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Writer's pictureAvi Barak

Cameras, surveillance and tracking. Is this the the final stages of privacy as we know it?


Say hello the "Hawk's Eye" system implemented in Israel, yet another step towards the complete loss of privacy, that started with the decision of people living and “governing” outside the State of Israel or any western country for that matter, gained momentum during the Coronavirus “Pandemic” (because that's what they do in crises - they take advantage of them) and now raising to the next level.


As always and as with any decree that takes away more of our freedoms, there are two key words that grease the way into the collective minds:

"Convenience" and "Safety”.


In this case, the use of “For your safety” is again the excuse, just like the Israeli law that passed in the parliament last year, that allows the police to search our homes without a warrant, the official reason being "the rising crime rates in the Arab community in Israel".

That is a bogus reason of course.


Whenever they pass some law or regulation that takes away more of our freedoms, they must add some kind of an excuse or a reason to make it slide better down our throats.


This was and is true in regarding those text messages Israeli’s received during that "Pandemic" - which said that if we don't "agree" for the police to track our location through our mobile phones, they reserve the right to pop up at our homes unannounced at any given time of the day or night.


This is also true for the massive and unprecedented deployment of cameras everywhere in the public space (on any average corner on a major street in Tel Aviv, for example, you can count over 15 cameras on a single pole).


These cameras are connected to a system that is capable of facial recognition even from a distance, and is already connected to the police data systems.

It is only a matter of time and some more legislation and it will be possible to integrate them into "preventive arrests of potential suspects" and share them between the various authorities.

"For our safety."


👉 A few months ago in the USA it was published that Amazon has provided Ring doorbell footage to law enforcement 11 times in this past year without the user’s permission, a revelation that’s bound to raise more privacy and civil liberty concerns about its video-sharing agreements with police departments across the US


It turns out that apparently some of the fine print in the purchase contract allows this.

That is a well established example of the cooperation we have been witnessing for the past three years between governments and law enforcement agencies, and big tech companies.

Along the way our individual rights are being trampled on, but who cares about those small and minor issues like civil rights, right?

Not as long as we are in a “constant state of grave danger”.


👉 A few months ago, also in the USA, a woman who works in a law firm came to see a show in New York City with her daughter.

Just went out to see a show and have a good time

The building where the performance took place belongs to a company that is being sued by the law firm where the woman works.

It turns out that her face was scanned in advance and put into their database, like all other employees of that law firm, and as soon as she entered the building, the cameras and the systems to which they are connected, alerted her and she heard her name being said over the public PA system, followed by a group of security personnel from the same concert hall that arrived and escorted her outside the building.

These are just a few examples from a multitude of existing ones.


 


All that is needed is the deployment of the system at the technological level, and this is already being implemented.

in the second stage - legislation that will allow the technology to be used by the governments and law enforcement agencies "for our security and safety", a system that is enabling things like:


1. To mark Opponents of the regime and restrict their movement and authorizations to enter places like for example: government offices, buildings and services.


2. Travel restrictions and flagging “Problematic people”, taking certain people's ability to move freely.


3. ‘Preventive detention' to keep people from committing ‘future crimes', and letting artificial intelligence manage these systems.

This will enable computers to “predict” crimes, and analyze potential suspects body language in the street, and of course recognizing them, so they can be apprehended as quickly as possible.

All in the purpose of "maintaining order".


4. Fines and public punishments for lawbreakers without the possibility of appeal. Could be even a person who threw litter on the ground.

Cameras will (and already are in places like China) a big part of enforcing the social credit score.


5. Prevention of demonstrations and protests.


6. Identifying people for personal advertising targeting.

They will also find an excuse for this such as "the tech company donated the technology to the state in exchange for...".

And more and more as the imagination goes.


This adds up to the growing ban on the use of cash, combined with the digital currency that will be the only central bank currency in a matter of a few years.

Elimination of any ability to pay without tracking.


All they need is the deployment of the technology (already happening), legislation that will allow its use against the public (already happening), and the compliance and consent of that public against whom the sanctions will operate (already happening - the Covid period is a clear example).


Step by step, bite by bite, and our lives will be unrecognizable.

It never happens in one day, but one day you do wake up and realize that your life is nothing more than a chapter in the book 1984.


And always "for your own sake and for public safety".


 

These decisions are not taken at the level of the local parliaments, but at the level of the World Economic Forum and the other bodies that dictate to parliaments like ours, what and how.


The Knesset and the parliaments of the countries under the control of those bodies (bodies that no one elected in free elections) - are nothing more than rubber stamps populated by puppets.





The only way to fight back and set limits, is first of all to be aware of the process.

To be alert and resist.

Resist as much as possible.



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