Friday, February 25, 2005
Someone who thinks a little too little
The rise of the Panopticon is most clearly evident in the case of computer communication technology. The most commonly cited privacy-buster is the "cookie:" a small program deposited on your computer that records your Internet browsing habits and reports them to a business you know nothing about. Corporations occupy the central tower in this cyber-Panopticon.
Governments are also moving to open up your private lives to public view. The Echelon system, controlled by five Western powers, is reportedly capable of scanning all available non-military communications in real time and recording for further review those communications which contain certain keywords. The FBI has developed a software package named Carnivore which allows the agency to scoop "packets" of your e-mails out of the flow of information from one terminal to another. These packets can be reconstructed into full messages and used against you. Interpersonal communication is no longer private, but is open to prying corporate and government eyes.
Response to 1: A cookie isn't a program and doesn't record anything. A cookie is a text file that maintains state in a communication. Here's what state is. Imagine that whenever you said something to someone, you would get a response, but they wouldn't remember that they just said anything to you or who you were. Might be a little hard to have a conversation, right? Now imagine two computer talking like that. That's lack of state. State is memory. Ooh. How evil. Computers can remember what they said to each other so you can do evil things, like, have a shopping basket on amazon.
Response to 2: If you think that there's some kind of privacy when you hit the send button in your email program . . . come now. Your message gets routed through every computer from here to Nevada. There was no security well before the Feds came along. This is about as much of a privacy violation as sitting next to someone at a bar and listening to them talk.
People must calm.
Governments are also moving to open up your private lives to public view. The Echelon system, controlled by five Western powers, is reportedly capable of scanning all available non-military communications in real time and recording for further review those communications which contain certain keywords. The FBI has developed a software package named Carnivore which allows the agency to scoop "packets" of your e-mails out of the flow of information from one terminal to another. These packets can be reconstructed into full messages and used against you. Interpersonal communication is no longer private, but is open to prying corporate and government eyes.
Response to 1: A cookie isn't a program and doesn't record anything. A cookie is a text file that maintains state in a communication. Here's what state is. Imagine that whenever you said something to someone, you would get a response, but they wouldn't remember that they just said anything to you or who you were. Might be a little hard to have a conversation, right? Now imagine two computer talking like that. That's lack of state. State is memory. Ooh. How evil. Computers can remember what they said to each other so you can do evil things, like, have a shopping basket on amazon.
Response to 2: If you think that there's some kind of privacy when you hit the send button in your email program . . . come now. Your message gets routed through every computer from here to Nevada. There was no security well before the Feds came along. This is about as much of a privacy violation as sitting next to someone at a bar and listening to them talk.
People must calm.
