this post was submitted on 30 Jan 2026
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This is what many of us warned against already 20 years ago. It's one of the inherent dangers of ALL proprietary software.
Back then most people didn't believe or understand it, now that such dangers are out in the open, nothing continues to happen about it.
Everybody knows today, but (almost) nobody gives a shit.
Member when “the government is listening!” Was ‘just crazy paranoids’?
Yeah.
People in the 90s and early 2000s were the ones most paranoid about that. I don't think people in the 60s were anywhere near as worried or aware of wiretaps.
Back then the reality was more “the government wish they had the power to listen to everything” and now that they have the power, no one believes it because it was previously ridiculous to think they were already doing it.
The conspiracy was just ahead of its time.
I mean ECHELON was reading satellite traffic in the 70s. Although now we call it Five Eyes. Encryption for regular people just wasn't a thing until the 90s. Still isn't for 90% of everyone on most platforms.