Quoting Bruce Schneier on Security
Proxies are a natural outgrowth of society, an inevitable byproduct of specialization. But our proxies are not us and they have different motivations – they simply won’t make the same security decisions as we would. Whether a king is hiring mercenaries, an organization is hiring a network security company or a person is asking some guy to watch his bags while he gets a drink of water, successful security proxies are based on trust. And when it comes to government, trust comes through transparency and openness.
A very good point. I don’t normally comment here on political things because it’s easy to get wrapped up in emotions. The point I want to remind us of is that our government was founded from the beginning on principles of being open and honest. The very fact that we have three branches of government, each which balances out the others is important to remember regardless of what the discussion is. Everything should be open to the public, and even if it isn’t should be subject to review by another branch of government which has a different perspective (and accountability to the people).
I’m weary of hearing the catch all “National Security Threat” phrase tossed around as a reason. Just lay out the facts and let it either be obvious that there is a threat or obvious that your just scarred silly. Security by obscurity in any means, be it disallowing photography or trying to hide maps or hiring foreigners, might give you a warm and fuzzy but In the end it only makes matters worse and wastes tax payer money at the expense of civil liberties.
Believing that people are not capable of making intelligent decisions based on objective facts will only lead to people not being able to make those very decisions. Next thing you know the year will be 1984…. again.