Today’s quote comes from the UK Ministry of Defence’s Development Concepts and Doctrine Centre, which recently published a report entitled Global Strategic Trends 2007-2036. The report’s purpose is to analyse a wide range of potential outcomes over the next thirty years, ranging from the impact of globalization, inequality, and poverty, to terrorism, climate change, and future technologies and weapons. There are several fantastic quotes scattered throughout the document, but one of the more interesting ones is this:

The middle classes could become a revolutionary class, taking the role envisaged for the proletariat by Marx. The globalization of labour markets and reducing levels of national welfare provision and employment could reduce peoplesâ?? attachment to particular states. The growing gap between themselves and a small number of highly visible super-rich individuals might fuel disillusion with meritocracy, while the growing urban under-classes are likely to pose an increasing threat to social order and stability, as the burden of acquired debt and the failure of pension provision begins to bite. Faced by these twin challenges, the worldâ??s middle-classes might unite, using access to knowledge, resources and skills to shape transnational processes in their own class interest.

I find that particularly fascinating (and promising, in fact). I’ve always found Marx’s works to be interesting and still relevant in today’s society, especially in the fields of sociology and political economy, despite some of my friends still having a chuckle and saying that he has absolutely no relevance in today’s world. In fact, one of the first lines of an economics text I read a while ago said that, with the fall of the Soviet Union, Marx was proved “wrong”, never mind that since the earliest days of the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 it was recognised amongst the Left and others that Lenin’s revolution bore no resemblance to Marx’s ideas. At any rate, it seems he may have relevance in tomorrow’s world.

On a related note, this document ties in nicely with another paper I’ve started reading from the Oxford Research Group entitled Global Responses to Global Threats: Sustainable Security for the 21st Century, which argues “that international terrorism is actually a relatively minor threat when compared to other more serious global trends”, such as climate change and resource competition.

(And if you want a summarised version of the Global Strategic Trends report, the Guardian have done an article on it).

For anyone interested in privacy, security and surveillance issues, Roger Clarke’s website is a must. Well-researched and insightful, it has become a regular read for me since he covers a lot of issues that have arisen from technology-saturated societies and the natural marriage between IT, governments and corporations in creating ubiquitous surveillance.

Today’s quote is from a paper Clarke wrote in 2006 entitled “What’s Privacy?“, in which he offers this wonderful definition of privacy:

Privacy is the interest that individuals have in sustaining a ‘personal space’, free from interference by other people and organisations.

We would do well to keep this definition in mind before privacy simply comes to mean that corporations and governments can still conduct massive surveillance and collect information on you, but they’ll try make sure it’s secured from unauthorized access. Privacy is not, and should never be, the same as data security.

One of my favourite books from last year was the superb “Spychips” by Katherine Albrecht and Liz McIntyre (they have a blog), examing the RFID industry and its threat to privacy. What I found to be of particular interest was the strategy developed by the Auto-ID Centre - the primary research group behind the Internet of Things concept, backed by some major corporations like Procter & Gamble and Gillette, and also the Department of Defense - to overcome the privacy concerns of consumers.

The Auto-ID Centre hired the pricey public relations firm Fleishman-Hillard and set out to “develop best messages to pacify” consumers. Yes, pacify. They came up with a plan to “identify potential consumer road blocks/fears, construct a proactive message framework to minimize negatives arising [and] assess consumer reaction if [the] press develop scare stories.”

[…]

The Auto-ID Centre’s advisers knew it would be tough [but] they hoped consumers would feel hopeless and too “apathetic” to react (their exact quote was “on balance they are negative by apathetic”). […] “The best communication strategy appears to be positioning the technology simply as an improved barcode,” the advised, noting that, ” … discussing any benefits or using rational argument is largely ineffective and is perceived as ’spin’. Once consumers are concerned, they remain concerned, no matter what we tell them.” (Spychips, pg 156-7)

So, next time you hear it’s an improved barcode, or someone refers to a “radio barcode” (Tesco), “intelligent label” (Marks & Spencer), an “electronic product code” (Wal-Mart), or “green tag” (Auto-ID Centre), remember that someone is trying to “pacify” you.

I wonder how long before we’ll be told that arphids enable and enhance who you really are?

It seems the NSA snooping scandal has taken a little twist. ABC News journalists Brian Ross and Richard Esposito have claimed that a federal source told them “the government is tracking the phone numbers we … call in an effort to root out confidential sources.”

Continue reading »

“The thought police would get him just the same. He had committedâ??would have committed, even if he had never set pen to paperâ??the essential crime that contained all others in itself. Thoughtcrime, they called it. Thoughtcrime was not a thing that could be concealed forever. You might dodge successfully for a while, even for years, but sooner or later they were bound to get you.”
- George Orwell, 1984

Orwell, were he still alive, would have been rather fascinated at the technological advances that now allow governments to spy on their citizens. He would probably also be amazed to realise that it no longer requires a physical person to connect the dots to suspect someone of being a possible terrorist, or to monitor thought crime. The Great Firewall of China is an excellent example how an increasingly technological age allows for greater methods of control and surveillence.

Continue reading »

The Guardian has a damn interesting article about the new Digital Rights Management (DRM) technology about to hit consumers with HD and Blu-Ray: The Advanced Access Content System backed and co-developed by Sony, Toshiba, Intel, IBM, Panasonic, Microsoft, Warner Brothers and Disney. This quote from Mike Evangelist of HD Boycott puts it in perspective:

Continue reading »