1984 light?

[PainlessDocM]

Today all of us are filmed by an ever increasing number of cameras in public places, many of us happily feed personal data into "social networks", our homes are visible in high detail on Google Street view, our telephones and gps make it possible to locate us every moment of the day.

It seems strange to me that (a lot of) people don't seem to care about privacy (anymore?) and even applaud this evolution.
I wonder when and why this began and whether the public will continue to support this.

Personally I don't really mind the government using cameras in places where a lot of crimes take place (not sure if this is actually efficient) but I find it very strange to see friends and family sharing everything from birth to the present day with companies like Facebook.

Yesterday Google Street view became available in my country, to my surprise (well not really) I have to ask Google to blur my house if I don't want it on public display. Shouldn't this be the other way around?

I'm wondering what other NMA users think about this phenomenon.

 

[Token-not-found]

Today all of us are filmed by an ever increasing number of cameras in public places, many of us happily feed personal data into "social networks", our homes are visible in high detail on Google Street view, our telephones and gps make it possible to locate us every moment of the day.

It seems strange to me that (a lot of) people don't seem to care about privacy (anymore?) and even applaud this evolution.
I wonder when and why this began and whether the public will continue to support this.

Personally I don't really mind the government using cameras in places where a lot of crimes take place (not sure if this is actually efficient) but I find it very strange to see friends and family sharing everything from birth to the present day with companies like Facebook.

Yesterday Google Street view became available in my country, to my surprise (well not really) I have to ask Google to blur my house if I don't want it on public display. Shouldn't this be the other way around?

I'm wondering what other NMA users think about this phenomenon.

I live in a city full of em .

Even semi-obscure streets have em.

Needless to say i hate them- i hate the very idea of the state documenting my every movement and life.

Also , how do we know if they have microphones or not? I know they are supposed to have a sign or something - those with a microphone are usually forbidden , but i don't exactly live in a country that would care anything bout those sorts of privacy violations.

People here don't mind em at all , i mean literally - they don't even think about them- you got it good- at least they have an opinion on them (good or bad).

In my old city there were only a few - usually only banks and big stores had them.

People like us are in the minority and easy to override - think about it - how many people actually prefer privacy to security and comfort?

There was a pool conducted in sweden a while back that asked young people what form of government would they prefer - 20% something said a dictator.

My old city is among the most violent in the country - but even in a peaceful city- how many people do you think would actually prefer privacy over security?

Good thing for us though,social psychology teaches us that minorities can turn the tide and heavly influence majorities after a time - provided some conditions are met (like the minority not being too extreme in comparison with majority)

The average joe likes being told what to do- it makes life simple, it gives him meaning- making choices that sort of thing is hard- people don;t like hard.

 

[Ohaimerk]

I'm in the "Who cares?" category. They can stick cameras in my house for all i care, I have nothing to hide and I have nothing that would really affect me or anyone else if someone knew even every single detail about my personal life.

"Oh look, farmerk is taking a shit! Oh look, Farmerk's discussing autumn with his grandma! Oh look, farmerk is eating crackers and drinking coffee!" Oh no, what an orwellian nightmare that would be!

 

[Surf Solar]

I'm in the "Who cares?" category. They can stick cameras in my house for all i care, I have nothing to hide and I have nothing that would really affect me or anyone else if someone knew even every single detail about my personal life.

"Oh look, farmerk is taking a shit! Oh look, Farmerk's discussing autumn with his grandma! Oh look, farmerk is eating crackers and drinking coffee!" Oh no, what an orwellian nightmare that would be!

I'm pretty much in the same boat. Yes, privacy should stay like that and the gov't has no right to look into that, but I personalyl don't really care, I've nothing to hide. If they want to observe my boring daily life, let them.

 

[Token-not-found]

I'm in the "Who cares?" category. They can stick cameras in my house for all i care, I have nothing to hide and I have nothing that would really affect me or anyone else if someone knew even every single detail about my personal life.

"Oh look, farmerk is taking a shit! Oh look, Farmerk's discussing autumn with his grandma! Oh look, farmerk is eating crackers and drinking coffee!" Oh no, what an orwellian nightmare that would be!

I'm pretty much in the same boat. Yes, privacy should stay like that and the gov't has no right to look into that, but I personalyl don't really care, I've nothing to hide. If they want to observe my boring daily life, let them.

How can you say that?

It does not matter if you have something to hide or not, it's about the amount of POWER available to the state.

If we lived in an ideal world - with ideal perfect people your argument would work- hey i have nothing to hide. But as we know those holding political power are in practice anything but benevolent or interested in the common good.

