This is the mini existential crisis I have randomly. The attack area for a modern IT computer is mind bogglingly massive. Computers are pulling and executing code from a vast array of “trusted” sources without a sandbox. If any one of those “trusted” sources are compromised (package managers, cdns, OS updates, security software updates, just app updates in general, even specific utilities like xz) then you’re absolutely screwed.
It’s hard not to be a little nihilistic about security.
The more important thing would seem to be what actually led to the immigration in the first place. In Cuba’s case it seems like widespread corruption and wholesale mismanagement by the government. This particular case doesn’t seem like an inevitable result of globalization but the natural reaction to a terrible government.
The tools used, as you’re undoubtedly aware, go far beyond small arms. Family members in the Army have talked about training to clear houses where they want to avoid going through a heavily defended doorway so they put an explosive against a wall, duck around the corner, light it off, pick themselves up, and run through the newly created entryway.
I have this exact same experience about every other time I walk into a grocery store as well. It's hard not to be in awe of the amount of time and effort that went into every single one of those thousands of products. Multiple people studied for years to learn the skills required to create a small part of just one of those products.
> I’ve some to see it as some kind of “spiritual awakening”, although I think those are really loaded words. But in essence a cultivation of a broader awareness of the inherent complexity and interconnectedness of everything we interact with.
Imagining the hordes of humans and machinery behind the simplest of products is truly awe inspiring.
But nuclear power starts to look even better when you look up the death tolls and realize that as long as you are halfway competent (i.e. not Chernobyl) even the worst disasters have led to vanishingly few deaths. What is more dangerous is the irrational fear of nuclear power that led to the dangerous evacuation of Fukushima.
The main problem seems to be that LLM outputs seem to be tied to the company itself. If the tool is creating un-diverse images or sexist text people seem to intuitively associate that output with the company itself. This appears to be different than search results. People don’t generally get angry at Google because they can find sexist ideas through the search engine.
Maybe to have more powerful AI tools we need to stop getting angry at the company that trains the AI because of the bad outputs we can get and instead get annoyed with companies that create crappy hobbled tools.
Bitcoiners have been thinking about this storage problem for a decade now. Secure electronic devices in faraday cages and tamper and water proof bags or engraved steel plates (possibly cut up and distributed) seem to be the way to go for storing small bits of extremely valuable information.
Or of course you can use multiple key storage techniques and have a 2 out of 3 or more type setup. It all depends on how valuable the information is.
Security against unauthorized use and data lifespan are separate concerns. They're not fully orthogonal—security tends to make things more brittle—but you can apply whatever form of security you like and then store the secured data in any way you like. Hardburn seems to have been talking purely about the useful life of the archived data. The charge in flash storage leaks, so the data is eventually lost if not refreshed. A flash drive is reliable for a year, but not a decade. If you want long term storage you're going to want something else. Paper would be fine for most uses. An ordinary printout subjected to ordinary handling is good for a few decades with reasonable storage conditions.
It’s hard not to be a little nihilistic about security.