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Comment by kelnos | Hacker News Reader

Because we need to understand the purpose of the data collection and what bad things might happen because of it.

If Treasury is using this data to catch people who violate economic sanctions, ok. If the IRS is using this data to catch people who cheat on their taxes, ok. I don't love either of those things, but they are using the data only to do things that have been defined as their job to do for a long time now.

There doesn't seem to be any evidence that any of this data is going to be used to penalize people financially/economically for "social infractions", or to penalize people in unrelated ways (like, you missed payments on your credit card so you aren't allowed to ride on a train). If there was, then sure, that's cause for worry.

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>> There doesn't seem to be any evidence that any of this data is going to be used to penalize people financially/economically for "social infractions"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IRS_targeting_controversy

That's bad, but is not what we're talking about here. Not to mention it was a big scandal and that practice (which was not supported by any law or legal policy) has stopped. The China-style social credit system people worry about is something done on purpose, as designed, out in the open.

Can we stop taking isolated incidents and framing them as official policy?

> what bad things might happen because of it

> can we stop taking isolated incidents and framing them as official policy

Which do you actually want? What bad things that might happen because of it, or that list of bad things massively trimmed down to just what the US government publicly sanctions as official policy?

Don't forget to add parallel construction to the list of options too: bad things that then help make a separate case using sanctioned methods.

>>> In January 2014, James Comey, who at the time was the FBI director, told Fox News that its investigation had found no evidence so far warranting the filing of federal criminal charges in connection with the controversy, as it had not found any evidence of "enemy hunting", and that the investigation continued. On October 23, 2015, the Justice Department declared that no criminal charges would be filed.

Corrupt Comey, who shored up the ranks on the Steele dossier gaffe which is now bearing court cases, doesn't seem like the bastion of integrity that we should be assuming is performing in good faith.

Also, did you read anything else in the article?

The IRS did nothing wrong here, and it certainly is not an example of the IRS penalizing people for social infractions. As with any movement with lots of money and momentum and rapidly gaining popularity, there were a lot of fraudsters capitalizing on the Tea Party movement's name and engaging in shady tax dodging practices. The IRS was correct to subject them to increased scrutiny.

In terms of the facts involved, this has nothing to do with China's social credit score. Note that I am strictly talking about the facts involved, not the political fallout and usual bloviating.

>> The IRS did nothing wrong here

Uhh, that's obviously debatable.

I was responding to a very specific claim. It does have to do with China's social credit score in that it is a slide down the slope toward implementing such nonsense in the US.

> There doesn't seem to be any evidence that any of this data is going to be used to

Irrelevant. Get a targeted warrant, then get limited data.

I think history has shown enough times, that there needs to be a bigger barrier than, "no evidence currently that this data will be used in ways that differ from the stated reason"

I think the barrier is that if people getting canceled impacts their credit score, or if their credit directly impacts their ability to travel or get a job, there'd be a lot of social unrest. Especially in a country where people's perception and politics plays a huge role in the functioning of the government

I'd argue that it doesn't play that big of a role in the functioning of the government. Privacy abuse has been pretty non-partisan for decades. As Chomsky would say, the areas of intersection between the parties represent the institutional power outside the democratic process. For example, the American people do not have a choice in how to treat Snowden, he has been deemed a treasonous criminal of the state, regardless of actual public opinion on the issue

I don't disagree that privacy abuse for various goals, or some governmental policies (like the treatment of Snowden) are not beholden to public opinion. Although the counterargument might be the intensity of public opinion on the topic.

My main argument is specifically around whether the US is veering towards the implementation of a social credit score (which I think would look like having ones credit score be impacted by social reasons, and having the credit score be more pivotal to various civil liberties like travel). That's the kind of thing I think intense public outrage would shift government behaviors, especially since it's the kind of policy that would impact every single American

fair point. I guess my counter argument to that is that it is very surprising how much public outrage can be controlled through lengthening time duration, media propaganda to fuel fear and anxiety.

the world is much different than it was 30 years ago. I'm sure many would be appalled by the lack of privacy and governmental overreach.

Also, in the current era, the division of the populace, to the point where many actively hate the other side and think they are evil, is the exact conditions where a social credit score could become palatable if you believed the other side would be affected more.

Just look at the current trend of cancel culture. Its not that far of a leap to make that government policy

The FBI needs file hashes of every photo on everyone's phone. It will help detect abusers of cp/illegal content.

It is the mandate of the FBI and their job for a long time now to stop those things.

There doesn't seem to be any evidence that these hashes would be used to penalize people in other ways, but if there was then sure, that's cause for worry.

/parody

The comment says /parody, but I'd happily sacrifice such a small amount of privacy (hashes of the photos of my phone; not even the photos themselves?) to help law enforcement detect abusers of child pornography and related illegal content.

The hypothetical "what if" of how those hashes could be used to penalize people in other ways is FUD. We can think of millions of ways to abuse any system -- but that doesn't mean that people will.

>"Because we need to understand the purpose of the data collection and what bad things might happen because of it."

And government would of course never abuse the data it has. We've heard that before. The have, they do and they will keep doing it.

Selective enforcement is more American than apple pie and baseball.

Look at the prosecution of Aaron Schwartz, where the prosecutor plainly indicated Aaron’s political views were motivation for being so zealous.

I agree that's bad, but what does it have to do with the current conversation? It seems like a non sequitur.

Maybe you didn't consent to the data being sold, yet it was sold anyway?

In the US, except in California perhaps, you have no recourse. In the EU, that's a violation of GDPR and various local data protection laws. Elsewhere, unclear.

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