[HN Gopher] Rights, Laws, and Google ___________________________________________________________________ Rights, Laws, and Google Author : vinnyglennon Score : 111 points Date : 2022-08-29 14:09 UTC (8 hours ago) (HTM) web link (stratechery.com) (TXT) w3m dump (stratechery.com) | bsedlm wrote: | edit: deleted. | merely-unlikely wrote: | This doesn't necessarily take away from your point, but | commonly under the law there is a legal fiction that holds a | corporation is considered a "person"[1]. | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood | nonrandomstring wrote: | > power ... exerting force over a minority ... free software | movements were never about the openness nor the accessibility | of the source code. But about issues such as this. | | Yes, Free Software culture has always been more about justice | on a new (digital) frontier where new forms of injustice and | abuse roam wild (and have only grown worse). | | I sincerely think the best model for understanding big-tech | corporations like Google is as serfdom under feudal warlords | within modern fiefdoms. It closely mirrors these historical | power relations where laws and constitutions have nothing to | say. | | The article is long and complex but I eventually found the | kernel in this line: | | > "A Google spokeswoman said the company stands by its | decisions, even though law enforcement cleared the two men." | | Though the moral questions behind it all are very complex, this | case is not itself actually that complex. There was no mistake. | No lack of proper investigation or tardiness by the police. The | child, parent, doctor and police - all of the parties except | Google - acted fairly, in good faith, mutuality and consent. | | Google is the problem here, and simply believes itself a law | unto itself, that's the nub of it. For all the posturing about | complying with the laws of nation states, companies like | Facebook and Google have grown smug about their power. When | they roll over the toes of the innocent, they laugh and say | "and what are you going to do about it?" | | We are in new "might is right" times and nobody big enough has | yet had the courage to say "Act justly, or we will hurt you | back", and then follow up. | | For the ordinary citizen, the only sensible course is to | resolutely refuse to use their services and products, and Free | Software which provides so many alternatives to Google, | Microsoft, Facebook and suchlike is the solution. It is the | _moral_ choice that a _good citizen_ can and should make in | these times. | waylandsmithers wrote: | My theory on why Google does this (and follows the same pattern | in so many areas) is that having one person simply use common | sense and reasonable judgment would be something of an admission | that their software, created by the best and brightest engineers, | isn't top notch. | paulcole wrote: | Start with questioning whether the software was created by the | best and brightest. | Animats wrote: | There's a question as to whether Google is acting as an agent of | the Government here. When the Government outsources something, | that activity sometimes becomes subject to constitutional | protections. Cases on this are iffy, though.[1] This has come up | in reference to Amtrak, the Federal Reserve, Blackwater, and | privately run prisons. | | Suppose Google analyzed all business data that passed through its | servers looking for patterns of tax evasion. If the probability | of tax evasion was high, reporting it to the IRS, which offers | rewards, could be a profit center. | | [1] https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2394843 | cee_el123 wrote: | Does a petition/campaign in Mark's favour have any hope of | getting Google to restore his account ? | | the most frustrating question I have - Why isn't Google restoring | his account despite him being cleared by the police ? Why are | they not even explaining this ? | gumby wrote: | They are probably worrying that if they did it would open a | floodgate of challenges, lawsuits and political attacks. | | As the last paragraph of this essay points out: tough. Google | needs to step up and deal with the consequences of its own | size. | golemotron wrote: | > Google needs to step up and deal with the consequences of | its own size. | | This is where regulation can help. | gumby wrote: | This is an under-appreciated factor in regulation ignored | by the reflexive "regulation bad" crowd. Companies can | welcome regulation, and not in a malign, regulatory capture | fashion. | | One case could be this one: doing the right thing could | open you up to attacks from bad actors. A regulation could | give you air cover (and legal cover). | | Or lets say you want to be more environmentally friendly | but customers won't pay extra. Your competitors do too, but | of course you can't agree to do this (that's collusion). A | regulation removes the risk and is applied to all. | crazygringo wrote: | I am utterly baffled as well. This was literally a front-page | article in the NYT, not just the online home page but front | page of the _paper edition_ [1]. | | It's one thing to get the attention of some Googlers on the | front page of HN, it's a whole other order of magnitude for the | front page of the NYT. | | I cannot imagine how this hasn't become an urgent priority for | Sundar himself to make sure this gets fixed and fast, at a | minimum in these known situations. What could they possibly | still be debating or deciding inside there at Google...? Police | determined no charges, so restore the accounts. I don't see any | potential risk, legal/reputational/otherwise, this would open | up. Google's inaction here _boggles the mind_. | | [1] | https://www.nytimes.com/issue/todayspaper/2022/08/22/todays-... | wswope