Azaran on 28/1/2012 at 06:48
Blocking child porn and racist sites is not the problem; it's when they start blocking other stuff, such as material that intelligence agencies consider unfit for public eyes. I've read more than once that they've silently blocked sites on the US military, and on various leaks, after pressure from the US government. I can't ascertain whether it actually happened, or it's just people being paranoid, but in any case I'm a bit less trusting of Google these days.
heywood on 30/1/2012 at 01:24
Google Maps street view content was pulled from around US military bases, and there are a lot of sites which have been blurred out on satellite view at government request. Besides, it's common knowledge that Google has been censoring search results for years at the whim of various governments and they do all kinds of region filtering as part of normal business.
It's not just censorship that we should be worried about. Google has a whole department of people to handle the volume of secret FISA warrants they get from the US. And despite the threat of terrorism waning in the US, the use of secret warrants keeps growing:
(
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/73598.html) http://www.technewsworld.com/story/73598.html
Also, we still haven't gotten to the bottom of the Google-NSA agreement:
(
http://epic.org/foia/epic_v_nsa_google.html) http://epic.org/foia/epic_v_nsa_google.html
It's likely that Google is both the world's biggest censor and the world's biggest privacy foe.
Sg3 on 31/1/2012 at 05:20
I must say, I did find it surprising that Google would be one to make a stand against censorship.
Sg3 on 31/1/2012 at 05:36
I would guess that Area 51 is old hat by now. Like it's so infamous that they don't bother to keep anything serious there anymore. No sense trying to keep something that well-known a secret. [g]
demagogue on 31/1/2012 at 07:08
It's the best place for testing new military aircraft. A massive, flat, dried-up lakebed miles from civilization. As I understand it, it was never much more nor less than that. And since everything that's always made it a good testing grounds still mostly applies, location-wise (you have to imagine whatever place they pick will be discovered sooner or later, so it falls back on what actual location is best suited for the job), I think it's probably seeing the same use now as it always has.
R Soul on 8/3/2012 at 17:09
If anyone has files stored on Hotfile, you may want to save them to another site too:
(
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17300225)
Just like with Megaupload, we can be sure the site will be shut down before the owners are proven to have broken any laws, and with no regard to users who have used the site for lawful reasons.
Azaran on 10/3/2012 at 17:41
Fuck :(
Sg3 on 11/3/2012 at 15:49
Generally speaking, the people are to blame for the loss of their digital rights. I've consistently observed a stubborn apathy concerning the subject in the colossal majority of P.C. users of all types. For example: I am, literally speaking, the only person I know who actually reads E.U.L.A.s. That alone--the fact that no one reads E.U.L.A.s--is enough to ensure the eventual destruction of digital liberty. I have seen many scoff at those who are leery of Facebook, Steam, et al., but time will prove these doubts well-founded. Indeed, it already is doing so, unfortunately.
Koki on 11/3/2012 at 18:42
d e s t r u c t i o n o f d i g i t a l l i b e r t y
