Privacy? What privacy?

[lektrode]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

they can also do it with java-scripting that reads the browser history file and essentially anything else that you have input to the browser - and for all i know, anything that windows itself keeps on file - this is precisely the reason to NOT USE 'internet excuse' (explorer) and to use firefox with the NoScript Firefox extension
this let YOU decide whether or not any script runs and/or WHEN you want to allow em to run

i have mine set to BLOCK ALL SCRIPTS by default and only enable em when i want/need to see some particular aspect of a site - it gets a bit bothersome at times, but well worth the effort, IMHO - just to keep as much of this crap from occuring as possible - i'm sure it has the desired effect as well, as eye note some sites change the damn scripts or servers that deliver them, sometimes daily - all in an effort to dump who knows what onto your machine, so thay can collect who knows what from it all.

f__k em, i'm not going quietly or without a fight....

[shiny!]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

they can also do it with java-scripting that reads the browser history file and essentially anything else that you have input to the browser - and for all i know, anything that windows itself keeps on file - this is precisely the reason to NOT USE 'internet excuse' (explorer) and to use firefox with the NoScript Firefox extension
this let YOU decide whether or not any script runs and/or WHEN you want to allow em to run

i have mine set to BLOCK ALL SCRIPTS by default and only enable em when i want/need to see some particular aspect of a site - it gets a bit bothersome at times, but well worth the effort, IMHO - just to keep as much of this crap from occuring as possible - i'm sure it has the desired effect as well, as eye note some sites change the damn scripts or servers that deliver them, sometimes daily - all in an effort to dump who knows what onto your machine, so thay can collect who knows what from it all.

f__k em, i'm not going quietly or without a fight....

You can also use Tor with Firefox. Instead of NoScript I like to use a large hosts file:

Web adverts can be simply blocked by using a specially formatted text file called a “Hosts” file which is a list myself and numerous others have painstakingly compiled to now over 60000 (verified) known banner advertising companies and providers along with hostile websites that have been discovered (popup providers, spyware, dialers ,scams etc). This file tells your computer to try to and access itself whenever a banner advert is requested from a server that is in its "black" list, but instead of contacting the advert server your computer tries to request itself, and as your machine doesn't contain any adverts (if you are not running a web server) nothing will be shown.

Will this stop cookies and popups ?

Certainly, it will stop cookies ,hostile scripts in fact all communication (not just web traffic) from any server in this “Hosts” file

I don't know how well a host file works in Windows, but it works great in Linux. It speeds up page loading, blocks the annoying flashy ads and doesn't use any resources.

[aaron]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

adblockplus Firefox plugin is essential. I think there is one for chrome as well. The web becomes a much more interesting, safe place. Be sure to set your cookies to manually accept as well. I do not use noscript, but it certainly is helpful if you want more protection.

There are items on pages that track you all over the web. You know those cute "post to facebook" icons all over the interwebs? If you see one, you have already given facebook information on the page you are visiting, your location (via ip), your browser, etc. Then, when you go to the next blog with the icon, they see that. Basically, they know more than you can imagine.

Google's ads are on a huge number of web sites across the world. They also have the largest web site traffic analysis service in the world that many web sites use. They also provide javascript libraries to millions of sites across the web... basically every "Web 2.0" site uses their network to serve up jquery (among others) for use on web pages. Again, every time you download it, they know who, where, and what. They know exactly where you have gone, where you go, your searches, EVERYTHING.
There are companies that sell ip address location services. I would not be surprised if they know where I live down to the street/house.

I recommend against using proxy services. I have seen some neat demonstrations where proxy owners mess with web content (and insert there own code into pages you download). There is a lot of bad stuff that goes through the Tor network.

It all depends on the level of privacy you care about, I suppose. In reality, only laws protect us. I suspect so much data has been gathered, that if you start to use privacy tools, that also will be noticed.

[FrankL]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

If you're the government, you can do that.

No one else can. For one thing, you can't access all of the cell phones unless you have APIs into all of the possible service providers.