wrote: | I'm right there with you in dismay, but I think this has been | building up a while: consider how long there have been Google | employees who browse HN, fully aware of how broken processes | are damaging users and developers, and just sitting on the | sidelines because they're in it for the paycheck. | codefreeordie wrote: | I'm surprised at how long this has gone on, but not _at all_ | surprised that it happened. Based on my experience at Google, | I would have expected the NYT article to get it unstuck | within 2-3 days. | | When I was at Google, I was continuously amazed at how hard | it was to stop this kind of own-goal when we knew it was | happening. (Based on where I was inside Google, I came across | (dramatically-less-sensational) obviously dumb decisions of | this sort). | | It was always _shockingly_ hard as a Googler to get traction | on fixing some customer 's bureaucracy-navigation problem -- | but usually it getting into the press finally got someone | through the bureaucracy. | [deleted] | Tangurena2 wrote: | Google has become too large. As a result, they're a threat | rather than a benefit to the web ecosystem. | | We saw similar stuff when banks were getting bailed out because | they were "too big to fail". That meant that their very size | was a threat to the financial system - they were really too big | to allow to exist. | alexb_ wrote: | This is an extremely good article. The hard part of this is | everyone can agree that "legality is not morality" and that what | is legal is not necessarily moral. But this is used for the wrong | side of the argument - since the Bill of Rights is a legal | document, some disregard it as any guidance for morality. | vorpalhex wrote: | The Bill of Rights is a legal document based on a Moral set of | beliefs. | merely-unlikely wrote: | I think this article points to a missing product in the market - | integrated cloud services but with the cloud located on a private | server in the home. Specifically for a company like Apple (who | hand waives at being pro-privacy) to enable all iCloud | functionality to be hosted on a personal mac. From a high level | (and likely ignoring important but probably not insurmountable | technical details), the idea would be for everything to look | exactly the same to the iPhone user, but for all data and | processing to happen on a machine the user controls. No Apple | accessible or hosted user data, end-to-end encrypted in transit, | etc. | | One might argue there are products that can fill this niche and | certainly many on Hacker News are capable of setting up their own | home servers. However, that is not nearly as convenient or | realistic for the average person to do. Those setups also don't | integrate directly into default services like iMessage, Photos | (including both storage and things like photo tagging), etc. | Modern desktops and many people's internet connections should be | powerful/fast enough to handle this. | | To the extent user data is used to feed big-data algos/machine | learning/etc, this might not be practical. That's why I suggest | Apple do it rather than Google (Apple already claiming much of | their ML services are handled on-device). | | One might argue that's essentially something iTunes handled | (still could?) but again it's not nearly as integrated as modern | iCloud services. And that only works over a local network or | direct wired connection. | | The basic idea is just to move data hosting and processing from | third-party servers where users have no direct control over how | their data is used or accessed to hardware sitting in their home. | izacus wrote: | This exists are part of NAS devices. Buy a Synology and you get | your iCloud/Google set of services in your home, for 1-time | price. | | With all of the services you mentioned. | merely-unlikely wrote: | That only covers a subset of iCloud functionality though. | Remote file storage sure. What about things like like backup | the entire device with the ability to restore on a new | iPhone, browsing history, app data (first and third-party), | passwords, etc. AFAIK solutions aren't nearly as integrated. | Which is why it would need Apple's support. | | Then there are services like email, iMessage, reminders, | notes, etc. The latter there may be some service that does it | but not in the default apps. The former I don't know of any | plug-and-play solutions not cloud hosted. For example, many | privacy concerned people use Proton mail but that is cloud | hosted and subject to search without the user's knowledge | (hopefully provided a valid warrant, but I don't think that | takes away from the point). | | I'd also rather services like find-my-iphone, recent | locations, and other map data be handled on a server I | control without Apple having any potential access. | | I'm not saying there are no solutions but I am saying that | they involve tradeoffs that a first-party solution could make | a lot smoother. I'd gladly pay for a home Apple server that | could replace all iCloud functionality without having to | change my habits. I suspect I'm not the only one - just look | at their recent privacy focused offering that turns off a | bunch of features for "at risk" individuals. | smoldesu wrote: | It more sounds like your fault for becoming overly-reliant | on services that are only possible by putting your trust in | one company. I'm also one of the people who does the whole | "home NAS" thing, and I have no problem syncing my | passwords, notes, dotfiles and whatnot. | | This is the hook that Tim Cook has been setting up for | years. They wanted you to take a bite out of their services | without thinking about how their concentration of power | effects you. Now