. Confronting others I found that none of the 80 other participants shared my feelings to any extend. Notably, most considered that they should do something back for the Boseong government, for having paid half their trip, and so this was all fine. They also gave enormous leeway for the volunteers that happily organized this tour, and simply didn't see the harm of being taken pictures of (for whatever purpose). (I got a horde of childish remarks, apparently most 20 somethings abroad are still living their highschool dreams) The age of privacy, and everything with it, including the freedom of association and separation of public and private life, is ending. The public is smiling merrily along the road. 1984 is coming, but the public is not scared or suppressed. They are smiling happy people, obedient and cheerful, and they take the best of care of their keepers. This is neither a hyperbole, not that much of a doomsday scenario. It is simply inevitable and true. The cost of surveillance is decreasing, the abuse of surveillance is mild or absent - and has passed from the people's minds. People are not concerned with the eventual consequences of tracking all their activities, they are concerned with having more fun.

On 06/28/2015 10:19 AM, rysiek wrote:

It was Huxley, not Orwell, who was right: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death

More Huxley than Orwell perhaps, but one look at the downtown shopping district in my 'hood and you'll see cctv cams everywhere and undeputized private patrol security guards on the street literally blackshirting young people, the poor, and displaced workers (Blackshirting... like making up illegitimate definitions of laws and ganging up on people who refuse to comply. I dialed 911 on these thugs one day when three of them surrounded me for sitting at a perfectly legal streetside window-ledge and when the officer arrived I was refused a citation that I was more than willing to take b/c the officer couldn't legally cite me.) But the book is an excellent read and available from LibCom Anarchist Library: https://libcom.org/library/amusing-ourselves-death-public-discourse-age-show... Direct link to pdf: https://libcom.org/files/Neil%20Postman%20-%20Amusing%20Ourselves%20to%20Dea... RR

Dnia niedziela, 28 czerwca 2015 17:58:39 Steve Kinney pisze:

...

...

The age of privacy, and everything with it, including the freedom of association and separation of public and private life, is ending. The public is smiling merrily along the road. 1984 is coming, but the public is not scared or suppressed. They are smiling happy people, obedient and cheerful, and they take the best of care of their keepers.

The end of "privacy as we know it" is only a dystopian scenario if the institutions of authoritarian governance survive in the post-privacy world. I don't believe they can survive, because the same network infrastructure that has already made so much formerly "private" information public also shifts the balance of power away from established institutions in fundamental ways.

I'm afraid, unfortunately, that the head start we got by jumping on this Internet thingy early on and figuring shit out is slowly running out. The NSA and the rest of Five Eyes figured this shit out now, too -- along with "oh wait, there was no privacy-by-design anywhere? that's cute". And they have a much, much bigger budget. Between that, and the populace being herded by "EHRMAHGEHRD TEHRRISTS!" on one hand and "privacy is gone, baby" on the other, we are not winning this one right now.

Keeping State and Corporate secrets out of public view is becoming progressively more difficult, while the mechanism of ad-hoc self organizing "smart mob" actions arising from the public at large is an emergent challenge to established power centers. If and as these trends continue to accelerate, the nature of political power will eventually be transformed.

That's why "hackers", "hacktivists" and "Anonymous" are used as synonyms of "terrorists" by the powers that are. And the media. -- Pozdrawiam, Michał "rysiek" Woźniak Zmieniam klucz GPG :: http://rys.io/pl/147 GPG Key Transition :: http://rys.io/en/147

On 6/24/15, hellekin wrote:

... What can be done is not necessarily to be done--and the fact no H-bomb has been detonated for a while demonstrates technology can be tamed by human will, if only by a safe bit. Actually that seems to be the only path left, as technology is being imposed on a global scale without restraint, like free trade or private property before it.

trending exponential technology is the Great Filter.[0] earth humans must get house in order! [1] :P best regards, 0. "... With no evidence of intelligent life other than ourselves, it appears that the process of starting with a star and ending with "advanced explosive lasting life" must be unlikely. This implies that at least one step in this process must be improbable." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter 1. white, privileged, young and middle aged males the outlier, in modern harm terms. significantly over represented in column "run amok". first to feel the downward mobility, and most to grow unhinged agro over it?

