<del></del>

Edited by asdzxc57 on 01/29/2012 12:54:07 MST.

Jeremy:
"....
The "nothing to hide" argument assumes that any privacy problem must be immediate and obvious or else it must not exist. However, information that may seem harmless in itself presents a far different picture when combined with numerous other bits and pieces ("mosaic intelligence"). Anyone involved in personal security or criminal law should be quite familiar with just how damaging information can be, no matter how benign it may seem.

Identity theft or harassment may be the public face of privacy loss, but the slow erosion of privacy rights due to the "nothing to hide" argument is far more damaging, like litter on a trail or oil from a poorly-maintained boat.".

You said it so well. Thank you for that.

BIG +1 to Jeremy's last post.

>>"Further, privacy is not just about having "something to hide"; it is a matter of whether parts of your life are someone else's business in the first place. I am personally averse to the development of a brave new world where every bit of someone's life is on permanent display, even more so if that information is limited to governments or industry."<<

Again, BIG +1. My perspective would be that when we post something on the internet, we are basically agreeing to the fact that almost everything online is open to 'public' viewing. If I don't want something viewed publicly online (either now or in the future), I do not offer it publicly online.

Sure, I have 'things to hide' (dramatic dum dum duuuuuuuuum) and there are aspects of life that are 'no one else's business'. In turn, I don't post them online and assume that no one will ever notice. Seems simple enough.

If you don't want potential bosses/clients/in-laws/etc to know that you participate in drunken revelries on the weekend with your ol' college buddies (exaggerated example, I know) then either don't post it online or don't participate in the first place.


Edited for grammar/spelling

Edited by cwayman1 on 01/26/2012 10:15:56 MST.

Privacy is dead and a thing of the past since the patriot act if you visit any urban area cameras are every where.

I had a patient who manufacture cameras and surveillance equipment he was telling me about their capability. They put a camera on top of a sky scraper in down town San Diego to test the camera and equipment they could zoom in on a persons wrist watch and tell what time it was and mark that person with a dot and the camera would follow the person trough out town for a 4 to 5 block radius.
With facial recognition software now they can find you.
The small city of Carlsbad their Police force have a large walls of monitors with 5 to 9 person team monitoring every major intersection. When they see something wrong they can send out the closest unit right away .

Look at goggle earth and satellite photos they take even if they are old. I was looking up my house my car was parked in front of my house,Then I looked up my work and my car was parked at work it was pretty funny . The creepy part of google earth is the street level view option you can see the front of your house and front yard. Once in while I see the google camera cars driving down street to get the street level views. The only thing the online map companies keep private now are military bases streets now their just big redacted blots on the online maps.
Terry

Edited by socal-nomad on 01/26/2012 11:46:58 MST.

I agree on Jeremy's last post being a good one.

Clint - let me give an example that specifically relates to me and how this affects me.

In my profession money is king. Most everyone who is rising in my business probably wants a 10,000 sf mansion and a fleet of Mercedes in the 10 car garage. I am interested in backpacking, spending time outdoors, the tiny house and minimalist movements interest me. In my profession that might be considered odd/contradictory. I don't want to quit my job, I'm not lying to anyone telling them that I want a mansion with a helipad, they can think what they want. I am a young, aggressive, sharp guy that wants to rise in my field, make money, be the boss eventually or own my own company. That's all they need to know about me. So for me, something as innocent as posting about the tiny house movement might be a red flag. 'What is this guy some kind of liberal hippy? backpacking?, camping under a tarp on the ground? Tiny houses?'

This is just one example.

One of the main reasons is I just don't want to make vast amounts of information about myself available to anyone that can run a search in google. Just from a privacy standpoint, it's none of anyone's business. The only person that needs to know everything and everything about me is my wife (and she does).

Google Earth street view is amazing/crazy....and available to anyone with a computer. Kinda scary.

Somewhere I ran across a Google Street View website one time that was weird/odd pictures people had found. They would post the pic and people would comment. One of the ones with the most funny comments stories was looking into a driveway, a naked guy was crawling out of the trunk of the car parked in the driveway, there was an open umbrella in the driveway but the sky was sunny and blue, and there was a dog laying in the driveway that was either napping or dead. The stories people were coming up with were hilarious. It was like 'okay, the guy killed his dog with the umbrella, didnt want to get blood on his clothes so he stripped naked to load the dog in the car'. Or 'The mafia shot the guy and his dog, loaded the guy into the trunk...' Funny.

