Re: Brin on Privacy

Michael Lorrey (retroman@tpk.net)
Fri, 20 Dec 1996 20:08:13 -0500


max m wrote:
>
> I think that another big problem with this surveilance technology is
> that it is so easy to forge video, and it's getting constantly easier.
> With enough time and money you can make everybody do anything. How will
> you ensure when something was taped, if it has been edited, morphed,
> retouched or in any way altered. You only have to be avare of a camera
> to make use of it in your own interrest.
>
> Will cameras cover every concievable angle? How many cameras would that
> take? What would the storage reqirements be for that amont of video? How
> do we verify the content?

Thats the easy part. Have a reverse PGP encoding on the time/date and
sumcheck information. Reverse PGP being where the ability to encode the
data is known only to the camera, while ANYBODY can read the output.
Doctoring of the video file will result in a file size different from
the encoded sumcheck data, which would indicate inadmissible evidence.
>
> If we started to depend on video for justice/truce we would see so many
> false examples that we wouldn't believe them anymore.
>
> A bulletproof surveilance society is not technical possible!!!! It's a
> downright stupid an uninformed idea. There will be more of it of course
> as everybody buys cameras and point them out of their windows. But total
> recall? Never!

Using the above scheme (total survellance with reverse PGP video
coding), we could have total openness of ones activities with total
privacy of one's throughts with PGP. Thus individuals could think
whatever they wished, but to act lays you bare.
>
> Beside that, the democracy rest upon the protection of the individual.
> How much is that protection worth if a minor group of persons cannot do
> something that's not *approved* by the majority. (Courtrooms exists,
> among other reasons, to prevent the majority from having complete
> control. If not it would be easier to fix societys problems with guns.)

What is important is a judiciary that understands that as the foudner
of Hustler magazine says, "freedom of expression is not to protect the
words you love but the words you hate". As long as this rule is applied
rigorously, a totally open and totally free society can exist. When it
does not, freedom does not.
>
> Max M Rasmussen

-- 
TANSTAAFL!!!

Michael Lorrey --------------------------------------------------------- President retroman@tpk.net Northstar Technologies Agent Lorrey@ThePentagon.com Inventor of the Lorrey Drive Silo_1013@ThePentagon.com http://www.tpk.net/~retroman/ --------------------------------------------------------- Inventor, Webmaster, Ski Guide, Entrepreneur, Artist, Outdoorsman, Libertarian, Certified Genius.