Cameras Everywhere

Lately the mass deployment of cameras has gotten ridiculous.

And it's an insistent, aggressive, maniacal attitude of deployment wrapped up in a bit of mystery and cluelessness and probably backed up by unlimited funding.

I mean, EVERY intersection in my portion of the Phoenix metropolitan area has cameras.

TWO types of cameras:  

    Line of site cameras on the traffic light poles and fish-eye cameras at the street corners.

You ask the cops who is watching these cameras and they answer "what cameras?"

I don't know if they are really that ignorant or are pretending to be.

Finally the answer "Nobody is watching those cameras".

The answer I finally yanked out was that these 'cameras' only perceive traffic to modify the function of the traffic signals...they don't actually see anything!

What about the fish-eye cameras?

After being asked what I am talking about, I got tired of dealing with these idiots.

I started asking my neighbors.

Same response: "What cameras?"

Are you kidding me?

The population IS really THAT clueless - they have no perception of the environment, or even of reality itself.

What's happening?

Too difficult to raise your  head from the SmartPhone screen to see what's up?

OLIVE GARDEN

I go to Olive Garden, and am told I am supposed to order my meal from these touch screen devices sitting on my table.

Unlike most people, I am curious, I like to observe and look at things.

What do I see inside this obnoxious device but a mini CAMERA looking back at me.

When I ask the waitress what a CAMERA is doing in my 'ordering device' she has no clue.

OFFICE MAX

I was surprised how accommodating the local Office Max cashier was when offering to special order an item the store did not have.

I gave up the relevant information when the dude takes out what looks like a large calculator and starts pressing buttons on  it to complete the order.

Looking down at this thing I notice there is a miniature CAMERA looking right up my nose.

I tell the guy there is a camera in the calculator thing looking up my nose and I want to know why!

No response.

I say, EXCUSE ME, I just made a statement to you in plain English!

(see stuff like this is what frightens people nowadays - asking questions)

The guy has no response, but calls the manager.

After hemming and hawing, the manager finally confirms to me it is some sort of 'client confirmation' method.

All these cameras are being shoved up my face and up my nose with no formal declaration, no information and without permission.

You know what SCREW these stupid, clueless people...and their cameras!

Lately, while being checked out by a cashier at a supermarket, I notice there were cameras at foot-level.

I asked what was up.

The cashier said they were there to catch and charge people for items being carried in the wheel-level basket of a shopping cart.

Gee, that makes sense!  

How about just looking under each shopping cart.

I play a little with the line-of-sight of the cameras and sure enough....

I find it is making 'lens contact' with my face from foot level, literally filming RIGHT UP MY NOSE!

Fast forward.

I walk up to the window of my local bank, and a bank teller I have never seen before in my life greets me by my first name.

I ask her how she knows my name? 

Here answer is "I remember you."

Sure you do, honey, but that's a bit hard considering we have never met.

Then I see the way she keeps looking at the screen and seems rather entertained.

Then I remember. 

I am carrying my 'SMART' Credit Cards and Debit Cards - you know, the ones with the active transmitting microchip embedded in the card.

The cards identified me to the cashier as soon as I approached the teller window!

And I know better than to argue with a teller at a keyboard...

....considering she is typing EVERYTHING YOU ARE SAYING INTO THE RECORD.

 So I am trying to deal with new reality of being constantly spied upon, checked upon and even betrayed by what amounts to spy devices all over the environment.

 As I begin looking into this reality, I find out things are worse than I thought.

I find out Samsung televisions have cameras in which WATCH you.

Cable or Satellite TV boxes have cameras watching you.

I come to find out the latest X-Box One video game console has an infrared camera that can see through clothing, and even into neighboring rooms

Excuse me?!

Is this the crazy train or what!

They are even making fridges with cameras and sensors recording who takes what.

Ad posters in supermarkets have cameras in them filming customer behavior and even which way the customers' EYES wander while scanning the merchandise.

What sort of freak show is this?

Its common knowledge that cameras now have 'facial recognition' or the ability to IDENTIFY you just by scanning your face?

Where is the reference databank?

Try your latest Department of Motor Vehicles Driver's License digital photo, specifically designed to create a facial recognition grid of your face...to which these cameras - the traffic cameras out there on the street - have access.

These cameras also have the ability to read your car's license plate, knowing therefore, not only what car it is, but who's driving it...and where it's going!

My only question is, when did life become a freaking Habitrail?

Some sore of transparent cage where us hamster-like humans pretend to live out our lives in pretend privacy and make-believe sovereignty.

All I know is I next time I am asked for my VIP Customer Card I will take great pleasure in telling them "Not only do I NOT have one, but I will NEVER have one and people like you will never know who the fuck I am!"










 

Your Private Data on Wholesale

It's become unavoidable.

Almost every time you buy something now, some semi-illiterate jerk behind the counter is asking you for your private information so you can partake of great savings, freebies and even prizes as a member of some sort of VIP card club.

It really got to me when the local yogurt shop asked me for my name and phone number so I could partake of all the 'benefits' (which included a cup of free yogurt!)

The entire phenomenon is becoming rather tiring and irritating.

Now it turns out there are giant companies offering the little Mom and Pop stores (like my yogurt shop) the benefit of having their very own VIP Customer Card Service.

Yeah, the cards are all look the same and carry the name of the mega-corporation running the program (not you local vendor) but who cares, you're a VIP and your local Mom and Pop got a VIP customer program.

Yeah, “just let us get a few bits of personal information to get you started...”

The worse thing is they look at you as if you were some sort of paranoid schizophrenic...or even a TERRORIST if you REFUSE to give them any personal information whatsoever!

