[HN Gopher] The US government is buying troves of data about Ame... ___________________________________________________________________ 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? ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2023-06-12 23:00 UTC)