that people are realizing that | iCloud/Apple Pay/App Store are all just ploys to add an | Apple Tax to other segments of the economy, they're relying | on the people addicted to their services to justify it's | use. When people talk about the degrading Apple ecosystem, | _this_ is what we 're referring to. | | I jumped off that racket years ago. Buy a few WD Reds and | set up RAID, then you can self-provision your own cloud | resources. | merely-unlikely wrote: | I don't disagree. Still, the situation remains and I bet | Apple could charge another "tax" to remedy it. And to be | clear, I'm suggesting a product offering not a regulatory | solution. | smoldesu wrote: | Yep. I certainly wouldn't hold your breath for Apple to | reverse their stance on services/the cloud though. They | make too much money off it to encourage people to self- | host. It may well take regulatory action before Apple | puts their customers before profit margins again. | blfr wrote: | _I think this article points to a missing product in the market | - integrated cloud services but with the cloud located on a | private server in the home._ | | That would be very cool but, sadly, 60% of that market is in | this comments thread. And we want it to be open source. | rpdillon wrote: | The product that kicked off the topic is Google Photos, which | I recently neared my storage limit on. Sensing that Google | One may not be an ideal next step, I set up my phone to | backup photos and videos to my Synology instead using DSFile | (Synology's file manager for Android). This has been pretty | awesome so far, at least for my use cases. | | I think Synology is the closest product I know of that | provides something like what you're describing, though, as | you point out, it's not OSI open source. | gernb wrote: | I use google photos for access, not backup. So, I can not | only access all my photos from anywhere, I can also take | advantage of their ML driven search. I'm not entirely happy | with the UX of Google Photo's but it's 1000x better than a | self hosted file share | merely-unlikely wrote: | I suspect the market may actually be of decent size if you | consider enterprises, journalists, politicians, and the like. | Users who aren't necessarily tech savvy, won't stop using | default services/apps without a fight, but who require a | level or privacy that is currently somewhat compromised. | vkou wrote: | Have you seen the unmitigated dumpster fire that is mass- | market Wordpress hosting? Now imagine that, but _even | worse_. | | Users who aren't tech savvy who are trying to run their own | mission-critical software on their own hardware: | | 1. Should expect to pay $200+/month for a support plan. | That will buy them one hour of an engineer's time per | month. They are going to need that time, because _deploying | software is hard_ , _keeping software running is hard_ , | and there are no SRE/DevOps economies of scale when every | Tom, Dick, and Harry wants to run their own service on | their own hardware. | | 2. Should expect to either deal with all the problems | (stability and security) that come with regular auto- | updates, or regularly getting pwned (because they aren't | auto-updating, and because they are a juicy, high ROI | target for bad actors). | | 3. All this stuff already exists for enterprises, and they | aren't complaining in these HN threads, because their needs | _are_ being met by cloud providers (As are the needs of | politicians. Because they generally don 't need security, | they need security _theatre_. As long as they can check the | compliance checkbox, they are in the clear.) The people | whose needs aren 't met are the long-tail small-fry of | journalists and hobbyists and their ilk. Who aren't enough | of a market, and can't afford the money, and the time, | because see points #1 and #2. Like, maybe the NYT can | afford to have this set up, and set up well for their | people, but they already have dedicated IT teams doing just | that! | marcosdumay wrote: | > And we want it to be open source. | | I don't see how that bit would be a problem. The market size, | yes, it's a problem, but it's supposed to be a cloud service, | there is no loss on the clients being open source. | bsedlm wrote: | yes there's a loss, not a monetary/economic loss, but a | loss of (potential) power. the fact the loss is "potential" | irks me about calling it a 'loss'; it's not quite a loss, | but a missed opportunity to leverage more power over. | smolder wrote: | We want it to be open source because open source is the only | source of services you can run at home or on premises at a | small business for a reasonable cost. | | It's really a supply side issue pretending to be a demand | one. Self hosted services of all kinds are woefully | underdeveloped. | | Tech giants aren't going to encourage you to own your data | and hardware by spending effort on supporting it, because | that undermines key reasons for building cloud services: | surveillance and control. | SpicyLemonZest wrote: | Self-hosted services are woefully underdeveloped because | people outside the open source community generally don't | want them. I'm familiar with a couple of small | organizations who've been around since the pre-cloud days; | all of them hated "the server" and love that Google enabled | them to get rid of it. | ineptech wrote: | > Tech giants aren't going to encourage you to own your | data and hardware by spending effort on supporting it | | On the contrary, it would make a lot of sense for Amazon to | work on open source self-hosted server apps, because they | would seem to be the answer to the question, "Why would a | non-techy want a cloud VM." Surely their PMs must day-dream | about a future in which a cloud VM is as