

How Much Surveillance Can Democracy Withstand? - Libertatea
http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/10/a-necessary-evil-what-it-takes-for-democracy-to-survive-surveillance/

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bnolsen
Or to rephrase it: when much surveillance turn a free society turn into a
police state?

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icu
I feel this is one of the most important articles I've read in the wake of
Snowden's patriotic disclosure. Thank you Libertatea for sharing it.

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j2d3
Admittedly skimmed this once I saw it is a list of "remedies" that will,
unfortunately, never happen.

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Zigurd
Stallman is right again, but he leaves out a very important point about
privacy and constitutionally limited government: Without privacy, ANY law can
be implemented.

Imagine re-arguing abortion in this era of big data. If makers of pregnancy
and baby products can reliably infer that you are pregnant, do you still have
an expectation of privacy in what it going on inside your body? The government
almost certainly knows you are pregnant. They have your call to your mother
recorded. You have admitted it!

The government knows you are pregnant or not. There is no barrier to fairly
and uniformly enforcing laws against abortion because reliable information is
universally available to any prosecution.

Let's imagine all the other previously impractical laws that would improve
society!

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bnolsen
Originally a big push back against the social security system was that it
would assign a number to every individual allowing each to be tracked by the
federal government. Seems to me the original founders intended that the
federal government dealt directly with the states and NEVER had anything to do
with individual citizens. How much the US has changed....