If you're the government, you have far better ways to get this information - like Echelon.

Some ways (nearly) anyone can correlate license plates with cellphones. Neither method is legal in the country I live in, probably not in yours either (unless you're the government). Technically, these methods are trivial to implement though.

1.) Use a camera and 2 bluetooth radios (one on each side of the road) with a common accurate timing source. The camera will detect the license plates, the bluetooth radios will capture all the phones that have an active bluetooth radio (a very high percentage).

if you absolutely need 100% detection rates, this is slightly more complicated:
2.) Use the camera, but replace the bluetooth with two femtocells (one on each side of the road). There's no secure authentication protocol between tower and phone afaik, so it is trivial to make the phone communicate with the femtocells (just overpower the telco signal?)

[charliebrown]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

In addition to what others have said, i always browse as a user who does not have administrator rights. I am also thinking about running my browser within a VM that is snap shotted so all history disappears when the VM is closed.

[c1ue]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

Some ways (nearly) anyone can correlate license plates with cellphones. Neither method is legal in the country I live in, probably not in yours either (unless you're the government). Technically, these methods are trivial to implement though.

1.) Use a camera and 2 bluetooth radios (one on each side of the road) with a common accurate timing source. The camera will detect the license plates, the bluetooth radios will capture all the phones that have an active bluetooth radio (a very high percentage).

if you absolutely need 100% detection rates, this is slightly more complicated:
2.) Use the camera, but replace the bluetooth with two femtocells (one on each side of the road). There's no secure authentication protocol between tower and phone afaik, so it is trivial to make the phone communicate with the femtocells (just overpower the telco signal?)

As far as I know - your device has to be on 'Bluetooth Search' mode in order to be accessible by non-verified devices.

Secondly, Bluetooth range for cell devices is only 10 meters - and it is greatly reduced if there is a large speed differential (i.e. increased error rates).

Not very clear to me that this would work.

As for femtocells - there very much is encryption on transmissions from cell to tower. On top of which - mounting femtocells which are bandwidth stealing on a cell companies spectrum is a criminal offense.

If you want to correlate, there are far easier ways. One really easy one: for areas with RFID toll passes like in Dallas or in the Bay Area: query the toll tag. These are designed specifically for high speed identification and communication.

What's really creepy? In LA, where there aren't tolls taken (to my knowledge), a friend driving his car from the Bay Area was having his toll tag beep (i.e. get queried) while on Interstate 10. Clearly there is already some form of data harvesting going on.

[reggie]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

That's funny, OODA isn't even 1 generation old and you're calling it 100 years?

I also find it amusing that you're saying that computational theory is 100 years old; we don't even have 50 years of programmable computers.

But hey, to a hammer - all things are OODA.

OODA comes out of Cybernetic thinking, which the Greeks called Kybentic, and which Plato refers to in his writings. So, actually, you're right, the science is not 100 yrs old, it's actually much older.

And to an indoctrinated mind, everything appears as the indoctrinators wish. Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with Marcuse's "one dimensional man", because that's what you've become. I was right to ignore you months ago, and I shouldn't have weakened to respond to another one of your threads that merely relay institutional programming.

[DSpencer]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

OODA comes out of Cybernetic thinking, which the Greeks called Kybentic, and which Plato refers to in his writings. So, actually, you're right, the science is not 100 yrs old, it's actually much older.

And to an indoctrinated mind, everything appears as the indoctrinators wish. Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with Marcuse's "one dimensional man", because that's what you've become. I was right to ignore you months ago, and I shouldn't have weakened to respond to another one of your threads that merely relay institutional programming.

Reggie,

Ignoring for a moment the debate about how this system of control works, what do YOU personally do to protect against it? From what I can tell, almost every one of your posts deals with these topics of people somehow being controlled by other forces. Do you live some type of "alternate" lifestyle? Do you have a normal job? Pay taxes? Buy groceries and clothing?

In other words, if someone read about every idea, author etc that you suggest and became convinced of your viewpoint, what then? What should they change in their life?

