Internet

Every connection, for example sending a message, or entering a website, goes through your Internet Service Provider, before it reaches the target. In theory this means ISP's can freely spy on and modify everything you do on the Internet; for example - slow down or block the downloading of torrents or even create a massive censorship system, like the so-called "Great Wall" of China. The most common usage of the Internet is browsing websites, for which we use a web browser such as Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer or Google Chrome. These three "giants" pretty much exist to collect data on their users. Google at least admits to it - on the other hand, Mozilla pretends to care about your freedom and privacy, but actually spies on you and controls you. It's been a few years since Mozilla decided they will decide what add-ons you can and cannot install - apparently to "protect the users", but nothing stops them from, for example, disabling AdBlock. The myth of Firefox "respecting the user" has died and will not resurrect. Just read a certain reply from their website: Our products do not interrupt the browsing experience; they catch users when they are most receptive to seeing new information. So, for them, you are simply prey to be caught for the purpose of having advertisements be shoved into your brain. Despite that, they still spew slogans about "respect and freedom". I could spend the whole article on pointing out all the ways popular web browsers exploit you. Opera, for example, literally spies on your whole web history without your knowledge. The three giants mentioned earlier also spy on you, but in some other ways. Almost every big website works closely with the police / government and will happily share data about you with them - for example, the IP address of the computer you made a forum post from. Exception, such as Lavabit, (interesting story by the way - you can read it on the Internet) or The Pirate Bay, have their servers raided. Lately, it became fashionable to store your data "in the cloud", for example Dropbox or Google Drive. This is really helpful to the elites - they can now see and analyze your files, which can give them information about your interests or plans (which could be used against you). One guy from 4chan was storing bomb making instructions on Dropbox, only to find that, one day, they have been deleted. The Internet is full of cases like that, and they're not all about bombs. Thus, we can see that your data isn't safe on these cloud "services" - it ceases being yours. Most likely, in several years, wanting to keep your data on your own drive will be considered "abnormal" - and cloud storage will be the standard - like it is today with cash vs bank accounts, for example. This will open the door to complete control of your stored data, automatically blocking materials about, for example, the aforementioned bombs. Another, maybe more plausible option, would be punishing the people who upload such files - like film producers did with people downloading certain torrents.

Social networks

One of the most popular internet sites these days are social networks, such as Facebook or Twitter. People flock to them like flies, filling their database with information such as name, surname, phone number, place of work, interests, and friend lists. They don't have a problem with sharing their political opinions. Facebook makes it really easy, since the "Like!" button appears on most popular websites, and clicking it sends information to Facebook about the article you liked. How could they use that information? For example, for showing targeted advertisements. A few years ago, Facebook promised that it would never do that - but then changed their mind and it is now a reality. Some of these advertisements can be insulting - for example, a person suffering from cancer, after searching for information about it on the internet, was shown ads about...burial services! We could be focusing on singular situations - was someone punished appropriately or not? You could even blame the victim. But the logical thing to do is to look at the whole issue from afar. If these comments were made in person, and not on the internet, no one could get in trouble. The possibility of punishing someone is the consequence of the technology that attaches the things you post to your name. After years of using social networks, you could find something on anyone, even if he did not think that the message he's writing would give him problems later. 300 employers were asked whether they've checked the profiles of their would-be recruits, and 91% agreed. 69% dismissed an employee because of something he had in his profile. Some of the offending things were: negative opinions about previous employers, photos of using drugs or drinking alcohol, or "inappropriate" photos. There are also more direct ways that the social networks can affect you. In 2014 Facebook did a psychological experiment that was supposed to show that you can control human minds without knowing them personally, and without their knowledge. 689003 people (who weren't aware of being lab rats) were divided into two groups - one of them was shown only content generating positive emotions, the other - only negative. The more positive content someone saw, the more positively he himself responded. The differences were small, but maybe they could be increased with more drastic measures. For example, showing someone articles about murders or kidnappings. You could also target the content someone was going to be shown individually - based upon the things he's written in his profile, or his browsing history (which Facebook collects through the "Like!" buttons). If someone reads a lot of anti-government websites, they would be shown articles about the government doing something bad. Or an anti-GMO person would be shown information about GMOs being legalized somewhere. It is plausible that this experiment opened the door to just this kind of thing. You can read the whole experiment here: http://www.pnas.org/content/111/24/8788.full (archive) Facebook also uses an algorithm for detecting faces on photos and automatically adding a name to them. http://www.dailydot.com/technology/facebook-deepface-science/ (archive). If your name is on at least one photo, every other photo with your face could be detected as you.

Electronic banking

Cash payments are more and more often being replaced by electronic ones. People like the comfort of being able to order anything you want and pay for it with a few clicks. Having a bank account is something normal these days, even required. But behind the curtain hide gigantic implications for human privacy and freedom. Let's start from the basics - what is electronic money? It's a number in a database on a server belonging to the bank you're using. Your ability to buy anything is dependent on how big that number is - and since humans have to, for example, eat - your life depends on it. How much electronic money you have is dependent on a lot of things you can't affect - just using a bank account costs money, so participating in this system means you automatically lose money. A bank can eat much more of your money - even without taking into account hacking attacks like this: https://thehackernews.com/2016/05/swift-banking-hack.html (archive), where the hackers stole 12 million dollars. One guy from Cyprus got 720 000 Euros stolen by the european commission to pay off Cyprus' debt. He had to fire all his Cyprus employees and move to another country. First, the sum was displayed as "blocked", then they deleted it altogether from his account. And, as he himself says, Thousands of other companies around Cyprus have the same situation. This shows how much you can rely on a number in a database - all it takes is one thought in someone's mind, and it's gone. Read more about this topic here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=160292 (archive) Another problem with electronic payments is the fact that they are anti-privacy. All your transactions are stored in the bank's database. And the people controlling the bank can use it against you - blocking unwanted transactions, such as buying bitcoins http://www.coindesk.com/dutch-bank-rabobank-blocks-bitcoin/ (archive) or donations to WikiLeaks: http://www.bankrate.com/finance/credit-cards/naughty-things-credit-card-wont-buy-6.aspx (archive) It's easy to imagine a world where all your transactions are analyzed and automatically blocked according to a list of banned items. Paper money does not have that problem. It will not disappear from your pocket. There is no central point that stores information about your transactions. You can't "turn someone off" if he pays with paper money - if someone doesn't want to sell you something, you go somewhere else. Paper money is a tool of the free person - that's why the elites are targeting it.