[HN Gopher] The US government is buying troves of data about Ame...
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The US government is buying troves of data about Americans
Author : benwerd
Score : 238 points
Date : 2023-06-12 20:21 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.wired.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.wired.com)
| walterbell wrote:
| https://cybernews.com/news/france-senate-surveillance-camera...
|
| _> In France, the Senate just approved a controversial provision
| to a justice bill that would allow law enforcement to secretly
| activate cameras and microphones on a suspect's devices. This
| type of surveillance would be activated without notifying the
| owner of the device. The same provision would also allow agencies
| easier access to geolocation data to track suspected criminals
| ... Critics are urging French parliamentarians to dismiss the
| controversial provisions. And it's not too late - the update to
| the bill must still be approved in the National Assembly, the
| more powerful lower house of the Parliament._
|
| Any startup employees working directly on technology trade
| secrets or otherwise non-public intellectual property should
| enable iOS Lockdown Mode.
|
| Thanks to years of invasive online targeting, bulk data breaches
| and mobile phone network structural insecurity, it has never been
| cheaper to screen for higher-than-average-value targets with
| digital assets that can be exfiltrated. Since targeting costs
| have fallen, it is profitable to target employees below the
| C-suite, e.g. those in strategic or development roles who
| routinely need to access sensitive information and digital
| assets.
|
| This applies to enterprise, mobile and WFH environments, e.g.
| leveraging mobile phone foothold to reach other devices like a
| home router.
| FredPret wrote:
| Lockdown mode gives them a handy shortlist of higher than
| average value spying targets
| jjtheblunt wrote:
| i guess if everyone enables lockdown mode, the list is not
| short, if everyone can enable lockdown mode.
| walterbell wrote:
| Many people could enable Lockdown mode, at the cost of
| opting-out specific websites or apps which are (a) trusted,
| (b) dependent on features disabled by Lockdown mode.
| walterbell wrote:
| _> higher than average value spying targets_
|
| Acquisition of a per-device, client-side signal is orders of
| magnitude more expensive than bulk purchasing the data of
| millions of individuals.
| blueridge wrote:
| https://archive.is/GB5oS
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| They are purchasing information that is for sale. Worrying.
| What's more worrying is that we can assume this information is
| also available to every US adversary.
|
| Tangentially, it's interesting that the US declassifies things
| and they become publicly available.
| rashkov wrote:
| Where can I buy my own information? I'd like to know what info I
| am leaking so I can make adjustments to limit what I'm sharing
| graphe wrote:
| It's bulk. You are going to be buying a lot of information. I'm
| sure it includes triangulation information.
| rashkov wrote:
| I assume it's also somewhat anonymized too? But easily de-
| anonymized?
| [deleted]
| graphe wrote:
| I have never processed this data. You can find patterns for
| triangulation, and see where the cells are as this or this
| hour. Then you look at the calls and the texts (not using
| data, sms and phone calls) and determine their links. Mix
| this with credit card information and banking info and you
| have their names, shopping patterns, location and who that
| are in contact with through calls and texts (off the top of
| my head). With the data, you can see people's sites they
| visit from the ISPs, but with https and SSL not get
| everything, but you can get a very good idea from that.
| janalsncm wrote:
| There was a good NYTimes piece about it a few years ago.
| It's easier than you'd think. If you know the target's
| home address you can track the devices that come from
| there, and everywhere they go. On weekdays they're
| probably going to work, which is also quasi-public info.
| graphe wrote:
| What exactly is being sold here? Triangulation information, texts
| and calls? If so it's been there forever, this isn't new. It's
| been happening for over a decade. Who remembers lifelog from
| DARPA? Killedhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_LifeLog Who's
| giving them information? You are (on Facebook, Instagram, Reddit,
| etc).
| aksss wrote:
| Don't forget the people including you in photos that go up on
| Facebook, Insta, etc.
|
| You may not have accounts there but rest uneasy that unless
| your family and friends respect your privacy and right to
| informed consent, photos of you are getting processed for face
| recognition and location without you having to do much other
| than say "queso" for the photos.
| graphe wrote:
| I wonder if we can get our own information someday it would
| be fun to see how right and wrong they get this information.
| I've seen stuff like socialblade and aggregators guess, and
| they're always way off. With AI it's time to poison the well.
| :)
| ofslidingfeet wrote:
| There was a time when it was incredibly obvious to virtually
| everyone in the country that if you start throwing the Bill of
| Rights away, this is the result.
| whartung wrote:
| Not talked about in the article, is that this report is actually
| trying to move progress forward to addressing the issues
| surrounding the new, abundant, and detailed information and how
| the current framework of 4A legislation isn't really appropriate
| in the new data market.
|
| From the conclusion: U) Third, as part of this
| set of policies and procedures, and/or as a complement to it, the
| IC (Intelligence Community) should develop more precise
| sensitivity and privacy-protecting guidance for CAI (Commercially
| Available Information). Again, we offer several suggestions for
| the development of such guidance.
|
| So, in some light this should be considered progress, not the
| 800lb gorilla in the room.
| phkahler wrote:
| Rules or guidance just serves to legitimize it. Hey, it's OK as
| long as we follow the rules... oops sorry we didn't follow the
| recommended practice there... quite different than getting
| caught breaking a law.
| teelelbrit wrote:
| [flagged]
| graypegg wrote:
| > Canada drives me nuts with how much of an edge it lacks, how
| slow and sort of boring it is
|
| Yep! It's alright. We definitely aren't the greatest country in
| the world, but it's nice enough to be enjoyable, and boring
| enough to not put random personal or societal disasters in your
| way with any sort of regularity.
| teelelbrit wrote:
| Montreal has so much character, quebec in general really. It
| reminds me of the city you'd get if you combined boston, bits
| of manhattan and amsterdam.
