AI Job Lawnmowers: Will Your Blooms Be Chopped Off and Put a Rat King in Your Future?
March 25, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I love “you will lose your job to AI” articles. I spotted an interesting one titled “The Job Sectors That Will Be Most Disrupted By AI, Ranked.” This is not so much an article as a billboard for an outfit named Voronoi, “where data tells the story.” That’s interesting because there is no data, no methodology, and no indication of the confidence level for each “nuked job.” Nevertheless, we have a ranking.
Thanks, MSFT Copilot. Will you be sparking human rat kings? I would wager that you will.
As I understand the analysis of 19,000 tasks, here’s that the most likely to be chopped down and converted to AI silage will be:
IT / programmers: 73 percent of the job will experience a large impact
Finance / bean counters: 70 percent of the jobs will experience a large impact
Customer sales: 67 percent of the job will experience a large impact
Operations (well, that’s a fuzzy category, isn’t it?): 65 percent of the job will experience a large impact
Personnel / HR: 57 percent of the job will experience a large impact
Marketing: 56 percent of the job will experience a large impact
Legal eagles: 46 percent of the job will experience a large impact
Supply chain (another fuzzy wuzzy bucket): 43 percent of the job will experience a large impact
The kicker in the data is that the numbers date from September 2023. Six months in the faerie land of smart software is a long, long time. Let’s assume that the data meet 2024’s gold standard.
Technology, finance, sales, marketing, and lawyering may shatter the future of employees of less value in terms of compensation, cost to the organization, or whatever management legerdemain the top dogs and their consultants whip up. Imagine eliminate the overhead for humans like office space, health care, retirement baloney, and vacations makes smart software into an attractive “play.”
And what about the fuzzy buckets? My thought is that many people will be trimmed because a chatbot can close a sale for a product without the hassle which humans drag into the office; for example, sexual harassment, mental, drug, and alcohol “issues,” and the unfortunate workplace shooting. I think that a person sitting in a field office to troubleshoot issues related to a state or county contract might fall into the “operations” category even though the employee sees the job as something smart software cannot perform. Ho ho ho.
Several observations:
- A trivial cost analysis of human versus software over a five-year period means humans lose
- AI systems, which may suck initially, will be improved over time. These initial failures may cause the once alert to replacement employee into a false sense of security
- Once displaced, former employees will have to scramble to produce cash. With lots of individuals chasing available work and money plays, life is unlikely to revert back to the good old days of the Organization Man. (The world will be Organization AI. No suit and white shirt required.)
Net net: I am glad I am old and not quite as enthralled by efficiency.
Stephen E Arnold, March 25, 2024
Getting Old in the Age of AI? Yeah, Too Bad
March 25, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I read an interesting essay called “’Gen X Has Had to Learn or Die: Mid-Career Workers Are Facing Ageism in the Job Market.” The title assumes that the reader knows the difference between Gen X, Gen Y, Gen Z, and whatever other demographic slices marketers and “social” scientists cook up. I recognize one time slice: Dinobabies like me and a category I have labeled “Other.”
Two Gen X dinobabies find themselves out of sync with the younger reptiles’ version of Burning Man. Thanks, MSFT Copilot. Close enough.
The write up, which I think is a work product of a person who realizes that the stranger in a photograph is the younger version of today’s self. “How can that be?” the author of the essay asks. “In my Gen X, Y, or Z mind I am the same. I am exactly the way I was when I was younger.” The write up states:
Gen Xers, largely defined as people in the 44-to-59 age group, are struggling to get jobs.
The write up quotes an expert, Christina Matz, associate professor at the Boston College School of Social Work, and director of the Center on Aging and Work. I believe this individual has a job for now. The essay quotes her observation:
older workers are sometimes perceived as “doddering but dear”. Matz says, “They’re labelled as slower and set in their ways, well-meaning on one hand and incompetent on the other. People of a certain age are considered out-of-touch, and not seen as progressive and innovative.”
