this post was submitted on 30 Apr 2024
195 points (98.5% liked)

Privacy

31808 readers
368 users here now

A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.

Some Rules

Related communities

Chat rooms

much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 

from the less-safety-equals-more-safety,-say-EuroCops dept

all 36 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] refalo@programming.dev 98 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

Privacy measures currently being rolled out, such as end-to-end encryption, will stop tech companies from seeing any offending

Front doors also stop them from seeing things... is that next? What about clothes to conceal drugs?

[–] delirious_owl@discuss.online 38 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Butt cheeks must be cut off so I can more easily inspect your rectum.

[–] Scolding0513@sh.itjust.works 19 points 6 months ago

"Aight sir i just needs ta check insad ya aeshowl"

[–] ItsComplicated@sh.itjust.works 52 points 6 months ago (2 children)

The letter opens with an admission by the collective of police chiefs that they’re unable to do their jobs unless tech companies do half the work for them.

I suppose previous generations of law enforcement that were able to do their jobs before all this does not count.

[–] gomp@lemmy.ml 21 points 6 months ago (1 children)

To be fair: previous generations of police officers, back when most people used phones, have made extensive use of wiretapping (and current policemen still do, of course).

[–] firefly@neon.nightbulb.net 15 points 6 months ago (2 children)

@ItsComplicated@sh.itjust.works

Forty years ago police had to have a basic level of intelligence and they investigated. Now some of them just rely on arm-twisting and plea bargain threats to find any patsy they can to stuff in a cell. They can have no crime, no complaint, no witness, no evidence, and still arrest you, and the D.A. will offer you a plea deal for something that didn't even happen. Your public pretender defense lawyer will tell you to take the deal. Don't laugh... it can happen to anyone.

[–] ItsComplicated@sh.itjust.works 4 points 6 months ago

Sad but true.

[–] gomp@lemmy.ml 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

You seem to be describing the US system (or some other common law one... but I believe district attorney is a US-specific term?)...

IDK about other EU countries (I guess they are all the same in this regard?), but in my Italy the public prosecutor has zero discretionary power when it comes to indictment and must, per the Italian Constitution, proceed based on the investigation outcomes. So there is no "help me catch the bigger fish and I'll only charge you with some minor crime" like in the movies.

So... yes, what you describe can happen to anyone, but it can't happen just anywhere :)

[–] firefly@neon.nightbulb.net 2 points 6 months ago

The court system in USA is absolutely and irredeemably corrupt. Many prosecutors in USA are vile criminals and most of them belong in prison themselves. They have no respect for the Constitution or Bill of Rights that they are by law subscribed and sworn to uphold. They will use bogus criminal charges to affect or chill the outcome of an unrelated civil matter, to 'shut you up' in street parlance. People think America is free. It is an authoritarian hell run by delusional nutters. People like to scoff at that, until it's _their turn_ to ride the courthouse railroad.

[–] Scolding0513@sh.itjust.works 12 points 6 months ago

lazy asses. no wonder so much real actual crime goes unnoticed.

[–] MigratingtoLemmy@lemmy.world 23 points 6 months ago (1 children)

And how exactly do they think they're going to break PGP and TOR without running an NSA-style racket?

[–] Arbiter@lemmy.world 32 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Simple, they make it illegal so they don’t have to break the encryption and can arrest you purely for having encrypted content.

[–] SoylentBlake@lemm.ee 11 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Tor is funded by the CIA, which means assets use it to get info or send info.

It's going nowhere.

Same thing with Bitcoin. It's not going anywhere. In fact thats the reason why the CIA can trace every Bitcoin transaction and identify the owners, which was thought no one could do, but what do you know, when you wire up 3000 ps4s into a giant supercomputer for 1/50th the cost apparently the budget opens up some and now they must have a dedicated supercomputer just for this. Those chucklefucks who blackmailed the pipeline in the SE, that energy company paid up in Bitcoin, within 24 hours the NSA/CIA had the Bitcoin back and perps arrested.

Make your trades in favors, that's all I'm saying.

