Last night we watched Enemy of the State on AMC. Quite a good movie, and incredibly relevant today, especially considering it was made in 1998 - the plot sounds like something that would be thought up today, not eight years ago. The amount of surveillance today is amazing, and not just on the part of the government. Thanks to Google, MySpace, and other wonders of the modern web, ordinary people have more ability than ever to spy on their fellow citizens.
Get a name, do a lookup on Google. Do a little phone book searching, or reverse phone book search if you start with a number. Find an address, get satellite and aerial imagery. And all of that can happen within a minute. Do a search on MySpace or Facebook and find even more. If their information is "private," ask to be their friend. Chances are they'll accept. If not, friend their friends to give yourself a little more credibility, so that it doesn't seem like you're coming totally out of the blue. It's creepy.
Of course, the government has far more capabilities, as explored by Enemy of the State. This morning I read an article on MSNBC about the ongoing hunt for Osama bin Laden:
WP: Bin Laden trail goes ‘stone cold’ - washingtonpost.com Highlights - MSNBC.com
Very interesting stuff. Sounds like it would make for an excellent movie a few years down the road...
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