I like to think of myself as doddering. I am not sure anyone, regardless of age, will label me “dear.”
But back to the BBC’s essay. I read:
We’re all getting older.
Now that’s an insight!
I noted that the acronym “AI” appears once in the essay. One source is quoted as offering:
… we had to learn the internet, then Web 2.0, and now AI. Gen X has had to learn or die,
Hmmm. Learn of die.
Several observations:
- The write up does not tackle the characteristic of work that strikes me as important; namely, if one is in the Top Tier of people in a particular discipline, jobs will be hard to find. Artificial intelligence will elevate those just below the “must hire” level and allow organizations to replace what once was called “the organization man” with software.
- The discovery that just because a person can use a mobile phone does not give them intellectual super powers. The kryptonite to those hunting for a “job” is that their “package” does not have “value” to an organization seeking full time equivalents. People slap a price tag on themselves and, like people running a yard sale, realize that no one will pay very much for that stack of old time post cards grandma collected.
- The notion of entitlement does not appear in the write up. In my experience, a number of people believe that a company or other type of entity “owes them a living.” Those accustomed to receiving “Also Participated” trophies and “easy” A’s have found themselves on the wrong side of paradise.
My hunch is that these “ageism” write ups are reactions to the gradual adoption of ever more capable “smart” software. I am not sure if the author agrees with me. I am asserting that the examples and comments in the write up are a reaction to the existential threat AI, bots, and embedded machine intelligence finding their way into “systems” today. Probably not.
Now let’s think about the “learn” plank of the essay. A person can learn, adapt, and thrive, right? My personal view is that this is a shibboleth. Oh, oh.
Stephen E Arnold, March 25, 2024
Google: Practicing But Not Learning in France
March 22, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I had to comment on this Google synthetic gems. The online advertising company with the Cracker Jack management team is cranking out titbits every days or two. True, none of these rank with the Microsoft deal to hire some techno-management wizards with DeepMind experience, but I have to cope with what flows into rural Kentucky.
Those French snails are talkative — and tasty. Thanks, MSFT Copilot. Are you going to license, hire, or buy DeepMind?
“Google Fined $270 Million by French Regulatory Authority” delivers what strikes me a Lego block information about the estimable company. The write up presents yet another story about Google’s footloose and fancy free approach to French laws, rules, and regulations. The write up reports:
This latest fine is the result of Google’s artificial intelligence training practices. The [French regulatory] watchdog said in a statement that Google’s Bard chatbot — which has since been rebranded as Gemini —”used content from press agencies and publishers to train its foundation model, without notifying either them” or the Authority.
So what did the outstanding online advertising company do? The news story asserts:
The watchdog added that Google failed to provide a technical opt-out solution for publishers, obstructing their ability to “negotiate remuneration.”
The result? Another fine.
Google has had an interesting relationship with France. The country was the scene of the outstanding presentation of the Sundar and Prabhakar demonstration of the quantumly supreme Bard smart software. Google has written checks to France in the past. Now it is associated with flubbing what are relatively straightforward for France requirements to work with publishers.
Not surprisingly, the outfit based in far off California allegedly said, according to the cited news story:
Google criticized a “lack of clear regulatory guidance,” calling for greater clarity in the future from France’s regulatory bodies. The fine is linked to a copyright case that began in 2020, when the French Authority found Google to be acting in violation of France’s copyright and related rights law of 2019.
My experience with France, French laws, and the ins and outs of working with French organizations is limited. Nevertheless, my son — who attended university in France — told me an anecdote which illustrates how French laws work. Here’s the tale which I assume is accurate. He is a reliable sort.
A young man was in the immigration office in Paris. He and his wife were trying to clarify a question related to her being a French citizen. The bureaucrat had not accepted her birth certificate from a municipal French government, assorted documents from her schooling from pre-school to university, and the oddments of electric bills, rental receipts, and medical records. The husband who was an American told me son, “This office does not think my wife is French. She is. And I think we have it nailed this time. My wife has a photograph of General De Gaulle awarding her father a medal.” My son told me, “Dad, it did not work. The husband and wife had to refile the paperwork to correct an error made on the original form.”
