Children of the lens, seekers of tomorrow blog had a link to an article I read in utter amazement from top to bottom. Charlie Stross penned the scariest article I ever read on current and pending technologies that will destroy what remains of our rights to privacy.

Stross paints a black picture of how screwed we will be if we just sit back and allow our Government to continue to erode our rights and monitor our every breath, word we speak, place we visit, dollar we spend, and ultimately arrest us if merely have an evil thought.

Did you see the movie Minority Report; if not, rent it tonight! Is this the future you desire???

The 18th century utopian philosopher Jeremy Bentham’s panopticon was a prison; a circle of cells with windows facing inwards, towards a tower, wherein jailers could look out and inspect the prisoners at any time, unseen by their subjects.

Though originally proposed as a humane experiment in penal reform in 1785, Bentham’s idea has eerie resonances today. One of the risks of the technologies that may give rise to a singularity is that they may also permit the construction of a Panopticon society — a police state characterised by omniscient surveillance and mechanical law enforcement.

Note that I am not using the term “panopticon singularity” in the same sense as Vinge’s Singularity (which describes the emergence of strongly superhuman intelligence through either artificial intelligence breakthroughs or progress in augmenting human intelligence), but in a new sense: the emergence of a situation in which human behaviour is deterministically governed by processes outside human control. (To give an example: currently it is illegal to smoke cannabis, but many people do so. After a panopticon singularity, it will not only be illegal but impossible.) The development of a panopticon singularity does not preclude the development of a Vingean singularity; indeed, one may potentiate (or suppress) the other. I would also like to note that the idea has been discussed in fictional form by Vinge.

For now, simple things like Counter Surveillance Tip # 27, disguises that cover your face, will prevent most facial recognition technology, however, gait analysis takes surveillance to the next level. They analyze how you walk, which can’t be hidden, unless you start walking with a fake limp.

I would get picked up for sure with fake glasses & moustache, walking with a limp down the street, just so I can avoid all the facial and gait recognition technologies. Might as well just get a motorize wheelchair, and a grey beard, so no one will know who I am.

Will we lay down and take this, or will we vote out the entrenched enemy combatants that have taken over our Government? Are we men or mice?

Comments? Writing to my Congresspeople won’t help, so what do we do?

Christopher Winkler
Supplier of Spy & Surveillance Equipment
http://EyeSpyPro.com/Spy-Surveillance

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 5th, 2008 at 12:14 pm and is filed under Big Brother, Computer Security, Personal Security, Public Surveillance, Spy Stuff, Surveillance Systems. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.