Glibertarians.com 2019 Archive

Category: Privacy

  • The NSA Reaches Out to Glibertarians

    NSA Headquarters at Fort George Meade, Maryland.

     

    Greetings, Glibertarians!

    I’m Michael T. Hunte, junior investigative agent with the National Security Administration.

    On behalf of the NSA, allow me to address you in the spirit of friendship and cooperation which our republic holds so dear. As your site’s designated Security Representative and Advisor, it is my duty, but also my pleasure, to greet you in the proper manner outlined in our organization’s recent Community Outreach Program, also known internally as Operation Good Neighbor.

    Please don’t let the officious nomenclature fool you! This is simply our way of saying ‘Hello!’ to various chat groups, website memberships, and blog communities that catch our interest over the normal course of fulfilling our duties.
    Now, don’t get yourself all worked up over NSA taking an interest in your charming little website. Why, the past few months I’ve spent reading through many of your daily posts have been quite pleasurable. I’ve learned an awful lot about so many subjects of interest to your regular members, from firearm maintenance to craft beers, Mormonism to spatchcocking. I especially love the humor that your members generally employ – the many Monty Python references, the good-natured ribbing over grammatical errors. And that Steve Smith character – I wouldn’t want to meet him in a dark alley!

    That’s why I feel privileged to be your website’s personal Representative. I feel like I already know so many of you already, even though you’ve been nothing more than i.p. addresses and blips on a drone pilot’s screen to me previously. Let’s face it, in the course of my duties, I get to see the good and the bad – all of you who pick your noses surreptitiously while watching pornographic videos, for example. Do not like, as the kids say! But, it’s not all bad. Gary M., I’m glad you finally had that wart removed… that sucker was getting huge!

    In that spirit, I want us to have a closer working relationship. The NSA isn’t just a bunch of soulless, faceless badguys listening to you make mousey sounds while you have sexual relations in the ‘privacy’ of your bedroom. It’s that, sure, but so much more also!

    Totes not us, Glibs. These guys are CIA.

    We respect your membership’s adherence to the Constitution, an allegiance that, I promise you, our organization shares. And we work hard to protect our Constitutional Republic against enemies, both foreign and domestic. But, we need your cooperation!

    I want you Glibertarians to feel free to come to me with any concerns you might have concerning our nation’s freedom, and the selfless protecting of same. You’ve heard the phrase, ‘See something, say something’? Well, I want you to know, I’m here to listen to any of your concerns. Any time, day or night, you can come to me with any troublesome information you might have regarding the safety of our beloved Republic.

    You know, some in my organization aren’t quite ‘down’ with Constitutional protections the way you Glibs are. We need to bring those Glibbers to heel, some of them say. Well, I just look them right in the eye and I dare them to lay a finger on this fine website and its membership! As your NSA Representative, I take my role very seriously, and I want you to know that I’m on your side.

    Mike Hunte is here for you. Mike Hunte is open and ready for whatever you’ve got, my friends. Got some pent-up aggression and need a handy but private outlet? Well, you just lay it all on Mike Hunte, Mister! Mike Hunte isn’t afraid to take a pounding, believe you me.

    Mike Hunte is fair and open to all. Why, just the other day, my pet Yorkie, who my family calls York Hunte, got up on the bed (she knows she’s not supposed to!) and, well, left a piddle behind. I looked at my wife and said, “Look what York Hunte did! York Hunte deserves a good beating!” But don’t worry. My wife Madchek Hunte (she’s from a former Soviet country, but don’t worry, she’s been thoroughly vetted!) told me that the little darling was sorry and deserved to be loved on rather than punished. Well, how could I say no to that? I ended up giving the little critter a kiss on the nose.

     

    The other night my daughter Emily, whom we all call Tinkerbelle, or Tink Hunte, came home late after a ball game. She was having a dustup with her beau, and boy, was she sore! She read him the riot act – how can he treat Tink Hunte that way? Doesn’t he know what a precious treasure Tink Hunte is? She really had that boy against the wall until I thought I ought to step in to cool things down a bit. Now, I dearly love Tink Hunte, but she was so hot that I was afraid she was gonna hurt that fella. Well, pretty soon the two youngsters made up, thank goodness, because who can say no to sweet Tink Hunte?

