full-disclosure - “if you are not doing anything wrong, why should you worry about it?”

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Message-ID: <43FA449D.8080702@linuxbox.org>
Date: Mon Feb 20 22:39:04 2006
From: ge at linuxbox.org (Gadi Evron)
Subject: “if you are not doing anything wrong, why should you worry about it?”

Our friend Alex Eckelberry over at Sunbelt's blog
(http://sunbeltblog.blogspot.com/) writes about Houston's Police Chief
Harold Hurtt, who seems to love cameras and to think Big Brother is all
in your mind -
http://sunbeltblog.blogspot.com/2006/02/oh-and-while-were-talking-about.html.

"if you are not doing anything wrong, why should you worry about it?"

Even I can't deny the need or the effectiveness, and I can see how
cameras can be good for the public and law enforcement protecting the
public. London has been a great example of that.

Still, like with many other such solutions, the perps just move
elsewhere where cameras don't cover their every move. Whether it's
another city block or another city is another issue all-together.
Shuffling the trouble is always the best solution, right?

Putting such technology in the hands of people who believe they should
also see into your house and that if you'd like some privacy, you must
be a criminal is rather amusing in how it is scary.

The main point being, that even if the current head honcho is a nice guy
(or gal) and all those who work for him (or her) are cool people, who is
to say their followers will be. What's to stop them from putting cameras
in our showers, next? After all, do we have anything to hide? Maybe we
all just like to "help ourselves"...?
Are there any limitations on what this will be used for after it is
there? How do you enforce that?

With all the recent privacy issues in the states, Finand, etc. I am
becoming increasingly uncomfortable trusting those who are supposed to
protect me.

I have always been a strong believer that just because solutions to
something can potentially be abused, that is no reason not to find out
what these solutions are.
As an example, most of us agree we need to fight terrorism, yet
immediately make war on any attempt to do so. Instead of killing every
possible suggested solution I'd rather they fight on HOW it gets done.

To do it and leave it wide-open for abuse, however, should in my opinion
be illegal. How you define what "wide-open for abuse" though is
problematic, but getting less so in some sectors with the increasing
popularity of industry standardization. At least where it is understood,
and I don't know of many who utilize these tools and really understand
what standardization is about.

	Gadi.

-- 
http://blogs.securiteam.com/

"Out of the box is where I live".
	-- Cara "Starbuck" Thrace, Battlestar Galactica.