Saturday, August 21, 2010

a soothing balm

Aieee, it's a balm! Somebody's got a balm!

NSA analysts flagged internal communications by top officials at Hawaiian Tropic, on suspicion that they were making balms.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

NSL against Calyx ISP story

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/08/nsl-gag-order-lifted/

The use of gag orders around NSLs is one of the most viscerally alarming things about post-9/11 security policies. Also, these situations where secret evidence is introduced in trials and the other side can't challenge it because they aren't allowed to be told what it is. It's interesting what Merrill says at the end: "
I either want to inspire others to follow the example [his example in fighting back] ... or develop technology that makes it more difficult for people to be snooped on." I think it works with the tiers I came up with for how to approach AFP/DFP dangers.

- civil libertarian ("this shouldn't be happening because it's wrong")
- civil efficacian or civil-liberties efficacian ("this is being done in a shoddy fashion and too many false positives are getting hurt - if you're going to do it, do it well, or the leeway to have this authority/power should be tightened or revoked")
- strong encryptor ("Privacy is dead. It's unrealistic to expect them not to do it, or not to make mistakes. I am going to use defensive technology so I won't be one of the false positives.")

There are things I like about all three of these positions.