It's about the amount of power you are permiting the state to have over you- an amount that can translate in other things as well- like police being able to detain you more easly , more liberty limiting terrorism laws , etc etc.

If you let them get away with one thing- they sure as hell going to go the whole mile .

If today they can get away with watching every move- tommorow they may crave and obtain the right to listen to you talk- next thing your civil rights and libierties don't mean shit.

Power= at least potential for abuse

 

[Sub-Human]

Woo, this topic would go on fire if we had any of those New World Order bullshit fans around here.

I know I have nothing to hide, but I still like privacy, even when playing on my computer or watching a movie it's not really comfortable if I know someone's watching me. It gives an uneasy feeling on my back (sixth sense, lol?)

 

[Surf Solar]

I'm in the "Who cares?" category. They can stick cameras in my house for all i care, I have nothing to hide and I have nothing that would really affect me or anyone else if someone knew even every single detail about my personal life.

"Oh look, farmerk is taking a shit! Oh look, Farmerk's discussing autumn with his grandma! Oh look, farmerk is eating crackers and drinking coffee!" Oh no, what an orwellian nightmare that would be!

I'm pretty much in the same boat. Yes, privacy should stay like that and the gov't has no right to look into that, but I personalyl don't really care, I've nothing to hide. If they want to observe my boring daily life, let them.

It does not matter if you have something to hide or not, it's about the amount of POWER available to the state.

If we lived in an ideal world - with ideal perfect people your argument would work- hey i have nothing to hide. But as we know those holding political power are in practice anything but benevolent or interested in the common good.

It's about the amount of power you are permiting the state to have over you- an amount that can translate in other things as well- like police being able to detain you more easly , more liberty limiting terrorism laws , etc etc.

If you let them get away with one thing- they sure as hell going to go the whole mile .

If today they can get away with watching every move- tommorow they may crave and obtain the right to listen to you talk- next thing your civil rights and libierties don't mean shit.

Power= at least potential for abuse

The power to do what? Oh my fucking god, they know my schedules when going to the shitter - think of all the possible ways they could abus this fact! Geez, oh no, they know that I am phoning my mother once a week - an instant entry in the interpol database for sure, fuck now they know I forgot to water the plants, I'm sure they will list me as a potential terrorist for not caring for a life!

Really. Your post sounds like the typical "fuck the police!" schtick spiced with a wee bit of paranoia.
How can you say that?

 

[Ilosar]

Not to mention most of these are just for show. Do you realize how horrendously impractical it would be to actually watch all this footage 24/7? No government has enough employees to pull that shit off. Look, 1984 had an excellent concept, but in practica the State it described is anything but possible. So long as they are not in my bathroom, I don't much care either (well, it's not like we have much of those in Canada anyhow).

 

[Crni Vuk]

I'm in the "Who cares?" category. They can stick cameras in my house for all i care, I have nothing to hide and I have nothing that would really affect me or anyone else if someone knew even every single detail about my personal life.

"Oh look, farmerk is taking a shit! Oh look, Farmerk's discussing autumn with his grandma! Oh look, farmerk is eating crackers and drinking coffee!" Oh no, what an orwellian nightmare that would be!

yes and if we are at it giver them your IP address. Free access to your computer. Oh ? Why don't you allow them to open your mails and papers for you as well ? I mean hey! You don't have anything to hide am I correct ? - With "them" I mean government.

This I have to say is a very naive and bad approach to "security" and "personal data".

Hands down some form of protection and security is always needed. But one should never stop to "care" about it regardless if it seems harmless or not.

Dont get me wrong. I am just extremly worried about the opinion and attitude of todays generation where Facebook and other social networks seem to make it "modern" and "good" for big companies like game publishers and other corporations or even the state to collect all kind of informations about people. Regardless if those informations are usefull or not. Privacy should be a concern for us all. but it seems like people simply stoped to "care". Only because we have nothing to hide does not mean its "good".

The power to do what? Oh my fucking god, they know my schedules when going to the shitter - think of all the possible ways they could abus this fact! Geez, oh no, they know that I am phoning my mother once a week - an instant entry in the interpol database for sure, fuck now they know I forgot to water the plants, I'm sure they will list me as a potential terrorist for not caring for a life!

Really. Your post sounds like the typical "fuck the police!" schtick spiced with a wee bit of paranoia.
How can you say that?
How can you say that?

no clue how old you are. But lets look 10 or 15 years in the past. Would you have believed if anyone would have told you that one day you will have to be all the time online and to send companies some of your private data to play a single player game ?

On the other side you are missing the point here.

Another question do you know how to boil frogs ? If you simply throw them in boiling water they will jump out. But if you keep them in cold watter and slowly heat it up they will stay inside till they die - no clue if frogs are really working that way. But its just to make a point.

