Senate Panel Approves Even More Stringent Biometric Measures

Permission = Freedom?

Eric Blair

"The secret in propaganda is that when you demonize, you dehumanize," says James Forsher, a film historian. "When you dehumanize, it allows you to kill your enemy and no longer feel guilty about it."

Apparently illegal immigrants have been sufficiently dehumanized to force them into biometric tracking. There's no way the government would use biometrics to track the superior law-abiding natives, right?  More on this later.

Illegal immigration is a hot-button issue that genuinely affects many communities and the motivation to do something about it is understandable.  However, anti-immigration supporters may be playing right into Big Brother's hands by being tricked into supporting the hi-tech enslavement of themselves.

US to store passenger data for 15 years

Draft of Washington-EU deal leaked to the Guardian shows agreement 'violates basic European principles'  

U.S. terrorist screening program / Wiki Commons

Alan Travis
The Guardian

The personal data of millions of passengers who fly between the US and Europe, including credit card details, phone numbers and home addresses, may be stored by the US department of homeland security for 15 years, according to a draft agreement between Washington and Brussels leaked to the Guardian.

The "restricted" draft, which emerged from negotiations between the US and EU, opens the way for passenger data provided to airlines on check-in to be analysed by US automated data-mining and profiling programmes in the name of fighting terrorism, crime and illegal migration. The Americans want to require airlines to supply passenger lists as near complete as possible 96 hours before takeoff, so names can be checked against terrorist and immigration watch lists.

10 Ways We Are Being Tracked, Traced, and Databased

Are technological advances infringing on our right to privacy? 

Activist Post

The war on terror is a worldwide endeavor that has spurred massive investment into the global surveillance industry - which now seems to be becoming a war on "liberty and privacy."  Given all of the new monitoring technology being implemented, the uproar over warrantless wiretaps now seems moot.  High-tech, first-world countries  are being tracked, traced, and databased, literally around every corner.  Governments, aided by private companies, are gathering a mountain of information on average citizens who so far seem willing to trade liberty for supposed security.  Here are just some of the ways the matrix of data is being collected:

• GPS -- Global positioning chips are now appearing in everything from U.S. passports, cell phones, to cars.  More common uses include tracking employees, and for all forms of private investigation.  Apple recently announced they are collecting the precise location of iPhone users via GPS for public viewing in addition to spying on users in other ways.

• Internet -- Internet browsers are recording your every move forming detailed cookies on your activities.  The NSA has been exposed as having cookies on their site that don't expire until 2035.  Major search engines know where you surfed last summer, and online purchases are databased, supposedly for advertising and customer service uses.  IP addresses are collected and even made public.  Controversial websites can be flaggedinternally by government sites, as well as re-routing all traffic to block sites the government wants to censor. It has now been fully admitted that social networks provide NO privacy to users, while technologies for real-time social network monitoring are already being used.  The Cybersecurity Act attempts to legalize the collection and exploitation of your personal information.  Apple's iPhone also has browsing data recorded and stored.  All of this despite the overwhelming opposition to cybersurveillance by citizens.

• RFID  -- Forget your credit cards which are meticulously tracked, or the membership cards for things so insignificant as movie rentals which require your SSN.  Everyone has Costco, CVS, grocery-chain cards, and a wallet or purse full of many more.  RFID  "proximity cards" take tracking to a new level in uses ranging from loyalty cards, student ID, physical access, and computer network access.  Latest developments include an RFID powder developed by Hitachi, for which the multitude of uses are endless -- perhaps including tracking hard currency so we can't even keep cash undetected. (Also see microchips below).

• Traffic cameras -- License plate recognition has been used to remotely automate duties of the traffic police in the United States, but have been proven to have dual use in England such as to mark activists under the Terrorism Act.  Perhaps the most common use will be to raise money and shore up budget deficits via traffic violations, but uses may descend to such "Big Brother" tactics as monitors telling pedestrians not to litter as talking cameras already do in the UK.

• Computer cameras and microphones -- The fact that laptops -- contributed by taxpayers -- spied on public school children (at home) is outrageous.  Years ago Google began officially to use computer "audio fingerprinting" for advertising uses.  They have admitted to working with the NSA, the premier surveillance network in the world.  Private communications companies already have been exposed routing communications to the NSA.  Now, keyword tools -- typed and spoken -- link to the global security matrix.

• Public sound surveillance -- This technology has come a long way from only being able to detect gunshots in public areas, to now listening in to whispers for dangerous "keywords." This technology has been launched in Europe to "monitor conversations" to detect "verbal aggression" in public places.  Sound Intelligence is the manufacturer of technology to analyze speech, and their website touts how itcan easily be integrated into other systems. 

• Biometrics -- The most popular biometric authentication scheme employed for the last few years has been Iris Recognition. The main applications are entry control, ATMs and Government programs. Recently, network companies and governments have utilized biometric authentication including fingerprint analysis, iris recognition, voice recognition, or combinations of these for use in National identification cards.

• DNA -- Blood from babies has been taken for all people under the age of 38.  In England, DNA was sent to secret databases from routine heel prick tests.  Several reports have revealed covertPentagon databases of DNA for "terrorists" and now DNA from all American citizens is databased.Digital DNA is now being used as well to combat hackers.

• Microchips -- Microsoft's HealthVault and VeriMed partnership is to create RFID implantable microchips.  Microchips for tracking our precious pets is becoming commonplace and serves to condition us to accept putting them in our children in the future.  The FDA has already approved this technology for humans and is marketing it as a medical miracle, again for our safety.

• Facial recognition -- Anonymity in public is over.  Admittedly used at Obama's campaign events, sporting events, and most recently at theG8/G20 protests in Canada. This technology is also harvesting data from Facebook images and surely will be tied into the street "traffic" cameras.

All of this is leading to Predictive Behavior Technology -- It is not enough to have logged and charted where we have been; the surveillance state wants to know where we are going through psychological profiling.  It's been marketed for such uses as blocking hackers.  Things seem to have advanced to a point where a truly scientific Orwellian world is at hand.  It is estimated that computers know to a 93% accuracy where you will be, before you make your first move.   Nanotech is slated to play a big role in going even further as scientists are using nanoparticles to directly influence behavior and decision making.   

Many of us are asking:  What would someone do with all of this information to keep us tracked, traced, and databased?  It seems the designers have no regard for the right to privacy and desire to become the Controllers of us all.

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Swedes' emails to be stored for six months

The Local

Emails and mobile phone text messages would be stored for six months by internet service providers (ISPs), according to a bill presented by the Swedish government on Thursday to bring the country in line with EU dataretention rules.

• Sweden to extend police powers on data access (27 Oct 10)
• Anti-piracy law test case sent to EU Court (16 Sep 10)
• Justice Minister reluctant to store data (4 Feb 10)

Critics have come down hard on the proposal, which would compel telephone and broadband providers to retain electronic data for six months, the shortest possible time in accordance with EU directives.

Justice Minister Beatrice Ask explained that the bill is concerned about privacy when she presented the legislative proposal on Thursday.

"The proposal means that the information can only be disclosed for crime-fighting purposes," Ask said a news conference.

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10 Ways We're Being Tracked, Traced and Databased

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Live Superfoods It is time to Wake Up! You too, can join the "Global Political Awakening"!

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