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| I have no clue why GP's comment was flagged. Brigading
| going on?
|
| Few years ago we acquired something in Montreal related to
| AI, and it's interesting because when we tried to get the
| team to relocate to California many weren't interested. A
| lot of the key personnel ended-up moving, but they still
| kept a significant presence in the city. Even today, when
| hiring they'll have engineers indicate early in the process
| they won't ever move (despite pretty much everyone
| considered for that office being eligible for an O-1 due to
| the nature of the work being done there).
|
| What's interesting is we opened a satellite location in
| Toronto and it was a completely different experience. First
| thing people asked coming into interviews was about
| relocating to the US and if we could sponsor their visa.
| The demographics also skewed heavily toward recent
| immigrants to Canada.
|
| The irony was, the Toronto location was opened specifically
| to house developers that simply couldn't pass the higher
| bar for US immigration.
| graypegg wrote:
| Having lived and worked in Montreal and Toronto before, I
| can totally understand that sentiment. People are priced
| out of Toronto making 110k$/year if they wanted to live
| in an urban city. So people just aren't attached to it.
| They probably lived further near or into the GTA where
| it's less urban, or were paying a 1900$/month rent for a
| small bachelor apartment and were constantly comparing
| their experience with the bill.
|
| Montreal on the other hand, people will fight for. You
| can live here for (relative to Toronto) cheap, get the
| whole urban dream, and live around some very nice people
| that are equally proud of their city.
| [deleted]
| e40 wrote:
| > Bay Area - people are nice, streets are clean and police do
| their job
|
| I don't know about NYC, but the Bay Area doesn't fulfill those
| anymore. The number of people on the street. Trash. Crime. It's
| getting wild out there. I live in a very safe community and a
| 70 year old woman was beat up for a few dollars last week a few
| blocks from my house (and 1 block from the police department!).
| teelelbrit wrote:
| Yeah, I left after one friend in NYC was attacked on the
| subway and another beaten in broad daylight in Wallstreet
| after leaving his office.
|
| Sad that even in my prior neighborhood (los altos) there are
| carjackings and armed home invasions now... Impossible to
| imagine in 2015 while I was there :(
| pers0n wrote:
| The USA is good for making money and being safe from foreign
| invasion.
|
| Otherwise a lot has been going downhill and there is too much
| patriotic pride to admit or change it. But it's multiple
| issues, hyper-capitalism, lobbyists, no form of conflict of
| interest rules for politicians or anyone working for them,
| multiple news channels supporting "2 views", but all on the
| same page of ignoring the class warfare.
|
| I've talked to lots of people from other countries as I meet a
| lot of people and talk to many and most see us as going
| downhill or having poor worker rights and no social safety net
| (healthcare).
|
| Someone from China told me their parents think Americans work
| too much. Another person from Eastern Europe things we are in
| the toilet, etc. Other people from South America saying how
| they would pick Canada over the US any day. I just laugh when I
| hear it, because I feel we are too blind to see it.
|
| School shooting solutions are all about guns instead of the
| real issue, mental health.
|
| Politicians that want people limited on what they can earn with
| SS (keeping elderly people poor), when they get very good
| retirement benefits. Politicians dodging taxes or making sure
| the IRS is ill staffed, when its proven more IRS helps get the
| bungled dollars from Big Companies and Pockets that are
| cheating the system.
| cmilton wrote:
| Maybe this place you dream of does not yet exist.
|
| I, like you, wish there was such a place where everything just
| worked. Everyone got along. I think we all long for such a
| place.
| teelelbrit wrote:
| I've been to a number of countries that by GDP are "poor"
| compared to the US. They have perfect roads, very little
| crime and far fewer cultural problems that plague america.
|
| Italy, Switzerland and the Netherlands all seem to be getting
| along just fine.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| > far fewer cultural problems
|
| Do most people in those countries _look_ the same?
| teelelbrit wrote:
| yes - as an american I take the uncommon position of not
| making prescriptive judgements on how other countries
| should conduct their affairs.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| What does that mean?
| teelelbrit wrote:
| I don't think Switzerland is "problematic" because they
| prioritize laws and policies that benefit the Swiss for
| ex. Same for iran etc. I don't see what the skin color or
| cultural diversity of the country really has to do with
| anything.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| My point is that it's easier to have fewer cultural
| issues when your whole country looks the same.
| krapp wrote:
| A cursory look at a world history book proves that isn't
| the case.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I didn't say there were utopias but it eliminates an
| entire class of racism related cultural issues.
| krapp wrote:
| The same issues exist, just mapped onto other concepts
| like ethnic group, tribe, nationality, religion, class,
| etc.
| cobaltoxide wrote:
| Switzerland is one of the richest countries in the world.
| And I wouldn't call Italy or NL "poor."
|
| Switzerland's GDP per capita is around 25% higher than the
| United States. I would further guess that Switzerland
| probably has much less inequality than the United States.
| The Swiss are uniformly rich compared to the extremes of
| America.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| What is their ethnic breakdown?
