Larry Ellison: vast AI surveillance can ensure citizens are on best behavior (2024)

[joshdavham]

This might sound overly paranoid to some, but I think that most developed nations are actually at risk of becoming surveillance states in the future.

The technology is already here, and there would also be clear upsides, especially for private citizens trying to protect themselves, but the end result is that we end up in a surveillance state. Arguably, we may already be in one.

[klipklop]

This is not paranoid, this is the logical conclusion to the control grid they are actively building. We are most of the way there with near zero resistance.

[nmz]

As intended.

https://gizmodo.com/larry-ellisons-oracle-started-as-a-cia-p...

[abraxas]

But developing nations are already there. China has a social credit system and the Russians have had convenient ways of denouncing each other for their citizens for decades.

[Ekaros]

Looking at repeated pushes for breaking or banning encryption it is pretty clear that privacy of citizenry is no priority for anyone in power. Slow degradation is inevitable.

[timewizard]

You have been since the 1960s. The NSA and CIA entitled itself to intercept and read mail of United States citizens sent or received from foreign countries. The NSA built room 641A and captured traffic in the bulk with very wide filters. There is a data center in Utah which stores all of our cellular telephone call and message "metadata."

[rqtwteye]

There is no "risk". It will happen for sure.

[ignoramous]

> a surveillance state. Arguably, we may already be in one.

If the lawmakers openly demonize and marginalise the unprivileged (minorities, dissenters, protestors), then it is safe to assume that it is already the case, just unevenly applied, so that the majority would continue to support the State as it increasingly grows restless with the fringe even more.

[dyauspitr]

Throw in some LLM capable of interpreting surveillance camera data and it’s going to be hell on earth.

[horrible-hilde]

Well, if their dream is to turn twitter to whatsapp then we also will lose some control of our money.

[cpill]

this is fine for countries that have governments that look after it's citizens, like Europe where it is already relatively safe. for the US, where the wealth disparity is rapidly increasing and only an uprising is going to change anything, I'd say it's an oppressive till of the rich to micro-police the less fortunate.

[ashoeafoot]

china has it and is still destabilizing. Such systemd can work if its a panopticon of all on all, but they do not work if centralized and in service to a few.

[yakaccount4]

Does Larry really lack enough self awareness to not realize these kind of statements make him sound like an orwellian super villain, or perhaps he does and simply does not care?

The latter is surely more frightening.

[tw04]

Larry doesn't care about anything other than Larry. For Larry, the biggest issue facing him beyond how he can live forever, is how he can ensure nobody ever commits a crime against him. The best way to ensure nobody ever commits a crime against him is to monitor every living human on the planet.

Any crime he commits can be figured out in courts with his high-priced lawyers so the idea that AI constantly watching you would be repressive seems misplaced to Larry.

For people that think I'm joking, at one point his primary philanthropic contributions were almost exclusively to life-extending efforts:

>Take the massive amount of money he once gave to life-extension research, which was the core focus of his philanthropic efforts.

>And so over the course of 15 years at the beginning of the 21st century he would donate over half of a billion dollars for anti-aging medical research, at a time when the field was seen as fringe science.

https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/8/24/21369773/larry-ellison-...

[Frost1x]

The trend has been more openness in this sort of behavior. After all, the public hasn’t seemed to respond to it with much negativity other than people occasionally complaining about these sorts of behaviors online. The highest level complaint seems to be public protest, which don’t seem to garner enough momentum to push change.

If there’s no repercussions, why not be transparent? Scary indeed, as it’s quite telling of the direction we’re headed in, IMHO.

[ozim]

Don’t make a mistake of anthropomorphising Larry Ellison.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Does Larry really lack enough self awareness to not realize these kind of statements make him sound like an orwellian super villain

He's joining the attention economy. Saying something stupid but provocative yields earned social media. Larry Ellison saying something sensible wouldn't make HN's front page.

[scyzoryk_xyz]

For one, he’s one of the OG’s who’s had vast wealth and power for longer than many others have been alive.

And two, he’s at an age where people lose any sense of self-awareness, shame, filters - all that shit.

Anyways I don’t think he cares that it makes him sound Orwellian. I suspect he’s fine with being Orwellian outright. Not having what he has is as unimaginable as for all of us having a fraction of what he has. It’s too much of a stretch for someone like that to extent so much to imagine.

And yeah it’s frightening, it’s why we did away with autocratic Sun King calibre aristocracy/royalty and all that. We can expect all the other zillionaires to follow this path reliably over the next few decades.

[trillic]

Larry is an 80 year old man worth 200 billion US dollars I don’t think he gives a shit what he sounds like.

[horrible-hilde]

Its the latter, Larry is not your friend

[wesselbindt]

He is not stupid, and operates within the same broad cultural framework as we do. It's the latter.

