There was a time in the days of the cold war when we made jokes about Russia's government spying on their citizens. But back then it required the plumber maintenance man or telephone man to physically enter a residence to install a bugging device. Those days are long gone comrade. With computers a bit of software and the cooperation of the phone companies (yes most of them agreed to go along with this shortly after the Un-patriot Act was passed) the fly on the wall is sitting comfortably hidden in plain sight.
You have nothing to hide you say so there shouldn't be anything wrong with this you might think. You'd be wrong. It wouldn't take much to take something out of context and use that against you in one of their secret courts with secret laws. Who could defend against that? And the right wing have become masters at that. Look no further than Fox News to see how that all works out. They could turn a Boy Scout helping grandma across the street into a national felony case. Look no farther than A.C.O.R.N. to see what can happen there.
Then there's the issue of competition. We know for a fact that with all of these agencies that are there to supposedly guard our safety and well being have an unmatched rivalry always wanting to score the highest points for captured bad guys. The collateral damage is just part of the price of admission unless of course the victim is you who did nothing wrong. A wrong phone number or an accidental click of the mouse would all it would take to become insnared in their web. And once you get in there's no getting out. No one to plead you case to or process to have your name removed. Don't believe me? How many babies and young people are on the "do not fly list" who have a very difficult time flying on planes? All because their name is the same as some suspect. And there's another matter. Aren't we supposed to consider innocent until proven guilty? I guess not any more comrade.
For those of you who'd like to opt out of their little spy vs spy game there are alternatives. One place to start is a site called prism-break dot org. It lists methods and alternative software to keep prying eyes of big brother from looking over your shoulder. I'm not part of the tin foil hat crowd but with today's abbreviated messages it is very easy to misunderstand one's intent. And who knows who is related to whom when you get a wrong number? More on the devious technologies in the pipeline later. In the mean time keep your mouth shut.
7 comments:
It's always been my opinion that we have been watched in whatever ways they could. Life is too short for me to get all worked up over it.
If the weather is decent this weekend I'll start painting my 5th wheel.
Don't recall the name of it but a government agency watched my blogs for a while, guess they decided that I'm just a goofy old fuck cuz they went away.
"They could turn a Boy Scout helping grandma across the street into a national felony case."
What, he touched her WHERE??? Pervert! Lock him up.
Agree - it would be easy for them to find some little thing to get you on, and once in the system, who knows? I discovered a Facebook friend has extreme Islamist viewpoints (he had friended me recently and I didn't know much about him until now). My immediate thought was, "I'd better get rid of this FB friend before the FBI shows up at my door..."
The best part is that once the tech's out of the box, it's never going back in. Privacy is dead, unless you wish to become a full-time spelunker.
Wake up, it's time to post the Friday beaver shot.
Other commentators have suggested that they could care less about terrorism, what they want is blackmail material. Regardless, as things are now, they will simply pick off one or two at a time. What you hope is that no one gets into power who can decide on purges.
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