My takeaway from this anecdote is that Google may want to stay within the bright white lines in France. Getting entangled in the legacy of Napoleon’s red tape can be an expensive, frustrating experience. Perhaps the Google will learn? On the other hand, maybe not.
Stephen E Arnold, March 22, 2023
The University of Illinois: Unintentional Irony
March 22, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I admit it. I was in the PhD program at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana (aka Chambana). There was nothing like watching a storm build from the upper floors of now departed FAR. I spotted a university news release titled “Americans Struggle to Distinguish Factual Claims from Opinions Amid Partisan Bias.” From my point of view, the paper presents research that says that half of those in the sample cannot distinguish truth from fiction. That’s a fact easily verified by visiting a local chain store, purchasing a product, and asking the clerk to provide the change in a specific way; for example, “May I have two fives and five dimes, please?” Putting data behind personal experience is a time-honored chore in the groves of academe.
Discerning people can determine “real” from “original fakes.” Well, only half the people can it seems. The problem is defining what’s true and what’s false. Thanks, MSFT Copilot. Keep working on your security. Those breaches are “real.” Half the time is close enough for horseshoes.
Here’s a quote from the write up I noted:
“How can you have productive discourse about issues if you’re not only disagreeing on a basic set of facts, but you’re also disagreeing on the more fundamental nature of what a fact itself is?” — Matthew Mettler, a U. of I. graduate student and co-author of with Jeffery J. Mondak, a professor of political science and the James M. Benson Chair in Public Issues and Civic Leadership at Illinois.
The news release about Mettler’s and Mondak’s research contains this statement:
But what we found is that, even before we get to the stage of labeling something misinformation, people often have trouble discerning the difference between statements of fact and opinion…. “What we’re showing here is that people have trouble distinguishing factual claims from opinion, and if we don’t have this shared sense of reality, then standard journalistic fact-checking – which is more curative than preventative – is not going to be a productive way of defanging misinformation,” Mondak said. “How can you have productive discourse about issues if you’re not only disagreeing on a basic set of facts, but you’re also disagreeing on the more fundamental nature of what a fact itself is?”
But the research suggests that highly educated people cannot differentiate made up data from non-weaponized information. What struck me is that Harvard’s Misinformation Review published this U of I research that provides a road map to fooling peers and publishers. Harvard University, like Stanford University, has found that certain big-time scholars violate academic protocols.
I am delighted that the U of I research is getting published. My concern is that the Misinformation Review does not find my laughing at its Misinformation Review to their liking. Harvard illustrates that academic transgressions cannot be identified by half of those exposed to the confections of up-market academics.
Should Messrs Mettler and Mondak have published their research in another journal? That a good question, but I am no longer convinced that professional publications have more credibility than the outputs of a content farm. Such is the erosion of once-valued norms. Another peril of thumb typing is present.
Stephen E Arnold, March 22, 2024
US Bans Intellexa For Spying On Senator
March 22, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
One of the worst ideas in modern society is to spy on the United States. The idea becomes worse when the target is a US politician. Intellexa is a notorious company that designs software to hack smartphones and transform them into surveillance devices. NBC News reports how Intellexa’s software was recently used in an attempt to hack a US senator: “US Bans Maker Of Spyware That Targeted A Senator’s Phone.”
Intellexa designed the software Predator that once downloaded onto a phone turns it into a surveillance device. Predator can turn on a phone’s camera and microphone, track a user’s location, and download files. The US Treasure Department banned Intellexa from conducting business in the US and US citizens are banned from working with the company. These are the most aggressive sanctions the US has ever taken against a spyware company.
The official ban also targets Intellexa’s founder Tan Dilian, employee Sara Hamou, and four companies that are affiliated with it. Predator is also used by authoritarian governments to spy on journalists, human rights workers, and anyone deemed “suspicious:”
“An Amnesty International investigation found that Predator has been used to target journalists, human rights workers and some high-level political figures, including European Parliament President Roberta Metsola and Taiwan’s outgoing president, Tsai Ing-Wen. The report found that Predator was also deployed against at least two sitting members of Congress, Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, and Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D.”