[timewizard]

Once CIA, always CIA. Larry is just explaining from first hand knowledge what the deep state wants.

[archagon]

The oligarchs have now realized that nothing is going to stop them, so the masks are coming off.

How long until corporations start organizing their own private militias, I wonder?

[kdmtctl]

The biggest problem is every creator of ceasing privileges from others genuinely believes that he is excluded.

  First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.
  Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.
  Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.
  Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
  —Martin Niemöller

[beng-nl]

The lawnmower wants to use vast AI surveillance on the blades of grass.

Do not anthropomorphize the lawnmower.

[jiggawatts]

This is a reference to the infamous rant by Bryan M. Cantrill after Sun was acquired by Oracle: https://youtu.be/-zRN7XLCRhc?t=1982

[mrcsharp]

Do not fall into the trap of anthropomorphising Larry Ellison.

> https://youtube.com/watch?t=1980&v=-zRN7XLCRhc

[merek]

This is amazing, thanks for sharing

[FrankWilhoit]

You first, Larry. Else you have no credibility and no standing.

[WheelsAtLarge]

If I didn't know better I would think this is an Onion article. Unfortunately, he's not the only powerful man who feels this way.

[EA-3167]

The obsession with control has been a preoccupation of the elite for a VERY long time. The idea that we're just a few cameras away from the perfect panopticon i a surprisingly dangerous and common delusion, especially given the ample evidence that it doesn't work. Look at the UK, where handguns are rare, knives are illegal to supply to under-18's, there are cameras EVERYWHERE... and they still have frequent stabbings.

With kitchen knives. And yeah they catch it on camera, but they didn't prevent it.

[Delk]

Ars Technica article with a link to video records of the Oracle financial meeting: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2024/09/omnip...

[archagon]

https://archive.is/qqhCj

[rainworld]

CIA-Larry has been representing and pushing these ideas for a long time:

https://chroniclesmagazine.org/view/larry-ellisons-golden-ag...

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

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

[timoth3y]

> "We're going to have supervision," Ellison said.

I literally read that as "supervillain" when I first read it.

[pavel_lishin]

> "We're going to have supervision," Ellison said. "Every police officer is going to be supervised at all times, and if there's a problem, AI will report that problem and report it to the appropriate person."

I gotta say, I know that billionaires live in their own private world - in many sense of the word - but this is just wildly naive.

[walterbell]

Optional membership in Club-Invisible-to-Surveillance, based on social credit, faction, status or other "predictive" criteria.

[qzw]

The modern super billionaire is so rich that only complete societal collapse or being personally targeted by a state-level entity can threaten their basically never-ending wealth and power. That's why they all have built bunkers on various islands in the world and have kissed the rings of whichever political leaders that look the most likely to threaten their position and/or life. If some of these leaders are also going to give them more money for their services, then that's just another good transaction for them. Anyone can sell their soul for a price. It takes a billionaire to sell it over and over for an ever increasing return.

[JumpCrisscross]

> modern super billionaire is so rich that only complete societal collapse or being personally targeted by a state-level entity can threaten their basically never-ending wealth and power

Plenty of billionaires have gone to jail or gone bankrupt.

> Anyone can sell their soul for a price

But not for any price. Anyone who thinks they could build an Apple or Microsoft or even Oracle is probably not being honest about their own limitations.

[Juliate]

That is not what “citizens” means or are supposed to be.

He does not understand or want citizenship, he wants peons.

[yibg]

So he wants the US to become more like China. Got it.

[mr90210]

Unfortunately I am very pessimistic about the future of AI surveillance, its promises are way too compelling for the layperson understand its second order effect over time.

Europe is slowly but surely pushing for it as well.

[unethical_ban]

We're going to shift from merely recording everyone's movements in public, to identifying and analyzing each individual in real time and doing behavioral analysis. Laws need to stop that from happening. Maybe some states will be better than others.

[1vuio0pswjnm7]

"Citizens will be on their best behavior because we are constantly recording and reporting everything that's going on."

What about non-citizens.

[ChrisArchitect]

(2024)

Discussion then: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41562750

[prng2021]

Hilarious. This is from his wikipedia page:

“in 2019 a $1 billion lawsuit was filed against several Israel supporters, including Ellison. The lawsuit accused Ellison and others of conspiring to ethnically cleanse Palestinians from Israeli-occupied territories, committing war crimes, and funding genocide.”

[threeseed]

Fine. But let’s also make sure that there is no indemnity for AI companies.

And that we pass laws to make it that systemic mis-identification should be classed as criminal negligence. Just to ensure everyone is on their best behaviour and not overstating the reliability of AI.

[pseudalopex]

Not fine.