Security and privacy: bait and switch

Holy cow: Rolling Stone has a relevant article! I always think of Rolling Stone as some sort of tired 70s by-blow of Gloria Steinem and Larry Flynt, the place P.J. O'Rourke writes about vomiting in foreign lands. They get major credit for signing Naomi Klein.

(via BoingBoing (via Schneier))

Here's a story: China reinvents its nation, and in the process uses new technology to build "Totalitarianism 2.0" à la Orwell. Klein sketches a scary picture, draws disturbing parallels and connections with the U.S. government, and points out some nasty trends in our not-so-free society.

Although she doesn't spell it out in the article, I'll take it a step further and give a progression:

1. U.S. citizens were highly resistant to living in a police state.
2. A temporary crisis resulted in permanent security measures which cause widespread delay and irritation, but are ridiculous by any reasonable standard and provide no actual improvement in security.
3. The government provides a new method of sailing through security by handing over biometric information and submitting to electronic tracking.
4. Governments threaten to prohibit travel without biometric identification.

A simplistic view, but when you strip away the fear, propaganda and fancy talk, that's what is left.

I've already fallen for it. The border between the U.S. and Canada used to be a lot easier to cross, but since they tightened it so much in the past decade it is now very slow. As a result, the US and Canadian governments introduced the ominously named NEXUS program to facilitate crossing the border. I'm still regularly stopped and searched at customs and asked the usual questions, but now they have a more easily tracked dossier and my retina prints on file (hello General Poindexter!). This is how our privacy and freedom of movement are chipped away: piece by piece, year by year, and one person at a time.