Re: Help spread strong cryptography now!

"Douglas A. Gwyn" <DAGwyn@xxxxxxxx> writes:

Luc The Perverse wrote:
I don't care if I am being spied on IF the only thing the information
gathered will be used for is prevention of terrorism. On the other hand -
what people are afraid of is that this spying will be incorporated into a
fascist movement to suppress free speech, or that phones will start being
tapped and crimes identified and prosecuted.

As I said, effective oversight is the key to deterring abuse.

Is this like "perfect human beings are assumed". Oversight is always after
the fact. It is subject to the people doing the oversight being honest,
uncorrupted and unintimidated. It assumes that people doing the oversight
have the information needed. NOne of those is a given and all have failed
in the past. Effective oversight is like effective passwords-- more
honoured in the breach than the observance.
Once the fascist movement starts, oversight usually gets shunted aside. If
one has a simple ban, then the very fact is enough to raise alarm bells. If
spying is accepted then the fact of spying is not enough-- you have to
decide if it is legitimate or not. That makes the job harder.



I don't object to accidental information about real, objectively
define crimes being used to prosecute crimes. If the problem
is that some things are considered crimes that ought not to be,
then there's a different problem that should be addressed.

I joke way too much about bombs, nerve gas, Osama Bin Laden, anti Bush
propaganda, conspiracy theories etc. to have not gotten the attention of
some TLA at some point in time (at least since the domestic spying act).

Unless they have reason to target you, it is unlikely that they
have examined your messages at all. Dumb keyword filters
applied indiscriminately to all network traffic would drag in
too much trash to deal with.

All it takes is that for some reason, for any reason, he becomes of
interest to someone. At that point all of those things can and will be
dregged up and used. "have reason to target you" can include that you
flirted with the wife of someone with the power to initiate the process. Or
that your son pissed him off because of his haircut.
Ie, the assumption that that reason need be reasonable reason is very
unreasonable.


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