- cross-posted to:
- privacy@programming.dev
- cross-posted to:
- privacy@programming.dev
A very, very helpful article to help get people we fight with to understand why this is important for anyone and everyone. Send this to friends and family.
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I used to pitch signal’s encryption first. I got into so many pointless arguments that I stopped even mentioning encryption. What’s signal? Its an app with group chat and video calls. That’s all you need to know.
Two of my friends independently discovered the secret to converting their families to signal. Make it a premium form of communication. Tell people close to you that you check your whatsapp or facebook occasionally because of the spam volume… The best way to reach me is on signal.
Had a kid this year and we don’t post pix of him to social media. They all get sent to a signal group. You want the baby pix? You get signal! Even his 90-year-old great grandma is in it.
It must feel good to known they aren’tnusinf your child as data collection to sellnyou ads! Keep those photos off social media!
I’ve always reduced the argument to something like
“I have nothing to hide” … “well, you don’t get a choice”
at the end of the day removing privacy strips autonomy
I bring up Cambridge analytica since it was well known for Brexit. I’m like “It’s not about what you have to hide. Its about stopping automated unconsenting data collection that’s sold to the highest bidder to effect election results that will impact generations like Brexit. That data came straight from META.”
TLDR: Take off your pants then.
Let’s see your browser history.
You first you coward!
I think privacy is important for the west, but through interactions I’ve had with mostly Chinese people on this topic as well as visiting China and Taiwan, I think it’s very interesting how differently we view things.
Taiwan is much more like the west in this regard, and they pretty regularly hold protests and things like that. China is a different story, and they have mass surveillance and the people are happy to have it.
I believe that people in China are for the most part genuinely okay with mass surveillance and think it’s a good idea. One of the big ideological differences between east and west is that we value individualism over everything, and they value social harmony above everything. They would much rather give up privacy if that means that everyone in their community can feel safer. We feel strongly tied to privacy because we believe it’s necessary for true individualism.
For example, in China the crime rate is incredibly low. You can use your smartphone to hold your place on public transport or at a cafe, and people do this regularly because there is zero worry that it will be stolen. If someone does steal it, they’re very quickly caught. They’re happy to not have to worry about drug addicts wandering the streets, or even really have the possibility of encountering illicit drugs because they believe (and probably rightly so) that they destroy families and harm society. There’s many concrete benefits to mass surveillance, but they come at the cost of individualism.
Basically, we want the freedom and the means to do things that our government doesn’t necessarily approve of. For the west, I agree with this and I think it’s necessary because of how diverse we are. But, as we become more culturally homogeneous, the benefits of mass surveillance come with less and less of a cost.
It’s a tricky issue and there’s no one solution, it really depends on culture and context in my opinion. For the west in 2025,I think privacy is still very important and individualism is still highly valued, but I do wonder if our kids and their kids will share that sentiment or if we’ll see a shift as we become further homogenized.
I think a lot of young people already have the attitude of “They’re already tracking everything so I don’t care” which leads to the exact same conclusions as “I have nothing to hide so I don’t care”.
For example, in China the crime rate is incredibly low.
I think a correction is in order: petty crime such as what you have described is indeed low, but organized crime is through the roof. Far higher than in countries considered ‘the west’. Scammers mainly. So much so they’ve had to expand to neighbouring countries in the south/southeast to expand their ‘market reach’.
I agree about the difference in China with how they feel about privacy and surveillance. I’ve long respected they’re completely different. They’re motivations and reasonings, their history. Its just really different. But I do disagree with using China as a reason we should accept it and approach it the same. Our Governments are fucking WILDLY different. Entirely different motivations. As such we have to defend ourselves differently.
The more time I live on this earth, the more I see so many aspects of it is that “different strokes for different folks” apply to. So much conflict has been started because people wanting to force some ideal/correct/only way of doing things on another.
One thing I find it odd that I don’t ever see mentioned is the most obvious: private data is money and power for companies. Do you like X (meta, google, literal moronic x, etc) company that much that you want to donate money to them and make them more powerful?
Almost no one would say yes. They don’t care about their privacy, but they certainly don’t think poor zuckeberg needs some donations and more power.
It’s by far the biggest reason I care about my data. If I liked the company I wouldn’t mind the donation. But only evil companies would try to profit from personal data, so that can’t exist. My hate for these companies and my wish to see them destroyed far outweighs my concern with my privacy.
That includes governments of course. The one with the most spying, like the US or israel are the ones I hate the most and try as much as I can to not give them more power.
When it was Obama listening in on their phones, westeners agree.
When it was Biden or Trump listening in on their phones, westeners went quiet.
When it’s Xi selling phones unbugged, westeners grab your phone throw it on the ground, pour gasoline over it, light a fire, scold you and threaten your life.They’re all bad.
Right???
It’s been my experience throughout the years.
I haven’t personally heard “I have nothing to hide”
since Huawei phones started to become banned in my country.The moment they became popular they went from
“I’ve got nothing to hide” to “I’ve got nothing to hide, but this is different. Huawei is subject to the Chinese State.
Those other phones are made by our allies. We may have found time after time again that all phones of all our politicians have been tapped by the US and it’s true that no matter how hard our best security experts searched for listening bugs in these devices, they found diddly squat, but if you own one of those Chinese phones and think you’re not being listened to, than you’re being naive. Naive naive, !be scared!, naive national security naive.”.
We should all have something to hide, Moxie Marlinspike, 2013
When will this dumb question end ?
When someone talks about online privacy, every single corner of the site i can see this qn! Seriously, someone has nothing to hide? So maybe they living in graveyard instead in the woods!
Am saying nothing wrong about this post but that specific qn everyone asks…
The difference in this article and how it frames simple rebuttals for people to actually use easily and is an easy quick read.
Dad is the type to nag nag nag until we either give in or tell him off. Lecturing doesn’t work in my family because of my dad. They know I’m willing to help if they want to change.
I feel your pain.
Thanks.
This seems to be an advertisement for a subscription chat program.
Threema is a badass messenger that’s about $7.50 and well worth it. This letter is from the exclusive channel of people who bought it.