[c1ue]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

OODA comes out of Cybernetic thinking, which the Greeks called Kybentic, and which Plato refers to in his writings. So, actually, you're right, the science is not 100 yrs old, it's actually much older.

And to an indoctrinated mind, everything appears as the indoctrinators wish. Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with Marcuse's "one dimensional man", because that's what you've become. I was right to ignore you months ago, and I shouldn't have weakened to respond to another one of your threads that merely relay institutional programming.

I do find it fascinating how you are able to link a series of completely unrelated phenomena into a coherent whole.

OODA is not about population control nor cybernetics - it is about warfare. Furthermore OODA - as was clearly shown above - is not even documented by the original proponent. Its closest acolytes also restrict OODA to actual warfare, and equally do a poor job of documentation of what OODA is vs. what it is not.

Thus your attempt to show credibility by linking OODA with the distant past is a very poor one. The Greeks didn't have computers, they didn't do anything whatsoever with cybernetics, and they sure as hell didn't do anything like OODA.

You then try to link OODA with cybernetics in the more modern era of the 1950s. Whatever link may exist - I have yet to see it.

However, clearly you have a belief that there is some underlying coherence. Unfortunately you have yet to demonstrate this coherence exists anywhere else but your own mind.

As for cybernetics and Greek whatever - conflating the behavior of systems which are created of inanimate components which are designed to function mechanically ( i.e. control systems ) vs. controlling systems of independent agents - these are entirely different things.

You seem to think that because one is understood, so then can the other.

The list of failed 'controllers' of people is as long as history. For that matter, the belief that people in a mass can be fully controlled and/or understood is merely a different form of faith - an atheistic one or one in which the deity is a machine or knowledge.

[Andreuccio]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

What's really creepy? In LA, where there aren't tolls taken (to my knowledge), a friend driving his car from the Bay Area was having his toll tag beep (i.e. get queried) while on Interstate 10. Clearly there is already some form of data harvesting going on.

Creepy, maybe. But LA did recently institute trial toll lanes on two sections of freeway: the 10 from East of Downtown to about El Monte, and the 110 from South of Downtown to the 105. Tolling began Nov. 10. Who knows how much earlier tag beeps started. That was probably what your friend experienced.

Here's a link to a pdf of the map of the toll lanes:

http://www.metro.net/projects_studie...Toll_Entry.pdf

and general information about the "Metro ExpressLanes" project:

http://www.metro.net/projects/expresslanes/

[FrankL]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

As far as I know - your device has to be on 'Bluetooth Search' mode in order to be accessible by non-verified devices.

There are ways of sniffing 'hidden' bluetooth radios. e.g. see:
http://static.usenix.org/event/woot0...ll/spill_html/

Secondly, Bluetooth range for cell devices is only 10 meters - and it is greatly reduced if there is a large speed differential (i.e. increased error rates).

most roads aren't more than 10-20 meters wide, and with a powerful radio + directional antenna you can easily reach more than 20 meters (some bluetooth radios claim to reach a 100m range).

Not very clear to me that this would work.

As for femtocells - there very much is encryption on transmissions from cell to tower. On top of which - mounting femtocells which are bandwidth stealing on a cell companies spectrum is a criminal offense.

illegal? yes. Expensive and technically difficult? not at all.
See this article on how to use a femtocell for IMSI-catching:
http://www.isti.tu-berlin.de/fileadm...mto_ndss12.pdf

If you want to correlate, there are far easier ways. One really easy one: for areas with RFID toll passes like in Dallas or in the Bay Area: query the toll tag. These are designed specifically for high speed identification and communication.

What's really creepy? In LA, where there aren't tolls taken (to my knowledge), a friend driving his car from the Bay Area was having his toll tag beep (i.e. get queried) while on Interstate 10. Clearly there is already some form of data harvesting going on.

Yes, I can see how RFID tags can be privacy-undermining. Combined with above mentioned techniques you can build nice 'personal profiles' based on active and passive radio transmitters that people carry.

