Privacy; should you even bother?

[WHVW]

Hi All:

I've been asking a lot of questions about privacy lately. But read this:

https://www.chromium.org/Home/chromium- ... mechanisms

Now, is it worth it? Is there any real chance? (for privacy)

later

[all41]

Now, is it worth it? Is there any real chance? (for privacy)

In my (rather uninformed) opinion:
any hack can be mitigated and any mitigation can be hacked---
it's a vicious circle

[RIH]

Personally I look at it like physical house security.
No house is completely safe from being broken into, however that does not mean it is reasonable for me to leave my front door open when I go out.
So I lock my front door (use Linux rather than another system) & bar my windows (use a VPN & high privacy on my browsers), but I haven't resorted to building a moat & filling it with crocodiles like some advocate..

[all41]

building a moat & filling it with crocodiles like some advocate..

even then the crocs could be negated with a couple wildebeests

[Moem]

Yes, I personally believe that I should bother. There is a lot of difference between leaking some data (which probably can't be avoided) and leaking all of the data, all of the time.

[all41]

Somewhat like flour in a sifter

[Moem]

But some sifters have more holes than others.

[cliffcoggin]

Of course you should bother. If you give up the battle for an individual's rights in all their forms and allow states, institutions, and corporations to win you might as well curl up and die. The battle here began 800 years ago with Magna Carta and continues to this day. Nil illegitemi carborundum!

Apologies if that is too overtly political for this forum.

[Hoser Rob]

Yes, I personally believe that I should bother. There is a lot of difference between leaking some data (which probably can't be avoided) and leaking all of the data, all of the time.

+1.

[WHVW]

Hi All;

It is good to see response.....this is an extremely important subject....after reading that article (which, face it friends, seems rather grim...I read the whole thing) perhaps there are some things we all could do to improve the situation. For example:

Perhaps a "Privacy and Security" category on the main board index where various ideas and procedures could be worked out, discussed, and exchanged. (maybe covering some of the following subjects?)

There are a lot of "add-ons" for Firefox; yet little or no information on which ones are best, and less about which ones overlap, cause conflicts or make others superfluous. Such information could be invaluable.


In my readings, I keep seeing phrases such as "TOR makes no attempt to hide its presence" (well, why not?) can anything be done about thatt? If you are using TOR, just why would you want to advertise it, anyway? Wouldn't that make the trackers sniff harder?

Another representative example is anti-fingerprinting add-ons. They are said to have an obvious presence-well, why? Helping add-ons and other privacy-enhancing programmes disguise their activity seems to me as if it would be a big plus.

Perhaps a LM xx.x "privacy edition"?

Those are just a few ideas. There are, quite literally, thousands more. Hopefully you might find merit in them, and/or have better ones.

Later

[hattpa]

I agree with RIH , you should do what you can, no system is 100% secure, but most crackers are just looking for an easy win, make it tricky, some will persevere, but most will move on.

[Faust]

Of course you should bother. If you give up the battle for an individual's rights in all their forms and allow states, institutions, and corporations to win you might as well curl up and die. The battle here began 800 years ago with Magna Carta and continues to this day. Nil illegitemi carborundum!

Apologies if that is too overtly political for this forum.

Don't you just love Latin and it's awesome precision ?
" Illegitimi non carborundum " ...... "the unlawful are [or have] not silicon carbide”

" Nice one Centurion "

All said in fun of course ....
But joking aside , privacy is certainly important to me , and I'll keep on fighting the intrusions !

" Keep on rockin' in the free world " ...... Hmmm

[cliffcoggin]

Don't you just love Latin and it's awesome precision ?
" Illegitimi non carborundum " ...... "the unlawful are [or have] not silicon carbide”

" Nice one Centurion "

Romanes eunt domus.

[WHVW]

Hi All:

Well, I start a post about privacy and security, and instead spark a tutorial on Latin! Don't get me wrong, I actually love Latin, it is the basis of the language group ( English, French,Italian and Spanish) that, most likely, 65% of this site's users speak one or more of.

Romanes eunt domus

Rome (or writing) will conquer? Confession: I am too lazy at this moment, to go upstairs to get the Latin dictionary.

Seriously, though, and getting back to the subject, I suppose that this, plus the fact that there were only 273 views, is a rather strong indicator that there is little interest in what I have suggested.
Oh, well.

[Pierre]

maybe, it's now time to refine that Question:
- - is changing your Operating System to an Linux Based System - enough?
or should you do even more ?

considering that it is hard enough, to convince folks to Abandon That Other System.

