Monday, 9 August 2021

[8 min read]

Dear Reader,

Chris’s note: Today, you’ll hear from Dan Denning at our Bonner-Denning Letter advisory. He’s been sounding the alarm on mass digital surveillance for years. And below, he reveals why it’s so irresistible to the authoritarian mind…and what it means for your freedom.

Make sure you stick around until the end. Dan shares four steps you can take right now to help shore up your privacy. 

Q&A With Dan Denning, Co-Author, The Bonner-Denning Letter

Chris Lowe: You’ve been warning your readers about the Surveillance Society taking root in the US and other Western countries.

And you’ve spent a lot of time writing about the Surveillance Society that’s already up and running in China. For folks who are new to the conversation, why is what’s happening there so important to understand?

Dan: President Xi Jinping’s authoritarian government in Beijing wants to put a digital dragnet over an entire society.

The Chinese feds use facial recognition software and artificial intelligence to turn the security cameras scanning roads, shopping malls, and airports into a kind of all-seeing eye. The government knows where all its citizens are, what they’re doing, and if they’re breaking the rules.

Then it assigns everyone a ‘social credit’ score. It uses this to limit what a citizen can do. If you break the rules, the government docks your score. If you get a low enough score, it bans you from getting on planes and trains. It stops you from staying in certain hotels. It bars you from working at state-run companies. It even stops your kids from going to certain schools. You become a second-class citizen.

Chris: China is thousands of miles away. Americans may be aware there’s a digital police state there. But they’re not worried about that kind of thing taking root in the US. Are they right to be so complacent?

Dan: No, they’re not. As Bill Bonner and I have been writing about at The Bonner-Denning Letter, Americans are sleepwalking into a version of the Chinese surveillance state.

Every time we use Facebook (FB), for instance, we voluntarily submit to surveillance. About 195 million people in North America use Facebook every day. Each of them is sharing their most private and personal details willingly with this for-profit surveillance company.

There’s never been a more powerful surveillance tool than the internet. Facebook can track where you are…what apps you have installed on your smartphone…when you use them…and what you use them for.

It can also gain access to your webcam, microphone, contacts, emails, and calendar. It can know your call history, the messages you send and receive, the files you download, and the games you play. It sees your photos, videos, and music…and just about every move you make online.

Worse, the government could use your social media data to identify you as a threat. It could use what you ‘like’, post, and share on social media to build a profile of you. It could categorise you as a terrorist, a loner, or even — like me — a lover of cash, limited government, and individual liberty.

Chris: What about our lives outside social media? Are we still vulnerable if we delete our Facebook accounts?

Dan: Yes. Take something as ordinary as your weekly grocery run. You likely use your debit or credit card to pay. You’re also likely a member of the supermarket’s loyalty program.

This allows the supermarket to keep a record of everything you buy. That gives it — and anyone else it shares your data with — a lot of information about you. There’s also a digital record of your credit card payment.

And that’s just what’s in place now. I expect surveillance to become a lot more invasive…

Chris: Can you give me an example of what you mean?

Dan: Sure. Imagine going to a bar. You have a few beers. Instead of going to dinner after, you go to another bar and have a few more drinks. But when you go to pay for your next beer, your transaction is declined.

Not because you don’t have enough dollars in your account. But because the feds say, ‘According to our records, you haven’t eaten enough calories today. We know your body weight. Four standard drinks is too much for you. You’re banned from buying more drinks tonight.’

Or maybe you go for dinner, and the waiter tells you, ‘Our records show you’ve eaten too much cholesterol this week. You’re not allowed to order the steak.’

There’s a sphere of behaviour we used to consider private. But once all the data about our behaviour is in one place, the state can pass laws to regulate it. It can then enforce these laws by algorithm.

An algorithm is a rule for making decisions. Decisions we used to make for ourselves will become automated. People say it’s crazy…dystopian even. But this is where we’re headed.

Chris: Sounds like the convenience of new technology has lulled us into a false sense of security.

Dan: It has. Life is easier when we’re surrounded by digital technology. It’s easier to get places. It’s easier to find what you want. It’s easier to buy what you want.

But there’s a dark side, too. These technologies are irresistible to the authoritarian mind. They allow governments to monitor what people are doing…what they’re saying…and how they’re spending their money.

