Ah the new dark pool. Does anyone remember those from the trading? I still remember ARCA (good rebate back in the day), ECN (very fluid and very cheap), and a few dark pools that I used to get out of a trade quickly.
> For instance, the Church of Scientology, U.S. Navy, and the Washington State Military Department told Prism that they are no longer working with the network.
That first one took me by surprise. What a random hodgepodge of organizations.
Looks like a nothingburger? It's unfunded. An email describes a protest without giving a framing that the site would prefer. Then it turns out that nobody knows what it does, but it might do something bad.
I'm all for transparency and accountability but my assumption is that the bad things being done by LEO and intelligence are far worse than this.
Having a coalition of mega corporations all allied with each other isn't any better than having a strong government. Both are dangerous to personal liberties. I think we're due for a break up of these companies. No more Amazon, Google, Facebook, etc. We the people need to start taking power back.
Edited title to be more sensationalist - this is a Seattle local thing
> The Seattle Shield website states that its mission “is to provide a collaborative and information-sharing environment between the Seattle Police Department and public/private partners in the Seattle area. Seattle Shield members assist Seattle Police Department efforts to identify, deter, defeat or mitigate potential acts of terrorism by reporting suspicious activity in a timely manner.”
Not so surprising - we kind of suspected this. Anyone remembers Snowden or Assange?
We have to accept the fact that presently all democracies are merely simulation of a democracy. At the least in the USA; other countries may be a bit better, e. g. Switzerland or the scandinavian countries are somewhat better (though also not to be trusted - see how Sweden pursued Assange).
Perhaps this is how things always end? Democracies are kind of like an obsolete model when you compare it to authoritarianism (assuming the USA would still be a democracy rather than a tech-corporate-fascist country run by a corrupt elite of superrich).
Reminder if you work for any of these companies (not unlikely on this site) you are actively enabling this. If your first reaction is doubt, deflection, rationalization or discomfort, there are ways out.
> All suspicious activity reported must be behavior based. It is important to keep in mind that suspicious behavior, such as taking photographs or videos, is not a criminal act by itself, but may be a precursor to criminal activity.
the number of times I've been harassed by police for taking photos... even in small towns in the middle of nowhere people are paranoid.
A fictional public service announcement from the classic game Deus Ex (2000), also involving photographs...
> [Be Safe: Be Suspicious] How can you tell who might be a terrorist? Look for the following characteristics:
> * A stranger or foreigner.
> * Argumentative, especially about politics or philosophy.
> * Probing questions about your work, particularly high-tech.
> * Spends a greater than average amount of time on the Net.
> * Interests in chemistry, electronics, or computers.
> * Large numbers of mail-order deliveries.
> * Taking photographs of major landmarks.
> And those are just a few. If you're suspicious, then turn them in to your local law enforcement for a thorough background check. Better safe than sorry. You and your neighbors will sleep more securely knowing that you're watching each other's back.
I don’t understand. This seems like some version of NextDoor / neighborhood watch but for companies and larger interests in the Seattle area that might have their own security apparatus.
Why are folks jumping to some conclusions that this is some illuminati threat to democracy? Why is the article so breathless?
My thoughts as someone who doesn't know much about these types of things:
1. Terry Albury calling this list the "Panopticon" could have merit since he's a former FBI agent. However, I'd have to research more into him to figure out how credible he is, and why he is framing it like this.
2. Amazon and Facebook being in the title is most likely clickbait. They're literally only mentioned once in the article and the rest of it has nothing to do with them.
3. It's concerning that the National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM) can potentially cause this network to be used to label protestors as "far-left domestic terrorists", however, that is more of an issue with the NSPM than this network. Understanding the NSPM and the effects of it is probably worthwhile.
4. The article mentions that there's no oversight program for Seattle Shield. Is that a problem? Is it typical to have oversight for a program like this, or necessary? What would the program be like?
Overall, the article feels sort of sensationalized. It frames Seattle Shield as suspicious and questionable due to its secrecy and the fact that it performs surveillance. However, there aren't any strong facts or evidence of this program being abused in some Big Brother-type way. Terry Albury framing it in this manner might be the most credible point against it, but I would have to look into that to determine how credible it is.
Make a tool/browser extension that submits suspicious queries to Google, Facebook, Amazon on behalf of the user like "how to make a bomb", "How to make an explosive drone" or whatever. Have it run several times a day and use a lightweight abliterated llm to create unique queries that would match the kind of heuristics these programs are filtering for.
