...it's time we step in in our role as governments (both national and international) to create the regulatory environments that protect us...
Or putting on other imaginary hats:
...it's time we step in in our role as technology corporations to circumvent and mitigate broken government regulations which harm our customers...
...it's time we step in in our role as malevolent crackers to cease-and-desist thieving things which do not belong to us...
...it's time we as terrorists, child pornographers, and film pirates stop doing naughty things, so that people stop asking for digital surveillance...
How is the counterfactual, "we the governments", any more sensible than the "we the corporations", or the sillier ones? Schneier isn't a government. Inference along the aligns of "If I were the government I would...", in a democracy where you and everyone who kind-of agrees with you are an insignificant fringe, is barely more rational than pretending to be any other third party.
The main effect of this reasoning flaw is to accede more powers to the biggest digital-rights threat of all, national governments, out of the fatal illusion that they will be used to protect you, as imagined in your "If I were government" fantasy. The evidence strongly suggests that the government--which you are not--would much rather use new powers against you, to the benefit of established, paying clients (MPAA).
...we, as private citizens, should oppose regulation of our networks, because governments have been very bad at it, and we do not control them well enough to expect better.
I, for one, would be much happier with government brokering than corporate. At least with the (democratic) government, I will have some control. There are parliamentary processes, voting, constitutional rules, albeit often slow, that give me a say.
With the corporation, I only have illusion of control, zero transparency, and often contractual binding to an entity that only has incentive to take advantage of me.
Now, as far as government working properly: surely, it often doesn't work well. For one, governments are often too large (in citizen count) for individuals to participate effectively. This often leads to powerful interests taking over. But, perhaps this is because our governmental structures were invented way too long ago to be current.
The 'private citizen' part is interesting. I would prefer to have peer-to-peer relationships that are effective and strong enough. But, that's a ways off, isn't it?
How is the counterfactual, "we the governments", any more sensible than the "we the corporations", or the sillier ones?
For the obvious reason that governments, at least in democratic countries, are supposed to be about the people governing themselves. Governments are a means to solve cooperation problems.
Sure, this theory does not perfectly translate into practice. But it is the normative ideal of democracy. Hence your comment just comes off as snarky without really adding much to the discussion other than the point that yes, government power also must be restricted when it comes to information, just like it must be restricted in other areas of life. This is a useful point, but one that you might have made using much fewer words.
People tend to infer two-way bargains that have some degree of fairness; they are upset when those expectations are violated.
The general bargain is "You provide some services, I agree to let you see the data that I put in and either show me some advertising or charge me a small fee." This holds true for Facebook, Google, Apple... The problem is that many people assume that their data will be kept reasonably (not perfectly) private. Advertisers get to specify the attributes of people who will see their ads (age, large geographical area, expressed interests) and not, say, phone number, name, birthday and address.
But that bargain has not actually been struck.
And if you do read the pages and pages of legalese, and manage to comprehend it all, it can still all be changed out from under you.
People who realize this generally aren't happy about it.
My guess is we get far less cases of minor security breaches "my computer has a virus and I lost some files" but occasionally suffer massive scale data breaches. For example "somebody got into my facebook, bank and dropbox and has stolen my identity".
The amount of software that is being automatically downloaded , installed and executed every day on millions of devices from a handful of "trusted" servers is really quite frightening.
You just know that someone out there is busy trying to work out how to forge Apple certificates.
I'd rather have the freedom of choosing a feudal e-lord than trust governmental regulations. Maybe there's a reporting bias but the ones I hear about are always god-awful.
From seizing domains[1], blocking fairly random sites[2] to threatening ISPs over content[3], governments make Google, Canonical and the like look very attractive in comparison. Especially considering you can dump them with only moderate effort and cost.
Government regulations are MADE by the feudal e-lords.
It's just that some e-lords have more weight than others, and corruption advantages some more than others. And yes, companies funded before the Internet are also eligible to be named e-lords of their own.
If Google had more control over the government (and how know, they eventually might 10 years from now), we'd have similar problems with them.
Is the government offering to provide Internet services to you? You're comparing apples and oranges.
A government still can, and will, seize domains, block sites, and issue takedowns and warrants on content to Google. Suppose I own xyzzy.com, set up to use Google Apps to handle mail and serve some web pages. Just like if I was hosting at home or in a colo somewhere, the government can still come in and demand the data. In fact, the biggest difference is that companies like Google are more likely to just roll over--see the stories about cell carriers just handing over tons of information just because law enforcement said please.
I don't agree.
The cloud provider is a company only existing for the sake of generating revenue for the share-holders of this company.
The government is a (usually) democratically elected institution.
That is why I prefer to trust governments.