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| > it's starting to become hard to really qualify what I really
| get for being american
|
| I'm preparing to renounce my American citizenship (lived most
| of my life elsewhere, no remaining ties to the USA), and I am
| amused by the frequent exhortation on internet fora against
| renunciation "If you have a US passport, you can rely on the US
| government to get you out of trouble". People really seem to
| think that Seal Team Six is on standby to save any ordinary
| American facing violence or natural disaster abroad. Me, I
| remember the aftermath of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami when
| many European countries swiftly evacuated their citizens or
| citizens of fellow EU states, while US citizens were mainly
| left to fend for themselves.
| candiddevmike wrote:
| You may make more money here but it doesn't seem to go far
| compared to how much of the American lifestyle is captured by
| rent seeking.
| teelelbrit wrote:
| Yeah, it's also getting less appealing because the whole
| "game" of fancy cars, expensive houses and showing how much
| you have just isn't that interesting to me.
|
| I like investing basically all of my money and traveling
| whenever I want to. I'm not married yet so this has been
| working out pretty well - especially since I left NYC.
| asveikau wrote:
| I think a lot of times people go through things they're not
| happy about in their own lives (the glaring one in your comment
| could be the stress of a long distance relationship) and they
| project outwards, trying to make it about something external
| like the place where they live. From there, we invent boogeymen
| such as "criminals" getting away scot free, or unruly
| immigrants. Focus on removing stress from your own life and
| away from the boogeymen and scapegoats.
| johnea wrote:
| +1 for the article actually mentioning the 4th ammendment, even
| if it was only in a quote from Sen. Ron Wyden:
|
| "I've been warning for years that if using a credit card to buy
| an Americans' personal information voids their Fourth Amendment
| rights, then traditional checks and balances for government
| surveillance will crumble," Ron Wyden, a US senator from Oregon,
| says.
|
| I continue to try to highlight the degree to which the 2nd
| ammendmennt is quoted versus the 4th ammendment The 4th being
| much much more relvent to the current state of affairs.
| roarcher wrote:
| > Such data may be useful, it says, to "identify every person who
| attended a protest or rally based on their smartphone location or
| ad-tracking records."
|
| "May"? This is exactly how the January 6th protestors were
| identified.
| wmeredith wrote:
| Yep. It was also used against Occupy Wall Street protestors.
| kgwxd wrote:
| Source?
| roarcher wrote:
| https://www.businessinsider.com/doj-is-mapping-cell-phone-
| lo...
| kgwxd wrote:
| "subpoenaed cell phone data". It's completely justifiable,
| legally and morally, and been happening since cell phones
| existed, way before January 6th 2021. The article's claim
| that it was somehow new to this event shines a spotlight on
| their agenda.
| zer8k wrote:
| Youre either not well informed or being deliberately
| obtuse. Cell phone data has been used in individual cases
| for almost as long as cell phones existed.
|
| J6 was one of the first cases where mass surveillance
| paired with ad tracking and tower pings were used in
| combination for mass arrests.
|
| We did not see this when the George Floyd riots occurred
| Despite the fact federal buildings were attacked yet it
| was brought out for this. It's very indicative of the
| existence of a police state that chooses its targets in a
| politically expedient way.
|
| What we saw the government do and the fact the alleged
| conspirators have largely not been charged with anything
| but rather left to rot should terrify anyone. Just
| because you aren't the target today doesnt mean you won't
| be tomorrow.
| some_furry wrote:
| I don't doubt that this technique was used for the people who
| stormed the capital on January 6th, but I would hesitate to
| describe many of them as "protestors".
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Actually, let's _do_ call them protesters. If you want to get
| universal agreement on the need for privacy regulations, you
| need to present it a way that does not immediately turn away
| your intended audience.
|
| When both sides really agree on something, it's amazing how
| fast it gets done. Which, of course, is why there are people
| trying to hard to keep both sides from ever agreeing.
| idiotsecant wrote:
| On one hand I know that this is true. We have to guard
| against special pleading that allows oppression of those we
| disagree with because that inevitably leads to our own
| oppression sooner or later.
|
| On the other hand I understand what the post you're
| replying to is saying, even if it's not said extremely
| well. There is an enormous online narrative with a lot of
| money and power behind it trying to normalize the most
| violent and anti-democratic parts of the right wing of
| American politics and using that to drive views, clicks,
| and votes.
|
| I'm normally not someone to clutch pearls and will be the
| first one to acknowledge that the vast majority of
| Americans are just decent enough people trying to figure
| out how to keep fed, healthy, and safe. But the tendency
| toward fascism in the human animal is something we need
| vigilance against, as demonstrated over and over again in
| human history.
|
| The people who attempted to violently attack the seat of
| democratically elected power in this country were not
| protestors. There were protestors outside, but the people
| who crossed the line to breaking and entering, assault, and
| terrorism were not protestors.
| graphe wrote:
| I'm sorry, but before your diatribe you should have
| checked the facts.
|
| They were protesters.
|
| All the violent stuff you saw was replays of a few
| seconds from instigators, there's video of security
| helping the q anon shaman inside, escorted calmly by the
| security ever since the "storming". There is 0 indication
| he was violent at all. Feel free to prove me wrong.
| MisterBastahrd wrote:
| Yeah, that part where they were breaking down a window of
| a locked door in an attempt to get into the house inner
| chambers to attempt to impede the democratic process of
| the United States was totally a protest and not an
| insurrection.
|
| The folks who were non-violent never made it inside the
| capital because they were there to protest? They were
| protestors.
|
| The other ones? They were insurrectionists and they all
| deserve prison.
| PM_me_your_math wrote:
| [flagged]
| roarcher wrote:
| You're free to describe them however you like, it's
| irrelevant to my point.
