It appears that a senior vice president at Uber, the online taxi service, suggested that the company ought to investigate journalists who offend the company. In particular, Emil Michael, the SVP in question, seems to have directed his remarks at a BuzzFeed reporter named Sarah Lacy, who evidently has been critical of the company.
Although Uber has repudiated Michael's remarks and pledged not to investigate journalists, let's think hypothetically about what a nasty corporation might do in order to dig up dirt on an individual. There is the company's own database. In the case of an online taxi service, that would include name, credit card information, and perhaps a lot of addresses. Some you might not want your significant other to know about if you've been less than a paragon of fidelity. Others you might not want your employer to know about if you've been interviewing discreetly for a new job. Of course, there could be the address of the only abortion clinic in your city or a seedy hotel where the only things you could get are services from sex workers or illegal drugs.
In addition, businesses corporations have access to commercial databases created by shadowy companies that vacuum up everything about you they can find on the Internet and sell it for a fee. These databases might well include archived pages from social networking and other sites that you thought you deleted years ago (shiploads of stuff on the Internet have been archived, and a deletion on the active website doesn't necessarily mean all the archived stuff is gone). Businesses can also hire snoops to snoop around online and otherwise. They can get the name of the driver from the online taxi service, interview him, and find out that you were getting mighty friendly with someone in the back seat when you told your spouse you were going alone to a client dinner. Or they can find out the name of the restaurant where you were taken, and interview the bartender to learn there was someone waiting for you who whisked you away after spending five minutes at the bar.
No one is perfect. For many, their imperfections can be uncovered online or through information available online. Private interests can be bad. Some can be evil. There are fewer legal constraints on private interests digging up dirt online than there are on the government. It's creepy to think that NSA or some other government agency might be sneaking peaks at our e-mail accounts. But, ultimately, the government is subject to a variety of constraints that, at least sometimes, can be invoked. A business corporation or other private interest that wants to do evil is much harder to rein in because of the paucity of rules.
Privacy laws are like locks on doors. You lock your doors to keep undesired people out of the privacy of your home. Privacy rules keep undesired people out of the privacy of your data. Everyone wants a nonpublic place where they aren't subject to prying eyes. Even the Uber SVP, Emil Michael, who reportedly claims that his inflammatory remarks were meant to be off the record. (See http://www.cnbc.com/id/102199538). From the vantage point of his petard, Michael acknowledges the desirability of privacy.
It's unlikely Congress will do anything useful in the foreseeable future. But if it wanted to shock us with a pleasant surprise, it could enact a strong set of privacy rules for online data and the use of online data. After all, privacy matters.
Showing posts with label NSA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label NSA. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Saturday, January 18, 2014
Privacy Rights: Obama's Last Big Moment
Throughout his Presidency, Barack Obama seems to have been on a quest for greatness, something that would mark him as an exceptional President. He apparently isn't satisfied with being the first African American President, which is understandable. We all want to be judged as individuals, not as an ethnicity or a race. He tried to construct a program for federal stimulus for economic recovery, but got tangled up in the politics of government borrowing. He failed to achieve a grand bargain on the federal budget (which was a misguided tilt with a windmill from the get go). He managed, after almost failing, to get national health insurance legislation passed. But then he and his administration thoroughly botched the launch. His foreign policy accomplishments--getting us out of Iraq, and moving forward with withdrawal from Afghanistan--have been under-appreciated. Ending a war without a clear victory isn't seen as a mark of greatness, even if it is the right thing to do. And the prospects for anything really positive to happen with Iran, North Korea, Israel and the Palestinians, and the war on terror are problematic, at best.
But Obama now has a really big opportunity to achieve greatness. Edward Snowden's revelations about the NSA have blown wide open the increasingly pressing issue of privacy. With the Internet now ubiquitous, privacy is the most important civil liberties issue in the world. In a democratic nation, the relationship of citizens to their government is the essential dynamic. The process of electing the government, the notion of a government of limited powers defined in a national charter, the rights of individuals to speak out, worship, assemble, petition the government for redress of grievances, and publish, the protection of individual rights by an independent judiciary, the limitation of the government's authority to investigate (allowing search and seizure, wiretaps and other intrusions into the lives of citizens only with the approval of a court), and, at least in America, the right to keep and bear arms, all work to establish the individual citizen as the foundational component of society. The government is supposed to be of the people, by the people and for the people. The people aren't supposed to be subservient to the government.