On 06/28/2015 12:21 AM, dan@geer.org wrote:

...

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter

Hanson/Great_Filter is an excellent reference. So is

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_Earth_hypothesis

*** These two theories seem to promote the idea that life is so valuable that actions such as the ones endorsed by the CIA over its history (coups, torture, assassination, terrorism, drug trafficking, war mongering, economic racket, etc.) are immoral. As the CIO of the investment arm of this organization, how do you plan on provoking a volte-face in its individuation that would suddenly make it, and with it U.S. foreign policy, something beneficial for all life, instead of leading it towards a rapid self-destruction of complex life on Earth? What is the philosophical basis that sustains the CIA? == hk -- _ _ We are free to share code and we code to share freedom (_X_)yne Foundation, Free Culture Foundry * https://www.dyne.org/donate/

hellekin writes: | On 06/28/2015 12:21 AM, dan@geer.org wrote: | > | >> - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter | > | > Hanson/Great_Filter is an excellent reference. So is | > | > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_Earth_hypothesis | > | *** These two theories seem to promote the idea that life is so valuable | that actions such as the ones endorsed by the CIA over its history | (coups, torture, assassination, terrorism, drug trafficking, war | mongering, economic racket, etc.) are immoral. | | As the CIO of the investment arm of this organization, how do you plan | on provoking a volte-face in its individuation that would suddenly make | it, and with it U.S. foreign policy, something beneficial for all life, | instead of leading it towards a rapid self-destruction of complex life | on Earth? | | What is the philosophical basis that sustains the CIA? Life is indeed priceless, and the more rare it is the more self evident it can only have been the hand of God who created it. Nonetheless, if diversion now to a thoroughgoing philosophical value-of-life debate is of timely cpunks relevance, which it manifestly is not, then might we first begin with abortion, genetic tinkering, or the burning of coal. --dan

On Sun, Jun 28, 2015 at 2:14 PM, wrote:

...

What is the philosophical basis that sustains the CIA?

Life is indeed priceless, and the more rare it is the more self evident it can only have been the hand of God who created it.

If that's the philosophy of CIA, then if they harness / take life they become rich, life becomes rarer, and themselves closer to God.

abortion, genetic tinkering, or the burning of coal.

What's the wiki page for the school of thought where evaluating all the things against whether or not they help humans emigrate off their planet is all that matters? Otherwise, you know, The End. One could also consider fun stuff like whether those who think they are from the hand of God perform CIA-like actions for or against emigration. For that matter, if the Manifesto is too old or narrow or short term, what the Hell are cpunks doing and why?

On Sun, 28 Jun 2015 12:10:37 -0300 hellekin wrote:

What is the philosophical basis that sustains the CIA?

might makes right - what else

== hk

True, the devil is everywhere, unavoidable, only religion can save you sinners whose souls must be spied by conscience, confession to god's agents for forgivenss and guidance the only protection. Give generously to the building fund. Spies have forever preached this panopticism of the kindly and wise overseer, along with authoritarians of endless diversity and venality. How they fear the collapse of their temples, their insiders becoming apostates, their servants throwing off yoke of authority, rising up to lop howling heads apraying for forgiveness, the untutored no longer willing to accept the autocracy of the learned. Then learned preachers call in their wholly supportive and believing cops of coercion where might overrules reason and kindliness, then the prayerful affirm the righteousness of law and order, the need for ubiquitous spying, then judges, legislators, lawyers and educators are blessed with allegedly supreme wisdom and rewarded with mighty fine perquisites and stay out of jail no matter how corrupt and devilish, albe the perks are limited to the religion of male supremacy, disguised in all genders, armed to the max against their demon-righteously angry subjects. Senator Diane Feinstein dislikes the word "survellance" as spies dislike the word "spies." They all share a faith in complicitously necessary oversight of everyone-is-an- agent-of-the-devil-in-disguise except themselves -- for themselves only top secrecy faith in national security armed with megadeath retribution to shield the shrewdly aggrandizing learned in their temples of rationality for thinking deeply and kindly of how next to fuck the public. As their god wills and panoptically spies full spectrum emanations (once known as vapors of sin). At 02:05 AM 6/25/2015, you wrote:

On 06/25/2015 12:26 AM, dan@geer.org wrote:

...