Dear shop owner...let me whisper something in your ear....

IDENTITY THEFT IS OUT OF CONTROL!!!!!

Get it?

Once you give you your personal data, it is about as safe and secure as a San Francisco glory hole!

Of course your personal information is traded on the public market, probably THE VERY NEXT DAY!

Safe and secure my ass!

How insecure is the whole thing?

The very 'safe and secure' Chase bank made a small mistake in spelling my name.

I tried to have them correct the mistake, but, being Chase, they said they couldn't.

Lucky for me.

Because THE VERY NEXT MONTH I started receiving spam from all over the place with that very same misspelled name Chase had given me!

Safe and secure?

Even the big banks are lying through their teeth while selling your information through the back door.

The reason I am making such a big deal about this is that not only is identity theft out of control, but the police DO NOTHING when you report the DEVASTATING consequences of it on YOU!

They don't care!

I have been a victim of it and others have been a victim of it

And I see known friends and associates becoming victims of it every year.

Bank accounts have been cleaned out.

Credit cards have been maxed out.

Mortgages have been created by strangers in the victim's name.

You have credit scores which took decades to build being ruined over night.

You think the police give rats ass about your credit score or your finances?

Of course they don't!

So it's all the more surprising to see more and more stores asking, no DEMANDING that you join their Very Special Douche Bag Program.

And it's even more remarkable to see ALL THESE PEOPLE COMPLYING.

How stupid are we?!!!

Is the population at large going to need someone to help them wipe their asses very soon?

People...

IDENTITY THEFT IS OUT OF CONTROL!

THE POLICE DON'T INVESTIGATE OR PROSECUTE!

YOU ARE SHARING YOUR PRIVATE INFORMATION ON THE STREET!

AND YOUR INFORMATON IS SOLD ON THE STREET THE NEXT DAY!

Of course, it's not by accident.

The establishment is investing heavily in a universal system that will soon require you to identify yourself before being permitted to carry out ANY transaction.

Right now you increasingly have to identify yourself even with cash purchases through some sort of VIP card or other.

The penalties for not doing so are immediate.

YOU MUST PAY MUCH HIGHER PRICES IF YOU DON'T.

And woe to you if you don't get such a card.

The looks I have been getting lately from local vendors upon politely declining membership in their customer programs seem to indicate that 1) the vendor suddenly becomes very afraid and 2) I will probably get reported to the Department of Homeland Security.

And don't even get me talking about cash.

A short while ago the clerk had to stop everything and call the manager because I dared pay with a twenty dollar bill!

It started with hundreds, then fifties, not twenties...and eventually anyone paying with cash will probably be identified by facial recognition and labeled a prospective terrorist.

The Illuminati WANT US identifying ourselves at every transaction (which is what the VIP cards do).

The cover story is that our information is used to identify us for targeted ads and offers.

True, but is it worth your total loss of our privacy and your inevitable victimization by identity thieves?

The private interests who run all the VIP card scams are accumulating 'consumer' data bases the size of the NSA and not only trading that information on the free market but sharing it with the Federal Government.

You got it right.

The Feds have your 'private' information – where, what and how you buy.

Never mind that all this can be used for real time tracking.

And never mind your information is as available as street trash to whatever criminal wants to help himself to it.

Hear of all the private information being stolen from public and private data bases almost every week?

And whatever is not stolen is SOLD, guaranteed!

Once you turn in your vitals to turnip head, your information is about as private as STREET GRAFITTI.

The new FBI program consists of real-time interface with the information the private sector has on you to not only know more about you but to track you.

Why bother creating new databases if the corporate world has them all built and ready to go?

What you read, what you watch, what you think, where you go, what you buy is already out there for the Feds, criminals and spammers to check out.

Which is why I got upset at my Mom and Pop computer store recently.

The guy wanted my name, my address, my phone number and my email (all to be recorded on his computer database, of course)

All to grant me the 'privilege' of paying with a credit card.

I told him straight up that I was never asked those things at Target or Radio Shack.

Then I got curious.

“What's more important to you, making a sale or complying with this data request?”

The guy said “It's our policy”

Understood!

It's more important to be a control freak than make a profit.

Which is a new and strange attitude of American small business nowadays...which seem to be strangely driven by nebulous forces other than the bottom line.

The reason the guy preferred to lose a customer rather than skip on the data input?

THEY SELL THE INFORMATION!

That's right.

The information you give to your local yogurt vendor or computer shop is sold by the vendor to the giant consumer databases, which in turn sells your name to businesses that manufacture what your interested in.

THAT'S why I was refused a sale when I did not want to surrender my personal info.

My personal information was as profitable to this Mom and Pop store as me buying their product!

They SELL IT!

THAT'S why everyone is asking!

My friend, YOU ARE NOW A PRODUCT!

So they got this universal scheme going where everyone is asking for your info, connecting it to your buying interests and selling it to giant databases who then market the data to interested businesses...and the Federal Government as well.

Money and Corruption Win Again!

And the corruption has reached all the way to the small business owner who is now becoming personal information clearing house.

Screw the retail stuff, no one is buying much these days anyhow.

The assurances that your information, once surrendered, is 'safe and secure' is a BIG FAT LIE!

What the heck, we have a literal bastard as President LYING to us every day through his teeth, so should one more big fat lie surprise anyone?

Lies are becoming a normality in this country.

Now I have already done an entry...or two...or three on CORRUPTION, but it's perfectly true that the system is corrupting EVERYONE...from top to bottom.

The most recent corruption is the conversion of our local retail shops into private information clearing houses for profit while lying to us about how safely they will hold it.

What use to be trustworthy small businesses are now also becoming part of the the gigantic government spy grid.