If you don't protect the rights you have then you might have them at all. The moment we stop to care about our "usual" and privacy just because it seems to be trivial is a dangerous time. Because it means other people could at some point go a step further. To have rights is only half the job. To protect and keep them another. Things always change. Laws as well. But it does not mean we should stop to care just because it concerns our "unimportant" shedules. The problem with the whole situation is that it has no transparency. It is very confusing and it is not clear who has the "control" over "what". If the police takes you as suspect for example then you have some address or place where you can go and people which are responsible for it (usually). But with the way how informations are collected today in such a high number it is pretty much impossible to keep track of it. Facebook alone collects tons of data. And they are still stored even if you delete/close your account. Now try to ask them for your informations and see how far you will come. It is very complicated. Yet people do it all willingly. And that is dangerous. Not because of the things they can do today. But because of things someone might do tomorrow. And that has nothing to do with conspiracies. Just simple logic. - There will always be someone or a group of people which will abuse any system if it suits their targets

 

[Token-not-found]

I'm in the "Who cares?" category. They can stick cameras in my house for all i care, I have nothing to hide and I have nothing that would really affect me or anyone else if someone knew even every single detail about my personal life.

"Oh look, farmerk is taking a shit! Oh look, Farmerk's discussing autumn with his grandma! Oh look, farmerk is eating crackers and drinking coffee!" Oh no, what an orwellian nightmare that would be!

I'm pretty much in the same boat. Yes, privacy should stay like that and the gov't has no right to look into that, but I personalyl don't really care, I've nothing to hide. If they want to observe my boring daily life, let them.

It does not matter if you have something to hide or not, it's about the amount of POWER available to the state.

If we lived in an ideal world - with ideal perfect people your argument would work- hey i have nothing to hide. But as we know those holding political power are in practice anything but benevolent or interested in the common good.

It's about the amount of power you are permiting the state to have over you- an amount that can translate in other things as well- like police being able to detain you more easly , more liberty limiting anti-terrorism laws , etc etc.

If you let them get away with one thing- they sure as hell going to go the whole mile .

If today they can get away with watching every move- tommorow they may crave and obtain the right to listen to you talk- next thing your civil rights and libierties don't mean shit.

Power= at least potential for abuse

The power to do what? Oh my fucking god, they know my schedules when going to the shitter - think of all the possible ways they could abus this fact! Geez, oh no, they know that I am phoning my mother once a week - an instant entry in the interpol database for sure, fuck now they know I forgot to water the plants, I'm sure they will list me as a potential terrorist for not caring for a life!

Really. Your post sounds like the typical "fuck the police!" schtick spiced with a wee bit of paranoia.
How can you say that?

The power to get you on suspicion for example- walking down the street if a cop doesn't like the look of you - he can just bust your ass, beat you or take you in. I guess YOU would like that from what i read in your post.

The point is that if you let them get away with 1 thing, they are free to push for others, these kinds of precedents are dangerous for freedom.

Ok let me give you the example of jews: first they made them wear identifiers , then they confiscated their money , then they put em in the ghettos , then they made them labor , then they killed them.

Gradual progression towards the worst , these things happen with subtlety.

You are innocent and you have nothing to hide-- that makes you SUPERMAN and no abuse or just pure incompetence (in the court of law for example) can touch you.

 

[Alphadrop]

The U.K has the largest amount of security cameras in the world, one for every 14 people as of 2006 and it's just gotten worse.
Yea, they are pretty much useless but what bugs me is that it's such a horrible waste of money.

 

[Ohaimerk]

I can understand this being a problem in countries where you can be imprisoned for life for speaking against the government, but in my country, and I assume the same case for the majority of the users here, that's a non-issue. Maybe some day something similar to McCarthyism could come along again though and use the infrastructure for witch hunts.

For some reason Escape From LA keeps coming to mind

 

[Surf Solar]

Ok let me give you the example of jews: first they made them wear identifiers , then they confiscated their money , then they put em in the ghettos , then they made them labor , then they killed them.

So you compare a system which isn't even working proper and is but a huge moneywaste like Farmerk pointed out (glad that Germany doesn't even bother really with this stuff) to the Holocaust? Way to go man.

 

[Token-not-found]

Ok let me give you the example of jews: first they made them wear identifiers , then they confiscated their money , then they put em in the ghettos , then they made them labor , then they killed them.

So you compare a system which isn't even working proper and is but a huge moneywaste like Farmerk pointed out (glad that Germany doesn't even bother really with this stuff) to the Holocaust? Way to go man.

