“Surveillance Society”

Censorship of wrongthink by Big Tech at the behest of the government is government censorship, which violates the First Amendment

One warm weekend in October of 2020, three impeccably credentialed epidemiologists—Jayanta Bhattacharya, Sunetra Gupta, and Martin Kulldorff, of Stanford, Oxford, and Harvard Universities respectively—gathered with a few journalists, writers, and economists at an estate in the Berkshires where the American Institute for Economic Research had brought together critics of lockdowns and other COVID-related government restrictions. On Sunday morning shortly before the guests departed, the scientists encapsulated their views—that lockdowns do more harm than good, and that resources should be devoted to protecting the vulnerable rather than shutting society down—in a joint communique dubbed the “Great Barrington Declaration,” after the town in which it was written.

Law enforcement access to certain private data, like surveillance camera footage, typically requires a warrant. But increasingly, police are finding ways around that requirement. For owners of Amazon’s popular Ring video doorbells, police can submit an “emergency request” to get access to a customer’s stored footage without the customer’s permission. Now, in San Francisco, police can get live access to private security cameras, even if no crime has been committed.

Do you get mail? Of course, you do. You have a mailbox for your house, apartment, or condo, or you have a post office box. Everybody gets mail. But does everybody get their mail monitored? Well, if you’re a Second Amendment supporter or you don’t like Joe Biden, you may have somebody watching your mailbox.

What is happening?

On a hot May afternoon in southern California, near the border with Mexico, white-and-green border vehicles patrol the two-lane highway, black helicopters glide across the sky – and their latest companions, autonomous surveillance towers built by the tech defence company Anduril, peek over the ridges.

One Anduril tower, perched on a hill, has a clear view over the rusty brown border wall and into the Mexican town of Tecate. From here, it can detect people who climb over the wall and walk across the rugged landscape on the US side. Approach the hill and the camera atop the tower swivels toward you.

The FBI becomes the Stasi.

Unbelievable — and unbelievably dangerous.

This week we learned that the FBI swooped down on a Hardee’s in Minnesota, blocking the car of a notable customer: MyPillow founder and CEO Mike Lindell. And demanding he turn his phone over to them.

Just as they did with another prominent supporter of former President Donald Trump — Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Scott Perry.