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Comment by LukaAl | Hacker News Reader

I have two problems with your reasoning:

- Who decides that hacking the Mafia is Ok and someone else it is not? And if Mafia is ok, what about lesser criminals? What about someone you suspect is criminal but you are not sure?

- It is in theory laudable to ask full transparency from our politicians. And, yes, the on/off record distinction is sometimes problematic. But this is not what we are talking about. The article discusses private conversation between two public persons. They should think on how they express themselves in these conversations? This couldn't have the effect of freezing their ability to communicate? I have no idea, but I think it will be problematic. I'm not saying that one of the two involved parties could not breach the privacy assumption. That is own personal choice with the consequences to his reputation, so he could decide to do that according to his ethical consideration if he thinks what he has seen is wrong...

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>They should think on how they express themselves in these conversations?

Everything we say, including the way we say it, is a reflection of our values and though processes. If the way somebody talks off-record is drastically different from the way he/she talks on record, the problem is not the off record talk. The problem is that this mismatch indicates that the on-record talk doesn't actually reflect the person's true values and opinions and is just a facade.

I think you're looking for an objective truth that just doesn't exist. People change their minds. People have different opinions on things from one day to the next, based on what they just read. People will publicly say "the right thing" while privately having reservations about it - and that's ok.

Now if they go round saying the exact opposite in private, and condemn their own public remarks, then there's a problem. But that's mostly not the case.

I'm not sure I want to ever work with you. There are a lot of situations when with my coworker I discuss things in a way that could be misunderstood. This because my coworker have access to a lot of context (we work together) and they are well intentioned and able to extrapolate from the context my real meaning and belief. The general public doesn't have the same context. Plus, a third party could have a vested interest in representing my ideas under the worst light for me. So this is why I want to make some statement publicly, knowing the impact of my phrase, and use a different tone in private with people that know me.

And that's without touching the problem of public policies. Honestly speaking, some issues are generally too complex to be analyzed in a debate or in public speeches. So complex articulated analysis needs to be reduced and simplified. On some topic, it is possible to have a point of view that, when expressed, is a very valid one, but requires a lot of education to get buy-in from the general public. So if you are a politician what do you do? You could choose to use part of your consensus to push for a dividing policy and educate the public on why you are right. Are you could decide to wait, flow with the public, until you are ready to make your position public.

> Who decides that hacking the Mafia is Ok and someone else it is not?

The public may or may not have sympathy with it, but it's a crime. The hacker who did it would have committed a crime and would be sought out and prosecuted appropriately.

Some considerations:

* The hacker's intent--purely altruistic or otherwise--is irrelevant (or at least must be left to a judge/jury to consider)

* The hacker acted as vigilante. The argument that a hacker turning up dirt on "bad" people is acceptable would be arbitrary, and the rule of law would thereby be subverted. You can't have one set of laws for some folk and not for others under the rule of law.

As a corollary, I just listened to a guy at a security conference talk about how he had hacked black market credit card resellers and deleted their databases. Arguably a good thing, right? Ignore him, eh? Give him a medal, perhaps? Well... first he'd downloaded their inventory for his own black market site. Whoops.

FWIW, he did his time and now works for Wired as a security correspondent.

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