Paraphrasing Bonnie Raitt, let's give 'em something germane to argue about. In particular, what do I have wrong here:

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/Passcode-Voices/2015/0617/Opinion-Th...

...

--dan

*** Thank you for this interesting opinion. I can't see anything wrong at first sight, objectively. Nevertheless, when I read "There is no mechanistic difference whatsoever between personalization and targeting save for the intent of the analyst.", I'm tempted to drop a bit of sleeping time to respond and propose a "quantum difference".

Surely Law can't prevent physics, and unless all buildings are coated against radiation or jammed with noise, both unlikely outcomes, our privacy is stuck with Murphy's Law and the goodwill of people thinking that if it can be done, it will be done. There's no defense against it, except, as you say: sabotage, and not being correlated (though luck with that in cosmopolitan space, where acquired targets glow like Christmas trees wrapped in gilded RFID garlands).

The "quantum difference" between personalization (serving the user) and otherwise (sucking it dry) resides in ethics: one is helpful and considerate; livingry vs. killingry. What can be done is not necessarily to be done--and the fact no H-bomb has been detonated for a while demonstrates technology can be tamed by human will, if only by a safe bit. Actually that seems to be the only path left, as technology is being imposed on a global scale without restraint, like free trade or private property before it.

It may sound like trying to keep the rain from falling with one's bare hands, but frankly, what else is there to do than revolt what's left of the human mind against the tyranny of paranoid integral control? Nietzsche declared God dead, and here we are mechanizing Its omni-science in search of omni-impotence, and soon we'll be declaring humans dead as well, obsolete, parasiting the good working of the machine.

But once the mechanistic reduction of a helpful activity into a dreadful one is identified, it's easy to rewind one sentence, and stumble upon a very troublesome term: "data acquisition". So you want to turn those who acquire data into biohazard liabilities? Would whistleblowers, journalists, and scientists count among them, or just greedy corporations and morbidly obese intelligence agencies and military-industrial crackpots?

Obviously we're way past trying to limit our technical capacity to damage ourselves: only radical change in human behavior can achieve that. An alien invasion? The second coming of the messiah? Otherwise, well, sabotage seems to remain a valid joker: making it so that "unique signatures" can be shared to disrupt sensors everywhere and confuse data analysis. We are all J. Doe.

Still there's another issue at work with pervasive surveillance, that is more of a concern, and that some clever sabotage expert could play against public figures, as exemplified in the notorious (misattributed?) quote of Cardinal Armand Jean du Plessis Duc de Richelieu, Pair de France, CIO of Louis XIII Le Juste: Give me six lines written by the most honest man, and I will find something there to hang him. What about: irrefutable biometric evidence recollected over the past week links [target] to the mysterious murder of [past target].

No government would be stupid enough* to target all their citizens in general (unless given sufficient firepower). But sweeping at the margins, one gait-profiled parasite at a time, has proven to be an efficient defense of the abominations perpetrated by the State throughout history. Such power given to supra-State actors like corporations, or organized crime (be it terrorist, an intelligence agency, or both) is a very amusing perspective to the Cynic within.

In conclusion, as a final tongue-in-cheek comment: if we can't stop progress, we can at least try and make it worse.

Regards,

== hk

* Except the USA, Russia, UK, France, China, Cisco, Facebook, Google, etc.

-- _ _ We are free to share code and we code to share freedom (_X_)yne Foundation, Free Culture Foundry * https://www.dyne.org/donate/

Dnia czwartek, 25 czerwca 2015 03:05:18 hellekin pisze:

The "quantum difference" between personalization (serving the user) and otherwise (sucking it dry) resides in ethics:

I would say, the difference resides in the answer to the question: "who actually controls the data" If it's the user that has *physical* control, than it's probably personalisation; otherwise, it most definitely isn't -- or will soon cease to be. -- Pozdrawiam, Michał "rysiek" Woźniak Zmieniam klucz GPG :: http://rys.io/pl/147 GPG Key Transition :: http://rys.io/en/147

2015-06-25 21:44 GMT+09:00 z9wahqvh :

this is absolutely tremendous, original, and insightful. in my opinion.

