vvswarup

mtbnut said:

Do Google majority shareholders trade using real money? If Apple releases an AC adapter that isn't to their investors' liking, they revolt; Google, on the other hand, releases turd after turd...and crickets.

 

Google's majority shareholders are the founders themselves. They created a shareholder structure that gives them unchallenged control of the company. To this day, I am amazed that Google's founders got away with basically saying to shareholders "we are trying to protect ourselves from the likes of you." 

This is an encouraging sign. To begin with, American LEOs who have stepped up to the pulpit to attempt to paint Apple as in cahoots with criminals have completely ignored the fact that encryption isn't some American military secret. In calling for backdoors, these self-serving LEOs and politicians have conveniently neglected to mention the fact that encryption boils down to math and computer science. Weakening encryption in the US with backdoors will do nothing to stop malicious users from finding ways to communicate in secret. It's another encouraging sign that backdoors have been labeled as "weakening encryption." This is a label that Comey and other LEOs have vigorously refuted.

It's time people realize that encryption has far more uses than to just protect us from government intrusion. This is how Comey and other LEOs have attacked encryption-by painting as a tool meant solely to protect our civil liberties. Granted that civil liberties are a major consideration with encryption but the need for encryption goes far beyond just that. The threat of hackers is very real and very grave to an extent that weakening encryption will actually make us less secure as a nation. 

awilliams87 said:

vvswarup said:

Trump is barking up the wrong tree. It's not in Tim Cook's hands where iPhones are made. People like to think Apple closed down its American factories and moved them to China to save money. That's not what happened. Apple closed down every single one of its factories in the entire world. Apple doesn't want to be in manufacturing. Apple designs all the components for its devices. It then pays component manufacturers to make them according to Apple's specifications. Those component manufacturers are located all over the world. Some of them are even in the USA.

Bottom line is that Apple cannot "move manufacturing back to the USA" because it doesn't own any manufacturing plants to begin with. 

But Apple does want to manufacture it's own products if it reaches cost parity with outsourcing it to others.

Manufacturing is a capital-intensive business. That's the reason Apple got out in the first place. Cutting regulations to the bone won't solve that problem. 

Trump is barking up the wrong tree. It's not in Tim Cook's hands where iPhones are made. People like to think Apple closed down its American factories and moved them to China to save money. That's not what happened. Apple closed down every single one of its factories in the entire world. Apple doesn't want to be in manufacturing. Apple designs all the components for its devices. It then pays component manufacturers to make them according to Apple's specifications. Those component manufacturers are located all over the world. Some of them are even in the USA.

Bottom line is that Apple cannot "move manufacturing back to the USA" because it doesn't own any manufacturing plants to begin with. 

securtis said:

vvswarup said:

So essentially you're saying "let's all give up our rights now or else when things get really bad, the government will take away even more rights from us." 

The only reason the government can pass the kinds of laws you're describing in the wake of a terrorist attack would be because we as a people put them in power. If we fall prey to irrational thinking, what you're describing will happen. Since Apple stopped keeping encryption keys, Comey and other LEOs stepped up to the podium to bash Apple. They tried to paint Apple as the friend of "terrorists, rapists, child pornographers, and any other abhorrent type of criminal." The pie chart we're seeing here paints the exact opposite picture. Of the 400+ iPhones that the DA's office can't crack, more than 60% are tied to drug crimes and cybercrime, neither of which fit the FUD that Comey and other LEOs tried to spread. What does that tell you? 

Since when do people act rationally predictably? The whole point of this is to be proactive and not reactive. I agree that for most of the crimes you list we shouldn't go all out fighting to unlock them but for terrorism, things are different. I personally would be ok with giving up some some electronic data if it could prevent deaths and or limit broad draconian measures from effecting broad swaths of our population (muslims).

What do you view the government as-some all powerful entity that can do whatever it wants? The government is only as powerful as we the people are willing to make it. The government will get away with passing those draconian measures only if we keep such people in power. 

You say that the point of this is to be "proactive and not reactive," then let's educate ourselves. Throughout history, governments have used the specter of war or attack from outside to frighten the populace into giving up its rights. The FBI's tactics are no different. The counter to that is for us to see through the rhetoric spewed by Comey and other LEOs. In every investigation of a terror attack in the US, it has never been determine that the government could have foiled the plot if it had more intel. Even 9/11 wasn't chalked up to insufficient intel. On the contrary, the government had tons of intel. It just couldn't act on it properly. 

If you want to hand over your data, be my guest. I'm not going to.