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Comment by casca | Hacker News Reader

For those unaware, this is not "London" that's stopping the tracking bins, it's the City of London. This is the historical center and current financial district. It is ~1 square mile out of ~600 for the. There are all sorts of curiosities around the City - it is not governed like the other boroughs and is extremely wealthy in its own right. Conspiracy theorists have found much fodder in the City government and control.

The current set of bins are claimed to all be in the City , but this move is not the end of of the tracking of people in London via their phones.

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Indeed, the same City of London that is surrounded by the "Ring of Steel"[1] - described as a "surveillance cordon" with almost half a million CCTV cameras. At the checkpoints police had near-carte-blanche to search any vehicle they liked.

From a different era, granted, but a strange entity to be kicking up a fuss about privacy.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_of_steel_(London)

Wealthy people like to protect their personal privacy.

Makes me wonder what will happen when clothes, hats, glasses and etc start emitting electromagnetic interference that inhibits this vast system.

There's gotta be money in that, eh?

Think of all the fun you can have too. You could potentially fake a person's electronic signature and then visit strange places.

Kind of reminds me of Ghost in the Shell philosophy[0]:

What good is electronic surveillance when people who can run scripts and programs to imitate other people to the point that it will be indistinguishable from the real thing?

Thinking about this stuff gets me excited about the future. I'm deff going to be involved making stuff like this happen, haha.

Edit: Already getting myself involved with it now…

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_Ghost_in_the_She...

I JUST finished watching (for the nth time) episode 6 of SAC, and this is where the laughing man case takes form. I feel that if you're on Hacker News, it's a must watch because it blends philosophy and technology with a bit of ethics and possibility very very well.

Heck, I won't be surprised if someone's startup is inspired by that. I can already see usage of some tech that vaguely resembles the Oculus Rift (and yes, the Virtual boy of the past), ah you know what, just go watch it. You will not be disappointed.

CGPGrey's The (Secret) City of London (Part [1]: History, Part [2]: Government)

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrObZ_HZZUc

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1ROpIKZe-c

I've seen the video at link #1 before but not #2, still interesting to watch I watch #1 again and #2.

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