Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Big Brother: Watching, Listening And Shouting:

Conerned individual | 30.11.2006 15:01 | Repression | Technology

 http://www.infowars.net/articles/november2006/281106BB.htm

Behavioural control agenda continues as cameras will now record our conversations in the street and determine whether we are aggressive

Steve Watson
Infowars.net
Tuesday, November 28, 2006

In an amazing story, that was passed over as if completely by-the-by, it was revealed over the weekend that London police and councils are considering monitoring our conversations in the street using high-powered microphones attached to CCTV cameras.

The microphones, which are already in use in the Netherlands, can pick up "aggressive tones" on the basis of 12 factors, including decibel level, pitch and the speed at which words are spoken. They are so advanced that background noise is filtered out, enabling the camera to focus on specific conversations in public places.

The excuse being touted is that in 2012 London will host the Olympics. So what?

These devices may be successful in recording the murmurs leading up to a scuffle between a couple of hobos but they're certainly not going to prevent any major security threats. What are they going to do, monitor conversations and despatch emergency squads of argument police if it looks like it might turn nasty?

Step by step our free and open society is being transformed into one of hi-tech authoritarian panopticon state control.

This latest suggestion even has the former Home Secretary David Blunkett, (an MP who for so many years pushed the ID card database in the UK) up in arms. Blunkett yesterday remarked that the listening cameras "smacked of the "surveillance state".

Once again this about having total information awareness, the ability to monitor everyone, anywhere, all the time. It's about getting used to being controlled and eliminating any backlash towards living under total surveillance. Note how the primary function of the cameras is to detect aggression or dissent.

In addition to simply watching and scanning us 24/7 with the ability to positively identify who we are, which many now consider perfectly normal, the latest technology is being used to monitor and manipulate our behaviour.

Face scanning cameras are another example of such technology. Some of these devices are programmed to sound an alarm when they spot suspicious behaviour, such as waiting somewhere for a prolonged period of time or just walking in a suspicious way.



Don't think that these are just proto-type tools either, we have seen how their use in airports and train stations has been hyped over the past year.

Those who are lucky enough to work out of the big cities or those who drive to work have their movements and personal behaviour monitored by traffic cameras all over the UK.

In an even more shocking move we reported last month that the cameras may even start shouting at you in order to publicly humiliate you and let everyone else around know if you are doing something they deem to be wrong. "UNMUTUAL, UNMUTUAL". This way you might be shamed into never stepping out of line in that way again.

Such forms of eavesdropping and monitoring conversations are not new, they are now simply less covert and more out in the open because there is an excuse to justify their use.

In the US you can call your cell phone company, ask them where you are and they will tell you down to a few feet. That is a federal operation that's hooked into the NSA right at this moment and about to be hooked into every major police department and squad car.

Your name, everything about you, what you're doing, where you're going and the cop can punch in a few keys and use your phone as an audio sensor.

Major cities such as Austin, Texas have already installed gunshot detection microphones. The government assured us that they respect our privacy but the very companies installing them bragged about how they can listen to a kid on the street talking to his friend two hundred yards away.

And now, from Rochester New York to Austin Texas to Chicago, the government has announced that they are being used as microphones and they will be used to listen to us.

And it's not just in the street that you can be listened to.

Private industry and eventually government is planning to use microphones in the computers of an estimated 150 million-plus Internet active Americans to spy on their lifestyle choices and build psychological profiles which will be used for surveillance, invasive advertising and data mining.



Check your computer now, if it is a fairly new model it more than likely has a built in microphone that really serves no obvious purpose at this time. Cable and satellite boxes also have the microphones. Why does your TV need to listen to you?

Even if you believe the agenda is purely a consumerist drive to aggressively advertise (why should you when the government wants warrantless wiretapping and the power to detain without trial) this is still a flagrant invasion of our privacy and an attempt to manipulate our behaviour.

A government engaging in escalating criminal actions and becoming more and more secretive should not be watching and tracking us as if we're all criminals. The same goes for all forms of watching, listening, shouting, singing, dancing, flying CCTV surveillance. That's not freedom.

The very matter of fact announcing and the creep of this surveillance nightmare works on two levels. On the one hand the placement of the technology allows a literal big brother monitoring system to function. Secondly the fallout is shaping individual behavior, which means it doesn't much matter what slips past the surveillance grid, because people are cowering in fear of speaking out or being active in any way.

Big brother may not need to watch all the time and that is ultimately more successful, because control by fiat rather than force is something that’s far easier to accomplish and far harder to resist.

Do not cower. If you see any of these devices in your area, demand their removal. Or if your local government plans to implement listening and shouting cameras, resist them.

please forward and distribute!

Conerned individual

Comments

Hide the following 3 comments

don't worry about it

30.11.2006 16:48

The brits will get pissed off if it go's too far and turn into an uncontrollable mob

ahwell


How bad does it have to get...?

30.11.2006 22:06

I have a mobile police CCTV van despatched (at a cost) to train it's roof-mounted cameras on my house every time my son revs up his moped. So where is this mob?

Big Mama


already here.

01.12.2006 11:07

If you live in london look around on the lamposts of soho.
These microphones are already there and have been for some time.

@#%*


Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech