Comment by y-c-o-m-b | Hacker News Reader

Comment by y-c-o-m-b | Hacker News Reader

It's evident citizens are not going to win the fight for privacy by trying to change policy. Voting has become nearly meaningless in the modern age when it comes to changing politics. Influencing businesses to do what's right is becoming more challenging too as this order shows they can just be forced to hand over data by authorities.

I don't want the "bad guys" getting away with their activities either, but I don't want some jackass in a volatile country to obtain my confidential data because the authorities are too incompetent to store it securely on their servers. It's just begging for identity theft and black-mail. Time and time again we've been shown that even the most sensitive data can't be secured properly (e.g. Equifax, Google, Yahoo, Anthem, NSA/CIA hacks and leaks).

I also don't want some corrupt cop having a bad day make up an absurdly false reason to go through my private life. It's bad enough with people getting drugs planted by corrupt cops; authorities just can't be trusted and there is no proper oversight to make sure they're acting ethically.

The only way to fight this is by developing tools to counteract these measures in a reasonably intelligent manner. Hidden multi-layer partitions, hidden "remote" hosts, encrypted decoys that show faux private content so it appears you're cooperating when real content is hidden, etc.

I disagree that voting has become meaningless. The issue is that young people think and feel that voting is meaningless. Thus politicians don't really have to pay attention to what young people think or want.

(You don't vote, you don't count.)

If you don't vote, your peers don't vote. You transfer your power to other people. Think of NRA. It is a small relatively movement. But if they say to their members go vote X, 100% of them are voting X. This conviction makes a difference. Even if they have 200 votes say, those 200 people are going to make sure everyone around them is going to vote appropriately. And the numbers stack. Also, as usual in the U.S. call your representatives, create a group and take legal action through courts, etc.

You have other tools in your belt too, which you mention. These are the "oh shit". But you wouldn't want 20 years from now, to have to use them, or go to jail for using them, because they were illegal.

People should also be aware that trying to convince people on the other side of whatever political fight you are in that voting is meaningless is a real strategy.

>I disagree that voting has become meaningless

You literally have better odds of winning the powerball than your vote having any effect on the outcome of a general election. Even if it did, the people put in office are worried about themselves and the people they owe money to -- not your opinions.

Voting is meaningful if you are aware of the candidates stances on such policies. If you would like to know more about a US candidate's stance on privacy, internet freedom, etc. then visit _decidethefuture.org_ to see what grade your local representative is getting.

> Voting is meaningful if you are aware of the candidates stances on such policies.

That's necessary but not sufficient. It's also necessary, in a representative democracy, for a candidate to exist that has a compatible stance on enough (for some definition thereof) policies and few enough incompatible stances.

Arguably, such a candidate must also have a reasonable chance of being elected.

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