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Comment by WhackyIdeas | Hacker News Reader

I agree. I had this worrying idea (realisation..?) that one day, maybe triple digit years away, maybe sooner, that tiny cameras and mics the size of grains of salt will be everywhere. They will cost nothing to produce, be self-charging, interconnected to each other and created to ‘reduce crime’ or ‘make you safer’. And in the same way as forever chemicals, you can’t get rid of them. Trillions of them, in fields, the ground. Spreading around stuck to your shoes, on your car tires.

Just a crazy idea, but I think that if they could make that happen today then they would. And that part is the main point - There is no limit to surveillance anymore. I live in the UK, that realisation is in my face every day. Can’t even take a trip to Tesco without being run through facial recognition.

There is no care for the concept of privacy anymore. All the richest companies in the world don’t make their money from caring about our privacy.

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I believe I read a science fiction book around this topic. Postsingular by Rudy Rucker I believe, related to nanotechnology. Can't remember most of it, but delved a little into how it affects relationships re: every thing being visible always to everyone. Not sure I'd entirely recommend it, but still interesting to see the thoughts and outcomes others come up with in regard to these types of potential technological changes.

I hadn’t heard of Postingular, so had a quick look at Wikipiedia and the first part I read about it reminded me of a Black Mirror episode with the killer robot bees (a scary but brilliant episode which somehow felt realistic one day!). Will check this out further thanks.

" that one day, maybe triple digit years away, maybe sooner, that tiny cameras and mics the size of grains of salt will be everywhere"

Why spend the effort, if everyone is already carrying their smartphones around with them?

Politicians and high ranking unelected officials also will want privacy so truly omnipresent surveillance would be concomitant with jamming and obfuscation technologies. There’d just be endless arms race.

There will come a time when everyone will face the panopticon though. It’ll be unavoidable, like forever chemicals. I suppose that will be when the machines take over!!

With a sufficient culture shift, I could imagine a world where the capability exists but is outlawed and shunned. Surveillance capitalism, and blanket security Surveillance feel possible to overthrow politically. And to limit somewhat through legislation.

That leaves targeted surveillance, emergency surveillance, and war-time surveillance. Those will probably not be limited, though they are inherently more limited.

As soon as one country implements such tech, all the powerful countries would do the same. It’s not really that far away from the tech we have already, just simpler, smaller and super dispensable and don’t get carried around in our pockets all day long (smartphones).

laws are the only thing that can save us... but with the top secret laws that we are subject to, I dont hold my breath.

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