The (original articles) title is a bit misleading. They only verified the importance of a specific protein and then found compounds that for mice helped the boost protein production in mice, they still need a lot more research to find something that would help human skin look youthful.
That makes it sound like it's still only theory that it would benefit mice. But they actually tried it:
> They isolated two chemical compounds — Y27632 and apocynin — and tested both on skin cells, with positive results. “Application of these drugs to full-thickness skin wounds significantly promoted wound repair,” the study said.
> More false positives wouldn't be a problem if CIA or NSA could predict even ONE significant international uprising before it happens.
Just because it's not in the headlines doesn't mean they didn't do anything. It's just that if the successfully stopped a terrorist attack for example, you wouldn't hear about it, both because it's no longer big news (nothing happened), and because those agencies would want to prevent the lose of assets as much as they can, so they wouldn't publish the information either.
I think the CIA and NSA have probably done a lot for the safety of America and US citizens (especially in times of peace). However (based on no evidence, just a hunch) I think that most of those cases, they just needed the basic tools already in their disposal (like monitoring suspects based on actual evidence and following a court order approval), and that the extreme means they use don't have a big impact when it comes to the security of lives (US or global).
I have to say I'm happy for this, I don't see much bad that can come of this, and I also agree that a lot of his suggestions are correct.
But I also agree that because of how powerful Facebook is, they can just do many of those things without fear of losing business to competition (like adopting the GDPR worldwide, or just not fighting certain governments when they do press them for privacy issues).
I think for him to blame the governments is a bit (or a lot) an escape from responsibility.
It was rather obvious even back then (or at least when Bezos first published his piece) that it was the Saudis that hacked his phone, I'm not entirely sure the significant of this message by De Becker.
Furthermore, at least the way I see it, the more important party at fault here is AMI. I mean we can't really be surprised that a dictatorship is using their powers against powerful and influential people (especially those that have publicly opposed and blamed them of crimes). But we should be outraged when an American corporation cooperates with them, and we should do what we can to stop and punish them, both the Saudis (in whatever way we can), and more easily, the entire AMI group, it's executives and everyone involved.
They are only the tool, but they are also almost completely under our (judicial systems) control, as opposed to the foreign power (that is just trying to maintain it's control).
Just like if someone spies for a foreign country, then while that country might be acting in an unfriendly way, and we should be wary of them in the future. Their agent is a traitor, and should be handled as such.
Saudi Arabia ordered the murder of an American journalist six months ago. That journalist was attacked and cut into small pieces by a 20 man kill squad.
Now, clear evidence has come out showing that the Saudis are willing to attack even the world’s wealthiest man, Jeff Bezos. If the founder of Amazon is in their crosshairs, it is clear that no American is safe.
The traitor Trump is a big supporter of Saudi Arabia and is currently planning on selling them advanced nuclear technology. Saudi Arabia is as dangerous as Iran or North Korea or Russia – their financial backing is what made the World Trade Centers attack possible on 9/11.
Saudi Arabia is an evil dictatorship and it must go. No American is safe.
Correction: Jamal Kashoggi was Saudi but had permanent residence in the US ("green card"). It was reported at the time that the US administration took umbrage in his non-citizen status as they were reluctant to take punitive measures
>The US never EVER helped Saudi to spy on a journalist...
Israel didn't help them either, it just didn't stop an Israeli company from selling certain products to the Saudis.
Do you think the US is stopping all companies from doing business with the Saudis, or even just stopping them from selling tools that can be used by the regime against the public?
because they aren't, they are however supposedly doing that with Iran and to a certain extent, with Russia, so it's not like it's something they can't do, it's just that they choose not to.
I'm by far not an expert, but I believe that This business (spyware for governments) works more similar to international weapons dealing. An Israeli company selling spyware to Saudi Arabia will likely at the same time work together with Mossad or another allied intelligence agency. Selling this software provides an obvious entry point, whether for human assets, piggy-backing on the eavesdropping software, or to map out future attack vectors.
They were former members in those organizations, like army vets, and as far as I understand they face a lot of criticism from the Israeli public, if not the government.
I think they are basically like those vets that go and work security for private contractors, and some of them end up working for some really bad people.
About the backdoors, I can't tell, on the one hand, I would assume you're correct, that they do provide access to the Mossad+friends, but on the other hand, if it was discovered, they would lose credibility, and all those basically bad people wouldn't work with them, and any normal entity probably aren't working with them already, so they would lose their entire business.