     

    It’s so cute that you people think this will help.

    So you see, Glibs, I’m in your corner. I’m also in your bathroom, your kitchen, your automobile, your electronic devices. Should you feel the need to reach out, just speak your peace: the NSA is always within earshot.

    Take care, fellow citizens, and I shall certainly see you later.

    Excelsior!

    Michael Hunte
    Junior Agent
    National Security Agency

  • Genetic Genealogy

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    I have a dilemma. I would love the information theoretically available from a medical and genealogy DNA test, however I am unwilling to voluntarily give up the genetic material to have it done.*

    But, does that really matter?

    Probably not.

    All it takes is a sibling, a parent, an aunt, a cousin to have given up their own, and I am now effectively in the database anyway.

    In spite of my reluctance to give up my own DNA for a database, genetic genealogy absolutely fascinates me. Indeed, I am a member of the International Society of Genetic Genealogy. As someone who has helped adoptees find birth parents, I love the possibilities of the tool. It’s exhilarating to track down and solve family history mysteries and to help people find information they have long sought.

    However, I have some very large privacy concerns.

    In spite of the existence of the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (2008), if you read the Terms of Service on the various websites, it quickly becomes clear that the services will be doing pretty much whatever they want to do with your most intimate, fundamental information. It would become difficult to track any alleged discrimination back to the test.

    Typical statements, these examples from 23andme, which was founded with medical genealogical research as a primary mission:

    Genetic Information you share with others could be used against your interests. You should be careful about sharing your Genetic Information with others.

    In a following section, however, it goes on to explicitly state:

    Further, you acknowledge and agree that 23andMe is free to preserve and disclose any and all Personal Information to law enforcement agencies or others if required to do so by law or in the good faith belief that such preservation or disclosure is reasonably necessary to: (a) comply with legal process (such as a judicial proceeding, court order, or government inquiry) or obligations that 23andMe may owe pursuant to ethical and other professional rules, laws, and regulations; (b) enforce the 23andMe TOS; (c) respond to claims that any content violates the rights of third parties; or (d) protect the rights, property, or personal safety of 23andMe, its employees, its users, its clients, and the public. In such event we will notify you through the contact information you have provided to us in advance, unless doing so would violate the law or a court order.

    Of course, everyone here expects that various government agencies have access, or could at any time in the future obtain access, to your information in “private” DNA databases.

    I’m sure most of you are aware that law enforcement agencies are already routinely using public genealogy databases to find matches to DNA collected in criminal cases. One of the most prominent examples was the Golden State Killer case.

    Within five minutes of reviewing the results, the investigators had located a close relative among the million or so profiles in the database.

    …..

    Within three years, the DNA of nearly every American of Northern European descent — the primary users of the site — will be identifiable through cousins in GEDmatch’s database according to a study published on Thursday in the journal Science.

    This is huge for adoptees seeking birth families, as well as actual kidnapped persons, as in this fascinating and informative case. Of course, I am of two minds about being able to track down birth parents. People who gave up a child while being promised privacy and, perhaps, anonymity have a reasonable expectation that this will persist.

    However, I also believe that people have a right to know who they are and from whence they came, and the genetic medical tendencies and/or conditions they may have inherited. There are many cases where having this information has potentially saved lives, in birth families and for adoptees.

    How do we balance these competing needs? I don’t know.

    What I do know is that the genie is out of the bottle and there is no putting it back in, so I fervently hope society figures out how to manage this. I remain skeptical.

     
     

    To learn more about this topic, I highly recommend accessing the free resources on the wiki of the International Society of Genetic Genealogy.

     
     

    * There are various methods available to try to accomplish this anonymously, one of which is simply to buy the kit commercially in a location remote from one’s home with cash and then follow the other suggestions to access the results. So far, it is more trouble than it is worth to me, since there are very few family history questions I haven’t answered in taking my own family lines back 200+ years, and in some cases, far more.

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