
Edward Snowden promotes global treaty to curtail surveillance - jsnathan
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/edward-snowden-promotes-global-treaty-to-curtail-surveillance-1.3243469
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jsnathan
I wonder what the chances are for something like this taking off. On the one
hand it is popular for politicians around the globe to criticize the U.S.
surveillance programs - on the other hand, most governments probably want the
same kind of power over their own citizens that mass surveillance can give
them.

Governments which don't currently have the technical means to run these kind
of programs might be more likely to sign up.

I really hope some country will step up soon and get the ball rolling.

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hugh4
The chance is zero.

Treaties work in a situation where states are happy to stop doing something if
they can be reassured that other states will do so too. But this isn't even
really about state vs state, it's primarily about state vs non-state actors.
The interests of all states are aligned here in not signing any such treaty.

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jsnathan
Not all states have these kinds of programs already running. And even if all
states interests are aligned, that still leaves the people demanding change.
Does democracy have no chance in this instance?

Remember that this is not the first time that mass surveillance programs have
been defeated. East Germany might be a good example. Of course it's different
- but also it's the same. I hope we don't need to go further down the
Orwellian rabbit hole before we realize the problems and stand up to fight
them.

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vezzy-fnord
Saying the GDR's surveillance program was defeated has the causality wrong.
The state was dissolved entirely amidst the Fall of Communism. With
unification, the main SIGINT, HUMINT and foreign surveillance agency is now
the BND.

Unless your proposal is to topple nation states.

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jsnathan
Just because a government is overthrown doesn't guarantee that the new
government uses less repressive policies than the old. But it worked here
because the new government had a different vision for life than the old.

I am not hoping that violent coups are necessary - or even possible in many
places. But the fact is that not all governments around the world are as
cordial as the Western ones, and mass surveillance has a terrifying potential
in many places around the globe.

I do hope that democratic states can avoid these outcomes when enough
political will has been gathered to affirm a way of life that values privacy,
and a transparent government.

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athenot
A more realistic option would be to institute a strong audit process. Anytime
personal data is viewed or matched against some criteria, it would be logged.
By default, those logs would be available after something like a few years,
unless there's an ongoing investigation (and that extension would be logged
along with who/why it was authorized).

The only way something like this could even work is if there was a completely
separate government agency that was both empowered and motivated to be the
counterweight against warrantless surveillance. Unfortunately, I have no idea
how this could ever happen.

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pcrh
The only way surveillance on the current scale will be defeated is if
technology makes it moot.

Perhaps someone could comment on whether current encryption protocols are
sufficient? If not, what would it take?

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devit
There is currently no system that can provide perfect anonymity against a
global adversary (someone who has wiretaps on all links and can possibly
inject data as well), and it's not clear if it is technically feasible to
build one.

There is also no feasible way of mathematically proving that complex hardware
or software does what is supposed to do, which means that you need to trust
the authors, and isolation against bugs with security impact is required.

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techdragon
I can see something like the Open Skies treaty, actually working. But that
doesn't end the surveillance it merely formalises the situation so all parties
have equal access to the same level of spying capabilities on each other.

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ketralnis
They were already doing it secretly and lying about it. Why wouldn't they just
sign the treaty, win their political points and votes, and go right back to
doing it secretly and lying about it?

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code_sterling
He's got a better chance of being pardoned, unfortunately.

