Re: The Utility of Privacy

[Jeremiah A Blatz <jer+@andrew.cmu.edu>]

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nobody@huge.cajones.com (Huge Cajones Remailer) writes:
> I am asking why I should protect my privacy.  Most people have
> concluded that it is not worth the bother.  Why are they wrong?
> 
> (And, why are privacy advocates uniformly hostile to these questions?
> Because they are asked anonymously?)

I, too, have been rather confused by the responses. I considered
replying as soon as I saw your(?) original post, but figred that my
views would probably already sitting on someone else's mail spool, so
didn't add a "me too" to the list. Unfortunatly, no one has presented
a clear outline, so here goes.

Protection of your privacy

   From "valid" authorities
       You may not trust your government/police/employer to deal
       with your speech/actions in a way that you find acceptable.
       This is kinda the "dark horse" of provacy, since it allows
       the four horsemen to spred porn and serin across the land.
       However, there are many reasons to not trust the gov't. Maybe
       you sell post to cancer patients. Many people would not
       condem your actions, but the DEA would. This also encompases
       the argument of insurance from political revolution which has
       been much dwellt on. (Is dwellt a word?)

   protection from "criminal" elements
      This is typically the argumnet given by econoists and the like.
      You want to protect your CC # and other personal info. Also,
      those posters to alt.sexual.abuse.recovery might want to protect
      their identities.

Protection of the privacy of others
   So, say you don't care if some high school d00d3z clean out your
   bank account and the MeesePolice imprison you for posession of
   _Arabina Nights_. Using techniques to protect your banal infor-
   mation also protects those with something to hide. Take, for
   example, anonymous remailers. Assuming you encrypt and chain and
   all that Good Stuff, the bad guys can't tell your post to cypher-
   punks asking why you should protect your privacy from Bob's post
   to alt.blacknet giving the location of all US nuke sites. If no
   one except those with someting to hide protected their identity,
   then it would be an easy thing to (under a slightly more oppres-
   sive political regime) toss them in jail. 

The first argument (protecting yourself) has been much talked about in
this thread, but the second has been AKAIK, untouched. I, pesonally,
think crypto is just swell. As such, I pgp sign all my posts/email.
Not only is it one more layer of protection against forges, it helps
spread the PGP meme.

Jer

"standing on top of the world/ never knew how you never could/ never knew
 why you never could live/ innocent life that everyone did" -Wormhole

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