Latest Moan From You and Me 2024

Right now, we have freedom. Preserving it requires thinking ahead and being alert to things that look innocuous in our current situation, but may not be down the line.

Digital technology could enable loss of freedom on a massive scale, like nothing ever seen before. And not just utilised by govs.

 

Digital technology has improved lots of peoples freedom as well, there are at least as many positives as negatives.
The Security services say that cannot keep tabs on a few hundred potential terror suspects, how are they going to monitor 60 million people?

 

I'm not subscriber to the paranoia, but let's stick with facts.

Mass surveillance is not at all about the behaviour of individuals. It's all about trends.

Nobody in any position of power gives a stuff what I think or what I do. It's completely unimportant to anyone that I generally get my car out at around 8.20 am then drive a particularly route to another town where I work, before coming home again around 5pm. Nobody cares.

What is of interest though is how many thousands of people hit major routes at certain times, or how many thousands start spending their money on a particular category of products or services, or how many thousands watch YouTube or tiktok videos of a particular theme.

How is this data used? Well the Russians keep getting accused of interfering with the politics of different countries. I doubt that some geezer with a suspicious accent goes to people's homes to 'persuade' them to think a particular way. That would be futile, and a little bit comical. Much more likely, you study the data on the habits of the masses, then use a bit of psychology to drop ideas in here and there that gently steer people into a particular opinion.

There was a report a few years ago about TikTok in the UK and USA Vs TikTok in China. Someone profiled what was trending in China Vs UK and USA. They claimed to find that in China, intellectual content was promoted, while in the UK and USA there was more of a tendency to mindless drivel. It was suggested that the idea here was to slowly turn young Brits and Americans into thickos, while Chinese kids would go on to be bright spark engineers and scientists. I don't know enough about the study to have an opinion on its validity, but it does serve as a good example of how data on the masses, not on individuals, can be used to achieve certain political goals.

 

But what about the good?
I was able to face time Chinese ICU consultants during the COVID crisis and discuss management of patients. This happened on a global basis, which enabled potential new treatments to be rapidly evaluated. This was the first time this sort of thing had happened, and it probably saved, 10,000s lives.
Patients in the UK with rare diseases are now able to have face time with people with similar problems, which can be an enormous help.

 

If you have a new, digital passport or driving lcense you're already carrying the equivalet of an ID card. Extending the carrying of ID cards to everyone will help with ID fraud, especially in banking and social secuirty claims as well as voting, hospital treatment and so on.

The cards don't carry visible address details but, lik eyou bank cards, have chips which hold your personal data and needa special reader to access them.

The UK was way ahead of the EU, for example, in using loyalty cards to trace spending and travel habits and has far more official street and public vehicle CCTV cameras per head than anywhere else in Europe as well as private dashcams, doorcams, gatecams.

It's beyond naive to think an ID card will be an extra loss of liberty. I spent 25 years in Belgium with an ID card and was only ever asked to show it when I opened a bank account, reported a burglary and went to hospital for procedures.

 

There is nothing wrong with the technology. The issue is it tends to advance much faster than the regulation. Then the regulations gets fiercely opposed by the very same people that fear the technology.

It's a no win situation. It's why the more successful tech companies just do as they please, because they know they'll get objections no matter what they do.

 

But it would be a loss of liberty if, say, in a future pandemic, a digital ID was used to deny some people access to supermarkets. In Australia, a vaccine passport was used in this way.

Before Covid, that would have seemed an impossible restriction. Now, it is all too real.

Now, you may or may not agree that restricting some people from doing some things on the basis they have not consented to an irreversible medical intervention is fine. That's not the point. The point is that we can't predict what demands future govs might may on citizens once digital IDs make these possible, just as we could not have predicted lockdowns or mask mandates, etc.

 

Absolutely. No question about it. Digital tech has opened up fantastic opportunities. That doesn't mean we should be blind to its darker side though, with mass surveillance for the purpose of control being a particular issue.

 

As I said earlier, ID cards wouldn't bother me, but if I have to have it on my person 24/7 then no.
i know these things can creep and that could be a worry.
But the principle is not a problem for me.

 

@ViewAhead in France during Covid we were restricted for the first 3 months to staying within 1km of our homes except for work, medical appointments and a weekly shop. We were, initially, expected to carry a form saying who we were and why we were out in case of being stopped by police. It never happened to us.

Masks had to be warn at all times in public spaces and busy streets. No entry to SMs without them. Later on, as the vaccines came in, we were allowed to go to cafés and restaurants and organised social gatherings like my patchwork club as long as we had a valid vaccination certificatewith a scannable QR code.

Those restrictions were in the interests of the health and safey of the majority and the rights of health workers putting themselves at risk to care for others. I have no patience with idiots/selfish individualists who do not see that and do not respect the rights of others to such care and consideration. It's called social responsibility.

 

The funniest thing to come out of the pandemic was how all the people in entry level jobs suddenly became so proud of their critically important roles as 'key workers'.

My boss tried to make me one in order to get me to come into the office one time. I had no problem going to the office on that occasion. I knew exactly how to explain myself if stopped. But my boss thought it would be nice if she gave me a letter explaining that I was a key worker, because although in my role as an IT engineer I have no direct influence at all on food production, our company does distribute food ingredients.

I flatly refused to carry a note from my boss. It was like being at school, having a note from your mam excusing you from PE because you've bashed your big toe.

 

I just went out for a drive when I felt like it, the roads were so much nicer to drive on, I used to try going for a walk in the park but knees were bad at the time and they had tape around all the seats to stop you sitting down.
There was even pictures on the news of coppers stopping people and asking where they were going when they were out walking.

All part of the scare tactics, I just tried to stay clear of people, apart from going to the supermarket, and it seemed to work.

 

We were lucky @pete, having a decent dog walking circuit that never took usmore than a 1km radius from the house but which gave us and the dogs a good airing.

I had to do the SM run on my own. It's normally a 25km drive but floods in January brought down a bridge so I had to do a detour making it nearer 40km. It was spring so the country roads changed ever week as the spring flowers lit up the verges and then the blossom and new leaves came out in the hedgerows and woods.

We saw nobody, not even neighbours, until OH was allowed to go and play golf again in June. It did make us grateful for having space outside to work and play.

 

But, as I said, that's a different discussion. Some people will agree with you, some won't. Some people will agree with some of the restrictions imposed, but not others. Some people will have cooperated with them all at the time, but looking back, be less convinced due rigour was applied to the decisions.

My point is there could come a time when you did not agree with whatever is being demanded, made possible by digital IDs.