Hatrack River Forum: Big Brother?

This is topic Big Brother? in forum Books, Films, Food and Culture at Hatrack River Forum.

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Posted by camus (Member # 8052) on :

quote:
A secret code embedded in many colour laser jet printers allows the US government and any other organisation capable of reading the cipher to identify when the copies were made and on which particular machine...Among the copiers found to include the secret yellow dots are ones made by Brother, Canon, Dell, Epson, HP, Konica/Minolta, Kyocera, Lexmark, Ricoh, Tektronix/Toshiba and Xerox...

although the Secret Service claims to use this information only for cornering counterfeit crimes, there is no legal framework to prevent the information being put to other uses.

"this technology makes it easier for governments to find dissenters," said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Lee Tien

"Even worse, it shows how the government and private industry make backroom deals to weaken our privacy by compromising everyday equipment like printers.

"The logical next question is: what other deals have been or are being made to ensure that our technology rats on us?."

News24 Article

Posted by ludosti (Member # 1772) on :

I liked how printers and copiers are referred to interchangably.

Posted by Telperion the Silver (Member # 6074) on :

Um... weird and creepy... [Angst]

Posted by Orson Scott Card (Member # 209) on :

You watch ... uteruses are next. Every child born with a little dot that records exactly who the parents are ...

Oh, wait. already got it. DNA.

Posted by JannieJ (Member # 8683) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Orson Scott Card:
You watch ... uteruses are next. Every child born with a little dot that records exactly who the parents are ...

Oh, wait. already got it. DNA.

I was totally not expecting that, and I think I just inhaled my chamomile tea by accident. [Wink]

Posted by human_2.0 (Member # 6006) on :

I think the idea behind the printers is that lots of bad things can be done with them, and having printer "fingerprints" helps the "good guys".

Also, this is pretty old news. The current privacy problems come from the databases and cameras. If you think you have privacy, think again.

Comercial businesses do not have the laws restricting how they can link their databases like the government does. Anyone watchdogging them? Amazon knows more about you than you do...

Anyone live in Chicago? Do you know most of the city is under constant camera survaliance? There are so many articles on it, I'll just link to Google:

http://www.google.com/search?q=chicago+police+camera&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

If you are in law enforcement, Chicago is the bomb. If you are a bad guy, you stay away from Chicago. If you are neither, you are probably upset.

Posted by Joldo (Member # 6991) on :

Camera surveillance isn't such a bad thing, at least in public areas. It's no invasion of privacy, unless they work on cameras that won't show your clothes in the tape.

Hey, Germany's had 'em for years and we're doign just fine.

Posted by Tante Shvester (Member # 8202) on :

Nice to see you back on this side, Mr. Card. [Wave]

And I don't understand why the copier and printer companies would want to embed this surveillance in their products. What is in it for them?

Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :

One possibility, it may be a requirement (or threatened requirement) for printers to be purchased by the federal government. Unless non-government entities stopped buying the printers because of this, it would be cheaper to just have the models with the dot fingerprinting.

Don't know that this is the case, but it wouldn't surprise me.