"And the reason it’s flawed is that the people making it are evaluating the tradeoff in a vacuum, looking only at this present moment, without accounting for where we’ve come from".
and unfortunately without a scintilla of thought of where we are heading!
Indeed. We need to shine a light on our trajectory, so that people truly understand the ramifications of the surveillance infrastructure they're building/advocating
Great piece, Naomi. The shifting baseline framing is doing real work here. Everyone reaches for the boiling frog thing and it always turns into a side argument about whether frogs actually jump out. Shifting baseline syndrome is documented science. Harder to dismiss.
Salt Typhoon is the example that's going to stick with people. A backdoor built for lawful surveillance became the entry point for a foreign adversary. You can't hand-wave that away with "responsible implementation."
I want to poke at one thing though, because I think you're the right person to sit with it.
The ecosystem we're in chose a public ledger as its foundation. Every transaction visible to everyone, forever. That's more financial transparency than anything the Bank Secrecy Act ever created. It makes your bank look discreet by comparison.
So when the pragmatists at ETH Denver say privacy needs concessions for adoption, part of me wonders if they're just being honest about the system they already chose. The concession happened at the architecture level. Everything after that is retrofitting.
I know there are protocols working on this. But that baseline you're describing, the one that keeps shifting downward? In crypto it started at zero.
That feels like it deserves the same scrutiny you're giving CALEA and the Patriot Act.
“Limits on privacy are a price worth paying for mainstream adoption of cryptographic privacy.” is like saying we need to be dead in order to be alive. No. Privacy first, last, and always needs to be the default. And only I should get to say what is and is not private based on the platforms and services I choose to use.
Another brilliant article and a power of conviction and truth. Thank you for being a light to the facts.
Thanks so much for reading!
"And the reason it’s flawed is that the people making it are evaluating the tradeoff in a vacuum, looking only at this present moment, without accounting for where we’ve come from".
and unfortunately without a scintilla of thought of where we are heading!
Indeed. We need to shine a light on our trajectory, so that people truly understand the ramifications of the surveillance infrastructure they're building/advocating
I think we need a worldwide sign that we reject these privacy restrictions.
Maybe with a label that we can put on our websites or something.
But anyway, one and the same message to the world and governments that we are united in this standpoint.
Together we are stronger.
We try to use priv/acc (privacy acelerationist) as a sign, feel free to add or suggest alternatives!
The name accelerationist is nice but rather long and maybe less easy to remember for the public, no? + Typos?
I’ve put some possible alternatives to consider:
Privacy Activist, Privacy Advocate, Privacy Network
We did not find any copyrights on these names.
In the mean time I'm working on a label/logo … :-)
What do you think?
Ok, I will look into this (as a professional designer).
Well put. 👍🏻
Thanks for reading! <3
It’s hard not to notice how often the justification is framed as temporary or necessary. History makes that framing harder to accept at face value.
Yeah, it's always "temporary and necessary", and people need to start being more skeptical of such claims in light of history
Hear, hear Naomi!
<3
Great piece, Naomi. The shifting baseline framing is doing real work here. Everyone reaches for the boiling frog thing and it always turns into a side argument about whether frogs actually jump out. Shifting baseline syndrome is documented science. Harder to dismiss.
Salt Typhoon is the example that's going to stick with people. A backdoor built for lawful surveillance became the entry point for a foreign adversary. You can't hand-wave that away with "responsible implementation."
I want to poke at one thing though, because I think you're the right person to sit with it.
The ecosystem we're in chose a public ledger as its foundation. Every transaction visible to everyone, forever. That's more financial transparency than anything the Bank Secrecy Act ever created. It makes your bank look discreet by comparison.
So when the pragmatists at ETH Denver say privacy needs concessions for adoption, part of me wonders if they're just being honest about the system they already chose. The concession happened at the architecture level. Everything after that is retrofitting.
I know there are protocols working on this. But that baseline you're describing, the one that keeps shifting downward? In crypto it started at zero.
That feels like it deserves the same scrutiny you're giving CALEA and the Patriot Act.
Congrats on winning the debate. 🎉
“Limits on privacy are a price worth paying for mainstream adoption of cryptographic privacy.” is like saying we need to be dead in order to be alive. No. Privacy first, last, and always needs to be the default. And only I should get to say what is and is not private based on the platforms and services I choose to use.
Keep fighting the good fight.