
How the coronavirus is driving new surveillance programs globally - walterbell
https://onezero.medium.com/the-pandemic-is-a-trojan-horse-for-surveillance-programs-around-the-world-887fa6f12ec9
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DennisP
In the U.S., the Supreme Court decided[1] in 2018 that the government couldn't
access cell location data without a warrant. However, they made an exception
for public safety:

> Such exigencies include the need to pursue a fleeing suspect, protect
> individuals who are threatened with imminent harm or prevent the imminent
> destruction of evidence.

Fighting a pandemic arguably falls into this category, since an awful lot of
people are threatened with imminent harm. So we already have a constitutional
standard for rolling back pandemic-related surveillance measures.

Also, something this article overlooks about the Apple/Google system is that
it does a pretty good job of protecting user privacy. Contacts are discovered
by direct bluetooth contact, and central servers don't get any information
from people except that they tested positive.[2][3]

[1] [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/22/us/politics/supreme-
court...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/22/us/politics/supreme-court-
warrants-cell-phone-privacy.html)

[2] [https://ncase.me/contact-tracing/](https://ncase.me/contact-tracing/)

[3] [https://github.com/DP-3T/documents](https://github.com/DP-3T/documents)

~~~
zadler
Regarding privacy, is there something in particular blocking then from
receiving identifying information from people? Because it seems like this
wouldn’t be difficult to add in at such a time as the climate is right to do
so, and to be frank I’m not sure that they deserve the benefit of the doubt at
this point.

~~~
DennisP
Since they control the OS, I guess there's nothing in particular blocking them
from uploading your location and identifying information at all times
regardless. But this specific proposed system just uploads a set of random
numbers when someone tests positive.

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Tainnor
I think the article should more clearly distinguish between approaches that
indeed gather lots of unnecessary data (that is often of questionable
importance) vs. more decentralised (e.g. bluetooth based) approaches that can
help with contact tracing while still allowing to be implemented with privacy
concerns in mind.

Also, (as a non-American) I think the patriot act is a horrible thing, but I
also think that in particular, the threat of terrorism has always been
massively overstated (and even if not, many of the subsequent changes e.g. in
airport security, are terribly ineffective). By contrast, I think that
Coronavirus is a very serious threat and a recent study does seem to indicate
that app-based contact tracing solutions could really help. I'll repeat that
it's possible to do this in a privacy-conscious manner and it really should be
done like that (not just because otherwise people will refuse to use it).

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saagarjha
> Governments need information to create containment strategies and know where
> to focus resources. At the same time, governments have a way of holding onto
> tools that undermine citizens’ privacy long after the moment of crisis has
> passed.

I wonder if it’s worth governments’ time trying to come up with automatically
expiring bills for “emergency” uses such as these.

~~~
lkramer
In Denmark, most (all?) of the emergency measures have come with a sunset
clause, typically a year from inception.

~~~
a_imho
Why a year? Emergency measures being valid for the duration of the emergency
would be pretty straightforward.

~~~
johnr2
> Emergency measures being valid for the duration of the emergency would be
> pretty straightforward.

Deciding when the emergency is over is less straightforward than a fixed time
period. A government that wanted to extend the measures indefinitely would
just claim there's still an emergency.

~~~
BWGB
For example the Patriots Act in USA, signed into law after 9/11 attacks. The
sunset was in 2005, but it's still in force.

~~~
gmueckl
But the cooperation of legislators is required because of the fixed deadlines.
If the government would be allowed the right to extend the provisions on their
own, they probably would try to do that in perpetuity. With a legislative
branch that actually cares about civil rights, the former is the much better
option.

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m-p-3
I think the part that worries me the most for privacy and how far-reaching it
could be is this

[https://coronavirus.medium.com/apple-and-google-join-
forces-...](https://coronavirus.medium.com/apple-and-google-join-forces-to-
track-spread-of-coronavirus-fc2c68fda0ea)

I know Apple is marketing themselves as pro-pricacy, but I doubt they can
anonymize the data in a way that preserves privacy while still achieving the
goal of tracing contacts.

It just seems like a convoluted way of making a gigantic knowledge graph of
interactions between individuals under the pretense of public health.

------
at_a_remove
Never let a good crisis go to waste.

------
lukeplato
Although it's still considered a fringe/conspiracy theory, I've heard some
interesting claims on the use of digital ids and immunity certificates for
verifying who has been vaccinated.

\- [https://id2020.org/](https://id2020.org/)

\- [https://youtu.be/-aR7cz30chE?t=145](https://youtu.be/-aR7cz30chE?t=145)

~~~
triyambakam
It's not a theory, recently Bill Gates did an AMA on Reddit [1] and verified
that ID2020 would indeed be used to verify who has been vaccinated. The
conspiracy theory aspect is whatever one wants to expound on from there...

[1]
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fksnbf/comment...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fksnbf/comment/fkupg49)

~~~
kiba
We already have driver licenses. It wouldn't be too difficult to expand to
driver license plus immunity card.

~~~
stronglikedan
I don't know if ID2020 is being proposed as compulsory, but one is not
required to obtain a driver's license, or any other form of state issued ID,
in the US. If asked to present ID by an officer of the law, merely giving your
full name and birth date is sufficient.

~~~
hartator
You don’t have to answer even to that if there is no probable cause.

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CoronaBasedGod
These protests we are seeing would be significantly more powerful if they
didn't mention politics. Instead people are quick to say "it's just the other
political party and those people are stupid".

