Olives @olives@qoto.org

Julie appears concerned about the prospect of "generative AI" being used to generate messages for use in "catfishing". This is admittedly one I've never thought of before. Then again, I'm very surprised this potentiality, of all things, would rise to an official's attention.

I also noticed the citation provided for this is an article which talks about this phenomena broadly, but not specifically within this context. This appears to be a theoretical issue?

In any case, I don't much like the prospect of random officials barging in to tell companies to design products in particular ways over random risks which they've thought up.

https://edri.org/our-work/8-december-case-why-is-encryption-on-trial/

"On 3 October, the trial of the so-called “8 December” case began. Seven people are prosecuted for being a “terrorist group”.

The intelligence services in charge of the judicial investigation (Direction générale de la Sécurité intérieure, DGSI), the National Antiterrorist Prosecution Office (Parquet National Antiterroriste, PNAT), and the investigating judge based their case on the fact that the defendants were using different tools to protect their privacy and encrypt their communications on a daily basis.

This trial is part of an increased political push by states and law enforcement for surveillance measures and the criminalisation of encryption. That is why the trial is crucial in the battle against the state’s ongoing attempts to criminalise commonplace, secure and healthy digital practices."

"One of the main issues in this trial is whether such privacy habits can be used by the police and the courts as incriminating evidence to feed the presumption of a terrorist plot. If the judge shows such bias, it would have dangerous consequences. This would mean that any form of confidentiality would become a reason for suspicion."

#privacy

Here is Discord's Chief Legal Officer Clint Smith with Julie on the 14th.

Looks like Julie is carrying out a "public consultation", that is probably an important one to keep in mind throughout it.

The Lantern cartel is not to be confused with the "brand safety" cartel, although they're both problematic in their own ways.

There are many questions about freedom of expression, proportionality, due process, and so on here as well, particularly as these companies tend to be overly censorious and frivolous.

Also, some of the terms used here are extremely suspicious.

The anti-trust question though is one which keeps getting overlooked, and it's an important one.

While investigating other things, I discovered multiple tech companies engaging in very creepy and opaque cartel-like behavior with a program called "Lantern". They also appeared to be funding reports to justify it.

It's actually not unheard of for tech companies like these to attack their competitors, then to invoke some high minded "concern" like "safety" to try to deflect responsibility from that. In 2021, Google even tried to remove Element, which is practically akin to a web browser for the Matrix Network, from the app store.

There also appeared to be a company called "Thorn" (which is well-known for being fairly problematic) involved.

Apparently, the "brand safety" cartel even shut down a progressive media outlet.

Some points about censoring fictional content there (censorship is a bad idea):

1) It might fuel someone's persecution complex. The idea of a dangerous world where people are out to get them. Feeds anxiety, alienation. It's happened a fair bit. It doesn't actually do anything positive.

2) Someone might see someone as an idiot or crazy (that's not wrong, lol). In any case, it poisons the well as someone is not seen to be credible or competent in these matters at all.

3) It violates someone's free expression. People have these things called rights, that's important.

4) Bad people don't need it. They can still do bad things. Good people are who'd suffer.

5) It violates the Constitution. Multiple constitutions.

6) Punishing someone because they resemble someone unpleasant isn't good. Also, due process still applies, in any case...

7) Can be a coping mechanism.

If you don't want a surveillance camera inside your toilet, that means you hate children.

Looks like Australia is shelving breaking E2EE for now.

I wasn't even going to comment on it but someone seemed so confident in these dodgy numbers, seeing something that isn't even really there. Anyway, if you're ever unfortunate enough to encounter these arguments, then you know their flaws, I guess.

"Have you ever committed a crime?" (Probably with some dodgy definition) type questions are not useful to determine if someone is *currently* committing a crime.

Plus, other inherent weaknesses you get with looking for simple correlations.

Also, again, it's a "mystery sample". We have no clue where it comes from. Also, involves a bad faith actor who is known to use loaded language and to twist terms.

Also, saying that a criminal is more likely to use a privacy tool than the average person doesn't say a whole lot about non-criminals who use them.

Also, one of these measures seems to be remarkably "once a criminal always a criminal", therefore probably significantly over-estimates the number of criminals.

While criminals probably follow the path of least resistance (i.e. they're not going to go out of their way to do things in a harder fashion for no particular reason), they're also extremely motivated and would find some way to do what they do...

His antics haven't gone unnoticed by me.