[–] wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 19 points 6 months ago

You've got a bit of misunderstanding of how bitcoin works, and they definitely aren't using the juryrigged supercomputer for unmasking. Most likely human analysts and investigators with some minor algorithmic help for analyzing tumbled transactions on the chain.

Bitcoin is inherently traceable. The entire concept of the blockchain originally was to have a distributed ledger of all transactions available and verifiable by anyone, so the banks couldn't go "no that transaction never happened".

The anonimity of being able to instantly and freely create wallets with little to no identifying info attached was a side purpose, but not a true purpose. Your wallet is effectively just a username they'd have to find a way to connect to your real identity.

All bitcoin transactions are auditable by anyone.

So most criminals use tumblers, scattering a transaction into irregular pieces that move across a shit ton of wallets before slowly making their way to the actual destination wallet.

But even those are traceable, just difficult. Over time and through seizing black market servers, intelligence agencies can build maps of what wallets match up to what. Sellers leaving donate links in forum signatures, finding the tumbler accounts from a seized market, etc. Then by using external info like knowledge of the payout amount and how many wallets its going to end up in, they can analyze the block chain ledger and connect the dots.

TL;DR- Bitcoin has always been psuedonymous, not actually anonymous, and is more easily traceable than other options by fucking design. You are only as anonymous as the distance between your real identity and your wallet address. Practice proper OpSec for shady business.

[–] TipRing@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

This just results in deniable encryption.

[–] Dkarma@lemmy.world 10 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I had no idea this jpeg was 40gig ur honor

[–] XTL@sopuli.xyz 1 points 6 months ago

That's rookie numbers. My collection of cat pics is about 2 TB. Individual files are reasonable size of course. Clearly nothing can be hidden there.

[–] magnetosphere@fedia.io 21 points 6 months ago (2 children)

They’ll be accepting responsibility for every illegal act that’s preventable by annihilating the right to privacy, then?

[–] Valmond@lemmy.mindoki.com 10 points 6 months ago (1 children)

What about the illegal, but moral acts?

[–] magnetosphere@fedia.io 14 points 6 months ago (1 children)

That would require an appreciation of nuance, which governments aren’t famous for having.

[–] firefly@neon.nightbulb.net 2 points 6 months ago

@magnetosphere@fedia.io @Glass0448@lemmy.today @Valmond@lemmy.mindoki.com

Nuance? Isn't that a racial slur? Mastodon is too based for me.

[–] firefly@neon.nightbulb.net 7 points 6 months ago (1 children)

@magnetosphere@fedia.io @Glass0448@lemmy.today

Looky here, we found this nifty thing called, 'qualified immunity'.

[–] maynarkh@feddit.nl 7 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Not in Europe, that's a US thing.

[–] firefly@neon.nightbulb.net 6 points 6 months ago

You can have it now. We don't want it any more!

[–] GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml 18 points 6 months ago (1 children)
[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 7 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I would start with a letter to your representative

[–] GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml 2 points 6 months ago

I don't live in the EU

[–] DirigibleProtein@aussie.zone 18 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Malicious compliance. Have Apple and Google remove all apps that feature encryption — web browsers, banking apps, messaging apps — from their stores for 24 hours. Demonstrate that this isn’t really a good idea.

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 12 points 6 months ago

They should agree to do that willingly. While they are at it they should break sign in as well and block outgoing 443

[–] KingThrillgore@lemmy.ml 17 points 6 months ago (1 children)
[–] WhatAmLemmy@lemmy.world 13 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

That's a declaration of war on democracy and civil liberties

FTFY

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 11 points 6 months ago

In the US encryption (source code) is protected under free speech

[–] warmaster@lemmy.world 7 points 6 months ago (1 children)

OK, but you remove all gun safety mechanisms. If you shoot yourselves in the balls, we encrypt everything back.

[–] padlock4995@lemmy.ml 5 points 6 months ago

Ah shit. Here we go again 🤣🤣

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 4 points 6 months ago

Not surprising