common a monthly | fee for a middle-class family as a gym membership or | netflix subscription, right? | ineptech wrote: | Fake edit to add: there's a startup devoted to solving | this problem with a novel OS intended to be a good | platform for server-side apps, and since they appear | unlikely to get traction I would be very happy to hear | that Amazon is forking or duplicating it, just because I | so badly want to be a user of such a product. | nemothekid wrote: | > _I think this article points to a missing product in the | market - integrated cloud services but with the cloud located | on a private server in the home._ | | I don't know, this sounds like a technical solution to what is | a political problem. Gmail, today, already scans your email for | ads; what if congress decides that they started doing CSAM on | your emails? How feasible is it for everyone to host their own | email in that situation? | | This also echoes the controversy with CSAM scanning in iCloud. | There is no clear national consensus if the government should | be allowed to invade your privacy when it comes to child abuse. | Ironically, terrorists seem to have better privacy protections | than a pedophile. | | Personally I don't think CSAM scanning of your private data | should exist, much like I think everyone should be afforded | E2EE communication even if they might break the law with it. | Whether we allow our privacy to be invaded in such a manner is | a political/regulatory problem. A "private cloud" doesn't help | if congress decides that comcast should also be allowed to MITM | your SSL connection to scan every image you donwload. | Wowfunhappy wrote: | > A "private cloud" doesn't help if congress decides that | comcast should also be allowed to MITM your SSL connection to | scan every image you donwload. | | Not to be overly pedantic, but I don't think this is true on | a technical level? Any "private cloud" worth its salt would | presumably use its own E2E encryption, with keys known only | to the owner. | | The government could _force_ the private cloud vendor to | build a back door, but that 's kicking things up a notch. The | vendor could also decide to build a back door on their own, I | suppose... which is another reason people in this market tend | to want open source. | nemothekid wrote: | Yes, a private cloud should be able to do it; I don't want | to imply that it is impossible to build such a solution. | justinwp wrote: | > Gmail, today, already scans your email for ads; | | https://support.google.com/mail/answer/6603 | | > The process of selecting and showing personalized ads in | Gmail is fully automated. These ads are shown to you based on | your online activity while you're signed into Google. We will | not scan or read your Gmail messages to show you ads. | hertzrat wrote: | Notice is says "for ads," and not in general to profile you | or train ai systems | sib wrote: | Although it's a fair mistake; Google used to do this. | | Here is an except from my "welcome to Gmail" message, from | Google, from June 2004: | | "You may also have noticed some text ads or related links | to the right of this message. They're placed there in the | same way that ads are placed alongside Google search | results and, through our AdSense program, on content pages | across the web. The matching of ads to content in your | Gmail messages is performed entirely by computers; never by | people. Because the ads and links are matched to | information that is of interest to you, we hope you'll find | them relevant and useful." | pdonis wrote: | _> A "private cloud" doesn't help if congress decides that | comcast should also be allowed to MITM your SSL connection to | scan every image you donwload._ | | It also doesn't help if you send the image in an email to a | third party that doesn't share encryption keys with you. | Which is going to be the case for situations like the one | described in this article unless your "private cloud" expands | to include all your health care providers--not to mention | your bank, your insurance company, etc., etc. Which of course | it won't; all of those third parties are not going to care | what your private cloud setup is; they're going to use | whatever all the other large companies use. | verisimi wrote: | > I think this article points to a missing product in the | market - integrated cloud services but with the cloud located | on a private server in the home | | Absolutely. But who's going to sell it to the masses? Most | people don't care, as they haven't been told to - no one has | sold it to them. | | And who is going to explain about the erosion of privacy? Would | that be Google, the government? Why, when both are | beneficiaries of the existing system (ie making money for | google, increasing control and monitoring for govts)? This is a | market that is studiously ignored as it is in no one's | interests! | | Do you remember when Google piled into rss only to try its best | to then kill it? When data is your business, it makes no sense | to cut yourself out of the intermediation. | tempodox wrote: | I guess the three-letter agencies would be severely | disappointed if that happened, at a minimum. | gernb wrote: | Apple is never going to do this. Their largest growing source | of income is "services" (iCloud, etc...) They make a ton of | money charging users for those services | murphyslab wrote: | > the tremendous trade-offs entailed in the indiscriminate | scanning of users' cloud data. | | It might be helpful to frame any cloud-based scanning of user | activity or files as akin to mass-testing in health. While it | sounds good in principle, there is always a background rate of | false positives. And being incorrectly diagnosed can have | negative consequences. There