• Risks Digest 31.69 (2/2)

    From RISKS List Owner@21:1/5 to All on Mon Apr 20 18:59:37 2020
    [continued from previous message]

    mobile apps warn citizens about their proximity to infected patients.

    This kind of technology is not limited to east Asia. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel recently authorised the Israel Security Agency to deploy surveillance technology normally reserved for battling terrorists to track coronavirus patients. When the relevant parliamentary subcommittee refused
    to authorise the measure, Netanyahu rammed it through with an *emergency decree*.

    You might argue that there is nothing new about all this. In recent years
    both governments and corporations have been using ever more sophisticated technologies to track, monitor and manipulate people. Yet if we are not careful, the epidemic might nevertheless mark an important watershed in the history of surveillance. Not only because it might normalise the deployment
    of mass surveillance tools in countries that have so far rejected them, but even more so because it signifies a dramatic transition from *over the skin*
    to *under the skin* surveillance.

    Hitherto, when your finger touched the screen of your smartphone and clicked
    on a link, the government wanted to know what exactly your finger was
    clicking on. But with coronavirus, the focus of interest shifts. Now the government wants to know the temperature of your finger and the
    blood-pressure under its skin.

    The emergency pudding

    One of the problems we face in working out where we stand on surveillance is that none of us know exactly how we are being surveilled, and what the
    coming years might bring. Surveillance technology is developing at breakneck speed, and what seemed science-fiction 10 years ago is today old news. As a thought experiment, consider a hypothetical government that demands that
    every citizen wears a biometric bracelet that monitors body temperature and heart-rate 24 hours a day. The resulting data is hoarded and analysed by government algorithms. The algorithms will know that you are sick even
    before you know it, and they will also know where you have been, and who you have met. The chains of infection could be drastically shortened, and even
    cut altogether. Such a system could arguably stop the epidemic in its tracks within days. Sounds wonderful, right?

    The downside is, of course, that this would give legitimacy to a terrifying
    new surveillance system. If you know, for example, that I clicked on a Fox
    News link rather than a CNN link, that can teach you something about my political views and perhaps even my personality. But if you can monitor what happens to my body temperature, blood pressure and heart-rate as I watch the video clip, you can learn what makes me laugh, what makes me cry, and what makes me really, really angry.

    It is crucial to remember that anger, joy, boredom and love are biological phenomena just like fever and a cough. The same technology that identifies coughs could also identify laughs. If corporations and governments start harvesting our biometric data en masse, they can get to know us far better
    than we know ourselves, and they can then not just predict our feelings but also manipulate our feelings and sell us anything they want -- be it a
    product or a politician. Biometric monitoring would make Cambridge
    Analytica's data hacking tactics look like something from the Stone
    Age. Imagine North Korea in 2030, when every citizen has to wear a biometric bracelet 24 hours a day. If you listen to a speech by the Great Leader and
    the bracelet picks up the tell-tale signs of anger, you are done for.

    You could, of course, make the case for biometric surveillance as a
    temporary measure taken during a state of emergency. It would go away once
    the emergency is over. But temporary measures have a nasty habit of
    outlasting emergencies, especially as there is always a new emergency
    lurking on the horizon. My home country of Israel, for example, declared a state of emergency during its 1948 War of Independence, which justified a
    range of temporary measures from press censorship and land confiscation to special regulations for making pudding (I kid you not). The War of
    Independence has long been won, but Israel never declared the emergency
    over, and has failed to abolish many of the *temporary* measures of 1948
    (the emergency pudding decree was mercifully abolished in 2011).

    Even when infections from coronavirus are down to zero, some data-hungry governments could argue they needed to keep the biometric surveillance
    systems in place because they fear a second wave of coronavirus, or because there is a new Ebola strain evolving in central Africa, or because ..., you
    get the idea. A big battle has been raging in recent years over our
    privacy. The coronavirus crisis could be the battle's tipping point. For
    when people are given a choice between privacy and health, they will usually choose health.

    The soap police

    Asking people to choose between privacy and health is, in fact, the very
    root of the problem. Because this is a false choice. We can and should enjoy both privacy and health. We can choose to protect our health and stop the coronavirus epidemic not by instituting totalitarian surveillance regimes,
    but rather by empowering citizens. In recent weeks, some of the most
    successful efforts to contain the coronavirus epidemic were orchestrated by South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore. While these countries have made some use
    of tracking applications, they have relied far more on extensive testing, on honest reporting, and on the willing co-operation of a well-informed public.

    Centralised monitoring and harsh punishments aren't the only way to make
    people comply with beneficial guidelines. When people are told the
    scientific facts, and when people trust public authorities to tell them
    these facts, citizens can do the right thing even without a Big Brother watching over their shoulders. A self-motivated and well-informed population
    is usually far more powerful and effective than a policed, ignorant
    population.

    Consider, for example, washing your hands with soap. This has been one of
    the greatest advances ever in human hygiene. This simple action saves
    millions of lives every year. While we take it for granted, it was only in
    the 19th century that scientists discovered the importance of washing hands with soap. Previously, even doctors and nurses proceeded from one surgical operation to the next without washing their hands. Today billions of people daily wash their hands, not because they are afraid of the soap police, but rather because they understand the facts. I wash my hands with soap because
    I have heard of viruses and bacteria, I understand that these tiny organisms cause diseases, and I know that soap can remove them.

    ------------------------------

    Date: Sat, 18 Apr 2020 13:41:10 +0300
    From: Amos Shapir <amos083@gmail.com
    Subject: Re: How Coronavirus Is Eroding Privacy (RISKS-31.68)

    So now it's official knowledge: Advertising companies are following us
    around and know where we are and what we are doing, all the time (as if we
    had any doubts). What privacy? We never had that on the net, and never
    will.

    ------------------------------

    Date: Sat, 18 Apr 2020 13:09:12 -0700
    From: "Rex Sanders" <rex.sanders@usa.net>
    Subject: Re: New CDC Study Shows Coronavirus Can Survive For Hours On ...
    (RISKS-31.68)

    Quoting the CDC article:

    "Our study has 2 limitations. First, the results of the nucleic acid test
    do not indicate the amount of viable virus. Second, for the unknown
    minimal infectious dose, the aerosol transmission distance cannot be
    strictly determined."

    I like to use this analogy with friends and family: Someone gets murdered in a home. Police find a suspect's fingerprints everywhere inside the home, but haven't actually looked for the murderer.

    Is the home still dangerous? We don't know. All we have are fingerprints.

    In the CDC study, the researchers found genetic fingerprints of the virus,
    but have no idea if what they found could infect people. They even said so
    in the article!

    Unfortunately I see this fingerprint/murderer confusion in far too many coronavirus news reports - including this one.

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    Date: Mon, 14 Jan 2019 11:11:11 -0800
    From: RISKS-request@csl.sri.com
    Subject: Abridged info on RISKS (comp.risks)

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