I find the mob’s addiction to the smart phone fascinating. Clearly, it’s an electronic pacifier for adult minds. And, no, all the smart phone can do is reveal your location to tyrannical government authoritarians. Throw it away and free yourself.
sasquatch320
4 years ago
I surely can’t be alone in not having bluetooth or GPS location services enabled deliberately. but then I can read maps and use wired headphones when necessary. it’s bad enough we can be triangulated using cell phone towers though thankfully not as accurately as is being proposed.
I’m not picking on your personally, but you do typify a certain view on this whole question. Unless you are doing something criminal at the time, do you think anybody in charge of the database is really that bothered where you personally are or what you are doing or who you are doing it with? Frankly, they have better things to do. I know the standard retort: you’re being complacent, the authorities cannot be given the opportunity to abuse their power blah, blah. The trouble with this sort of slippery slope argument is that it uses a potential, but in fact very, very improbable future scenario, rather than any hard evidence of past abuse or any credible future threat.In this case, it seems like there is a workable solution without any great intrusion, but I don’t think even this would satisfy you.
Jerry W
4 years ago
“Don’t put too much faith in metrics” is just as accurate a headline. Statistical or risk analysis, not a human strongpoint 🙂
steve.capell
4 years ago
Like many others, I do feel that the privacy invasion of big tech over our lives is going too far. However, if you read this article carefully and if you take a close look at that Singapore solution (the code is public at https://bluetrace.io/) then it does appear to me that this is very far from “big brother watching me”. The Singapore solution does NOT track GPS location – it only listens for bluetooth signals from nearby phones. And, contrary to the statements in this article, it does actually use random and frequently rotating identifiers like the DP-3T model. So there’s no way to figure out what phone numbers you’ve been close to just by looking at the list of identifiers locally recorded. Also it doesn’t send anything to government unless, after having been diagnosed positive with COVID-19, you approve the release of the last 21 days of random contacts. Only then can the government figure out which other phones you have been close to. Given the undoubted pain that economic shutdown is causing for millions, would I take part in this kind of technology if it became evident that it is a key part of a shutdown exit strategy? In a heartbeat. Don’t confuse the egregious behaviour of big tech through our smartphones with a genuine effort from a government that cares about both privacy and health of its citizens.
Lee Johnson
4 years ago
Good heavens. And I thought I was bonkers !
Brian Harris
4 years ago
What about people who do not possess a mobile phone? Do they just remain in lockdown whilst everyone else just get back to normal, my Wife has a mobile which I sometimes share if I really have to, but normally I don’t have a mobile with me.
Jim Baker
3 years ago
I doubt the benefits that contact tracing apps can give us. On 1st May Bruce Schneier blogged about the problems of false positives and false negatives, and there don’t seem to have been solutions proposed for the problems he raised then. For example unnecessary quarantining because of false positives when Bluetooth passes through walls or till-screens which prevented transmission of the virus; but also “false negatives” because large numbers don’t have an app running, or when virus transmission occurs without close proximity – e.g. via common surfaces.
I find the mob’s addiction to the smart phone fascinating. Clearly, it’s an electronic pacifier for adult minds. And, no, all the smart phone can do is reveal your location to tyrannical government authoritarians. Throw it away and free yourself.
I surely can’t be alone in not having bluetooth or GPS location services enabled deliberately. but then I can read maps and use wired headphones when necessary. it’s bad enough we can be triangulated using cell phone towers though thankfully not as accurately as is being proposed.
I’m not picking on your personally, but you do typify a certain view on this whole question. Unless you are doing something criminal at the time, do you think anybody in charge of the database is really that bothered where you personally are or what you are doing or who you are doing it with? Frankly, they have better things to do. I know the standard retort: you’re being complacent, the authorities cannot be given the opportunity to abuse their power blah, blah. The trouble with this sort of slippery slope argument is that it uses a potential, but in fact very, very improbable future scenario, rather than any hard evidence of past abuse or any credible future threat.In this case, it seems like there is a workable solution without any great intrusion, but I don’t think even this would satisfy you.
“Don’t put too much faith in metrics” is just as accurate a headline. Statistical or risk analysis, not a human strongpoint 🙂
Like many others, I do feel that the privacy invasion of big tech over our lives is going too far. However, if you read this article carefully and if you take a close look at that Singapore solution (the code is public at https://bluetrace.io/) then it does appear to me that this is very far from “big brother watching me”. The Singapore solution does NOT track GPS location – it only listens for bluetooth signals from nearby phones. And, contrary to the statements in this article, it does actually use random and frequently rotating identifiers like the DP-3T model. So there’s no way to figure out what phone numbers you’ve been close to just by looking at the list of identifiers locally recorded. Also it doesn’t send anything to government unless, after having been diagnosed positive with COVID-19, you approve the release of the last 21 days of random contacts. Only then can the government figure out which other phones you have been close to. Given the undoubted pain that economic shutdown is causing for millions, would I take part in this kind of technology if it became evident that it is a key part of a shutdown exit strategy? In a heartbeat. Don’t confuse the egregious behaviour of big tech through our smartphones with a genuine effort from a government that cares about both privacy and health of its citizens.
Good heavens. And I thought I was bonkers !
What about people who do not possess a mobile phone? Do they just remain in lockdown whilst everyone else just get back to normal, my Wife has a mobile which I sometimes share if I really have to, but normally I don’t have a mobile with me.
I doubt the benefits that contact tracing apps can give us. On 1st May Bruce Schneier blogged about the problems of false positives and false negatives, and there don’t seem to have been solutions proposed for the problems he raised then. For example unnecessary quarantining because of false positives when Bluetooth passes through walls or till-screens which prevented transmission of the virus; but also “false negatives” because large numbers don’t have an app running, or when virus transmission occurs without close proximity – e.g. via common surfaces.