| phpisthebest wrote:
| Remember to some people "there are no bad tactics, only bad
| targets", lots of people are blinded when their perceived
| political enemies are getting "what they deserve" and fail
| to understand the powers and tactics used on their
| political enemies will soon be used on them....
|
| They will then go all shocked pikachu face then the
| government assault team in their door step taking them
| way... how can this bee they were the good ones.. they were
| on the "right side of history"...
|
| Welcome to the system, everyone's a victim Doesn't matter
| if you're red or blue it hates you all
| hahahasotruez wrote:
| [dead]
| whoopdedo wrote:
| It's not irrelevant to point out the false equivalency of
| putting constitutionally protected speech on the same level
| as forced entry, assault, and destruction of property.
| graphe wrote:
| I don't see this sentiment for the George Floyd riots
| that plagued the whole country for longer and did
| significantly more damage, instead of caring for corrupt
| politicians why not persecute those who robbed and stole
| from the common citizen.
|
| If a protest doesn't make the news what's the point?
| thebooktocome wrote:
| You don't see it because you're not looking for it.
| Plenty of protest groups were extremely vigilant about
| minimizing property damage and rooting out violent
| infiltrators.
|
| The George Floyd protests were far more policed: twenty-
| five protestors died; around 14k were arrested. [1]
|
| Hard to say any 1/6er suffered a similar fate, despite
| their significantly more egregious apparent crimes.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Floyd_protests
| graphe wrote:
| Do you not see the irony of your post? Did you not see
| the same at the 1/6? If they were more policed, the
| fires, and destruction didn't help it make it appear so.
| I could see the Floyd protests/riots outside. 1/6
| affected some .1% of the elite I could care less about.
|
| I'm still trying to see a reason why the common man hates
| that the citizens protest the government, or cares so
| much for the corrupt elite of either party. The
| government is not your friend. If the Floyd protests went
| to Washington it could have been less 1996 and more MLK.
| thebooktocome wrote:
| I don't know how to tell you that there were George Floyd
| protests in DC.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Floyd_protests_in_Wa
| shi....
|
| Somehow they managed to avoid breaking into the Capitol
| building and rifling through the offices of
| Congresscritters.
| coldtea wrote:
| Any protest march and demonstration worth its salt can be
| described with terms such as "forced entry, assault, and
| destruction of property" (and has been)...
| roarcher wrote:
| It's irrelevant because my entire and only point is that
| the government has this capability, no "may" about it.
|
| Whether my choice of words implied the level of
| ideological purity that you wished to see has nothing to
| do with that.
| weaksauce wrote:
| doubtful. they were issuing subpoenas to the cell companies for
| their records of the tower registrations for a certain time
| frame when crimes were being committed. It doesn't take much to
| identify the owner of a smartphone via that and then correlate
| that with driver's license photo ids and correlate that with
| surveillance camera footage to bring a case. that had nothing
| to do with peaceful protester tracking but bog standard
| criminal investigation.
| autoexec wrote:
| They used a bunch of different tricks to ID some of the
| people there (and they've still not arrested most of them).
| The lesson here isn't that they aren't collecting data
| effectively, or that they aren't able to learn whatever they
| want, but rather that the data isn't really intended or used
| for protecting America from attacks or threats or terrorism.
| It's certainly being used, but not to protect us.
| roarcher wrote:
| I posted the source in another comment but I'll put it here
| as well: https://www.businessinsider.com/doj-is-mapping-cell-
| phone-lo...
|
| The data came from Google and included GPS data.
|
| Either way, I don't think that matters. My point is that tech
| companies store data that can be used to identify everyone
| present at a specific location and timeframe, and that data
| is easily available to the government. There's no "may" about
| it.
| weaksauce wrote:
| sure... I don't disagree with you there. they did need to
| get a subpoena for that information using all the other
| evidence that was publicly out there on facebook that the
| affidavit said. they were using an android device that
| tracks you if you let it and stores that information on
| google's servers if you let it. you don't have to have that
| feature on and just having the phone on you is sufficient
| to be triangulated by the cell towers. I don't see how this
| is incompatible with modern society. google didn't just
| give up the data without going through the judge granting a
| subpoena. even if they didn't have that cell phone record
| it's just one piece of evidence of many that would still
| likely get a conviction.
|
| it didn't start at gps data from google... it went from
| public posts on facebook to the email and phone number
| account associated with that to the google account
| associated with that to the gps data associated with the
| google account. if you show me them using a reach around
| route to get that gps data and persecute peaceful
| protestors that haven't been suspected of criminal activity
| then i do agree it's troubling. if you want me to agree
| that the government is not within their rights seek
| evidence via normal, judge approved, subpoenas to
| investigate/prosecute people storming the capital and doing
| legitimate crimes then i disagree. you need probable cause
| and that bar should be fairly high.
| roarcher wrote:
| In the J6 case they used a subpoena, yes. The OP article
| says that they're now going around the legal process by
| simply buying the data.
|
| But my point is that the article implies that there's
| some uncertainty as to whether this data can be used to
| identify everyone present at a place and time, and there
| isn't. It has been done before.
| kccqzy wrote:
| That's missing the point. Your article says
|
| > investigators obtained GPS and other cell phone records
| from Google via a search warrant
|
| Search warrants are and remain the correct tool for the
| government to get this data. What this article is worrying
| about is the fact that sometimes the government simply
| purchases this data without any sign off from a judge.
| That's where constitutional protections are eroded.
|
| Your outrage is misplaced until such time when the
| government can buy this data from Google without a search
| warrant.