With the recent disclosures of the NSA's seemingly insatiable appetite for, it would seem, every piece of information about everyone, citizens are threatened with a reversal of their relationship to their government. The government's interests seem to take precedent over the individual's historic right to be left alone in the absence of clear and demonstrable need for government intrusion. We won't have a government of limited power if the government knows everything there is to know about you. Democracy as we have historically understood the term would cease to exist.
Obama today made a speech, promising to rein in the NSA, and more strongly safeguard the privacy of Americans (and also some foreigners). His proposals are rather general, and, when it comes to privacy, the devil is decidedly in the details. When the details come out, we'll find out how much of a change he is really proposing. The privacy issue may well be Barack Obama's last chance to achieve greatness as a President. If he succeeds in upholding primacy of the individual citizen, he will be remembered well for decades and even centuries to come.
And while he's at it, he might as well tackle the problem of individual's rights against the Internet giants. The relationship of individuals, as consumers and workers, to giant corporations has been one of the great commercial and employment law problems of the industrialized world. Without strong protections for those buying the products and services of the titans of the economies, and those working for them, the raw economic power of these gargantuan organizations would leave individuals helpless to be victimized early and often. The Internet giants threaten to abscond with the privacy of all Internet users, and attain vast informational power over them. Just as GM, Ford, Chrysler and the other automotive manufacturers weren't allowed to sell dangerous products to consumers without legal liability for product defects, the Internet giants shouldn't be allowed to treat Internet users as sheep to be fleeced in order to boost ad revenues and executive bonuses. A Presidential initiative to significantly protect online privacy would bolster Obama's chances for greatness.
But Obama now has a really big opportunity to achieve greatness. Edward Snowden's revelations about the NSA have blown wide open the increasingly pressing issue of privacy. With the Internet now ubiquitous, privacy is the most important civil liberties issue in the world. In a democratic nation, the relationship of citizens to their government is the essential dynamic. The process of electing the government, the notion of a government of limited powers defined in a national charter, the rights of individuals to speak out, worship, assemble, petition the government for redress of grievances, and publish, the protection of individual rights by an independent judiciary, the limitation of the government's authority to investigate (allowing search and seizure, wiretaps and other intrusions into the lives of citizens only with the approval of a court), and, at least in America, the right to keep and bear arms, all work to establish the individual citizen as the foundational component of society. The government is supposed to be of the people, by the people and for the people. The people aren't supposed to be subservient to the government.
With the recent disclosures of the NSA's seemingly insatiable appetite for, it would seem, every piece of information about everyone, citizens are threatened with a reversal of their relationship to their government. The government's interests seem to take precedent over the individual's historic right to be left alone in the absence of clear and demonstrable need for government intrusion. We won't have a government of limited power if the government knows everything there is to know about you. Democracy as we have historically understood the term would cease to exist.
Obama today made a speech, promising to rein in the NSA, and more strongly safeguard the privacy of Americans (and also some foreigners). His proposals are rather general, and, when it comes to privacy, the devil is decidedly in the details. When the details come out, we'll find out how much of a change he is really proposing. The privacy issue may well be Barack Obama's last chance to achieve greatness as a President. If he succeeds in upholding primacy of the individual citizen, he will be remembered well for decades and even centuries to come.
And while he's at it, he might as well tackle the problem of individual's rights against the Internet giants. The relationship of individuals, as consumers and workers, to giant corporations has been one of the great commercial and employment law problems of the industrialized world. Without strong protections for those buying the products and services of the titans of the economies, and those working for them, the raw economic power of these gargantuan organizations would leave individuals helpless to be victimized early and often. The Internet giants threaten to abscond with the privacy of all Internet users, and attain vast informational power over them. Just as GM, Ford, Chrysler and the other automotive manufacturers weren't allowed to sell dangerous products to consumers without legal liability for product defects, the Internet giants shouldn't be allowed to treat Internet users as sheep to be fleeced in order to boost ad revenues and executive bonuses. A Presidential initiative to significantly protect online privacy would bolster Obama's chances for greatness.
