Slashdot Mirror
Can We Avoid Government Surveillance By Leaving The Grid? (counterpunch.org)
Slashdot reader Nicola Hahn writes: While reporters clamor about the hacking of the Democratic National Committee, NSA whistleblower James Bamford offers an important reminder: American intelligence has been actively breaching email servers in foreign countries like Mexico and Germany for years. According to Bamford documents leaked by former NSA specialist Ed Snowden show that the agency is intent on "tracking virtually everyone connected to the Internet." This includes American citizens. So it might not be surprising that another NSA whistleblower, William Binney, has suggested that certain elements within the American intelligence community may actually be responsible for the DNC hack.
This raises an interesting question: facing down an intelligence service that is in a class by itself, what can the average person do? One researcher responds to this question using an approach that borrows a [strategy] from the movie THX 1138: "The T-H-X account is six percent over budget. The case is to be terminated."
To avoid surveillance, the article suggests "get off the grid entirely... Find alternate channels of communication, places where the coveted home-field advantage doesn't exist... this is about making surveillance expensive." The article also suggests "old school" technologies, for example a quick wireless ad-hoc network in a crowded food court. Any thoughts?
This raises an interesting question: facing down an intelligence service that is in a class by itself, what can the average person do? One researcher responds to this question using an approach that borrows a [strategy] from the movie THX 1138: "The T-H-X account is six percent over budget. The case is to be terminated."
To avoid surveillance, the article suggests "get off the grid entirely... Find alternate channels of communication, places where the coveted home-field advantage doesn't exist... this is about making surveillance expensive." The article also suggests "old school" technologies, for example a quick wireless ad-hoc network in a crowded food court. Any thoughts?
You can get off the grid: become a homeless bum, move to a third world country, etc. But there are obvious disadvantages associated with that. If you own a house, have a salary, drive a car, take a plane, see a doctor, own a gun, use a credit card, etc. you are being tracked. NSA surveillance is really the least of your worries. And the thing to recognize that most of that tracking has nothing to do with terrorism, but with financial regulations, taxes, mandatory insurance and retirement plans, gun control, the war on drugs, the war on poverty, equal opportunity enforcement, zoning, building inspections, etc.
That is, the progressive social welfare state is inextricably linked with government tracking and surveillance: government can't right the supposed wrongs in society, manage the economy, and help everybody to become healthy and smart without detailed information about what people do and want. So, if you don't like that level of surveillance and tracking, the only way is to turn back the progressive welfare state.