has been a large amount of | examination of the consequences of mass-testing for various | diseases without indication. | | e.g. | | COVID testing: https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n1411/ | | Herpes: https://www.statnews.com/2017/01/26/flawed-herpes- | testing-le... | | Genetic testing: https://www.geneticsdigest.com/genetic-testing- | potential-con... | colinsane wrote: | the article makes good points, but i don't think the conclusion | is obvious. for example, i want the freedom to not interact with | Google. a ruling to require Google provide services to every | individual might allow for a future corresponding ruling, that | individuals must interact with Google (or at least, this becomes | the socially acceptable view, which shapes laws later). wiser, i | think, would be to prevent any single company from becoming | critical to participation in society. | SpicyLemonZest wrote: | I don't think that really solves anything here, because nothing | in the story indicates that Google was _critical_ to Mark 's | participation in society. He got new contact information and it | sounds like he's been able to (with some effort) get all his | non-Google accounts switched over. He didn't get fired, or | evicted, or land in any legal trouble. He just liked Google's | services and enjoyed using them until he was unfairly banned. | [deleted] | themacguffinman wrote: | If regulation is the answer, I'd hope it is designed with the | restraint that Madison had: only guarantee the deepest and most | fundamental rights. It should not rule out the ability to use | error-prone systems at all, at most it could restrict their use | for the most severe consequences like broad account bans. Google | can and should be reducing the scope of their automated action. | | I think error-prone systems are still necessary today to reduce | costs to a tolerable modern level. I'm not inclined to throw out | the baby with the bathwater regarding communication costs for the | same reason I don't want $300 toasters even if "they don't make | 'em like they used to". | | A good example is something that Facebook does: they have a | blacklist of domains you can't send on Messenger, the message | will be instantly blocked when you paste a detected link. From | experience, this list is fairly large and very inaccurate, but | the false positives for this system are annoying rather than | catastrophic because all it does is block a specific message. If | you don't like this, then you can use Signal or something, I | don't want other people making that choice for me. | sylware wrote: | Isn't google/alphabet a part of the vanguard/blackrock galaxy | now? | | Aren't blackrock/vanguard making the laws in the US? Like killing | the planned obsolescence related bills? | jjulius wrote: | >As company shareholders, BlackRock and Vanguard can vote on | behalf of their clients at company shareholder meetings. Both | firms also have "investment stewardship" functions, which | enables the proxy votes. | | >BlackRock's spokesperson said the votes can also be carried | out by a portfolio manager - and in some cases at BlackRock, | can be carried out by the clients themselves (here). | | >BlackRock and Vanguard do not "own" all the biggest | corporations in the world. They invest trillions of dollars | into leading companies on behalf of their clients, who | ultimately own the shares. | | https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-business-investmen... | sylware wrote: | So blackrock/vanguard can "hide" their "big" investors, | depending on the company "invested in", or is this public | info? | | That said, it is actually blackrock/vanguard ppl on the | boards, and often they are the biggest ones, and expecting no | steering from them or the "big" investors behind would be... | "unexpected". | | Their is also the massive debts with the gigantic interests | to be paid all along the calendar year. In the case of | starbucks, owners of the debts is public info or the web page | is incomplete? | | That said, now I understand why online non- | franchised/licensed starbucks stuff has the aspx file | extension. | jjulius wrote: | >... it is actually blackrock/vanguard ppl on the boards... | | Citation needed. | sylware wrote: | The 2 other heavily blackrock-ed/vanguard-ed companies | are microsoft and apple, then "their" directors would be | the current microsoft CEO and the apple guy. | jrm4 wrote: | This is where e.g. much of "free market" rhetoric and e.g. | Libertarianism need to take a severe backseat. | | Given the reach, it's absolutely time for "government | interference." Now, I'm not actually saying that we definitely | should shut things down. But we absolutely need to drag Google | people into public hearings and such. Google et al have inserted | themselves into their lives to an extent that they ought no | longer be able to claim "but we're a private company." It's | increasingly difficult, if not impossible, to opt out. | | Example; I fully intended for my children to not have anything | like a Google account until a certain age -- but then the | pandemic and remote schooling happened. It is true that with a | great deal of pain to teachers et al I could have opted out, but | that would have been literally unreasonable, not to mention | unsustainable for other people. | Stupulous wrote: | This is tangential, but your opening statement threw me for a | loop. As a Libertarian, I've spent a lot of time arguing with | people on the left and right who are on the pro-censorship side | when it comes to corporations. While it wouldn't surprise me to | see a Libertarian take a position against individual liberty on | this issue, I have not seen that happen. Your ire may be better | directed