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Cyphernomicon 11.10

Surveillance, Privacy, And Intelligence Agencies:
Police States and Informants


  11.10.1. Police states need a sense of terror to help magnify the
            power or the state, a kind of "shrechlichkeit," as the Nazis
            used to call it. And lots of informants. Police states need
            willing accomplices to turn in their neighbors, or even their
            parents, just as little Pavel Morozov became a Hero of the
            Soviet People by sending his parents to their deaths in
            Stalin's labor camps for the crime of expressing negative
            opinions about the glorious State.
           - (The canonization of Pavel Morozov was recently repudiated
              by current Russian leaders--maybe even by the late-Soviet
              era leades, like Gorbachev--who pointed out the corrosive
              effects of encouraging families to narc on each
              other...something the U.S. has forgotten...will it be 50
              years before our leaders admit that having children turn in
              Daddy for using "illegal crypto" was not such a good idea?)
  11.10.2. Children are encouraged in federally-mandated D.A.R.E.
            programs to become Junior Narcs, narcing their parents out to
            the cops and counselors who come into their schools.
  11.10.3. The BATF has a toll-free line (800-ATF-GUNS) for snitching on
            neighbors who one thinks are violating the federal gun laws.
            (Reports are this is backfiring, as gun owners call the
            number to report on local liberal politicians and gun-
            grabbers.)
  11.10.4. Some country we live in, eh? (Apologies to non-U.S. readers,
            as always.)
  11.10.5. The implications for use of crypto, for not trusting others,
            etc., are clear
  11.10.6. Dangers of informants
           + more than half of all IRS prosecutions arise out of tips by
              spouses and ex-spouses...they have the inside dope, the
              motive, and the means
             - a sobering thought even in the age of crypto
           + the U.S. is increasing a society of narcs and stool
              pigeons, with "CIs" (confidential informants), protected
              witnesses (with phony IDs and lavish lifestyles), and with
              all sorts of vague threats and promises
             - in a system with tens of thousands of laws, nearly all
                behavior breaks at least some laws, often unavoidably,
                and hence a powerful sword hangs over everyone's head
           - corrosion of trust, especially within families (DARE
              program in schools encourages children to narc on their
              parents who are "substance abusers"!)


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