Image recognition is also getting to the point where its becoming trivial to identify a person based on a picture/video frame, provided that you have a large enough database with image-name pairs. Think of Google Picasa and Facebook.

Those databases will be worth a lot of money in future...

[c1ue]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

There are ways of sniffing 'hidden' bluetooth radios. e.g. see:
http://static.usenix.org/event/woot0...ll/spill_html/

Determining that a bluetooth cell phone is there, or even activating the bluetooth - is not the same as querying the cell radio. For one thing, the Bluetooth and the cell radio are completely separated by multiple software protocol layers.

Thus even being able to 'activate' a Bluetooth radio in a cell phone does not mean you will be able to query useful identification data. It might be possible; I haven't looked into the specific Bluetooth protocol to know if it includes device ID numbers, IMSI numbers, or phone numbers.

The paper you refer to merely offers the possibility of eavesdropping - this is a far cry from full access and information capture, much less in the moments available while a vehicle is driving by.

most roads aren't more than 10-20 meters wide, and with a powerful radio + directional antenna you can easily reach more than 20 meters (some bluetooth radios claim to reach a 100m range).

There are Bluetooth devices with a 100 meter range, but the range you refer to aren't for Bluetooth enabled cell phones - they are for household type devices. While there is no inherent reason why a cell phone can have a bluetooth radio with a 100 meter range, in practice this is never going to happen because of the battery drain.

illegal? yes. Expensive and technically difficult? not at all.
See this article on how to use a femtocell for IMSI-catching:
http://www.isti.tu-berlin.de/fileadm...mto_ndss12.pdf

In Europe, use of femtocells is easier because there is basically only GSM. In the US, no such luck.

If you're going to resort to illegal means, it is far easier to hack into the cell towers than bother with femtocells. Or bribe the appropriate law enforcement official.

Image recognition is also getting to the point where its becoming trivial to identify a person based on a picture/video frame, provided that you have a large enough database with image-name pairs. Think of Google Picasa and Facebook.

I'm not so sure. The military has the money and access to obtain decent results; private sector it is still far from clear.

I've spent significant time investigating how to use OCR to automate fighting parking tickets; the state of the art is simply not strong enough to handle random inputs for even character recognition. Check recognition is fairly robust because the amount, routing number, and account numbers are all in predictable locations. For cases where this is not true, or even in cases where the locations are static but the data is variable (i.e. different digits, etc etc) - OCR for off the shelf is unusable.

As for face recognition - I have my doubts on that as well. I don't know about you, but I see people who look similar ALL the time.

If I, with my millenia or millions of years of facial recognition software built in - have this problem - I have grave doubts over just how effective off the shelf systems can be. Unlike fingerprints, faces absolutely are not unique or even unusually different yet these off the shelf systems use identical underlying technology: placing 'check points' on specific features on a flat photograph and then capturing a pattern.

A military system, on the other hand, doesn't just look at the face with a variant of fingerprinting 'check points' - it looks at multiple angles and includes absolute scale comparisons.

[reggie]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

Reggie,

Ignoring for a moment the debate about how this system of control works, what do YOU personally do to protect against it? From what I can tell, almost every one of your posts deals with these topics of people somehow being controlled by other forces. Do you live some type of "alternate" lifestyle? Do you have a normal job? Pay taxes? Buy groceries and clothing?

In other words, if someone read about every idea, author etc that you suggest and became convinced of your viewpoint, what then? What should they change in their life?

"what do YOU personally do to protect against it?"

I don't buy-in. Hence, the Simulacra does not control my brain synapse development.

Do you live some type of "alternate" lifestyle?

No

if someone read about every idea, author etc that you suggest and became convinced of your viewpoint, what then?

If enough were to understand the gravity of the Simulacra, especially those withing the Technocracy, then humanity's trajectory would change significantly. Hence, the key here is understanding the Truth, and the rest takes care of itself.

You know, the real question to ask onself is WHY has our education been so limited and constrained, and WHY do we understand so little of history, especially on a meta-level.

I do find it fascinating how you are able to link a series of completely unrelated phenomena into a coherent whole.