| roarcher wrote:
| I'm aware of the distinction. I guess I wasn't clear in
| my original comment because this keeps coming up: My
| point is merely that there is absolutely no doubt that
| once acquired, the data gives the government this
| capability. The article implies that this is uncertain,
| and it is not.
|
| > Your outrage is misplaced until such time when the
| government can buy this data from Google without a search
| warrant.
|
| Whatever outrage you read into my comments, I assure you
| it's not there. If you're looking for a fight, look
| elsewhere.
|
| Also, the OP article is about the government doing
| exactly that. So if I was outraged, it would be well
| placed, according to you.
| lern_too_spel wrote:
| > Also, the OP article is about the government doing
| exactly that.
|
| The OP article doesn't match the document it describes,
| which says that the government authorized 5 searches of
| this data in the past 2.5 years.
| roarcher wrote:
| Are you sure about that? See Section 2.2 of the report,
| "Examples of CAI Contracts" that says "The IC currently
| acquires large amounts of CAI" and goes on to list
| specific data brokers contracted by specific government
| agencies. What am I missing?
| majormajor wrote:
| The government couldn't do it this easily if it wasn't for sale.
|
| It being for sale means _anyone_ can be doing it which might be a
| framing that would be more alarming to the law-and-order types.
|
| But really you need a two prong solution:
|
| 1) restrict this from being collected and compiled in the first
| place, eliminate the ability to default to this tracking unless
| someone opts out
|
| 2) restrict the government's ability to use or acquire through
| non-market-based means. The claim here is that there's already
| restrictions on this vs directly surveiling, but I haven't seen
| directly which specific restrictions those are for buying off-
| the-shelf info and the article doesn't specify.
|
| There are very really no companies that I trust to keep my data
| safe for 10, 20, 50 years. Leadership changes, ownership changes,
| etc. We have to cut it off at the source.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| > It being for sale means anyone can be doing it which might be
| a framing that would be more alarming to the law-and-order
| types.
|
| How about "more alarming to the _lawmakers_? "
|
| Someone could show that movement info, for example, is
| available for sale on a legislator. Or a legislator's spouse or
| child.
|
| _Now_ do you see the problem, oh you who write the laws?
| burkaman wrote:
| No, they still don't care. https://www.nytimes.com/interactiv
| e/2019/12/20/opinion/locat...
| rootusrootus wrote:
| > Someone could show that movement info, for example, is
| available for sale on a legislator. Or a legislator's spouse
| or child.
|
| Surely someone is already doing this? It wouldn't be
| especially expensive, but even if it were we could probably
| crowdfund it easily enough.
| [deleted]
| bilbo0s wrote:
| I suspect all those who write the laws already have a
| Damoclean Sword threatening to drop on them at any time
| convenient. So I wouldn't count on much help from them
| whether the laws apply to them or not. It's a virtual
| certainty that noone who seeks power is free of exploitable
| skeletons. They are the kind of people who seek power. So the
| law enforcement and security infrastructure can leak that
| whenever they choose.
|
| I guess what I'm saying is, your suggestion would be a good
| idea, but the security apparatus figured it out before you
| did a long time ago. See ABSCAM for instance.
| autoexec wrote:
| I'm reminded of how Obama was vocally opposed to domestic
| surveillance and campaigned on ending all the new spying on
| the American people, but once he was in office he changed
| his tune very quickly and ended up expanding the NSA's
| ability to spy on the people instead.
|
| I figure either he was shown some very strong and
| classified evidence that the data the NSA had been
| collecting was critical to protecting the people even while
| it violated their constitutional rights and freedoms or
| else he was shown how much dirt they have on him and his
| family and he was blackmailed into publicly declaring his
| love for NSA spying and handing them more tools to collect
| data while making only a few token changes.
| pjmorris wrote:
| Could someone start the 'Decentralized Intelligence Agency(,
| LLC)', buying, collating, and analyzing open market data
| feeds, and allowing subscribers to see what's known about
| themselves and others?
| jodrellblank wrote:
| Bellingcat are an investigative agency which uses open data
| and decentralised members (I think), but not doing it for
| members to see themselves:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bellingcat
|
| https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54680228-we-are-
| bellingc...
| bilbo0s wrote:
| Sure.
|
| If you have the wherewithal to protect yourself from the
| unsavory underworld types who will inevitably come after
| you for revealing things they'd just as soon keep secret.
|
| There's a reason you only see the government doing this
| kind of thing.
| NoZebra120vClip wrote:
| I think that something that should have made lawmakers, and
| others in public office, sit up and take notice, is a couple
| of years ago when a prominent and highly-placed Catholic
| priest was found to be hanging out on Grindr and with other
| users of the app, shall we say.
| https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/248431/usccb-
| general...
|
| The entity that orchestrated that outing, with the
| accompanying simple purchase of location data, etc. was a
| Roman Catholic newspaper known for high-quality investigative
| pieces. https://www.pillarcatholic.com/p/pillar-investigates-
| usccb-g...
|
| If such incriminating data is so easily procured against just
| one guy using a gay hookup app, imagine the treasure troves
| of data that could be wielded against Members of Congress and
| other people in power. Even in the absence of wrongdoing, I
| still don't think that public figures would enjoy having the
| public know their every move, every minute of every day, but
| the reality is that all the apps they run are phoning home
| and uploading that data constantly, unceasingly, and it's all
| for sale.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _imagine the treasure troves of data that could be
| wielded against Members of Congress and other people in
| power_
|
| You are overestimating the frequency of these events, or
| the degree to which their perpetrators are aware they're a
| liability. Seasoned members of the Congress are "on" all
| the time, egregiously aware of not only their own words,
| expressions, movements and probability of being
| surreptitiously recorded and tracked, but also how their
| competitors and allies might be and to what extent that can
| be turned or stockpiled for leverage.
