Originally Posted by
GUWonder
Who should be surprised about this kind of use of driving license photo databases by now? Also, who’s going to be surprised that the information used to get driving licenses is also increasingly often ending up in the hands of the federal government or contractors to run analysis against individuals for law enforcement and other so-called security purposes?
Big Brother must be loving today more than 1984, as surveillance state capabilities are now more technologically capable than ever before and comes with the support systems at various levels and across public and private sectors enabling it to become ever more comprehensive. And if people think such systems don’t come with risks and that mistaken ID or false lead-based investigations don’t take place as much now because technology is advancing, I have a bridge between Brooklyn and Manhattan available for sale after my own very recent experience of being flagged down as a wanted fugitive or arrest target in/from Lithuania — of all places — based on a run of a travel document of mine that wasn’t even run correctly by at least two foreign agencies that had more than enough data on hand — including about face data — to not get it wrong enough to entertain me like this.
I'm not surprised at all. Rather, I'm dismayed that an underhanded and manipulative government and an uncaring public have allowed this sort of thing to happen at every turn.
A quote by James Madison has haunted me for decades:
"It is proper to take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties. We hold this prudent jealousy to be the first duty of Citizens, and one of the noblest characteristics of the late Revolution. The freemen of America did not wait till usurped power had strengthened itself by exercise, and entangled the question in precedents. They saw all the consequences in the principle, and they avoided the consequences by denying the principle. We revere this lesson too much, soon to forget it..."
Boy did we forget that lesson somewhere along the way.