OODA is not about population control nor cybernetics - it is about warfare. Furthermore OODA - as was clearly shown above - is not even documented by the original proponent. Its closest acolytes also restrict OODA to actual warfare, and equally do a poor job of documentation of what OODA is vs. what it is not.

Thus your attempt to show credibility by linking OODA with the distant past is a very poor one. The Greeks didn't have computers, they didn't do anything whatsoever with cybernetics, and they sure as hell didn't do anything like OODA.

You then try to link OODA with cybernetics in the more modern era of the 1950s. Whatever link may exist - I have yet to see it.

However, clearly you have a belief that there is some underlying coherence. Unfortunately you have yet to demonstrate this coherence exists anywhere else but your own mind.

As for cybernetics and Greek whatever - conflating the behavior of systems which are created of inanimate components which are designed to function mechanically ( i.e. control systems ) vs. controlling systems of independent agents - these are entirely different things.

You seem to think that because one is understood, so then can the other.

The list of failed 'controllers' of people is as long as history. For that matter, the belief that people in a mass can be fully controlled and/or understood is merely a different form of faith - an atheistic one or one in which the deity is a machine or knowledge.

The phenomena are only unrelated to the indoctrinated mind, which you exhibit in almost everyone of your posts. The coherence is discussed throughout history by thinkers who are now household names, at least in science and philosophical circles. Quite honestly, you're embarrassing yourself here and reaching at strawmen everywhere... .it's actually quite disgusting.

Foucault talks about Power accumulating Knowledge in order to retain and centralize their power... .well, those with that Knowledge also build systems to insure that the Powerless never gain said Knowledge... and here we have the key benefit of the application of Kybernetics to social theory.

PS. Here's a little insight into how Soros thinks about the application of Cybernetics on a social level...

[reggie]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

Just did a quick search of my e-library and found the following thesis on Control Theory in warfare... here a couple relevant excerpts from the attached doc (link below).

Yeah, sure sounds like the military never adopted these theories into practice, and these theories are not in practice in human social systems

Tell me, who here actually believes that the elite are not perpetrating warfare on the public, and that said elite would refrain from employing the most successful war-fighting tactics in said war-campaign?

Introduction

....John Boyd’s theory of the OODA Loop passed directly into military doctrine with little examination of the theory itself. It was such an intuitively obvious expression of human decision and action that few commented on it, much less explored it in depth. This chapter, along with the one that follows, examines the basis for the OODA Loop: human behavior. Since the ultimate goal in war is altering the enemy’s behavior so that it aligns with one’s demands, establishing the legitimacy of the OODA Loop as a behavioral model is an important first step in defining control warfare.

Summarizing Control Warfare

Control warfare emerges from a legacy of economic warfare developed in the years
leading up to and through World War II. Appalled at the carnage created by the conventional
force-on-force approach to attrition warfare in the First World War, airpower theorists sought to
use their new weapon of war in a fundamentally new way. The Second World War heralded the
advent of economic warfare through aerial attack upon an enemy's means of producing the
weapons of war. Control warfare represents another step in the evolution of aerial warfare away
from pure attrition-style attacks.

Control warfare is predicated upon attacking the command structure that the enemy uses
to control its means of war. Central to this method of warfare is an understanding of how people
control organizations and direct them to act. This, in turn, is the province of human and
organizational behavior.

John Boyd created an enduring legacy for those involved with describing, affecting, and
compelling the behavior of others. Encapsulated in his model of the OODA Loop, Boyd's
framework represents the foundation for examining, and affecting, the actions of people, groups,
and nations. It is also the foundation for describing the command and control process.
Consequently, Boyd's OODA Loop informs any approach to control warfare.

Arming with Intelligence, Inside the OODA Loop.pdf

[c1ue]

Re: Privacy? What privacy?

OODA was originally intended for air warfare - and your article speaks to that.

Unfortunately it doesn't apply anywhere else, nor did this article help with the point that OODA was never actually formulated by Boyd.

What do you call a doctrine where the proponent left almost nothing written down?