Technotranscendence wrote:
> Anyway, one comment, in case someone hasn't brought it up. Imagine,
> ubiquitous surveillance is just around the corner, what things do you
think
> would be used to counteract it? There're always ways to fake out any
> system.
Here's my scenario, culled from various sources including Vinge's 1998
CFP talk on ubitiquous law enforcement (ULE).
First, in order to prevent innocent computers from being used as
zombies in distributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks, the gov't
mandates a new chip to be emplaced in any computers. Well, actually
it's not mandated, just a requirement to get your Internet access
license.
These chips are immediately hacked and found to transmit information
about the sites you visit and all sorts of other things (unlicensed
software installations, etc) which of course the gov't redistributes
to favored corporations (Real, Yahoo, whatever).
As per Vinge, a War On Drugs scale repression sets in as the gov't
attempts to stop hacking of these devices. ULE technology grows, and
after a while everything piece of technology you use is a gov't
informer. Hacking moves to the nano scale.
Another few years and the new thing is BrainNet, where people can
get linked up to each other using Kurzweil's brain-roving nanobots.
Technological telepathy allows BrainNet-connected people to be much
much more efficient and if you're not on BrainNet it's like not being
on the Internet today.
After a couple incidents where sleeping people are used as zombies
to perform Scanners-like attacks on others, and having established
precedent with the anti-DDOS measures, the gov't mandates that anyone
who wants to get a BrainNet access license has to have federal police
nanobots installed in their brains. Again, this isn't required, just
required if you want to access BrainNet. The policeman within becomes
the legal system within.
Of course these internal nanoFedbots report on far more than your
attempts to hack ULE components, and resulting market research data
is again made available to favored corporations. People begin to use
their own brain-roving nanobots against the nanoFedbots.
Now, the nanoFedbots having been made from NSA technology superior
to what one can get commercially, your own nanobots are no match
against them unless you devote conscious effort to develop tactics
and strategy and lead them into battle. You can spot people engaged
in battles with the nanoFedbots by the faint puffs of smoke coming
out of their ears as the nanobots make war on each other.
So, that's it! Instead of a global nanowar, we all have an internal
nanowar inside our own brains! What fun!
-Mike
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Jul 27 2000 - 14:08:59 MDT