Saturday, January 11, 2014
Learning From the Data Scandals
It's obvious that there is too much data being stored, and the biggest problem is that even more data is being accumulated. The NSA scandal reveals what happens when a very large, secretive government agency with a big, but probably unverifiable budget decides it wants to know everything there is to know about everyone--it accumulates the Brobdingnagian pile of data that would allow it to do just that. And Edward Snowden's revelations prove that whoever you might be, even if you're the NSA, your data isn't secure.
The Target data hack shows what happens when a private sector organization accumulates massive amounts of valuable data--someone figures out how to get it. And much of the fallout falls on the most innocent of all--Target's customers.
These examples are only the beginning. By all indications, Google and Facebook want to gather and store all the data on the Internet about you for ever and ever, so they can sell it to the highest bidding advertiser closest to your GPS coordinates. But in accumulating these massive amounts of data, they make themselves tempting targets for hackers--and perhaps the NSA. Remember what Willie Sutton supposedly said when asked why he robbed banks: "Because that's where the money is." Wherever there is a big pile of data, someone will go after it. No person or organization has completely secure systems; not Google, not Facebook; not anyone. The value inhering in these huge databases will motivate somebody somewhere to put in the effort it takes to find the flaw.
How can we get this data based nightmare under control? By doing what banks do to limit the impact of robberies--keep less around. Banks generally keep only limited amounts of cash on hand. If they are robbed, the bad guys don't get that much. The damage is limited by the fact that there simply isn't a lot of cash to steal.
The same thing can be done with data. The big accumulators should be forced to stop hoarding. Private organizations like Google and Facebook should be allowed to hold most types of data for only short periods of time. For example, perhaps they could be allowed to keep location data for a few seconds. That would be long enough to sell an ad to the restaurant you're walking or driving by. But the data should not be added to a profile of you or other long term records that they could keep forever and forever so that it would be available for hackers to steal. Your web browsing activities could be similarly retained for just seconds, to accommodate the sale of advertising, but not to be incorporated into your profile or other long term records. Of course, information that you voluntarily post on your Facebook page or your blog could be retained for as long as you choose to keep it there (although you should be allowed to delete whatever you post and thereby prevent Facebook, Google or whoever from retaining it thereafter).
Even for data accumulated from sources other than the Internet--possibly much of Target's data was accumulated from activity of customers at bricks and mortars stores--could be subject to time limits on retention. Why does it matter who was buying what brand of diapers two years ago? Kids grow older and stop needing diapers, and the customer isn't going to buy any brand of diapers no matter how badly bombarded with advertising. And if a person stops by at a Target store a few times a year, would the store's extremely limited information about that person's buying habits really justify keeping information about the person? Why put that person at risk of being victimized by hackers when the store's knowledge of the person has little commercial value? The bottom line is much less information should be accumulated, and the justifications for keeping whatever is kept should be much stronger than they now are.
Some of the proposals for reform of the NSA reportedly take a similar approach. Data accumulation may be taken out of the hands of the NSA and placed with service providers or other third parties. While such non-NSA accumulations would present tempting targets for the bad guys, they could be spread out among more places (and therefore be more difficult to attack). In addition, time limits should be set on the retention of such data. Yes, any such time limits might make detection of terrorists and other bad guys harder. But there isn't much evidence that NSA's Big Gulp of data has detected a lot of terrorists anyway, so what we lose from time limits could be pretty theoretical.
Time limits on data retention would mean potentially big changes for the business models of some major companies. So be it. Our personal data and personal lives don't exist to serve the needs of soulless corporations. The surging appeal of SnapChat, with its limited half-life for posted photographs, shows that people want time limits on data about themselves. One of the most appealing aspects of American life is that you can re-invent yourself. No need to be weighed down by what you were years ago. And you shouldn't have to be weighed down by data stored by Internet or retailing giants years ago. Live free. Power to the Delete key. Death to personal data.
The Target data hack shows what happens when a private sector organization accumulates massive amounts of valuable data--someone figures out how to get it. And much of the fallout falls on the most innocent of all--Target's customers.
These examples are only the beginning. By all indications, Google and Facebook want to gather and store all the data on the Internet about you for ever and ever, so they can sell it to the highest bidding advertiser closest to your GPS coordinates. But in accumulating these massive amounts of data, they make themselves tempting targets for hackers--and perhaps the NSA. Remember what Willie Sutton supposedly said when asked why he robbed banks: "Because that's where the money is." Wherever there is a big pile of data, someone will go after it. No person or organization has completely secure systems; not Google, not Facebook; not anyone. The value inhering in these huge databases will motivate somebody somewhere to put in the effort it takes to find the flaw.