Hopefully 10s of thousands of users use it and poison the ETL of these intelligence gathering operations. This kinda creates a prisoner dilemma for the first set of users, perhaps the tool would only start making queries once there was enough of a user base so that the first few users aren't signing up themselves for unnecessary scrutiny.
People are never going to quit doing this. I'm surprised we still get "incensed" by being "watched without consent". There is
No. Way. It's. Going. To. Ever. Get. Stopped.
The only way to level the effects are to radically increase the surveillance so that everyone ends up in a Dark Forest "I know shit about you too" deterrence stand off. And/or flood the sensors with so much input/noise that meaningful signal is tough to suss out.
35 comments
[ 4.4 ms ] story [ 50.2 ms ] threadThat first one took me by surprise. What a random hodgepodge of organizations.
I'm all for transparency and accountability but my assumption is that the bad things being done by LEO and intelligence are far worse than this.
:(
> The Seattle Shield website states that its mission “is to provide a collaborative and information-sharing environment between the Seattle Police Department and public/private partners in the Seattle area. Seattle Shield members assist Seattle Police Department efforts to identify, deter, defeat or mitigate potential acts of terrorism by reporting suspicious activity in a timely manner.”
We have to accept the fact that presently all democracies are merely simulation of a democracy. At the least in the USA; other countries may be a bit better, e. g. Switzerland or the scandinavian countries are somewhat better (though also not to be trusted - see how Sweden pursued Assange).
Perhaps this is how things always end? Democracies are kind of like an obsolete model when you compare it to authoritarianism (assuming the USA would still be a democracy rather than a tech-corporate-fascist country run by a corrupt elite of superrich).
No but really, probably nothing special happened. It's just another case of surveillanceists gonna surveil.
> [Be Safe: Be Suspicious] How can you tell who might be a terrorist? Look for the following characteristics:
> * A stranger or foreigner.
> * Argumentative, especially about politics or philosophy.
> * Probing questions about your work, particularly high-tech.
> * Spends a greater than average amount of time on the Net.
> * Interests in chemistry, electronics, or computers.
> * Large numbers of mail-order deliveries.
> * Taking photographs of major landmarks.
> And those are just a few. If you're suspicious, then turn them in to your local law enforcement for a thorough background check. Better safe than sorry. You and your neighbors will sleep more securely knowing that you're watching each other's back.
I hope they dont think im doing all of this for free
Why are folks jumping to some conclusions that this is some illuminati threat to democracy? Why is the article so breathless?
1. Terry Albury calling this list the "Panopticon" could have merit since he's a former FBI agent. However, I'd have to research more into him to figure out how credible he is, and why he is framing it like this.
2. Amazon and Facebook being in the title is most likely clickbait. They're literally only mentioned once in the article and the rest of it has nothing to do with them.
3. It's concerning that the National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM) can potentially cause this network to be used to label protestors as "far-left domestic terrorists", however, that is more of an issue with the NSPM than this network. Understanding the NSPM and the effects of it is probably worthwhile.
4. The article mentions that there's no oversight program for Seattle Shield. Is that a problem? Is it typical to have oversight for a program like this, or necessary? What would the program be like?
Overall, the article feels sort of sensationalized. It frames Seattle Shield as suspicious and questionable due to its secrecy and the fact that it performs surveillance. However, there aren't any strong facts or evidence of this program being abused in some Big Brother-type way. Terry Albury framing it in this manner might be the most credible point against it, but I would have to look into that to determine how credible it is.
Any government body with no oversight program indicates that rule of law is optional.
You've gotta be shitting me.
Make a tool/browser extension that submits suspicious queries to Google, Facebook, Amazon on behalf of the user like "how to make a bomb", "How to make an explosive drone" or whatever. Have it run several times a day and use a lightweight abliterated llm to create unique queries that would match the kind of heuristics these programs are filtering for.
Hopefully 10s of thousands of users use it and poison the ETL of these intelligence gathering operations. This kinda creates a prisoner dilemma for the first set of users, perhaps the tool would only start making queries once there was enough of a user base so that the first few users aren't signing up themselves for unnecessary scrutiny.
No. Way. It's. Going. To. Ever. Get. Stopped.
The only way to level the effects are to radically increase the surveillance so that everyone ends up in a Dark Forest "I know shit about you too" deterrence stand off. And/or flood the sensors with so much input/noise that meaningful signal is tough to suss out.
In places like the UK, where guns are nearly banned, this is the norm.
If I can't stop you from robbing me, I should have the ability to record you and identify you later.
I'm fine if we reduce surveillance, if gun/defense rights are added.