at the ones in the driver's seat who have the power to | address this and refuse to do so rather than the powerless | minority who consistently get this right. | [deleted] | pdonis wrote: | _> This is where e.g. much of "free market" rhetoric and e.g. | Libertarianism need to take a severe backseat._ | | No, it's where we the people need to understand that rights | come with responsibilities. If you want to claim the right to | keep your data private, you need to not give it to third | parties that you know are not going to honor that. And knowing | that is easy when it comes to Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc., | because of the simple rule that if you're not paying for the | product, you _are_ the product. | | The problem here is not too much free market and | libertarianism, but too little. The ultimate reason for this... | | _> It 's increasingly difficult, if not impossible, to opt | out._ | | ...is that the _government_ has inserted itself more and more | deeply into our lives, and we have let it. For example, your | kids ' schools are beholden to Google because they are run by | the government, which is insulated from free market competition | and can just punt on providing proper infrastructure. And the | reason why Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. can survive on the | ad-supported business model, instead of having to make their | users actual paying customers as would be the case in a real | free market, is that the government has set things up to favor | them. They can get cheap loans to build the massive | infrastructure they need because of government monetary policy. | They can insulate themselves from any effective legal challenge | because of the way the legal system is set up. | Aunche wrote: | > But we absolutely need to drag Google people into public | hearings and such | | We _have dragged_ Google into public hearings. The problem is | that the purpose of these hearings has always been to collect | soundbytes rather than to try to define a relationship between | internet services, the people, and the government. | ghiculescu wrote: | What should the government do? The article discusses how it is | not clear what should be different (other than turning the | relevant accounts back on). | | It is easy to ask for public hearings but if there's no | intended remedy or change they will just be a show trial and | nothing will change. | | Your example is great, because to me it illustrates my point | well. What would you like to have had be different? | jrm4 wrote: | I think good places in the past to look are "warning labels" | and/or "common carrier"-like ideas. | | Warning labels today, I think means "fixing voluminous EULA | crap," which we've done in other fields reasonably well, e.g. | the FDA I think is pretty solid here. Simply requiring | "readable" terms of services I think would go a long way | (though you have to wait a bit for things to shake out.) | | The general principles behind "common carrier" type services | would also be a good idea to start thinking about; they | essentially just say "When your product or service becomes a | day-to-day thing for a lot of people, we're going to hold you | to certain accessibility rules." | loudmax wrote: | I think I largely agree with you about getting the government | involved. But the nature of that involvement is important here. | | As I see it the fundamental problem is not that Google isn't | behaving as a responsible steward of free speech. The problem | is that Google shouldn't have this power to begin with. By law, | Google should be allowed to capriciously and arbitrarily shut | down a user's account. It's their service, they shouldn't need | to provide a justification. But Google shouldn't be in a | position where they control so much of the market. There needs | to be real competition in this area so users can easily switch | to a different provider if they lose faith in Google's | reliability. Where the government needs to be involved is in | ensuring real choice in a free market, rather than the current | duopoly. | | Ensuring a free market isn't easy. It's much easier to simply | pass a law that says that Google (or a company in a similar | position) needs to provide better service or offer users | recourse to dispute this sort of service interruption. But | that's just putting wallpaper over a crack. We need the | government to commit to the hard work of enforcing open | standards of interoperability so smaller entrants can get into | the market. | merely-unlikely wrote: | I'd like to see a private equity style Competition Authority. | The idea being the gov would come into a monopolized market | and fund new competitors. I say PE because I'd rather the | people profit if successful rather than subsidies but the | real point is funding more choice vs only having the power to | breakup or constrain existing corporations. Another tool in | the toolbox. | jrm4 wrote: | Essentially, though -- this is just "more regulation with | extra steps." | | Just pass the regulations and competition will likely find | a way around it. Honestly, this to me is the biggest blind | spot in all of "pro free market capitalism." The good | flavor of capitalism is _antifragile,_ You can make | competition better precisely by making things HARDER on | private companies, not easier. Stuff gets better because | the weak die. | shkkmo wrote: | > By law, Google should be allowed to capriciously and | arbitrarily shut down a user's account. It's their service, | they shouldn't need to provide a justification. | | I strongly disagree. | | While there should be some level of protection for large | companies ability to terminate customers at will, there also | need to be consumer