Maude Nificentmaudenificent@aus.social
Sep 12, 2026, 1:34 AMI know pbs tracks scripts (with good reason), but I would be surprised if personal data is in international returns.
I understand your concern tho' -- the world has gone to shit.
Replies
TinDrumoscarjiminy@aus.socialSep 12, 2026, 1:39 AM@maudenificent it doesn't need to be personally identifiable to be valuable (nor to be compromising)
and just to hook into the kinds of things companies like facebook know very well that hasn't really filtered into cultural awareness but the kind of compute power that's currently available (magnified massively by ai but not dependent on it) makes de-identified data identifiable
i don't mean to suggest that's necessary to capitalisation, only that it's not a limitation and that sale of those datasets (depersonalised or no) constitutes a massive wholesale betrayal by the state on a population scale imo
- Maude Nificentmaudenificent@aus.socialSep 12, 2026, 1:41 AM
oh yes. Betrayal is exactly the right word.
- Maude Nificentmaudenificent@aus.socialSep 12, 2026, 5:47 AM
I've been pondering upon what you're saying, and have recalled a day (ahem a while ago) I was working in a payroll office, and this dick (sorry, gender neutral terms won't cut it, but feel free to swap this for the other word) was approached by an insurance salesman for payroll details... and said dick blithely handed over an entire, complete printout of names, payroll ID, addresses...
I said some rude things to him but, y'know, pointless, cos he was a complete dick
organisations are like countries... sometimes the weakest links are at the top
- TinDrumoscarjiminy@aus.socialSep 12, 2026, 5:58 AM
@maudenificent trump admin gave doge (staffed by kids with no public service training, no knowledge or ken of social responsibility, no sympathies for anything or anyone outside their randian fantasies) full unfettered, unsupervised access
- TinDrumoscarjiminy@aus.socialSep 12, 2026, 6:03 AM
@maudenificent but also (and i'm getting off track i know) any and all datacentres run by an american entity (wherever the material infrastructure may reside and whatever sovereign legal jusrisdiction may ordinarily protect a given population) are subject to the cloud act which compels any entity subject to us law to both supply/surrender whatever data is in their possesion *and* forbids them to divulge either the demand or the nature of the data they surrendered
- TinDrumoscarjiminy@aus.socialSep 12, 2026, 6:04 AM
@maudenificent so universities, government bodies who use outlook for mail for example
- TinDrumoscarjiminy@aus.socialSep 12, 2026, 6:06 AM
@maudenificent and the point is this is *already* entirely normalised and that it follows embedded, unquestioned neoliberal logics