possibly noteworthy wrote:
Noam Cohen's friend:

Privacy is serious. It is serious the moment the data gets collected, not the moment it is released.

From the archive:

If you give me money, everything's going to be cool, okay? It's gonna be cool. Give me money. No consequences, no whammies, money. Money for me ... Money for me, databases for you.

More recently:

The ship has already sailed on the question of whether or not its reasonable for the government to collect evidence about everyone all the time so that it can be used against them in court if someone accuses them of a crime or civil tort. This is just another brick in the wall.

There is no privacy. It's only been an illusion. And just like everything else in the world of information, the walls are now being torn down. So anything that was existing because of the scarcity of information is now obsolete, and this includes the ILLUSION of privacy (and most industries, our economy, our way of life, etc). It used to be just your mailman who knew things about you that you didn't want anyone to know. Now your mailman has a blog and readers in China.

Decius wrote:
Noam Cohen's friend:

Privacy is serious. It is serious the moment the data gets collected, not the moment it is released.

Echoing my thoughts on Arod. Glad it was said.

If you want to see some of the justification for data collection, just watch this NOVA episode about the NSA. Now extrapolate "security" as it relates to the WoT to "security" in other things, like health, finance, education, etc. The same principals will be applied, and the same techniques will be used and abused. It's over. All your privacy are belong to us.