Trustworthy Technology

✨ Trustworthy Technology

What is it?

A (hopeful) new movement dedicated to a simple proposition—that our technology products should respect us! That is, support our wishes and uphold the principles of freedom, privacy, and informed consent.

Does that sound odd? 🤔 😅

We bet it does. Unless an expert in technology and its history, you’re unlikely to be aware how drastically the landscape has changed since the turn of the millennium. Fact is, in a little over two decades we’ve lost a significant amount of

autonomy and

agency to technology companies, through retreat and steady attrition alike.

This initiative attempts to remedy that.

For its part, “Trusty Tech” is a term we’re applying to a platform of largely existing

Open

hardware,

FOSS software, and respectful network services deployed in support of our goals.

The FAQs

What is the problem?

My Android phone prevents me from taking screenshots if an app author doesn’t want me to. [ It] prevents me from recording phone calls at the request of my carrier, even though it’s legal for me to do so in my jurisdiction. I’m not loving where all this is going.—jeffparsons at HN

Indeed—governments, technology companies, and data brokers have come to believe that we technology users are resources to extract value from, “monetize,” and frankly control as they wish.

To begin with, the group “technology users,” is modestly sized no longer. Nowadays, the club has expanded to ((checks notes))… nearly everyone on the planet! Ponder that one for a second. Computers and communication networks have shoehorned themselves between almost every aspect of everyday life. We’re neither few nor unimportant any longer—we are the citizens of the world. 🤩

Thus, we have the power to declare that the trampling of human rights now occurring in the technology realm is not acceptable, and hasn’t been for quite some time. Of course, this is a power available to us only when realized. We must band together, demand respect from product and service providers, curate, and even build some of our own solutions.

(Why yes, this is the theme of the Pixar film A Bug’s Life, if anyone needs a little inspiration. ;-)

Background: The Good Old Days

For decades now we’ve relied on idealists in the FOSS software movements, such as the Free(dom) Software Federation (FSF) and Open Source communities to give us options beyond the worst of industry practice. Born from an earlier time (the mid 1970s), when AT&T was forced to release its Unix operating system source code as part of an antitrust case (UK: CMA). That development fostered a culture of openness in computing, built on the tradition of sharing that underpins classic STEM research. (A tradition once strong, that now limps into the present.)

The next requirement for computing freedom was the availability of cheap, accessible hardware. Thankfully less than a decade later, serendipity struck with the introduction and rapid market dominance of the IBM Personal Computer (PC) in 1981—an accidentally open hardware platform. Another instance of good fortune, heavily influenced by IBM’s own antitrust battles over “bundling,” etc. The resulting competition in the marketplace drove prices down even faster than could the march of technology alone. 🔗

This combination of events (and a lot of hard work) led to an incredible “golden era” of technological innovation and prosperity, unrivaled in history until that point. So there was a period of roughly twenty years—from the early 1980s through 2000s—where we were in full control of our computers and enjoying substantial amounts of freedom and privacy. Looking back now, industry leaders might call it an accident, or perhaps a mistake. Either way, as we began to connect our unrestrained PCs together the promise of the new-fangled “information superhighway” grew and grew. The future felt incredibly bright in the late 90s. So much potential lay ahead, little did we know.

Slumbering Giants Awaken

Yet towards the end of this era, the powers-that-be began to wake up and recognize the ungodly amounts of money, power, and leverage at stake. As a result, the technology industry increasingly moved to seize control from the end user. Locking down products and removing choices—ostensibly to simplify and secure—but also consistently (and only coincidentally :wink:) enhancing profits all the while. Early on, the push was in deference to intellectual property concerns (as demanded by vested interests by the turn of the century), an increasing focus on neophyte users, and later in concert with an aggressive rise of government and corporate surveillance.

As a result, BigTech™ enthusiastically built the walls to lock us in, and for that were richly rewarded. With the dust settled, it’s clear we’ve lost much autonomy and effectively all of our privacy in...

Trustworthy Technology

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