| mc32 wrote:
| That guy who was tracking celebrities's plane traffic and
| publishing on TWTTR could instead do this. Automatically and
| repeatedly publish legally obtained data on all politicians
| fed, state and local. Now that would constitute a public
| service.
| nickpeterson wrote:
| Except they would make that illegal for politicians and let
| us all twist in the wind.
| ajross wrote:
| > The government couldn't do it this easily if it wasn't for
| sale.
|
| Stronger: this being for sale means that it's _already_ being
| purchased by someone.
|
| Really the scoop to this piece is just "The CIA engages in open
| source intelligence", which sort of a "duh" kind of thing. If
| there's intelligence value in a product on the open market, _of
| course_ they 're going to consider buying it.
|
| If it shouldn't be for sale it shouldn't be for sale. Let's fix
| that, not try to pretend that we're OK if Putin or Xi buys it
| but not the CIA.
| nonethewiser wrote:
| I don't fully disagree but there is still a big difference.
| People voluntarily give these companies their data. The
| companies aren't skirting the law. We shouldn't gatekeep
| disallowing government spying behind better consumer
| protections.
|
| The kicker in all this is that the taxpayers are literally
| paying for this. We are paying to give the government our own
| data.
| janalsncm wrote:
| My alarm bells for the Appeal to the Law fallacy went off. I
| see it quite often. When we're discussing what the law
| _should_ be, what the law _currently is_ is irrelevant
| (unless your position is that laws should not change).
|
| The fact that it is currently legal to harvest this data and
| the fact that it is currently legal for the government to
| purchase it should have no bearing on whether they should be
| able to in the future.
|
| Further, there is a serious question with regards to the
| extent to which these businesses had the actual informed
| consent of their users. Do people fully understand that their
| information will be sold to data brokers? Do they understand
| that the government will be able to purchase said info with
| our money (and possibly use this information to incarcerate
| them)? The latter is almost certainly no, which is why the
| government fought so hard to keep it a secret.
| malermeister wrote:
| Isn't 1) what the GDPR is trying to do?
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| Could some form of copyright or ownership help with this? The
| reason they can sell it is because it's theirs. Not yours. If
| you retained ownership of that data somehow would they need a
| warrant for it?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Could some form of copyright or ownership help with this_
|
| Just pass privacy rights. Backing into a solution with
| copyright is unnecessarily messy. Nobody wants to deal with a
| lifetime of the courts deciding on the status of personal
| data seized in a bankruptcy proceeding or hypothecated to
| foreign investors.
| bilqis wrote:
| That implies creating market for data, attaching speculative
| value to it and et cetera, and stinks of web3 bullshit.
| mc32 wrote:
| What i don't understand is why if it's illegal and forbidden
| for the government to directly indiscriminately collect
| information and data on citizens, they can buy the same
| information from data brokers without an issue? Surely this
| violates the intent of the law.
| shadowgovt wrote:
| The intent of the law was to limit government power
| specifically. Not unlike the law requiring most of the
| information on firearm sales at the federal level be kept in
| paper format so that it can't easily be mass-indexed and
| mass-crawled.
| Sai_ wrote:
| Maybe the world needs an NRA type agency for privacy -
| strident and extremist in scope so that the government
| invariably wilts before it.
| number6 wrote:
| Maybe they just want to check if it is dangerous for the
| security of the US? Someone could blackmail the president or
| a senator with this data
| autoexec wrote:
| I'm sure that's already happening. Nixon would have killed
| for the kind of data our government is collecting and when
| this data is turned against citizens the Neo-McCarthyist
| witch-hunts will be devastating.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| In theory, the data was provided willingly when collected.
|
| If you rent a locker, and the terms of the rental agreement
| say that the person you're renting from has access to the
| locker for any reason, then the cops do not need a warrant to
| ask the lessor to open the locker, only a warrant to _coerce_
| the lessor to open the locker.
|
| If the lessor is willing to let anybody take a picture of
| what is in the locker for $5, then the government doing so
| isn't abusing its special privilege.
|
| In practice, most people do not understand the ramifications
| of the things they agreed to that put this data out there (if
| they even read it!) and in many cases did not have reasonable
| alternatives to the services that they signed up for.
| nobody9999 wrote:
| >In theory, the data was provided willingly when collected.
|
| That's spot on, and your analogy is a good one, except that
| in the realm of personal information, no warrant is
| _required_ in the US.
|
| There is quite a bit of law and numerous court decisions
| around this process in the US.
|
| That jurisprudence is more generally called the Third-Party
| Doctrine[0]: The third-party doctrine is a
| United States legal doctrine that holds that people
| who voluntarily give information to third parties--such as
| banks, phone companies, internet service providers
| (ISPs), and e-mail servers--have "no reasonable
| expectation of privacy" in that information. A lack of
| privacy protection allows the United States
| government to obtain information from third parties
| without a legal warrant and without otherwise complying
| with the Fourth Amendment prohibition against
| search and seizure without probable cause and a
| judicial search warrant.[1]
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_doctrine
|
| Edit: To clarify, I disagree with this doctrine and would
| love to see limitations on data retention periods as well
| as warrant requirements for access to such data.