"the "nothing to hide" argument is" a giant step on the road to a totalitarian society. We're not as many steps from that as many of our fellow 'Mericans seem to assume.

To all those who say there's no such thing as privacy anymore, I say you're not getting far enough off trail. ;0)

I find it funny how many are concerned with privacy but yet still post on multiple forms. Oh the irony!

If your not going to say anything offensive why do you need freedom of speech?
if your not going to break the law why do you need a trail?
if your not a paranoid cynic why do you need a vote?
if your innocent why do you need a lawyer?
if your not going to assault people why do you need to bear arms?
if your not hiding anything why do we need a warrant to search and seize your property?
if your not a violent unemployed mob why do you need the right to assemble?
seems like only criminals would support civil and constitutional rights.

If you spend some time here and look around you will see many posters with incomplete, made up and phoney screen names. Despite what Addie says. Look for yourselves.

"You can call me Ray, you can call me Jay, but your don't have to call me Johnson."

Call me anything you want. Just don't call me late for dinner.

OK, let me be the devil's advocate for a moment.

I'm in the market for a really cool Trail Star and I know that Doug has just the item. I use his name and his location info from BPL to do a web search and find his address (in about 5 minutes). I check out his house and neighbourhood in Google Street View to make sure a break-in wouldn't be too obvious. That would take me another 5 minutes.

I also know from his postings that Doug is a very out-going guy and likes to do group backpacking trips. I can time my break-in for when he's off with a group of BPL friends. I could drop by his house while he's away and pitch a tarp on his lawn. This way, when his neighbour comes over to check me out, I tell him Doug invited me over to use his house while he was away on his trip. I'm heading out on a trip myself and Doug was kind enough to offer me his house so that I can hit the trail head early tomorrow. I thought I'd test my tarp setup one more time before heading out... probably a pretty natural sight at Doug's house. This provides an excellent reason (for the nosey neighbour) for me to be taking a backpack full of gear out of Doug's house.

As I walk out of Doug's house with my backpack loaded with all of Doug's extra backpacking gear, I'm thinking, dam*, Doug took his Trail Star with him! Not a big issue because once I sell all of his "extra" gear, I'll be able to buy my own Trail Star and then maybe I'll even arrange a group trip with Doug so that I can try out my new Trail Star and get some setup tips from Doug.

I was actually going to hit Ken Thompson's house because I like his shelters better but the idea of two dogs made me nervous ;)

I'm just saying...

Maybe if everyone just used the same screen name . . . ?

As in:

Joe: You don't know what you're talking about, Joe.

Joe: No, Joe, you're the one who's an idiot.

Joe: Would both of you try to keep it civil.

Knock yourself out. I'm insured, armed and live in view of the Police station. If I am not home chances are I have the few belongings that you were looking at with me.

And really this need not have been started at all. Plenty of BPL members who do not use their whole or even real names.

PJ
Dave T
Mike W
nanook ofthenorth
Jolly Green Giant
Hikin' Jim
Donna C
C Ash
Kat P
etc, etc...
Just a few examples that I could think of.

Had you not drawn attention to yourself(my preferred tactic usually). Nobody would have noticed.

And Ty. If you are not true to yourself, your going to have a stroke or get an ulcer or something. Time for introspection.

Edited by kthompson on 01/27/2012 07:16:37 MST.

I think I just realized that we are all playin' on the same team within this discussion. I don't believe anyone has expressed the NEED to use full names, only their own reasoning. To make clear, I'm totally cool with using initials (it adds a level of mystery and intrigue!) and I believe we all ended up agreeing on a couple of somewhat-related-but-not-the-original topics:

--Personal accountability is low right now and people should be responsible for their words.
--Certain aspects of our lives are nobody's business but our own.

Ty Ty, thanks for sharing your story. Whether you use your 'official name' or not, I think that the sharing of experience can do just as much to create a sense of community as using full names.

>>"the "nothing to hide" argument is" a giant step on the road to a totalitarian society"<<

A scary thought, for sure.

>>"To all those who say there's no such thing as privacy anymore, I say you're not getting far enough off trail. ;0)"<<

A HUGE +1

No wonder so many of you guys carry guns. Everyone is out to get you! :)

Problem solved (for now).

"I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered! My life is my own!"

Edited by asdzxc57 on 02/12/2012 20:01:54 MST.

For how long and whither? Analysis please?Thanks, J

You are number 6.

-- the new number 2.