This is exceedingly strange coming from an In-Q-Tel security officer. In-Q-Tel basically invests in anything performing more collections in the US. Does Dan Geer worry for the future, and effectively betray In-Q-Tel? Does he want to prevent anyone *else* from getting the nice intel? What exactly does he want to make information processors liable for? How can law prevent third parties associating freely available information?

On Fri, 26 Jun 2015 01:22:17 +0900 Lodewijk andré de la porte wrote:

2015-06-25 21:44 GMT+09:00 z9wahqvh :

...

this is absolutely tremendous, original, and insightful. in my opinion.

This is exceedingly strange coming from an In-Q-Tel security officer.

L, perhaps you are not yet appreciating the true nature of american oligarchy. "Think of it: an entire nation founded on saying one thing and doing another!"

In-Q-Tel basically invests in anything performing more collections in the US. Does Dan Geer worry for the future, and effectively betray In-Q-Tel?

In a parallel universe in which we're overdosing on LSD, maybe he does. But in the real world... http://cryptome.org/cyberinsecurity.htm That's pure terrorist talk. 'Official' terrorism of course. Bottom line being : because of microsoft, NATIONAL SECURITY is at risk. Curiously enough, they don't bother to mention that microsoft is a monopoly thanks to the state granted privileges of 'patents' and 'copyright'. ----------------------------- Cartman: I learned somethin' today. This country was founded by some of the smartest thinkers the world has ever seen. And they knew one thing: that a truly great country can go to war, and at the same time, act like it doesn't want to. You people who are for the war, you need the protesters. Because they make the country look like it's made of sane, caring individuals. And you people who are anti-war, you need these flag-wavers, because, if our whole country was made up of nothing but soft pussy protesters, we'd get taken down in a second. That's why the founding fathers decided we should have both. It's called "having your cake and eating it too." Randy: He's right. The strength of this country is the ability to do one thing and say another.

Does he want to prevent anyone *else* from getting the nice intel? What exactly does he want to make information processors liable for?

How can law prevent third parties associating freely available information?

Theory: In-Q-Tel funds - pushing the envelope means having opportunity to fund more stuff that breaks the new, harder stuff. Some opponents use the harder stuff already, it's just harder to fund if it's not widespread. The article reaches a bit in drawing conclusions, and offers little support. The picture painted is of a coherent judicial system - the opposite is true, each state even municipality treats the novel application of surveillance technology differently, holds different standards for 'public / private' and when, where and how you can expect privacy. Notable are the ways different courts treat cases of indecent exposure, when that exposure occurs on 'private property' (such as in an open window). The point illustrated, though, is valid - some clarity around what constitutes a 'search' beyond 'privacy mores in vogue' needs to be provided and codified, otherwise the US risks allowing widespread complacency to further continue the erosion of privacy. -Travis On Thu, Jun 25, 2015 at 11:05 PM, Juan wrote:

On Fri, 26 Jun 2015 01:22:17 +0900 Lodewijk andré de la porte wrote:

...

2015-06-25 21:44 GMT+09:00 z9wahqvh :

...

this is absolutely tremendous, original, and insightful. in my opinion.

This is exceedingly strange coming from an In-Q-Tel security officer.

Hancock: Mr. Franklin, where do you stand on the war issue?

Franklin: I believe that if we are to form a new country, we cannot be a country that appears war-hungry and violent to the rest of the world. However, we also cannot be a country that appears weak and unwilling to fight to the rest of the world. So, what if we form a country that appears to want both?

Jefferson: Yes. Yes of course. We go to war, and protest going to war at the same time.

Dickinson: Right. If the people of our new country are allowed to do whatever they wish, then some will support the war and some will protest it.

Franklin: And that means that as a nation, we could go to war with whomever we wished, but at the same time, act like we didn't want to. If we allow the people to protest what the government does, then the country will be forever blameless.

Adams: [holding a slice of chocolate cake] It's like having your cake, and eating it, too.

Congressman 2: Think of it: an entire nation founded on saying one thing and doing another.

Hancock: And we will call that country the United States of America.