| jacquesm wrote:
| In Europe it doesn't work like that. There you give consent
| to collect for a specific purpose and for any other purpose
| you need to go back to the source for another round of
| consent. This is something that many companies haven't
| implemented properly yet (but a surprisingly large number
| actually do).
| isaacremuant wrote:
| And in reality, every process is a kafkean bureocratic
| nightmare were you end up having to say yes in order to
| advance and they milk your data anyway while also using
| privacy rethoric to prevent citizens from getting gov
| transparency.
|
| The typical powerful west European countries are corrupt
| to the core and when people feel we are better off than
| in the US (self congratulatory posts are common) it's
| generally lack of political awareness and involvement
| more than anything.
| jacquesm wrote:
| In reality, it just mostly works. Source: ample
| experience with European (no idea why you added 'West')
| companies that deal with my data. Since the GDPR has gone
| 'live' (as in: fines are being issued for non-compliance)
| the situation is improving every day.
| imiric wrote:
| > In practice, most people do not understand the
| ramifications of the things they agreed to that put this
| data out there (if they even read it!)
|
| True, but it's even worse than that. Many of those who do
| understand it, simply don't care ("nothing to hide",
| "nothing to fear", etc.).
|
| The allure of a "free" service that everyone else uses is
| enough to abandon any expectation of privacy, and
| consciously come up with arguments that it doesn't matter.
| jacquesm wrote:
| There are a ton of 'workarounds' like that in play, parallel
| construction being one of the most extreme ones. It's
| interesting how these invariably work very well when it is
| the government in the position of the plaintiff but citizens
| will never ever see the benefit of any of this. Cameras
| everywhere, but good luck if your car gets stolen. Meanwhile
| all of your movements are tracked with abandon, ANPR on every
| second street and so on. Privacy is very hard to come by.
|
| At the same time: I sympathize with LE and intelligence
| service operators that have their heart in the right place
| and that would just like to be able to do their jobs in a
| hostile and hard to navigate digital environment. Tech moves
| so much faster than they can keep up with.
| mc32 wrote:
| If law enforcement has a reason to obtain data, they should
| be able to get a warrant to obtain data for people of
| direct interest. But especially the federal gov should not
| be able to have data that they cannot legally obtain
| directly from the population. What good is a law and right
| of the population, if it can be trivially circumvented?
|
| Having data on everyone and then only using it against
| people they want to use it against is exactly what the
| Stasi did. Obviously this is their dream come true --just a
| little to late for them.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Agreed, but this is something that has been going on for
| decades. Their excuse - believe it or not, I can dig up
| the source if you want - is that _as long as nobody looks
| at the data it is ok to have it_. I thought that was
| being incredibly economical with words, clearly that is
| not the intent of the law.
| mc32 wrote:
| It's ironic that this is what all repressive governments
| do. They hold data and when they need it they spring it.
| But I guess this escapes them -or maybe not.
| jacquesm wrote:
| It escapes them but it shouldn't.
| nonethewiser wrote:
| It absolutely does. Hopefully this gets brought to court.
| freefaler wrote:
| The government has the monopoly to violence, Google does not.
| The cops can arrest you, Netflix can't.
|
| That's why information in government hands can be more
| dangerous than in corporate. A good example is when Nazis
| occupied Holland they used governmental data on religion
| (collected to properly allocate funds for places of worship)
| to track jews and send them to the camps.
|
| So data in corporate hands is bad, but governmental data can
| be even worse.
| cmilton wrote:
| And this is why the constitution is in place. To prevent
| the government from overstepping.
| isaacremuant wrote:
| Constitutions around the world were absolutely trampled
| under the guise of an axiomatically defined emergency
| that trumped fundamental freedoms and civil rights.
|
| Freedom of movement, association, speech, religion,
| bodily autonomy and more... All down the drain.
|
| All you need is a bit of collision between government
| media and tech and you're golden.
| dylan604 wrote:
| It needs to start doing a better job then, cause it looks
| like it's asleep on the job
| cmilton wrote:
| The people have to wield its power. It won't act on its
| own.
| [deleted]
| coldtea wrote:
| The intents of those enforcing the law is more powerful
| predictive of what will happen in practice than any intent of
| the law itself...
| underbluewaters wrote:
| I'm curious what would happen if a privacy-focused nonprofit
| tried to purchase this bulk data and were refused. If it's only
| truly available to 3 letter agencies then they are acting more
| like contractors and the legal rationale might unravel.
| aksss wrote:
| It's a tangled mess. If the companies are voluntarily
| cooperating, it's not as simple as calling them contractors.
| Look at all the covid/Biden subject matter censorship that was
| going on for an example. These companies invited the agencies
| in for reasons; they became willing tools of government
| censorship. There's no crime in it unless the government is
| coercing them. If you've interacted with the agencies, you know
| that coercion can be very subtle and light-touch. It can also
| be unofficial bargaining to the look the offer to look the
| other way or the threat to look intensely in one direction or
| another. Point is, you're rarely going to see a demand letter
| on the record requiring compliance outside of the warrant
| system (including FISA). The agencies know they can't compel
| private companies or state governments to do their work
| legally, so they work within the gray areas.
| autoexec wrote:
| This assumes that three letter agencies care about the law at
| all. They'll either come up with some other legal rationale
| that sidesteps the clear intent of the laws which would
| otherwise protect the rights of the American people or they'll
| just ignore it. I'd actually prefer it if at this point they
| just openly admitted that they were going to grossly violate
| our rights than this game where they smile and tell us how free
| we all are while they continue to come up with insane legal
| theories, imaginary guardrails against abuse, and toothless
| regulations which ultimately let them get away with doing
| whatever they want anyway. A little honestly would be very
| refreshing.
