How much privacy and control are you willing to give up for the convenience of technology?

[NOT Sword Fighter Super]

I see commercials for this shit all the time.

From Nest, which can control everything in your house from your door locks to your house's temperature, to the Amazon Echo which you can use to controls the lights in your house as well as many other things. There are plenty of other brands out there too.

Sure, this technology can all be convenient, but do you really trust it? I don't know about the rest of you, but the idea of having internet-enabled security cameras inside or even outside of my house makes me uneasy. You never know who could be watching or even listening.

And not just for hackers or even the government, but just the thought of becoming more dependent on technology to do things that we are quite capable of doing for ourselves.

I dunno, what do you guys think?

 

[skiddlez]

How much privacy and control are you willing to give up for the convenience of technology?

Literally none. It is a myth that convenience and private, secure technology are mutually exclusive. Technology is often wide open out of laziness of the creators or entirely on purpose for reasons such as datamining, so that they can continue making money off of you even after you've bought the product.

The only correct answer from consumers should be "none" and consumers should demand privacy and security and transparency in the field of tech. Most are not savvy enough to understand how to.

 

[m0rnutz]

Why does it need access to their servers to log everything we do anyway? Why not connect for the main shit and all our stuff is cached on our end?

That's what bothers me about shit like Alexa.

 

[SpessCaptain]

I often make absolute sure that my data is as neutral as possible so it's useless to a point. They can't selectively tell me to buy, this is pretty obvious cause whenever I get eBay Ads (rarely cause I'm not an idiot and have adnauseum) it's probably something I have ALREADY bought or looked at out of curiosity. I'm almost inclined to believe that I have nothing to hide, therefore nothing to fear but I know that process of thinking is incredibly flawed. Don't be as complacent as I am.

One thing I will never do is have a Virtual Assistant in my house, it's beyond me why anyone would even think that it's good idea to let something be recording 24/7 in my private house.

 

[Piss Clam]

Having worked in the field I can tell you very few developers give a shit about your security and privacy. There is more attention paid to it now, but it doesn't matter.

So not being a luddite these things are generally good for humanity.

When we solve the energy issue (either fusion or material science being able to store more energy density) then we are going to have robotics all around us. What are you going to do then? Jeremiah Johnson won't work anymore, but damn having robots clean our waterways and mowing my lawn when I don't feel like it sounds like a good idea.

For the record my phone is over 10 years old, and a flip phone with a very small screen, mostly because I need a durable phone when hiking, but if I've got a robot carrying my shit for me...well then it is like your own EPIRB/PLB

 

[skiddlez]

One thing I will never do is have a Virtual Assistant in my house, it's beyond me why anyone would even think that it's good idea to let something be recording 24/7 in my private house.

Virtual assistants don't have to collect data and phone home to servers that monitor everything and mine the data. The popular ones do obviously, but a while ago I actually saw a kickstarter or something for one that was entirely open source and was fully customizable/configurable due to open and transparent code, as well as assurance of privacy. You also didn't need to make any accounts for anything online and it still had functionality even without internet connection. Anything that did not absolutely require internet would still work.

This was years ago and I can't remember the name and I have no idea if it was successful or not (probably not). The point is that it's possible. We can have nice convenient things and also have privacy and good security.

Edit: No success yet in finding that thing I remember seeing but I did find an open source home automation system focused on privacy that runs on a really cheap Raspberry Pi, this article that has a few different open source home automation systems, and this kickstarter with a fully open source home automation bot whose first promise is that it does not record you for data mining. However, It's not the one I'm remembering. I doubt I'll be able to find it but I found some equally useful stuff.

Having worked in the field I can tell you very few developers give a shit about your security and privacy. There is more attention paid to it now, but it doesn't matter.

Essentially this.

For the record my phone is over 10 years old, and a flip phone with a very small screen, mostly because I need a durable phone when hiking

Kinda off-topic but these are kinda cool if you haven't seen them.

 

[Red Hood]

Don't feed the Beast!

But seriously, I try to be careful about what I do and say online. A lot of people were practically raised online; I don't think I had reliable internet until I was about 16. I know that there's some shit you just don't put out there.

 

[killmeme]

Don't feed the Beast!

But seriously, I try to be careful about what I do and say online. A lot of people were practically raised online; I don't think I had reliable internet until I was about 16. I know that there's some shit you just don't put out there.

I'm old enough to be raised fearing putting certain stuff on the internet, but I noticed people who are more or less my age or older grew careless since Facebook became popular. It's not the youngest generation that's under impression accessing internet in your house means it's your private space, it's the cunts in 30-50 age bracket.

 

[Red Hood]

I'm old enough to be raised fearing putting certain stuff on the internet, but I noticed people who are more or less my age or older grew careless since Facebook became popular. It's not the youngest generation that's under impression accessing internet in your house means it's your private space, it's the cunts in 30-50 age bracket.

I have no argument against this. I shouldn't know as much as I do about certain members of my family and people I went to High School with, but thanks to the "share it all!" mentality I do. Social media was a mistake.

 

[Joan Nyan]

I'm not that concerned about privacy, I just see absolutely zero utility for any of those "smart home" things. Why would I want to yell at a box on the other side of my house to google shit for me or turn on the lights? I'm perfectly capable of operating a light switch or a google.

 

[NOT Sword Fighter Super]

I have no argument against this. I shouldn't know as much as I do about certain members of my family and people I went to High School with, but thanks to the "share it all!" mentality I do. Social media was a mistake.

I used to think (and still kinda do tbh) that people on documentaries/reality shows that make themselves look like assholes should know better and try to put on a better face especially when they know they're being watched, but when the cameras are on you 24/7, it's easy to forget that they're there at all, which is a dangerous place to be.

Social media is kind of the same way.

 

[GS 281]

Do what I do. Cop to anything deviant, gross or “bad”. When they have to work to separate truth from fiction, information overload is your best weapon.

 

[RG 448]

I like how we’re assuming we have a say in the matter.

 

[skiddlez]

I like how we’re assuming we have a say in the matter.

But here's the thing: you should totally have a say in the matter, and in many circumstances if not most, you do have a say in the matter. There are private and secure counterparts to most things, at least all the important stuff you need, and even for the shit you don't really need. You might have to go out of your way to find it but I'm sure it's there. Privacy and security are two things that are important to me so I often find myself seeking things that don't jeopardize those two things. For example, on the subject of private and secure home assistants...

 

[Commander Keen]

I haven't posted this in a good minute:

If you want privacy on the net, you gotta protect yourself because no one else will except for hardcore militants who still hang out on onion links out of a sense of duty for those starting their journey.