-- Twitter https://twitter.com/tbiehn | LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/in/travisbiehn | GitHub http://github.com/tbiehn | TravisBiehn.com http://www.travisbiehn.com | Google Plus https://plus.google.com/+TravisBiehn

On 06/26/2015 09:53 PM, Steve Kinney wrote:

On 06/25/2015 12:22 PM, Lodewijk andré de la porte wrote:

...

2015-06-25 21:44 GMT+09:00 z9wahqvh mailto:z9wahqvh@gmail.com>:

...

this is absolutely tremendous, original, and insightful. in my opinion.

...

This is exceedingly strange coming from an In-Q-Tel security officer. In-Q-Tel basically invests in anything performing more collections in the US.

That was my first reaction as well: But on close inspection he seems take the exponential growth of universal surveillance as a given, while the ability to correlate the collected information into actionable intelligence can and should be restricted to large organizations: "Most privacy laws exist to block government actions. A few exist to block private institutional actions. But none exist to block individuals' actions."

I interpret this as a response to the accelerating progress of open source collection and analysis into contexts formerly monopolized by State and Corporate actors. A war of sorts is already underway on this front; else why is Barrett Brown doing time for the crime of investigative journalism? Nobody stands to lose more in a truly open society than our professional secret keepers and sanctioned violators of the secrets of others. Like the good folks who pay the bills at In-Q-Tel.

Good catch! So he's calling for laws to restrict surveillance and correlation by private institutions and individuals. Now his position makes sense :(

Recent events including the exposure of Federal employee records and the integration of ICWatch data into Wikileaks' searchable archives may be weighing heavily on the minds of State and Corporate strategists. What good is owning a Panopticon if the prisoners have data terminals where they can watch the guards and their employers as they go about their daily lives?

Secrecy as we know it may be on the way out: With the advent of networked everything, the secrecy tax Julian Assange wrote about years ago keeps growing and may reach a tipping point where State and Corporate secrecy no longer pays.

Propaganda as we know it may be on the way out: With the advent of networked everybody, identity groups and market segments created and manipulated by broadcast propaganda are running on inertia. The 'ego casting' and 'echo chamber' effects that segregate the Internet today are at best leaky containers whose walls are getting thinner all the time.

I wouldn't mind a world where privacy is a thing of the past, as long as the playing field is reasonably level. Control of access to information is the key to controlling whole societies; both secrecy and propaganda are essential to the operation of any repressive regime. Could authoritarian State and Corporate institutions exist in a world without privacy, where bad faith actors have no hiding places? A world where control of news, information, education and entertainment is diffused across tens of millions of actors?

Dnia sobota, 27 czerwca 2015 05:59:45 grarpamp pisze:

On Fri, Jun 26, 2015 at 11:53 PM, Steve Kinney wrote:

...

I wouldn't mind a world where privacy is a thing of the past, as

What's the url to your lifecam again?

...

long as the playing field is reasonably level.

It will never be level once info leaves your personal space. Left unrestricted, others will collect and collude against you.

This. Plus, the field is not level, because those governments, institutions, organisations, companies and individuals that have more resources to mine available data will get more actionable information from it. -- Pozdrawiam, Michał "rysiek" Woźniak Zmieniam klucz GPG :: http://rys.io/pl/147 GPG Key Transition :: http://rys.io/en/147

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On 06/30/2015 05:53 PM, Juan wrote:

On Tue, 30 Jun 2015 08:16:36 -0500 Troy Benjegerdes wrote:

...

Now what's wrong with the story David Brin's been selling at http://www.davidbrin.com/transparentsociety.html

apart from the spam, what's the 'theory'? The tools used by nazi governments, especially the americunt nazi government are going to be used to 'limit' the power of government? Please.

"Brin consults and speaks for a wide variety of groups interested in the future, ranging from Defense Department agencies and the CIA to Procter & Gamble, SAP, Google and other major corporations. "