The hell man i wasn't doing that - i was just giving you an example how things can progress if you LET THE MOTHERFUCKERS HAVE THEIR WAY

The domino effect

 

[Ohaimerk]

There's a difference between a war-torn country being taken over by extremists and long-established governments with reputations to keep and watchdogs keeping tabs on their moves. I'd be more worried about the individuals at the monitors than the governments themselves. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes and all that jazz

 

[Tagaziel]

Token, refrain from posting if you don't grasp the concept.

Anywhoo, don't devaluate Orwell's books. Overabundance of cameras and availability of information on an unprecedented scale to everyone is pretty damn far from an oppressive, omnipresent and practically omniscient government with an utterly horrific human rights record, permanent indoctrination and infiltration of everyone etc.

It's a big, big difference.

 

[Ohaimerk]

Sorry, didn't see your post crni. I see where you're coming from but I think you're not taking into consideration that while with the internet and data cables connecting everyone to everything, and satellites connecting everyone wirelessly to everything, the individual has almost as much power as the governments on this front. The military has better technology and the government sectors have more personnel, but for the most part you could be watched by a hacker across the ocean just as easily as a government official a few miles away. A hacker stealing my identity is a bigger present threat than anything my government does/is allowed to do/does secretly anyways.

The only thing I'm a bit iffy on nowadays is corporations like google, facebook, etc. storing everything being fed into them, but is the fact that I got drunk on november 18th 2009 and did a search for Cucpcake Disasters on august 13th 2007 really that much of a threat? They only monitor what I purposely feed into them, a bit of vigilance and mindfulness goes a long way on this part.

 

[TheWearyGunman]

I personally don't care what they know about me, but I oppose it on principle. I don't think a few extra cameras is going to lead to an orwellian dystopia, but it's still the start of a slippery slope. If cameras are okay, then why not microphones? If microphones why not mandatory gps locaters for everyone? It's not an issue itself, but it sets a bad precedent.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Sorry, didn't see your post crni. I see where you're coming from but I think you're not taking into consideration that while with the internet and data cables connecting everyone to everything, and satellites connecting everyone wirelessly to everything, the individual has almost as much power as the governments on this front. The military has better technology and the government sectors have more personnel, but for the most part you could be watched by a hacker across the ocean just as easily as a government official a few miles away. A hacker stealing my identity is a bigger present threat than anything my government does/is allowed to do/does secretly anyways.

No worries.

The issue is just that with some hacker "abusing" your personal informations you have places where you can go and do something, police etc. if you will be successful or not is an entirely different question. But you have at least the option.

But what are you doing if you ever get one way or another in conflict with the authorities ? The issue is not "that" they collect your informations the issue is that there is (in my eyes) in many cases no transparency and really many loop holes in the system and then it starts to become dangerous because if something goes wrong you will have a hard time to get to the rots of the issue or who/what caused it. And as pointed out by Tigeraziel I am not talking about the extremes. But the shift in attitude is what worries me personally, from "My personal informations have value!" to "I don't care because I don't have to hide something".

To give some example there are many people which decide to not make their sexuality a public matter. Now by collecting informations one might or might not find out what someone is doing in his free time. From cross-dressing to simply watching gay porn. Now those informations somehow end on a PC in some place where they don't belong. Nothing illegal right ? So no harm done! But it opens many doors to abusing it one way or another eventually. Maybe not for the usual schmock on the street. But there are other people politician even. Things are never only about "black" or "white" cases. It is about what you do in YOUR apartment and the computer on your desk or hands is part of that.

 

[Lexx]

I'm in the "Who cares?" category. They can stick cameras in my house for all i care, I have nothing to hide and I have nothing that would really affect me or anyone else if someone knew even every single detail about my personal life.

"Oh look, farmerk is taking a shit! Oh look, Farmerk's discussing autumn with his grandma! Oh look, farmerk is eating crackers and drinking coffee!" Oh no, what an orwellian nightmare that would be!

Seriously? I don't believe you. What about more intimate stuff? Sex with another person, sex with other persons, sex with yourself, etc. you wouldn't mind them to look at you all day? What if you are political active and people abuse what they have recorded from you? What if they are monitoring what you say and if you say something they don't like, they beginn to oppress you?

Even if you think that this is bullshit and will never happen-- why are you so sure about this? What if it will happen? What if someone doesn't like you and uses the technic against you? How about police abuse, etc? That's pretty much a possibility and happened already.

I can't even try to be so uninterested, simply because I've read Orwells 1984 and found it extremely depressing. We are still a bit away from such a world, but ignoring it and saying that something similar is impossible... (not even pointing at the war in the book-- only the surveillance of the population is already enough)

I've nothing to hide.

Yeah, right.