I agree completely! Though I'm not AT ALL trustful of companies, they simply don't have the power that governments do. It's a heck of a lot easier to switch the company that hosts your email than it is to switch governments.
Nothing is going to happen with digital security rights so long as the NSA wants to be able to store everything indefinitely and we have a Congress that can't even agree on more critical issues like the budget.
It wont be an issue unless people make it, and for most people security isn't even a consideration.
[+] [-] uvdiv|13 years ago|reply
Or putting on other imaginary hats:
...it's time we step in in our role as technology corporations to circumvent and mitigate broken government regulations which harm our customers...
...it's time we step in in our role as malevolent crackers to cease-and-desist thieving things which do not belong to us...
...it's time we as terrorists, child pornographers, and film pirates stop doing naughty things, so that people stop asking for digital surveillance...
How is the counterfactual, "we the governments", any more sensible than the "we the corporations", or the sillier ones? Schneier isn't a government. Inference along the aligns of "If I were the government I would...", in a democracy where you and everyone who kind-of agrees with you are an insignificant fringe, is barely more rational than pretending to be any other third party.
The main effect of this reasoning flaw is to accede more powers to the biggest digital-rights threat of all, national governments, out of the fatal illusion that they will be used to protect you, as imagined in your "If I were government" fantasy. The evidence strongly suggests that the government--which you are not--would much rather use new powers against you, to the benefit of established, paying clients (MPAA).
...we, as private citizens, should oppose regulation of our networks, because governments have been very bad at it, and we do not control them well enough to expect better.
[+] [-] ap22213|13 years ago|reply
With the corporation, I only have illusion of control, zero transparency, and often contractual binding to an entity that only has incentive to take advantage of me.
Now, as far as government working properly: surely, it often doesn't work well. For one, governments are often too large (in citizen count) for individuals to participate effectively. This often leads to powerful interests taking over. But, perhaps this is because our governmental structures were invented way too long ago to be current.
The 'private citizen' part is interesting. I would prefer to have peer-to-peer relationships that are effective and strong enough. But, that's a ways off, isn't it?
[+] [-] nhaehnle|13 years ago|reply
For the obvious reason that governments, at least in democratic countries, are supposed to be about the people governing themselves. Governments are a means to solve cooperation problems.
Sure, this theory does not perfectly translate into practice. But it is the normative ideal of democracy. Hence your comment just comes off as snarky without really adding much to the discussion other than the point that yes, government power also must be restricted when it comes to information, just like it must be restricted in other areas of life. This is a useful point, but one that you might have made using much fewer words.
[+] [-] dsr_|13 years ago|reply
The general bargain is "You provide some services, I agree to let you see the data that I put in and either show me some advertising or charge me a small fee." This holds true for Facebook, Google, Apple... The problem is that many people assume that their data will be kept reasonably (not perfectly) private. Advertisers get to specify the attributes of people who will see their ads (age, large geographical area, expressed interests) and not, say, phone number, name, birthday and address.
But that bargain has not actually been struck.
And if you do read the pages and pages of legalese, and manage to comprehend it all, it can still all be changed out from under you.
People who realize this generally aren't happy about it.
[+] [-] jiggy2011|13 years ago|reply
The amount of software that is being automatically downloaded , installed and executed every day on millions of devices from a handful of "trusted" servers is really quite frightening.
You just know that someone out there is busy trying to work out how to forge Apple certificates.
[+] [-] spindritf|13 years ago|reply
From seizing domains[1], blocking fairly random sites[2] to threatening ISPs over content[3], governments make Google, Canonical and the like look very attractive in comparison. Especially considering you can dump them with only moderate effort and cost.
[1] http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/11/feds-seize-101-do...
[2] https://torrentfreak.com/uk-isps-block-pirate-bays-artist-pr...
[3] http://olgierd.bblog.pl/wpis,jak;urzad;celny;bogu;ducha;winn...
[+] [-] zobzu|13 years ago|reply
If Google had more control over the government (and how know, they eventually might 10 years from now), we'd have similar problems with them.
[+] [-] jff|13 years ago|reply
A government still can, and will, seize domains, block sites, and issue takedowns and warrants on content to Google. Suppose I own xyzzy.com, set up to use Google Apps to handle mail and serve some web pages. Just like if I was hosting at home or in a colo somewhere, the government can still come in and demand the data. In fact, the biggest difference is that companies like Google are more likely to just roll over--see the stories about cell carriers just handing over tons of information just because law enforcement said please.
[+] [-] jiggy2011|13 years ago|reply
What is needed is a portable VM image that provides file sync, email and blogging straight out of the box.
[+] [-] olalonde|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xmpir|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] davegauer|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] debacle|13 years ago|reply
It wont be an issue unless people make it, and for most people security isn't even a consideration.
[+] [-] saturdaysaint|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]