Brin snagged my real attention when he opened with a quote from John Brunner's 'The Shockwave Rider.' But I only skimmed the relevant text on his website because it was all so familiar. I'm surprised I never ran into this aspect of his writing before. A freelance Wizard follows more or less where patronage is available; if his work product is any good it is, in and of itself, morally neutral and will tend to enable good faith actors, if any, to make better decisions. That said, I personally won't work for "defense" contractors because I do have a personal problem with mass murder and such, and in today's political climate there's no denying that all roads lead to coercive force in the commercial interest. :o/ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1 iQIcBAEBAgAGBQJVkxm1AAoJEDZ0Gg87KR0L9C4P/1A3b+X3aFhXZLvsOaAEDeQj rdZac9MFr1XdTrjPAODcWQtsx4QMCzlb2yMNeRkbHdlAwJfG/xd230t3XzeTkp30 wg1CeGK6ZmwJKLV5Dce5usjcAvONdfSA9VLWnjLRoJ17RQU4PSAmyfy4bE7pFrxG XfOmZnBH0vau6guUmzFJoEv2CBDWP0VQvfdQlxTjNl4pL5riZjv5Q3qJuFN+CpUH Qaqo/iMoWv+6ODXQZh108ve5qsSBkqy6mjXZ9aIzp/MgmX7z0PyTo+DHFLkXgmjU y1IQahlYCS8tbV9Urn1Ep9xqDwEOfyC2OAwKCUATBfU8kj6GKRCdobYet14lHo5I /dGydMV2cYUj/1dC3qnQLimjcxHR6d9WbQh4XjBbIpb8TAR8c/uoGaII98LZP0Go cQmM3rsBajdosvxNGEoNgSq8iWbgegXQIh/+gVJdjTQDKqtvpxcpA9Ge7TeaPySB DpIbqjf2RK4xkjJF3fIMumWWLNUsItMH8tfTwylA3uVxDHJEOKa6EATv1pkXB6KB qcA7puST5pv5ZvC4j8TYewyFC3BGZVRTcS9lA+Mowow7eSpk4hPI/f8uCwawsAtG 2xwRMm/jlFBJtadqVrqwJH0yS3XBg455OTGv1DzNe4iA0Q17JD25ajJF09pypUin mpMOHjMS4wISz575rFXQ =/hUS -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Tom Ritter writes: | On 24 June 2015 at 22:26, wrote: | > Paraphrasing Bonnie Raitt, let's give 'em something germane | > to argue about. In particular, what do I have wrong here: | > | > http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/Passcode-Voices/2015/0617/Opinion-Th... | | I'm far from certain, but I think what you have wrong is the notion | that wavelength doesn't matter. I think the courts have decided it | does: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joffe_v._Google,_Inc.#U.S._Supreme_Court | | Specifically, "most of the general public lacks the expertise to | intercept and decode payload data transmitted over a Wi-Fi network." | Therefore the notion that you can point whatever sort of 'camera' you | want at people to capture them isn't accurate. (The other relevant | case is that the police do need a warrant to point infrared cameras at | people's houses.) Well, now we are into dueling Supreme Court cases; see http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/533/27.html Kyllo v. United States (2001) Despite the Court's attempt to draw a line that is "not only firm but also bright," ante, at 12, the contours of its new rule are uncertain because its protection apparently dissipates as soon as the relevant technology is "in general public use," ante, at 6-7. Yet how much use is general public use is not even hinted at by the Court's opinion, which makes the somewhat doubtful assumption that the thermal imager used in this case does not satisfy that criterion. In any event, putting aside its lack of clarity, this criterion is somewhat perverse because it seems likely that the threat to privacy will grow, rather than recede, as the use of intrusive equipment becomes more readily available. That reads, to me, that what the public adopts limits what I can do or expect. http://geer.tinho.net/geer.rsa.28ii14.txt We Are All Intelligence Officers Now ... In short, we are becoming a society of informants. In short, I have nowhere to hide from you. --dan

From: Tom Ritter On 10 July 2015 at 10:58,  wrote:

...

Well, now we are into dueling Supreme Court cases; see

http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/533/27.html     Kyllo v. United States (2001)     Despite the Court's attempt to draw a line that is "not only     firm but also bright," ante, at 12, the contours of its new rule     are uncertain because its protection apparently dissipates as     soon as the relevant technology is "in general public use," ante,     at 6-7. Yet how much use is general public use is not even hinted     at by the Court's opinion, which makes the somewhat doubtful     assumption that the thermal imager used in this case does not     satisfy that criterion. In any event, putting aside its lack     of clarity, this criterion is somewhat perverse because it seems     likely that the threat to privacy will grow, rather than recede,     as the use of intrusive equipment becomes more readily available.

