We Should All Have Something to Hide (2013)
There are a couple different arguments that have been developed to counter the government requests/propaganda for access to our data.<p>Here, Moxie works on one I don't think has been popularized yet- To reform unjust laws, people must be able to break those laws. That is an argument against allowing the government to have total information awareness, because that access would allow the government to enforce laws perfectly, which would make some unjust laws permanent.<p>I believe that is the weak bit of the argument- although it's true, there is a big gap between how the government could move from information awareness to perfect enforcement.<p>Instead, I'd take the argument in the direction that a database of the criminal behavior on every citizen would create the prefect tool for the suppression of dissent. Anyone who became politically inconvenient would have their entries combed for wrongdoing, and their life destroyed.<p>The weakness with THAT argument is that it assumes a conspiratorial, immoral federal government. Many of us may be able to imagine that, but it's an idea at the periphery of the Overton window.<p>Which brings me to my point.<p>We need a reference detailing historic government abuses of data.
It should focus on:<p><pre><code>    How data was collected
    The original purpose of collection 
    The benign intentions 
      of the original collectors
    How the data moved from the collecting administration
      to the abusive administration
</code></pre>
It seems like there should be a wealth of historical examples. What data did the Stasi have, Mao's china, the purges of intellectuals in russia and SE Asia. I bet there are even records of Torquemada's Inquisition.<p>I want us to make the posibility of a good administration collecting data, and then that data being captured or inherited by a bad administration, a part of the mental vocabulary of the US population. Yeah it's ambitious, but I think that is the best chance we have at fighting the Government here. And, I believe that an earnest civil servant could understand the danger, and want to limit his own power, once this was properly explained.