Path: ...!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail
From: Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com>
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: Schneier, Data and Goliath: no hope for privacy
Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2025 23:21:11 -0300
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
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D <nospam@example.net> writes:

> On Thu, 20 Feb 2025, Salvador Mirzo wrote:
>
>>> Amen! Quite an efficiency hack! =D Another "security" hack I have
>>> implemented for my father is that I have forbidden him from getting
>>> government digital ID on his smart phone. This is very funny,
>>> because once scammers called him and told some kind of story that
>>> ended with them asking him to confirm what ever they wanted by
>>> opening the digital ID app (this is how most old people get scammed
>>> where I live) and he told them that he doesn't have it, due to
>>> security reasons...
>>>
>>> ... the scammers sighed heavily and just hung up. =D
>>
>> Lol.  If that's not a super inconvenience to your father, then I think
>> it's a great solution.  Over here these scams are quite a problem too.
>
> At the moment, everything essential in society has to be able to be
> done on paper, so it really is not a problem, and costs about 20-40
> minutes per year in extra writing on actual paper.
>
> This scares me though! I fear the day when a smartphone is mandatory
> in order to participate in society. This will be a sad day indeed. Add
> to that, centralbank managed electronic currencies, that can be clawed
> back from you, or where you are blocked from spending them in an
> instant, if you go against the government, and we have a very
> dystopian situation indeed. =/

I would think that there are so many poor people in the world that
governments could never really ask anyone to always have a phone.
However, I think it's already real that without such tools, the
alternative way will be so painful that a person like you or I will
likely not choose not to use a phone.

I think that's already more or less true in commerce.  For instance,
I've been at times confronted with the situation that without using
Whatsapp, I could not get service.

During the pandemics, for example, so many people could not find a way
out of following protocols they did not want to follow and even taking
chemical substances they did not want to take.  So many people I know
did not want to do it and did it anyway because it was a hassle
otherwise.

>> I also do talk to my father quite a lot about such matters.  And
>> anything suspicious at all, he always talks to me.  In fact, I've talked
>> to my entire family about such things.  To always let one another know
>> about these events---to talk often among us.  We learn more and so we
>> protect ourselves more.
>
> This is good advice! My father and I, and my wife, talk about these
> things, but we never formalized it, so that we say that we should talk
> to each other in case anyone does get a weird message.
>
> I read that in order to protect against voice cloning, you should
> decide on a family password as well. This we also haven't done. But I
> am currently working on a small IT-security curriculum for retired
> people, and that class will include an example of voice cloning to
> show them how it works, and what they can expect.

I haven't done something like that either.  But, you know, I'm going to
propose that this week---I think it's a very good idea.  I'm meeting
most of my family in two days.

>> The reason we can be so good at handling this computing world is because
>> we are pretty much obsessed about it; we spend the entire day thinking
>> about it; reading about it; writing about it.  By talking more with our
>> families about these matters, they do learn more from us.  Of course, we
>> can't expect they'll be coworkers.  We need to take things very slowly
>> and only as much as they can handle it.  Then it becomes kind of fun for
>> them too and then they learn a bunch.
>
> This is true. But this also requires some amount of simplification in
> order for it not to become an energy drain. That is why I like my way
> of limiting communication to phone and email. It only leaves two doors
> open which is easier to defend than 3 or 4 or 5 doors open. ;)

Quite right.

>>>>> So I find this to be a hueg benefit! I am also lucky because I run my
>>>>> own company, so my business partners know that if they want to reach
>>>>> me, they have 2 options, email or phone, and all of them accept that.
>>>>
>>>> Nice to hear you run your own business.
>>>
>>> Yes, it is the best thing that has ever happened to me except for my
>>> wife. I am truly blessed and am very thankful for it every single
>>> day. =)
>>
>> Nice to hear that your wife is the best thing that ever happened to you.
>> I unfortunately can't yet say the same.  I'm single, although I'd love
>> to have little kids running around and through the house. :)  But first
>> I gotta find someone who I love and who loves me.
>
> In my experience, as long as you are living a positive life, and don't
> get caught in depression, and caught by unreasonable aesthetic
> standards, this will happen in time.

That's *very* good to hear as this is the most important thing to me.  I
feel very much protected from all of these malaise (for lack of a better
word).

> As for children, no such thing for me, since biologically I have an
> extremely low chance of having children. On the other hand, my parents
> got the same diagnosis from the doctor, and they had me, and the
> doctor said it was not possible according to science, so who knows? ;)

I am sorry for hearing the news, but I also feel that we should hope for
the best here.  I think nobody should trust doctor's predictions.  I
certainly don't know the reasons you might have low chance of having
children and let's remember this is a public forum.  The subject does me
remind me of a conversation with epidemiologist Shanna Swan, which I
have been slowly rewatching again---it's a 2h conversation.  The entire
conversation is very interesting.  In this conversation, we can learn
that male fertility is decreasing by 1% *per year*.

  Shanna Swan on male fertility (et cetera)
  https://youtu.be/C9aqGqjC1kE