Yes! That's the case I was obliquely referring to. Sorry, I kind of glazed over that part of your argument in the article.

That reads, to me, that what the public adopts limits what I can do or expect.

I guess where we quibble is I'm skeptical that the general public (as defined by the courts?) will (ever?) adopt the types of tools you refer to (uniquely identifying individuals based on electromagnetics, tracking tire pressure sensors.)  I don't think the 'general public' has adopted thermal imagers.  These will make their way into industry... (advertisers tracking WiFi probes in malls obviously).

Months ago, FLIR announced an IR-imaging add-on for IPhones, which is tiny.  However, just a month or two ago I saw a media reference to a (very tiny) T-shaped device, intended to plug into the micro-USB jack of a cell phone, that did IR imaging.  As I recall, very economical, but even then the majority of the population won't buy, simply because they have no need for such a thing most of the time.

So my wonder now is if industry adopting a technology is sufficient for the courts to qualify as 'general public'. But this, at best, only affects exotic technology.  We're already fighting this battle.

Automated license plate readers have never (?) been challenged (successfully?). They are an extension of "a police officer just watching a highway" which is legal.  And the courts like extensions of things that are already done - see bulk collection of metadata!

This 'extension' principle doesn't always work.  In 2012, the Supreme Court ruled (US v. Jones) https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/united_states_v._jones_%282012%29  that police could not place a GPS tracking device on a car without a warrant.  One argument that has been rejected in lower-court cases was the idea that in principle, a car's movements could be tracked with an army of police, one per street corner, so that a GPS tracking bug simply automated that process.  One problem that argument is that society not only doesn't have the resources to accomplish such a blanket coverage of an area, and that even if practical, society may not necessarily want such an intrusive system to exist. This issue was (secretly) quite relevant to me.  Federal authorities apparently installed a tracking device on a car I used, probably in about April 2000, without a warrant.  Presumably, if challenged they would have been claiming to follow a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decision from 1999,  U.S. v. McIver, which had allowed the placement of a GPS tracking device on a truck seen at the location of a marijuana growing operation.  The problem with this justification, however, is that at least in McIver, there was an actual crime involved, and the truck was plausibly involved in that crime.  In my case, after my release from prison in April 2000, nobody alleged that I was engaging in any crime.  The McIver case didn't rule that police could simply choose to place a GPS tracking device on ANY car, for no reason, and even without 'probable cause' or 'reasonable suspicion'. What was particularly devious (and I call illegal) was that later, probably in October 2000, the Feds actually obtained a warrant for the placement of ANOTHER tracking device on the same car (which, of course, may have ended up being the same device!) WITHOUT telling the judge that a tracking device was already on the car, and had been so since at least as early as April 2000.  Why the subterfuge?  They later used the result of the tracking device (at least, the portion taken after the October warrant) against me in court.  But they continued to conceal the fact that a GPS device had been placed since perhaps April 2000.  Presumably, they concealed that because they would have had to explain, in court, why they were tracking me, without a warrant, and despite the fact that they had no 'probable cause' nor 'reasonable suspicion' to do so.  To conceal that, they obtained the warrant, making it appear that the GPS surveillance started in October 2000.  This was fraud, because in order to obtain a warrant, they have to explain WHY they need the GPS device installed.  Clearly, since a GPS device was already installed in the car, there was no need to place one.  THAT misrepresented the need to the judge. You might ask, "Jim, why didn't you complain about this during the trial".  As you might know, I was given a long series of lawyers who, rather than being the first line of defense for me, were actually the first line of OFFENCE for the government.  What the average person doesn't understand is that a defense attorney, colluding with the government, has virtually unlimited power to sabotage his client's case, and that was precisely what happened to me.  The crooked attorney was Robert Leen. And it turned out that the government had a powerful motivation, or at least some of its employees:  They had faked an 'appeal' case in the 9th Circuit, 99-30210, forging at least two filings as if I had done them 'pro se', as if I was bring that case.  I did not, and I wasn't aware of the pre-May 2000 existence of that faked case until June 2003, when I first saw that case's docket.  The crooked attorney who concealed this from me was Jonathan Solovy.             Jim Bell