I think Facebooks reach is just to big to actually force it to become good. Sure, you might make it change certain practices, but at the end of the day, they would still find 'problematic' ways to develop their business.
Other, similar companies as well (did someone say Google?)
We tend to overestimate change in the short term and underestimate it in the long term. It's true that it'll probably take longer than we may like to resolve this situation, but in the end it'll probably be resolved more thoroughly and strongly than you'd have guessed.
As it is, even just where we are with the HN gestalt's opinion would have been difficult to imagine two years ago. It's slow, but it's a very strong opinion change. Another couple of years and having Facebook on your resume may be a problem getting your next job, who knows.
While I agree with your over/underestimate statement, I unfortunately think you've got it backwards, where we're overestimating the change this pressure is going to lever on how our data is utilized in the short term, and underestimating the reversion to the mean.
Next to companies like Palantir, AT&T(Room641A), Equifax, and hell, even credit card processors, I've always found the ire directed at Facebook to seem... scapegoatey? I'd observe that anger against those companies was quick to fade, and has not seemed to negatively impact employees to work for them, nor created a regulatory environment wherein that work isn't supported. (selfishly us-centric here)
Hell, after the snowden revelations, did those with NSA/govt credentials have trouble getting a job? If that didn't move the needle (and I say this as someone who had been doing gov. funded research at the time, and would have liked to see a stronger response) I'm pessimistic that we'll ever see meaningful long term perceptual shifts in this respect outside of when they're driven by a media-cycle furor.
(To address the root of this comment tree, I think the fad hasn't outlasted the media cycle, I think the media cycle has realized this topic continues to drive clicks for now)
Simply, I worry a lack of privacy, and lack of accountability for corporations/govt, has largely become normalized; or at least that people are increasingly unlikely to act in this direction without heavy media pressure. I hope I'm wrong.
> Whose side is Facebook on? The side of advertisers? It cannot be the side of users, at least not ones in Belgium. They cannot claim they are "neutral".
Facebook is on not on the side of the "users" (or what you would describe as it's users). If you look at Facebooks business model the ones actually paying them for a product are the advertisers, which is why FB is on their side.
'if you're not paying for the product, you are the product' - which means we are the product that Facebook is selling, or more precisely, our data.
Of course, I'm sure if Facebook is asked directly, they wouldn't admit and find a way to say they care about the people, and all that. But from the business side (and probably the investors side), Facebook shoudn't and doesn't care about privacy or other concerns of it's users (the citizen).
They won't do jack, just like with China where they handed over
all of iCloud to a govt. owned company, while simultaneously making "privacy" a selling point of Apple devices. Instead, they'll patently lie, and go on a P.R. offensive on Apple's (fake) moral superiority.
And how could Apple ever defy the likes of China and Sauds, when their militant control of the iOS walled garden is modeled after totalitarian regimes, like Saudi Arabia?
This case is different from that. In the Chinese case, they are complying with the legal request of a government. They are required by local law to answer that request.
But Apple is not required to distribute an app just because it's legal under local laws. There are all kinds of legal things you can't make an app for in the US. Apple is within its legal rights to say, "you can't distribute that app on our platform."
Apple was within it's right to stop sales of the iPhone in China, and protect Chinese citizen's privacy - and follow through with it's pompous advertising on privacy protection. But it chose to abandon privacy, morals and ethics, and remain in the country.
Apple's selective enforcement is indicative of the impact on it's bottom line. If banning the Saudi app leads to a ban on iPhones in Saudi, Apple will gladly cower to the kingdom for more money, as it has demonstrated with China.
Apple DOESN'T care about morals, or it's customers or the horse shit rules governing it's store - it just needs a worthy adversary to put it in it's place, else it'll gladly be the biggest bully in the playground, and claim moral authority while doing so.
it means that probably they know that they might have to update privacy policies and app policies and thus putting it out there that yes it's being investigated and yes there will be changes forthcoming
I don't think the neutrality argument works here. Because by having this app Google and Apple are clearly siding with the Saudi government.
The neutral thing to do was not to allow this app, but to also not allow an app that for example, helps women get out of Saudi Arabia.
This app helps clearly helps the Saudi government, and the men that choose to oppress their women (not all of them do), control the Saudi women. It makes this task easier and so helping it (by giving it a place and spreading it in your app store) isn't neutral.
It's great to know that even failed technological attempts, can still result in scientific discovery (even if in this case, the discovery was that Einstein is still correct).