How can we get this data based nightmare under control? By doing what banks do to limit the impact of robberies--keep less around. Banks generally keep only limited amounts of cash on hand. If they are robbed, the bad guys don't get that much. The damage is limited by the fact that there simply isn't a lot of cash to steal.
The same thing can be done with data. The big accumulators should be forced to stop hoarding. Private organizations like Google and Facebook should be allowed to hold most types of data for only short periods of time. For example, perhaps they could be allowed to keep location data for a few seconds. That would be long enough to sell an ad to the restaurant you're walking or driving by. But the data should not be added to a profile of you or other long term records that they could keep forever and forever so that it would be available for hackers to steal. Your web browsing activities could be similarly retained for just seconds, to accommodate the sale of advertising, but not to be incorporated into your profile or other long term records. Of course, information that you voluntarily post on your Facebook page or your blog could be retained for as long as you choose to keep it there (although you should be allowed to delete whatever you post and thereby prevent Facebook, Google or whoever from retaining it thereafter).
Even for data accumulated from sources other than the Internet--possibly much of Target's data was accumulated from activity of customers at bricks and mortars stores--could be subject to time limits on retention. Why does it matter who was buying what brand of diapers two years ago? Kids grow older and stop needing diapers, and the customer isn't going to buy any brand of diapers no matter how badly bombarded with advertising. And if a person stops by at a Target store a few times a year, would the store's extremely limited information about that person's buying habits really justify keeping information about the person? Why put that person at risk of being victimized by hackers when the store's knowledge of the person has little commercial value? The bottom line is much less information should be accumulated, and the justifications for keeping whatever is kept should be much stronger than they now are.
Some of the proposals for reform of the NSA reportedly take a similar approach. Data accumulation may be taken out of the hands of the NSA and placed with service providers or other third parties. While such non-NSA accumulations would present tempting targets for the bad guys, they could be spread out among more places (and therefore be more difficult to attack). In addition, time limits should be set on the retention of such data. Yes, any such time limits might make detection of terrorists and other bad guys harder. But there isn't much evidence that NSA's Big Gulp of data has detected a lot of terrorists anyway, so what we lose from time limits could be pretty theoretical.
Time limits on data retention would mean potentially big changes for the business models of some major companies. So be it. Our personal data and personal lives don't exist to serve the needs of soulless corporations. The surging appeal of SnapChat, with its limited half-life for posted photographs, shows that people want time limits on data about themselves. One of the most appealing aspects of American life is that you can re-invent yourself. No need to be weighed down by what you were years ago. And you shouldn't have to be weighed down by data stored by Internet or retailing giants years ago. Live free. Power to the Delete key. Death to personal data.
Sunday, June 16, 2013
How to Improve NSA Surveillance
Despite the uproar, there's little chance of changing the scope and extent of NSA surveillance of Americans. No politician wants to be blamed if there's another Boston Marathon-type bombing. So they'll hide behind the usual gridlock and do nothing.
That being the case, we might as well make the most of NSA's surveillance. After all, it's being done on the taxpayer's dime, and taxpayers ought to get their money's worth. Here are some ways NSA can make 'round the clock surveillance a better experience for all of us.
Package Delivery. Since NSA knows where you are at all times, it could run a great delivery service. Let's say you're on the road and forgot to bring your cellphone recharger. An NSA courier could be dispatched with a new recharger in a flash. And they'd want to make this delivery. After all, it's harder to keep track of you if your cell phone battery is dead.
And if you're traveling with a small child and need is a package of disposable diapers and some wipes, NSA could deliver them for a modest fee, even to the highway rest stop where you discovered what you forgot to pack. This would not only please many a distressed parental taxpayer, it would also give NSA a stream of fee revenue that could supplement its multi-billion dollar budget.
Chatline. There are many lonely people, and NSA may be among the few that care to listen in on their phone calls. Perhaps NSA could operate chatlines, to help the lonely find companionship. Maybe NSA will get lucky and a frustrated terrorist will unburden himself on a chatline, confessing to having fantasies about pressure cookers.