John Scott-Railton is a senior spyware researcher at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab and he said the US Treasury’s sanctions will rock the spyware world. He added it could also inspire people to change their careers and leave countries.
Predator isn’t the only company that makes spyware. Hackers can also design their own then share it with other bad actors.
Whitney Grace, March 22, 2024
Peak AI? Do You Know What Happened to Catharists? Quiz ChatGPT or Whatever
March 21, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I read “Have We Reached Peak AI?” The question is an interesting one because some alleged monopolies are forming alliances with other alleged monopolies. Plus wonderful managers from an alleged monopoly is joining another alleged monopoly to lead a new “unit” of the alleged monopoly. At the same time, outfits like the usually low profile Thomson Reuters suggested that it had an $8 billion war chest for smart software. My team and I cannot keep up with the announcements about AI in fields ranging from pharma to ransomware from mysterious operators under the control of wizards in China and Russia.
Thanks, MSFT Copilot. You did a good job on the dinobabies.
Let’s look at a couple of statements in the essay which addresses the “peak AI” question.
I noticed that OpenAI is identified as an exemplar of a company that sticks to a script, avoids difficult questions, and gets a velvet glove from otherwise pointy fingernailed journalists. The point is well taken; however, attention does not require substance. The essay states:
OpenAI’s messaging and explanations of what its technology can (or will) do have barely changed in the last few years, returning repeatedly to “eventually” and “in the future” and speaking in the vaguest ways about how businesses make money off of — let alone profit from — integrating generative AI.
What if the goal of the interviews and the repeated assertions about OpenAI specifically and smart software in general is publicity and attention. Cut off the buzz for any technology and it loses its shine. Buzz is the oomph in the AI hot house. Who cares about Microsoft buying into games? Now who cares about Microsoft hooking up with OpenAI, Mistral, and Inception? That’s what the meme life delivers. Games, sigh. AI, let’s go and go big.
Another passage in the essay snagged me:
I believe a large part of the artificial intelligence boom is hot air, pumped through a combination of executive bullshitting and a compliant media that will gladly write stories imagining what AI can do rather than focus on what it’s actually doing.
One of my team members accused me of FOMO when I told Howard to get us a Flipper. (Can one steal a car with a Flipper? The answer is, “Not without quite a bit of work.) The FOMO was spot on. I had a “fear of missing out.” Canada wants to ban the gizmos. Hence, my request, “Get me a Flipper.” Most of the “technology” in the last decade is zipping along on marketing, PR, and YouTube videos. (I just watched a private YouTube video about intelware which incorporates lots of AI. Is the product available? Nope. But… soon. Let the marketing and procurement wheels begin turning.)
Journalists (often real ones) fall prey to FOMO. Just as I wanted a Flipper, the “real” journalists want to write about what’s apparently super duper important. The Internet is flagging. Quantum computing is old hat and won’t run in a mobile phone. The new version of Steve Gibson’s Spinrite is not catching the attention of blue chip investment firms. Even the enterprise search revivifier Glean is not magnetic like AI.
The issue for me is more basic than the “Peak AI” thesis; to wit, What is AI? No one wants to define it because it is a bit like “security.” The truth is that AI is a way to make money in what is a fairly problematic economic setting. A handful of companies are drowning in cash. Others are not sure they can keep the lights on.
The final passage I want to highlight is:
Eventually, one of these companies will lose a copyright lawsuit, causing a brutal reckoning on model use across any industry that’s integrated AI. These models can’t really “forget,” possibly necessitating a costly industry-wide retraining and licensing deals that will centralize power in the larger AI companies that can afford them.