| d10486fa91eb46 wrote:
| [dead]
| ConanRus wrote:
| [dead]
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Quick, someone put up a web site where I can click on any
| legislator's name and read everything there is to know about them
| which can be commercially purchased. Maybe have a button to
| contribute to a fund to buy it so it can be published.
| null0pointer wrote:
| Next week: "Congress passes bill banning sale of US Gov
| employee data."
| beezle wrote:
| I believe this is the report in its original form:
|
| https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/ODNI-De...
| contingencies wrote:
| Named providers...
|
| _Reuters CLEAR_ has no clear opt out and is being sold as
| "prevention" ( _precog_ ).
| https://legal.thomsonreuters.com/en/products/clear-investiga...
|
| _LexisNexis_ https://optout.lexisnexis.com/
|
| _Exactis_ has no clear opt out. https://www.exactis.com/about-
| us/
|
| _PeekYou_
| https://www.peekyou.com/about/contact/ccpa_optout/do_not_sel...
| graphe wrote:
| Are the opt outs worth it? I don't see the benefit of giving
| them my real name, my info and telling them to delete it if
| they figured out it was me. Would it be easier to just change
| your name every once in a while legally?
| janalsncm wrote:
| Not sure what the play is here. By changing your name you
| are telling the government about your new name. So they
| will just search for all of your names.
| Sai_ wrote:
| Isn't a name change just another entry in a database saying
| user_id X now points to make Y?
|
| How hard can it be to combine one more database entry into
| a deanonymisation process?
| hospitalJail wrote:
| I'm sure those 5 major companies called out in PRISM are all
| selling the data, and one of those companies runs advertisements
| claiming they keep things private and secure.
|
| I'm no VIP, so its unlikely anyone would stumble across my name.
| However that typically can't be used as a defense for such a
| policy.
|
| I suppose it can be used as a defense if you want to claim your
| device prioritizes privacy and security. Its not a valid defense,
| but profit doesn't really care about being logically sound.
| bilbo0s wrote:
| _I 'm sure those 5 major companies called out in PRISM are all
| selling the data_
|
| Um, " _selling_ "?
|
| That's an, uh, interesting, characterization of what's likely
| going on.
|
| I'm not sure companies have a lot of choice in what's going to
| happen to their data here in the US despite what they tell us.
| (In fact, I'd bet they don't have much of a choice what happens
| to their data in _any_ country they do business in.) Maybe a
| few of the hardcore companies take it to court. But, OH! That
| 's right! In the US we've got FISA courts for this kind of
| thing, so it's illegal for us to know anything about any of
| that either.
|
| Oh well. Pity that I guess. Carry on citizens. Nothing to see
| here.
|
| On a serious note, never put anything on the digital record
| that you would be unwilling to have entered as evidence against
| you in open court. Full stop. I don't care what assurances you
| get from companies about security, or privacy, or end to end
| encryption. You just shouldn't do it.
|
| It helps to think of it this way, if it touches your phone or
| the internet in any way, it's part of the public record. No
| matter what app you were using. So be cognizant of that, it can
| come back to bite you 10 years later in ways you never would
| have imagined.
| falcolas wrote:
| FWIW, _also_ selling.
|
| As an example, a company called Dataminr sells views of
| Twitter to a bunch of government entities. Those views
| include things like fires, flash mobs, explosions, riots,
| etc.
| wefarrell wrote:
| It's a loophole, the 4th amendment prohibits the government
| from seizing data, however the government can legally
| purchase data from a third party.
| 60secs wrote:
| I can only read that title literally
| ripe wrote:
| One thought that occurred to me, regarding how to stop this kind
| of data being available:
|
| First, a question: how does the government (or any buyer)
| determine that the data they are buying is genuine?
|
| Second: Assuming that there's really no good way, then there's
| something you can do. Somebody could simply run lots of ChatGPT
| style models to generate a flood of nonsense but plausible-
| looking data about everyone on the planet. Flood the Internet
| with it. Compile it into lists and offer them for sale. Cheap!
|
| Once there's so much nonsense data out there, then provenance
| becomes more valuable. It becomes less useful to just buy random
| data.
|
| Doesn't solve the actual problem of privacy, but it might help in
| the short run.
| aliasxneo wrote:
| I wish I could read more reporting like this. Incredibly relevant
| to the average American, devoid of any political nonsense, and
| pretty straight to the point. The loopholes being abused by
| surveillance branches is truly alarming.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I suppose it's relevant but (devil's advocate) how does it
| affect/harm you? The reason the public doesn't seem to care is
| because it's benign.
| h2odragon wrote:
| lose yer phone.
|
| if your computing devices have cameras and microphones,
| disconnect them.
|
| do not use credit cards or online payment systems. cash, grass,
| or ass.
|
| ... and they'll _still_ know anything they care to about you; and
| failing that will _make up_ anything they need, should anyone
| with access to the levers of power decide that you are a worthy
| target, for whatever reason.
| donalhunt wrote:
| And if they are doing it to citizens, they are almost certainly
| doing it for non-citizens (most of the existing "protections"
| specifically state they don't apply to non-residents which always
| caused me to raise an eyebrow). :/
| mjfl wrote:
| [flagged]
| antonvs wrote:
| Shouldn't you be wearing khakis and marching in a protest
| somewhere?
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