Dating Service. If you're single, NSA already knows how bad your personal life is. They know everything about you--and everyone else. Since they know so much, they might as well operate a dating service. With all that they know, they should be able to find the perfect match for you in only three nanoseconds of processing time on their massive supercomputers.
Grocery Shopping. NSA could doing your grocery shopping and bill your bank account, all without you having to do more than tell them your grocery list. You can pick up the phone and say what you need. No need to dial because NSA's monitors will pick up your request anyway, and they can send one of their personnel to the supermarket. Billing your bank account will be a breeze, since they already know the number and track everything that goes on in it. Indeed, there's no reason for NSA to stop with groceries. It could keep you well-stocked with beer and wine, pick up and return your dry cleaning, and arrange for pizza to be delivered in time for dinner. You'd have to pay fees for these services, but think of the convenience.
Concierge Services. There's more. NSA could offer the full range of concierge services. They could get you movie tickets, make dinner reservations, call cabs, send personnel out to be your personal shopper, and so on. They already monitor your credit card and banking activity, so they know what movies you see, where you have dinner, and what your personal shopping consists of. Might as well make the situation a win-win by offering citizens some conveniences now available mostly to the 1%.
Rebranding NSA. NSA has an image problem. It's portrayed by its detractors as an intrusive ogre that laughs derisively while steam rolling over civil liberties. A common strategy in the business world for such a problem is to rebrand oneself. NSA could leverage its massive knowledge of every intimate detail of your life by offering services like those described above, and change its name to, say, NSA Deluxe Lifestyle Services. After all, nothing pleases citizens more than seeing government work for them.
That being the case, we might as well make the most of NSA's surveillance. After all, it's being done on the taxpayer's dime, and taxpayers ought to get their money's worth. Here are some ways NSA can make 'round the clock surveillance a better experience for all of us.
Package Delivery. Since NSA knows where you are at all times, it could run a great delivery service. Let's say you're on the road and forgot to bring your cellphone recharger. An NSA courier could be dispatched with a new recharger in a flash. And they'd want to make this delivery. After all, it's harder to keep track of you if your cell phone battery is dead.
And if you're traveling with a small child and need is a package of disposable diapers and some wipes, NSA could deliver them for a modest fee, even to the highway rest stop where you discovered what you forgot to pack. This would not only please many a distressed parental taxpayer, it would also give NSA a stream of fee revenue that could supplement its multi-billion dollar budget.
Chatline. There are many lonely people, and NSA may be among the few that care to listen in on their phone calls. Perhaps NSA could operate chatlines, to help the lonely find companionship. Maybe NSA will get lucky and a frustrated terrorist will unburden himself on a chatline, confessing to having fantasies about pressure cookers.
Dating Service. If you're single, NSA already knows how bad your personal life is. They know everything about you--and everyone else. Since they know so much, they might as well operate a dating service. With all that they know, they should be able to find the perfect match for you in only three nanoseconds of processing time on their massive supercomputers.
Grocery Shopping. NSA could doing your grocery shopping and bill your bank account, all without you having to do more than tell them your grocery list. You can pick up the phone and say what you need. No need to dial because NSA's monitors will pick up your request anyway, and they can send one of their personnel to the supermarket. Billing your bank account will be a breeze, since they already know the number and track everything that goes on in it. Indeed, there's no reason for NSA to stop with groceries. It could keep you well-stocked with beer and wine, pick up and return your dry cleaning, and arrange for pizza to be delivered in time for dinner. You'd have to pay fees for these services, but think of the convenience.
Concierge Services. There's more. NSA could offer the full range of concierge services. They could get you movie tickets, make dinner reservations, call cabs, send personnel out to be your personal shopper, and so on. They already monitor your credit card and banking activity, so they know what movies you see, where you have dinner, and what your personal shopping consists of. Might as well make the situation a win-win by offering citizens some conveniences now available mostly to the 1%.
Rebranding NSA. NSA has an image problem. It's portrayed by its detractors as an intrusive ogre that laughs derisively while steam rolling over civil liberties. A common strategy in the business world for such a problem is to rebrand oneself. NSA could leverage its massive knowledge of every intimate detail of your life by offering services like those described above, and change its name to, say, NSA Deluxe Lifestyle Services. After all, nothing pleases citizens more than seeing government work for them.
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