I would suggest that Google has already been ensnared by the French regulators. AI faces an on-going flow of legal hassles. These range from cash-starved publishers to the work-from-home illustrator who does drawings for a Six-Flags-Over-Jesus type of super church. Does anyone really want to get on the wrong side of a super church in (heaven forbid) Texas?
I think the essay raises a valid point: AI is a poster child of hype.
However, as a dinobaby, I know that technology is an important part of the post-industrial set up in the US of A. Too much money will be left on the table unless those savvy to revenue flows and stock upsides ignore the mish-mash of AI. In an unregulated setting, people need and want the next big thing. Okay, it is here. Say “hello” to AI.
Stephen E Arnold, March 21, 2024
How Smart Software Works: Well, No One Is Sure It Seems
March 21, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
The title of this Science Daily article strikes me a slightly misleading. I thought of my asking my son when he was 14, “Where did you go this afternoon?” He would reply, “Nowhere.” I then asked, “What did you do?” He would reply, “Nothing.” Helpful, right? Now consider this essay title:
How Do Neural Networks Learn? A Mathematical Formula Explains How They Detect Relevant Patterns
AI experts are unable to explain how smart software works. Thanks, MSFT Copilot Bing. You have smart software figured out, right? What about security? Oh, I am sorry I asked.
Ah, a single formula explains pattern detection. That’s what the Science Daily title says I think.
But what does the write up about a research project at the University of San Diego say? Something slightly different I would suggest.
Consider this statements from the cited article:
“Technology has outpaced theory by a huge amount.” — Mikhail Belkin, the paper’s corresponding author and a professor at the UC San Diego Halicioglu Data Science Institute
What’s the consequence? Consider this statement:
“If you don’t understand how neural networks learn, it’s very hard to establish whether neural networks produce reliable, accurate, and appropriate responses.
How do these black box systems work? Is this the mathematical formula? Average Gradient Outer Product or AGOP. But here’s the kicker. The write up says:
The team also showed that the statistical formula they used to understand how neural networks learn, known as Average Gradient Outer Product (AGOP), could be applied to improve performance and efficiency in other types of machine learning architectures that do not include neural networks.
Net net: Coulda, woulda, shoulda does not equal understanding. Pattern detection does not answer the question of what’s happening in black box smart software. Try again, please.
Stephen E Arnold, March 21, 2024
Viruses Get Intelligence Upgrade When Designed With AI
March 21, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
Viruses are still a common problem on the Internet despite all the PSAs, firewalls, antiviral software, and other precautions users take to protect their technology and data. Intelligent and adaptable viruses have remained a concept of science-fiction but bad actors are already designing them with AI. It’s only going to get worse. Tom’s Hardware explains that an AI virus is already wreaking havoc: “AI Worm Infects Users Via AI-Enabled Email Clients-Morris II Generative AI Worm Steals Confidential Data As It Spreads.”
The Morris II Worm was designed by researchers Ben Nassi of Cornell Tech, Ron Button from Intuit, and Stav Cohen from the Israel Institute of Technology. They built the worm to understand how to better combat bad actors. The researchers named it after the first computer worm Morris. The virus is a generative AI for that steals data, spams with email, spreads malware, and spreads to multiple systems.
Morris II attacks AI apps and AI-enabled email assistants that use generative text and image engines like ChatGPT, LLaVA, and Gemini Pro. It also uses adversarial self-replicating prompts. The researchers described Morris II’s attacks:
“ ‘The study demonstrates that attackers can insert such prompts into inputs that, when processed by GenAI models, prompt the model to replicate the input as output (replication) and engage in malicious activities (payload). Additionally, these inputs compel the agent to deliver them (propagate) to new agents by exploiting the connectivity within the GenAI ecosystem. We demonstrate the application of Morris II against GenAI-powered email assistants in two use cases (spamming and exfiltrating personal data), under two settings (black-box and white-box accesses), using two types of input data (text and images).’”
The worm continues to harvest information and update it in databases. The researchers shared their information with OpenAI and Google. OpenAI responded by saying the organization will make its systems more resilient and advises designers to watch out for harmful inputs. The advice is better worded as “sleep with one eye open.”
