[kwlug-disc] have I ever told you guys that Facebook is evil?

Fri Jun 17 22:17:19 EDT 2022

Thanks for posting the Joscha Bach link. I need to watch that video several times to absorb all the great ideas.

In the case of Tesla engineers, I think the greater good that they are working for is fighting climate change by switching the world economy from gasoline cars to electric cars. (Tesla also does batteries and solar panels, which are all part of the same mission to switch away from fossil fuels).

To promote this greater good (which is needed to avoid civilizational collapse), a tradeoff must be made, a lesser evil (surveillance) must be accepted. This is what I think they are thinking, in order to rationalize Tesla's behaviour. These kinds of tradeoffs must be considered if your ethical system is based on consequentialism, rather than on deontology (rules based morality). [*Consequentialism* is an ethical theory that judges whether or not something is right by what its consequences are. For instance, most people would agree that lying is wrong. But if telling a lie would help save a person's life, *consequentialism* says it's the right thing to do.] In this case, following a rule (no surveillance), at the price of causing civilizational collapse, is not the most ethical thing to do.

Now why would Tesla think that surveillance is necessary in order to achieve their moral objectives? Once again, I'm trying to reverse engineer the Tesla mindset here. Surveillance is needed to collect data to optimize their products. Most obviously, it is needed for training their self driving car software. The self driving feature (which was supposed to be finished years ago) was supposed to be one of the killer features that would make Tesla electric cars more desirable than gasoline cars. Remember than in the early years of Tesla, the idea of an "electric car" was originally associated in peoples minds with short range electric golf cart like vehicles, and only highly motivated eco-hippies would make the extreme sacrifice of driving such a terrible vehicle. This is the culture that Tesla was trying to overcome. They needed to make electric cars sexy, desireable, and better in every way than gasoline cars, in order to overcome the original cultural mindset. They were also short of money (almost went bankrupt a few times), and needed every advantage they could get to achieve their goal with the resources they had. So building surveillance into the cars would be morally justified by the goals.

I think that Musk himself has an "aesthetic" (in Joscha's terminology) that diverges from the mainstream. This aesthetic is derived from the transhumanist science fiction of Iain Banks. I've read all the books. I know Musk has read all the books because he borrows names and terminology unique to those books in naming many of his projects. Those books depict a utopian future where all cars are self driving (Tesla), the human race is multiplanetary (Space X), and all humans have neural implants that augment their cognition and connect them to the internet, and these implants are called "neural lace" (Neuralink). Also, in Banks' utopian society, there is almost no privacy, with an exception made for private thoughts inside your own head. I think Musk himself places little value on privacy. He clearly has no shame, and that's consistent with not valuing privacy.

But I don't think that all Tesla engineers are fully immersed in Musk's transhumanist fantasy. Instead, those engineers (the ones uneasy about surveillance) have a mainstream esthetic, and are justifying their work for Tesla by using consequentialist ethics and considering moral tradeoffs, as I outlined above.

Doug.

On Fri, Jun 17, 2022, at 11:29 AM, Mikalai Birukou via kwlug-disc wrote:
> 
>> Thanks Chris. We are long time Mazda owners. When our current car starts breaking down, we would like to consider an electric car. But without this kind of always-on telematics. I wonder if it will be available?
>> 
>> I would like there to be Canadian government legislation about this, framed as a consumer rights issue.
>>  1. The right to be fully informed about telematics before purchase.
>>  2. The right to disable or opt out of telematics, without crippling the thing being purchased:
>>      * for privacy (no surveillance)
>>      * for security (I don't want my car to become part of someones botnet, and I don't want to give hackers the ability to remotely take over my car).
> 
> 
> On the first DefCon with car hacking I bumped into Tesla engineers and asked appropriate questions, like, can this be turned off, disabled.
> 
> The disturbing element of the answer is that they did display hesitation/unease about no option to turn off remote connectivity. Which reminds a very interesting comment by Josha  in his second interview with Lex, at this point https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIpUf-Vy2JA&t=8944s
> 
> Out of love for greater good they have in mind an aesthetic of the world, which some of us know to be evil. I really wish every single one of engineers in cars and in web tracking to be dragged through real life in today's russia. Drag ones naked nerves through it to know that without privacy there is no security, none.
> 
> 
> 
>> In Europe, the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation of 2018) gives consumers these rights. It applies equally to car telematics and cookie tracking on web sites. So if political activism is required, we can point to the GDPR and say "me too".
>> 
>> The new data privacy bill C-27, announced yesterday, doesn't do the job.
>>   https://openmedia.org/press/item/new-privacy-legislation-repeats-past-mistakes
>> 
>> But there is still an opportunity to introduce amendments. I am going to contact my MP and see what can be done. I recommend everyone else on this list who is concerned by this issue to get active.
>> 
>> Doug.
>> 
>> On Fri, Jun 17, 2022, at 12:07 AM, Chris Irwin via kwlug-disc wrote:
>>> On Thu, Jun 16, 2022, at 17:47, Doug Moen wrote:
>>>> Like for example, we just bought a new washing machine and dryer. The top selling brand transmits everything you do to the manufacturer over the internet. For now, this is opt in, but internet surveillance already cannot be turned off for a growing number of consumer machines and appliances. We bought a less popular brand with no surveillance, because that's something that's still available.
>>> 
>>> You may find this interesting/disconcerting:
>>> 
>>> https://www.mazda.ca/en/mazda-connected-vehicle/overview/
>>> 
>>> Neat, Mazda has an app. It does a bunch of neat things like letting you start, pre heat/cool your car, unlock doors, get reminders for service and recalls. Neat. Oh, it can tell you where you parked your car, too.
>>> 
>>> Wait, how does this work? Lets check the privacy policy, because it's not documented anywhere else...
>>> 
>>> https://www.mazda.ca/en/privacy-policy/cv-privacy/
>>> 
>>>> _*Vehicle Data: *_When you purchase or lease a Connected Vehicle, the telematics system is active by default and transmits vehicle data, including driving behavior data (including the acceleration and speed of your Connected Vehicle, travel direction, and use of steering and braking functions) and vehicle health data (which includes Vehicle Identification Number (VIN); odometer, fuel level, and oil life readings; Diagnostic Trouble Codes (DTCs); and data from the Connected Vehicle’s OBD system, including engine coolant temperature, fuel injection volume, engine Rotation Per Minute (RPM), and the status of doors, hood, trunk, and hazard lights). If your Connected Vehicle has a Connected Services plan, we also collect geo-location coordinates of your Connected Vehicle’s latitude and longitude.
>>> 
>>> Oh, and don't forget you've also installed an app on your phone!
>>> 
>>>> _*MyMazda Data:*_ If you use the MyMazda app, we collect the location of your device, device type, device operating system, Internet Protocol (IP) address, unique identifier, type of browser, Internet service provider, phone number, and information about your use of MyMazda, including screen time, scrolling, specific actions and taps, reactions to alerts, the progress, completion and/or abandonment of in-application purchases, and crash reports.
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> And I'm not picking on Mazda in particular. I'm only aware of it because I own a Mazda and it came up in a discussion forum. Almost every car in the last few years has this kind of connectivity now. People expect it. You can probably blame Tesla.
>>> 
>>> -- 
>>> *Chris Irwin*
>>> 
>>> email:   chris at chrisirwin.ca
>>>   web: https://chrisirwin.ca
>>> 
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> -- 
> Mikalai Birukou 
> CEO | 3NSoft Inc.
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