New Report: “Recording Everything” Details How Governments Can Shape the Dynamics of Dissent
Brandon Turbeville
ActivistPost.com
Thursday, December 29, 2011
A recent Brookings Institution report has now confirmed what many have suspected for some time – that the United States government (and virtually every other government in the world) has the capability to monitor and record nearly every interaction that occurs within its national borders.
For years, those individuals who have tried to warn others of the creeping surveillance state were met with denials and catcalls of “conspiracy theory,” as well as the famous claims that it was not physically possible to monitor everyone.
This new report, however, shatters into a million pieces the delusional rationalities of the uninformed.
The Brookings Institution report entitled, “Recording Everything: Digital Storage as an Enabler of Authoritarian Governments” (.pdf) discusses the increasing capacities for surveillance due to the improvement in technology and the sinking costs of its procurement, along with the implications for human rights and authoritarianism that come along with it.
The report begins by stating:
Within the next few years an important threshold will be crossed: For the first time ever, it will become technologically and financially feasible for authoritarian governments to record nearly everything that is said or done within their borders – every phone conversation, electronic message, social media interaction, the movements of nearly every person and vehicle, and video from every street corner. Governments with a history of using all of the tools at their disposal to track and monitor their citizens will undoubtedly make full use of this capability once it becomes available.
The Rest…HERE
