[WMCoolmon]

http://www.networkworld.com/community/?q=node/8699

Pessimist that I am, I don't see a big positive reason for untraceable IM outside of some kind of witness protection or government function. Still, it seems a sad indicator of the times that the article immediately suggests the government perceiving the program as aiding a terrorist threat.

[Turambar]

well then i gotta get it.

it wont be long before they are  reading my IMs, if they arent already

[vyper]

I want.

[Mefustae]

Indeed, i'm planning a coup and could really use a nice, covert method of communications. My secret codename for use in emails isn't very flattering.

[Rictor]

Traceless anything is OK by me. Privacy is quickly becoming a thing of the past, and not just because of Bush and his scary CIA types. Corporations do it. search engines do it, governments both federal and local do it, we do it to each other etc. I'm afraid that privacy and anonymity is a luxury the coming generations will not know.

[Ford Prefect]

Too true. One must wonder how long it will be before "undressing that chick with your eyes" is no longer figurative.

[WMCoolmon]

Too true. One must wonder how long it will be before "undressing that chick with your eyes" is no longer figurative.

Where did that come from?

But I would argue that in many ways, socioeconomic privacy is more important than being seen naked. It seems to me that if you're oh-so-worried about being seen naked, you're either A) using that as a manipulative power, B) clinging to some morals that (while admirable) don't really have a practical bearing, or C) are overly concerned about what other people may think about you. Granted, there are a lot of people who will judge you for a lot less, but unless you have genital herpes or something, it's probably not going to tell people a whole lot of serious info that they didn't already know.

[Ford Prefect]

Where did that come from?

Just some purely academic commentary on the implications of these privacy questions.

*Cough*

[Mr. Vega]

Traceless anything is OK by me. Privacy is quickly becoming a thing of the past, and not just because of Bush and his scary CIA types. Corporations do it. search engines do it, governments both federal and local do it, we do it to each other etc. I'm afraid that privacy and anonymity is a luxury the coming generations will not know.

I don't know. The communist witch hunts of the 50s started up a lot of violations of personal rights, but it was followed by a massive backlash less than a decade later. Come on, Miranda vs. Arizona was criticized for being too anti-police back in the day. Is there anyone saying that now? There may yet be another reaction looming in the years ahead, that will undo every **** up Bushy here has created.

[Rictor]

But like I said, Bush is the least of it. It could be anyone and the point would still stand. It's worse, because dwindling privacy is not a function of politics, which can be reversed, but technology, which can't. Massive use of CCTV cameras (all modern cities have them), online shoping and searching and instant messenger, more debit and credit card transactions (as opposed to traceless cash) and a million other things are all ensuring that privacy dies the death of a thousand cuts. It's not any one thing, and by no means are all the factors, or even the worst ones, viewed as negative by people. If your financial transactions being tracked is the price to pay for quick and easy purchases anywhere, most people will go the route of convenience. If you can Google someone, and come up with a pretty decent sketch of that person, others can do it to you. If social networks track your online activities to custom tailor ads and content to your personality, who's going to complain about that.

The difference is only clear if you really think about it. One alternative is to live in a world where you can murder someone and get away with it (assuming you don't do anything stupid like leave fingerprints), but you there's no Amazon.com. That's the world as it's been up to this point. The other alternative is a world where everything ios quick and easy and affordable, but privacy and anonymity exist only as theoretical concepts. Basically, the difference between living in a golden cage or a desolate, harsh wilderness. Now I'm not saying that these two are realities, they are merely opposite ends of the scale along which society slides. As technology progresses, it is nearly inevtiable (and that "nearly" being about 99.99%) that privacy will go down the ****ter. If we have the capability to do something, in this case spy on people (for their own good of course), we WILL exercise it.

[WMCoolmon]

Well, to play devil's advocate a moment...if we assume that it is never abused for the wrong reason, is lack of privacy really a bad thing? One of the weaknesses I see in most debates is that most arguments for privacy rely on the assumption that people will abuse it.

And from a security POV, it makes sense. If you put the 'national' situation into a smaller scale, eg for a network where the administrator would be equivelant to the president, things start to make a lot more sense. No changes in policy or software without asking a committee. No reading any kind of e-mails, or monitoring any kind of network connections, or access to any user files, without getting authorization from a supervisor/management. Constant public scrutiny by the rest of the workforce. Under those kinds of conditions, wouldn't almost anyone take advantage of a penetration by hackers to gain control of more and more aspects of the system? Especially if you were dealing with the possibility of someone inside the company attempting to divulge secrets to competitors or otherwise cause system damage.

Although, arguably, it's not even as clearly defined as that. Privacy and lack thereof can have a huge impact on people's behavior. In a world without privacy, people simply may not understand what they'd be missing - and thus would have no negative feelings about it whatsoever.

Although, I get the feeling that this line of thinking will lead to "What defines the value of life?" and from there, "What is the meaning of life?" so perhaps it's not a very practical philosophical pursuit to answer the question of privacy.