Whitney Grace, March 21, 2024
AI Innovation: Do Just Big Dogs Get the Fat, Farmed Salmon?
March 20, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
Let’s talk about statements like “AI will be open source” and “AI has spawned hundreds, if not thousands, of companies.” Those are assertions which seem to be slightly different from what’s unfolding at some of the largest technology outfits in the world. The circling and sniffing allegedly underway between the Apple and the Google pack is interesting. Apple and Google have a relationship, probably one that will need marriage counselor, but it is a relationship.
The wizard scientists have created an interesting digital construct. Thanks, MSFT Copilot. How are you coming along with your Windows 11 updates and Azure security today? Oh, that’s too bad.
The news, however, is that Microsoft is demonstrating that it wants to eat the fattest salmon in the AI stream. Microsoft has a deal of some type with OpenAI, operating under the steady hand of Sam AI-Man. Plus the Softies have cozied up to the French outfit Mistral. Today at 530 am US Eastern I learned that Microsoft has embraced an outstanding thinker, sensitive manager, and pretty much the entire Inflection AI outfit.
The number of stories about this move reflect the interest in smart software and what may be one of world’s purveyor of software which attracts bad actors from around the world. Thinking about breaches in the new Microsoft world is not a topic in the write ups about this deal. Why? I think the management move has captured attention because it is surprising, disruptive, and big in terms of money and implications.
“Microsoft Hires DeepMind Co-Founder Suleyman to Run Consumer AI” states:
DeepMind workers complained about his [former Googler Mustafa Suleyman and subsequent Inflection.ai senior manager] management style, the Financial Times reported. Addressing the complaints at the time, Suleyman said: “I really screwed up. I was very demanding and pretty relentless.” He added that he set “pretty unreasonable expectations” that led to “a very rough environment for some people. I remain very sorry about the impact that caused people and the hurt that people felt there.” Suleyman was placed on leave in 2019 and months later moved to Google, where he led AI product management until exiting in 2022.
Okay, a sensitive manager learns from his mistakes joins Microsoft.
And Microsoft demonstrates that the AI opportunity is wide open. “Why Microsoft’s Surprise Deal with $4 Billion Startup Inflection Is the Most Important Non-Acquisition in AI” states:
Even since OpenAI launched ChatGPT in November 2022, the tech world has been experiencing a collective mania for AI chatbots, pouring billions of dollars into all manner of bots with friendly names (there’s Claude, Rufus, Poe, and Grok — there’s event a chatbot name generator). In January, OpenAI launched a GPT store that’s chock full of bots. But how much differentiation and value can these bots really provide? The general concept of chatbots and copilots is probably not going away, but the demise of Pi may signal that reality is crashing into the exuberant enthusiasm that gave birth to a countless chatbots.
Several questions will be answered in the weeks ahead:
- What will regulators in the EU and US do about the deal when its moving parts become known?
- How will the kumbaya evolve when Microsoft senior managers, its AI partners, and reassigned Microsoft employees have their first all-hands Teams or off-site meeting?
- Does Microsoft senior management have the capability of addressing the attack surface of the new technologies and the existing Microsoft software?
- What happens to the AI ecosystem which depends on open source software related to AI if Microsoft shifts into “commercial proprietary” to hit revenue targets?
- With multiple AI systems, how are Microsoft Certified Professional agents going to [a] figure out what broke and [b] how to fix it?
- With AI the apparent “next big thing,” how will adversaries like nations not pals with the US respond?
Net net: How unstable is the AI ecosystem? Let’s ask IBM Watson because its output is going to be as useful as any other in my opinion. My hunch is that the big dogs will eat the fat, farmed salmon. Who will pull that lucious fish from the big dog’s maw? Not me.
Stephen E Arnold, March 20, 2024
The TikTok Flap: Wings on a Locomotive?