[WHVW]

Pierre:

It is not enough (from what I've been able to discover) just to switch from "that other OP Sys" (I have been using Linux for almost 20 years ). Yes, Winderz is famous (perhaps infamous? ) for telling any website that asks: "you wanna download and run an executable file? Sure, no problem!" That is, unfortunately, not the entire depth of the problem (s). From what I could get from the article I mentioned at the start of this post, it is also a matter of where certain bits of data are stored, and the obviousness of the patch-around that enable many tracking schemes to see through the obfuscation effort.
Even with "User Agent Switcher" Browserleaks reports Firefox and Ubuntu, obviously that programme is either not enough or not designed properly.
Bits of data (MAC address was one mentioned) not only need to be varied, but varied in a way that looks entirely normal to spying eyes. Variable jitter needs to be introduced into the system clock, but again in an opaque manner. According to the article, even nanosecond clock drift can be an effective tracker. A programme that would adjust your system clock readout (to the outside world) to agree with the timezone of your VPN would probably not be a bad idea.
Although I cannot write code, it would seem to me that the "architecture" of the OP Sys would need to be modified in order that it could run on top of an "obfuscation layer" of system information that could be varied while looking entirely genuine to to the outside world.
Hopefully that made sense.

[majpooper]

Hi All:

I've been asking a lot of questions about privacy lately. But read this:

https://www.chromium.org/Home/chromium- ... mechanisms

Now, is it worth it? Is there any real chance? (for privacy)

later

While I agree we should all try and protect our privacy to whatever extent possible which definitely has a security component to it - the horse is out of the barn as they say. Unfortunately your privacy is not simply a matter of locking down you systems because the reality is that all our "private" data and thus our personal identity resides all over the Internet. I have mentioned this before - in my case the US Government's Office of Personnel Management (OPM) was hacked and millions of federal employee's and military member's records were stolen (China . . . maybe, who knows for sure). I once had a Top Secret clearance which involved a quite extensive back ground check which delved into all aspects of my life, family and who they associated with, friends and who they associated with, high school college sports and clubs, everywhere I ever lived and who my neighbors and friends are/were, every major purchase, finances, traffic tickets and on and on and on. Then there was the Exquafax (sp??) breach that exposed all my financial history to who knows who. Neither of these had anything to do with how my systems, i.e. PCs, laptops routers etc. were configured. And then some of us, not me, use social media like Facebook and Google whose business model is to exploit it's user's personal privacy for profit. The point is we have no choice but to trust systems and organizations well outside our control to protect our privacy unless we somehow want to try and exist outside of main stream society.

[cliffcoggin]

Hi All:

Well, I start a post about privacy and security, and instead spark a tutorial on Latin! Don't get me wrong, I actually love Latin, it is the basis of the language group ( English, French,Italian and Spanish) that, most likely, 65% of this site's users speak one or more of.

Romanes eunt domus

Rome (or writing) will conquer? Confession: I am too lazy at this moment, to go upstairs to get the Latin dictionary.

Twas my feeble attempt at humour. All is explained here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lczHvB3Y9s

[WHVW]

majpooper: (thank you for your service)

You have a point: However, Equifax, and certain aspects of Facebook etc. are probably best approached legislatively.

Equifax (et al) present an interesting question: do we really want a large, intrusive corporation arbitrarily assigning to us a number that dictates how well we may function in this world?

As for that separate aspect of Facebook, (etc.) That is a little different, however, inasmuch as you choose to join, although that doesn't mean that you want them to share/sell your private information. The other third of Facebook's evil is, of course, the beacons, trackers malware, etc. they install on your machine whether you want it or not. That aspect is what we could fix on our machines.

I remember when Facebook was all the rage, and everyone was saying: " Oh, you must join!" I took a pass. Same for all the other idiotic iterations of "social" media. I place social in quotes because I consider it to be far more anti-social than social. What, I ask you, could be more of a shallow relationship than a Facebook "friend"? I digress.

cliffcoggin :

Humour is cool. It's a great coping mechanism. Don't enjoy it too overtly however, or they will make it illegal.

Back to the main point: What I would like to see here is a separate "Privacy and Security" section on the main board to facilitate advances in this vital area. If you don't think its important today, you will tomorrow.

Linux has allowed us to revel in a virus-free world, and that, I fear, has engendered a false sense of security: viruses are not the only bad actors out there.

later

[Moem]

Back to the main point: What I would like to see here is a separate "Privacy and Security" section on the main board to facilitate advances in this vital area. If you don't think its important today, you will tomorrow.

You're not the first to ask and you won't be the last, but there are reasons why we don't have that: viewtopic.php?f=90&t=277817&p=1556382#p1556410