Internet Privacy: Republican created slave reality on its way in

… by Ann Diener

Today you are less free. You were told corporations needed to see your “internet habits,” so they could make money selling your private life to potential advertisers, that in itself is a tragedy, but it is also not true. Google controls most internet searches and has always done that.

You see, browsing habits and searches are not the same. When you go to the Social Security, your bank or the IRS website,  you “browse.” Now what you do there will be permanently sold to the highest bidder, forever – what you buy, forms you fill out, your Skype conversations and email – all of it is “browser content.”

Some is video from your laptop camera, some is email, all is now unprotected, easily gathered, no hacking required, not anymore, and used for what purpose?

That’s the kicker.

By removing the restrictions aimed at protecting consumers and by ending the possibility for future legislation for protecting consumers, Congress has just opened the door to social engineering of Americans through “microtargeting” by big data with information purchased from Internet Service Providers (ISPs).

The bill, blocking internet privacy rules passed by the Federal Communications Commission last year, passed by the House on Tuesday is on its way to the President’s desk with an additional bill that prohibits regulations from being passed in the future.

According to The Hill:  “The FCC rules would have given consumers greater control over what their internet service provider can do with their data by requiring those companies to get permission from customers before using their information to create targeted advertisements.

“The rules had not yet gone into effect. The bill, which passed the Senate last week in a party-line vote, invokes a law called the Congressional Review Act (CRA) that allows Congress to undo recently passed regulations. A CRA bill also prohibits agencies from passing similar regulations in the future.”

Eliminating these restrictions goes beyond selling you a new television or offering you a lower interest rate on your home using advertising, this data that is being bought and sold goes directly to companies like Cambridge Analytica, who assemble personality profiles of internet users that can be used in psychological operations.

What are the boundaries of the information that your internet service provider can gather about you?

“Your broadband provider knows deeply personal information about you and your family – where you are, what you want to know, every site you visit, and more,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said before the vote on Tuesday.

Even more serious to consider is that your ISP has every email and the content in every email ever written by or sent to you in their database, as well as every form you have filled out online including medical information and has access to your online banking information which contains every purchase you have made electronically. Blending the data together from your ISP, tech companies can create a personality profile that can be easily used to manipulate you.

Enter in Big Data

“Any company can aggregate and purchase big data, but Cambridge Analytica has developed a model to translate that data into a personality profile used to predict, then ultimately change your behavior. That model itself was developed by paying a Cambridge psychology professor to copy the groundbreaking original research of his colleague through questionable methods that violated Amazon’s Terms of Service. Based on its origins, Cambridge Analytica appears ready to capture and buy whatever data it needs to accomplish its ends,” according to Scout in an article The Rise of the Weaponized AI Propaganda Machine.

“Your behavior is driven by your personality and actually the more you can understand about people’s personality as psychological drivers, the more you can actually start to really tap in to why and how they make their decisions,” Cambridge CEO Alexander Nix said to Bloomberg’s Sasha Issenburg. “We call this behavioral microtargeting and this is really our secret sauce, if you like. This is what we’re bringing to America.”

The repeal of the internet privacy legislation will insure that companies such as Cambridge Analytica can purchase basically all of your information directly from your Internet Service Provider to further perfect your personality profile, which can be used to shape and mold your beliefs in the future using “behavioral microtargeting”.

Everything is now connected – from your car, your appliances and now Elon Musk is even attempting to connect your brain and all of your thoughts to your computer.

“Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX, Tesla, and a man who wants to nuke Mars, has founded a new company. According to WSJsources, Neuralink is a new venture that aims to pursue ‘neural lace’ technology to help brains interface with computers,” according to a BGR article that appeared on yahoo news, Elon Musk, very normal non-supervillain, starts company to implant electrodes in your brain.

” “Neuralink’s aim, according to the WSJ‘s sources, is to implant tiny electrodes in the brain that may allow for two-way interfacing with computers, allowing users to ‘one day upload and download thoughts.’ Although Musk didn’t confirm his involvement, one of the firm’s founding team members confirmed his involvement. Neuralink registered as a medical research company in California last year.”

Even your DNA is no longer safe, as employers may soon be require DNA testing of employees if the Republicans pass H.R.1313 – Preserving Employee Wellness Programs Act through Congress and the President signs it. The question that needs to be asked is will your DNA information be available on computers? Of course it will. Then it can potentially be collected by the ISPs and sold to big data.

According to CNBC, “Workers participating in so-called workplace wellness programs reportedly could be ordered to get genetic testing — and hand over the results — by their employers or face financial penalties, if a bill being pushed by congressional Republican becomes law.”

The Republican party and its “conservative” values have certainly been acting not so conservative. With legislation aimed at enabling surveillance and big data everywhere including in your DNA, what happened to rugged individualism?

I guess we are all completely for sale in their eyes, now what does that remind you of?

____________

Ann Diener

{p}Journalist, former publisher of The Military Beat magazine – serving active duty and retired military personnel in the Northwest US through 2001, Thinker, foreign policy analyst and renewable & advanced technology developer aiming to provide water, food, housing & energy for all.{/p}

anndiener.com