March 20, 2024
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I find the TikTok flap interesting. The app was purposeless until someone discovered that pre-teens and those with similar mental architecture would watch short videos on semi-forbidden subjects; for instance, see-through dresses, the thrill of synthetic opioids, updating the Roman vomitorium for a quick exit from parental reality, and the always-compelling self-harm presentations. But TikTok is not just a content juicer; it can provide some useful data in its log files. Cross correlating these data can provide some useful insights into human behavior. Slicing geographically makes it possible to do wonderful things. Apply some filters and a psychological profile can be output from a helpful intelware system. Whether these types of data surfing take place is not important to me. The infrastructure exists and can be used (with or without authorization) by anyone with access to the data.
Like bird wings on a steam engine, the ban on TikTok might not fly. Thanks, MSFT Copilot. How is your security revamp coming along?
What’s interesting to me is that the US Congress took action to make some changes in the TikTok business model. My view is that social media services required pre-emptive regulation when they first poked their furry, smiling faces into young users’ immature brains. I gave several talks about the risks of social media online in the 1990s. I even suggested remediating actions at the open source intelligence conferences operated by Major Robert David Steele, a former CIA professional and conference entrepreneur. As I recall, no one paid any attention. I am not sure anyone knew what I was talking about. Intelligence, then, was not into the strange new thing of open source intelligence and weaponized content.
Flash forward to 2024, after the US government geared up to “ban” or “force ByteDance” to divest itself of TikTok, many interesting opinions flooded the poorly maintained and rapidly deteriorating information highway. I want to highlight two of these write ups, their main points, and offer a few observations. (I understand that no one cared 30 years ago, but perhaps a few people will pay attention as I write this on March 16, 2024.)
The first write up is “A TikTok Ban Is a Pointless Political Turd for Democrats.” The language sets the scene for the analysis. I think the main point is:
Banning TikTok, but refusing to pass a useful privacy law or regulate the data broker industry is entirely decorative. The data broker industry routinely collects all manner of sensitive U.S. consumer location, demographic, and behavior data from a massive array of apps, telecom networks, services, vehicles, smart doorbells and devices (many of them *gasp* built in China), then sells access to detailed data profiles to any nitwit with two nickels to rub together, including Chinese, Russian, and Iranian intelligence. Often without securing or encrypting the data. And routinely under the false pretense that this is all ok because the underlying data has been “anonymized” (a completely meaningless term). The harm of this regulation-optional surveillance free-for-all has been obvious for decades, but has been made even more obvious post-Roe. Congress has chosen, time and time again, to ignore all of this.
The second write up is “The TikTok Situation Is a Mess.” This write up eschews the colorful language of the TechDirt essay. Its main point, in my opinion, is:
TikTok clearly has a huge influence over a massive portion of the country, and the company isn’t doing much to actually assure lawmakers that situation isn’t something to worry about.
Thus, the article makes clear its concern about the outstanding individuals serving in a representative government in Washington, DC, the true home of ethical behavior in the United States:
Congress is a bunch of out-of-touch hypocrites.
What do I make of these essays? Let me share my observations:
- It is too late to “fix up” the TikTok problem or clean up the DC “mess.” The time to act was decades ago.
- Virtual private networks and more sophisticated “get around” technology will be tapped by fifth graders to the short form videos about forbidden subjects can be consumed. How long will it take a savvy fifth grader to “teach” her classmates about a point-and-click VPN? Two or three minutes. Will the hungry minds recall the information? Yep.
- The idea that “privacy” has not been regulated in the US is a fascinating point. Who exactly was pro-privacy in the wake of 9/11? Who exactly declined to use Google’s services as information about the firm’s data hoovering surfaced in the early 2000s? I will not provide the answer to this question because Google’s 90 percent plus share of the online search market presents the answer.
Net net: TikTok is one example of a software with a penchant for capturing data and retaining those data in a form which can be processed for nuggets of information. One can point to Alibaba.com, CapCut.com, Temu.com or my old Huawei mobile phone which loved to connect to servers in Singapore until our fiddling with the device killed it dead. 
Stephen E Arnold, March 20, 2024
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