protections against unreasonable EULAs | and capricious decisions. (Edit: some such protections | already exist, so it is a question of if and how we shift the | balance between consumer rights and corporate rights. I think | as the companies grow larger, more powerful, and more | integral to our daily lives, that balance needs to shift | further towards consumer rights given the power imbalance.) | | When companies sell us digital goods and become integral | parts of our digital lives, there arises a need to balance | their rights of free association against the rights of their | users to due process. | | That is not to say that simply mandating a fair dispute | resolution system is a sufficient solution, but it is a | necessary step. | | I think mandating data portability and maybe even | interoperability is also necessary (though an | interoperability mandate seems tricky to do well.) | pdonis wrote: | _> When companies sell us digital goods_ | | Google is not selling you any digital goods. They provide | services like GMail for free to people. That is a big part | of the problem: users are not paying customers and so have | no leverage, as they would in a proper customer | relationship. Instead, users are the product, and the | actual paying customers have all the leverage in | determining how the product is treated. | horsawlarway wrote: | I think this is roughly my stance as well. | | If we've allowed Google (and a few other select tech | companies) the privilege of becoming de-facto monopolies in | their space (and I believe we absolutely have, often | intentionally as government policy in the international | space) then they should be bound by the same rules that the | government is. | | I think this is even more obvious when you consider how some | of these companies creep into government processes. | | Ex: Google classroom is estimated to be in use in more than | 60,000 schools across the US. This means that a Google | account is required for all students in these schools (opt- | outs exist, but are impractical, hard to enforce, and often | cause you to be labeled as troublesome by teachers and | staff). | | If my child attends a public school that is using Google | software and requiring a Google account - The government damn | well is involved, and I expect the government to require the | same rights & due process for a Google account as they do for | other governmental actions. | ghiculescu wrote: | It seems like the simplest solution here would be to not ban | accounts automatically for CSAM detections, but to have a process | to do so based on police recommendation. | | Clearly Google already has a process to escalate detection to the | police so banning the account based on what happens there doesn't | seem like a big leap. | notriddle wrote: | > It seems like the simplest solution here would be to not ban | accounts automatically for CSAM detections, but to have a | process to do so based on police recommendation. | | The police aren't going to recommend a ban. They don't want | people banned. They want people arrested, tried, and convicted | for criminal possession. They're going to recommend keeping the | account open until they have enough evidence to take it to | court. | dcow wrote: | Which seems completely fine. If the person is being | investigated and they are continuing to commit abuses, the | police will immediately arrest them and have evidence to bear | increasing the odds that society locks the person up prompty. | If the suspect is in custody, what does the status of their | account matter? The point is that the account ultimately gets | closed and the data purged if the suspect is found guilty, so | what benefit is there to anybody in being delete-happy? | bcatanzaro wrote: | We need to regulate Google and require it to have a transparent | appeals process. | tinalumfoil wrote: | I don't think Google's doing this out of a deep concern for | CSAM and hatred for due process, but I think it's in fact the | law itself that essentially requires corporations to have these | trigger bans otherwise they'd face liability. | | Think about Google's alternatives here. | | They could (1) not have CSAM filters -- your data is private no | need for Google to scan anything -- in which case people would | use their platform to distribute illegal content and they'd be | a nice target to get massive damages from. | | Or (2) give people due process, rights, appeals, etc despite | not having any of the tools of a court of law, it's even | illegal for them to look at the evidence, and if they make the | wrong decision _or_ they make the right decision too late they | 're still liable for their platform being used for illegal | activity. Keep in mind the only way to truly know if material | is sexually explicit is to show it to Potter Stewart. He'll | know it when he sees it. | | Or (3) be proactive in building systems that detect illegal use | of their platform and aggressively, without process or appeal, | remove any user of the platform the moment you have any | evidence at all they are engaged in this activity. | | Because people will try to use Google's platform for illegal | activity and Google knows this, (3) is not only the only | sensible option but it's actually the only legal option. It | would, in effect, be _illegal_ for Google to do anything other | than scanning all your files and aggressively ban people. | treis wrote: | >use their platform to distribute | | I'm not a fan of this phrasing because it absolves Google of | responsibility. If the CSAM is on a Google server then Google | is possessing and distributing CSAM. You can say they're | doing it unwittingly or unintentionally but that doesn't | change the fact that they're doing it. | josephcsible wrote: | > how big the number of false positives would have to be to shut | the whole thing down? | | Since it seems that false positives are uncorrectable (given that | even a New York Times article hasn't gotten this one fixed), and | the consequences of one are thus life-destroying, even a single | false positive should mean shutting the whole thing down. | sulam wrote: | So, Google, Apple, Twitter, Facebook, etc should all shut down | their scanning for CSAM? Do you realize the outcry this would | produce? | | Google is not unique here, nor does it have unique power. This | story would be just as plausible, and difficult, if the company | in question were Facebook or Apple. | | Once a system exists to scan for this material, it's quite easy | to argue that shutting it off would be immoral and potentially | criminal. "You had the means to identify abused children and | help them, but you turned it off because you couldn't work out | a reasonable policy to deal with the false positives? Try | harder, people." | | (Note that I do not speak for my employer here.) | Semaphor wrote: | > So, Google, Apple, Twitter, Facebook, etc should all shut | down their scanning for CSAM? | | What they should shut down, is their irrevocable deletion of | accounts. When the false positives trigger nuclear bombs, | then yes, a single false positive is too much. | | As far as I know, only Google does this, so everyone else can | keep scanning in this argument. | count wrote: | Shutting down this new type of scanning is not the same as no | longer scanning for CSAM. | | It's curious how the big providers have been scanning for | CSAM for YEARS with nothing making the news...because hashes | are much different and don't false positive like this. | josephcsible wrote: | It's immoral _not_ to violate everyone 's privacy, because | some people are criminals? | karaterobot wrote: | The process that has led to our phones scanning everything we | do and condemning us in an opaque extrajudicial process began | with much smaller violations of privacy and trust -- analysis | of our emails, tracking our movement with cookies, and so on. | When these practices were introduced, some people complained, | saying they were part of a motion that could only ratchet in | one direction: toward ubiquitous surveillance and corporate | control over more and more of our lives. | | Cut to just a few years later, and here we are: "shutting it | off would be immoral and potentially criminal". We can't go | back! So, that clicking sound you hear is the ratchet | turning. | tomrod wrote: | I disagree. The value Google and similar web services brings is | enormous. That said, there should be people in the loop who are | trained and authorized to work around the operational systems. | This is the cost of doing business. | josephcsible wrote: | I don't mean shutting down all of Google. I mean shutting | down the whole automatic image scanning and account banning | system. | ajross wrote: | That logic seems to go both ways, though. Actual child abuse | is, surely, even more "life-destroying", right? So wouldn't it | make more sense to tolerate any number of false positives if we | can save just one kid? | | I'm always amazed at the number of people who come to a | complicated nuanced issue like this, accuse one side of having | implemented an absolutist and inflexible dystopian monster, and | then promptly demand an equally absolutist solution. | | The libertarian answer might well be that we need to tolerate | CSAM in the interests of free speech, but that's not the sense | of the society we live in, nor of the laws it has passed. All | paths must be middle paths. | dont__panic wrote: | It is interesting to me that CSAM is used as justification for | such heavy-handed consequences and widespread surveillance. | People use the internet to do all kinds of awful things, plenty | of them crimes, plenty of those crimes being violent or | personal property crimes. Murder, robbery, burglary, etc. | | Obviously CSAM is vile and not something your average citizen | condones. But so are those other crimes. I suppose children | "pull on the heartstrings" more than your average victim, but | children are also the victims of those other crimes. Why | haven't we started surveilling personal messages to detect | criminal planning in advance? Because more people understand | the nasty implications of the government reading your messages, | but few understand the implications of machine learning | "detecting" CSAM in your Google Drive or Photos? | matthewdgreen wrote: | In the UK they also search for "terrorism related content" | and other types of criminal media. While this isn't required | in the US (and neither is CSAM scanning) part of the impetus | for building these systems is to satisfy non-US governments | that don't have the same constitutional protections that the | US does. US law enforcement officials routinely join with | their non-US counterparts in urging/pressuring US firms to | implement these systems, knowing that once they're built | (non-voluntarily) for non-US compliance they will likely be | turned on ("voluntarily") for US customers as well. | | See e.g. this open letter to Facebook authored by US AG Barr | and counterparts from the UK and Australia. | https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/attorney-general-barr- | signs-l... | vineyardmike wrote: | Your broader point stands, but in the US at least "pre crime" | monitoring or police intervention is a massive can of illegal | worms. | | The planning of a crime can be illegal itself, eg "conspiracy | to commit murder" is illegal, but generally it's fraught with | existing legal minefields. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-08-29 23:00 UTC)