Privacy advocates gained access to a powerful tool bought by U.S. law enforcement agencies that can track smartphone locations around the world. Abortion clinics, places of worship, and individual people can all be monitored without a warrant.

Privacy advocates got access to Locate X, a phone tracking tool which multiple U.S. agencies have bought access to, and showed me and other journalists exactly what it was capable of. Tracking a phone from one state to another to an abortion clinic. Multiple places of worship. A school. Following a likely juror to a residence. And all of this tracking is possible without a warrant, and instead just a few clicks of a mouse.

  • Skates@feddit.nlEnglish
    2·
    12 hours ago

    This is correct. But if you don’t work in the field, it’s fine.

    You don’t have to know how to bottle wine if you’re not a wine maker. You don’t need to know how to build a dam if you’re not an engineer. You don’t have to learn everything about the architecture of an OS if you’re a user and not a programmer. Let the kids use their devices without knowing obscure shit, just like people let us wear clothes without knowing how to sew. There are things we should all know how to do - changing a light bulb is cheaper if you don’t call an electrician every time it needs to be done. But there are things that are so opaque at first sight that they need to be performed by people with specialized knowledge. And it’s okay to not have that knowledge if you’re not in that field.

    Yes, there are 1-2 generations where everyone was learning how computers work. But there were also quite a few generations where everyone was learning how agriculture and farming works - you know, to survive. And I’ll be damned if I wanna have my kids birth a cow or install Linux on their PC. Unless for some godforsaken reason they decide that’s their job.

    • DogWater@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      5 hours ago

      You’re ignoring the point of why it’s useful and at this point, necessary, to have an above average understanding of technology to maintain any semblance of privacy in your life…you can do so much harm to yourself without ever knowing it just by having an Alexa or by having a Tesla.

      At certain point it’s like what the fuck can we even do with things specifically like the tool this article is talking about but tech illiteracy isn’t excusable if this day and age anymore. The world demands a certain level of knowledge or you can and will be exploited.

      • Skates@feddit.nlEnglish
        1·
        2 hours ago

        I know this is the case today, but we are still in the early days of massive surveillance and everyone being globally interconnected. I have to trust legislation will follow to regulate this, just like any potentially dangerous invention is now regulated in most countries, from pharmaceuticals to firearms, to lead based paints, to news outlets.

        The fact of the matter is, regular people cannot keep up with all inventions ever. It’s up to governments to protect their citizens from threats, and a failure to do so should be punished. If instead the government chooses to be that threat, the solution isn’t easy, but it is simple.