They also give governments the ability to control…influence…and even prevent certain behaviours.

Before, the default was: ‘You’re free to do it unless you break the law.’ Now, it’s: ‘You’re free to do it as long as we give you permission to.’

Chris: What’s your take on vaccine mandates? They seem closer to the latter category.

Dan: Bill and I covered them in the most recent issue of The Bonner-Denning Letter.

Our primary mission is to help our readers preserve their wealth — and their freedom — from dangers others overlook or ignore. And today, our rights to freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom of religion are under attack.

The Delta variant has become the dominant strain of the coronavirus worldwide. And it’s demoralising to see how quickly this has led authorities all over the world to re-embrace draconian lockdowns, vaccine passports, and even possible vaccine mandates.

But they don’t need to go that far. Governments could give you other ‘incentives’ for taking the jab.

Not vaxxed? No problem. But you can’t eat out, worship at church, or send your kids to school. Not vaxxed? No problem. But you must now be tested every day to prove you’re not infected, and at your expense. Not vaxxed? You can’t travel more than 10 miles from home without permission.

All these ‘incentives’ amount to coercion.

Chris: Is there anything we can do to reverse this trend?

Dan: Sadly, I don’t think so. Look at how widely we adopted these surveillance technologies — Gmail, YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. Or how quickly we got used to using credit cards and apps to pay for stuff instead of cash.

Chris: It reminds me of the chutes you send cattle down when they go to the slaughterhouse. The chutes go only one way. Once you’re inside, the only way out is toward the bolt gun.

So what can folks reading this do about it?

Dan: There are two approaches…

First, you could say, ‘Whatever. It’s just the modern world. There’ll be some restrictions on what the authorities can do. Let’s hope it’s not as bad as some people say.’

This is naïve. But it’s probably what most people think.

The second approach is to ‘go dark’.

Chris: Can you explain what you mean by that?

Dan: If you live in a country that requires a vaccine passport to fly, there’s not much you can do about it. You either show a valid barcode…or you don’t fly.

But much of the surveillance state is based around Google and Facebook. And these are ‘self-reporting systems’.

Nobody is forcing you to use them. You use them because they’re convenient. But they involve giving up a huge amount of your privacy.

That’s why I’ve been recommending folks opt out of these systems now…and stop self-reporting to the authorities.

There are four basic steps to ‘going dark’.

First, delete your Facebook account. We think we have to be connected all the time. But by staying on the platform, you’re sharing massive amounts of your personal data with the world.

You can’t be a private citizen and be on Facebook. Find out how to pull the plug here.

Second, de-Google your life. The way to stop Google from tracking every web search you type and every webpage you visit is to ditch the Google search engine and the Google Chrome web browser.

DuckDuckGo won’t track you like Google does. It offers a decent search service. There’s also the Epic Privacy Browser. It works just like Chrome, except it doesn’t store data on you.

Third, use an encrypted messenger app that isn’t WhatsApp. Chats on WhatsApp, which Facebook owns, are encrypted right now. But the feds recently requested that Facebook allow them to spy on chats on its messaging app.

WhatsApp has more than two billion users. Most of them are foreign. That makes it a target for US security services. Skype, which Microsoft owns, isn’t much better. Telegram is a more secure alternative.

Finally, buy a ‘dumb’ phone. This is the only way to stop broadcasting your exact location 24 hours a day. An unlocked phone with 16MB of memory and a two-megapixel camera will set you back about US$25.

You won’t be able to play Candy Crush while you’re waiting for your caramel latte you pre-ordered on your Starbucks app. But a dumb phone will relieve you of the urge to constantly pick it up and fiddle with it. So you’ll have more free time and a less cluttered brain.

We’ll also keep ringing the alarm bell in The Bonner-Denning Letter. [Find out how to sign up here.] You can be the wealthiest person in the world and build your own fortress. But if you live in a digital police state — and I believe that’s where we’re headed — you’re behind your own walls in a well-appointed prison of your own making.

The problem we’re trying to solve for our readers is how to not get caught on the wrong side of those walls. But the walls are going up pretty fast. And I’m not encouraged by what I’ve seen.

Chris: Thanks, Dan.

Dan: Anytime.

Regards,

Chris Lowe,
For The Rum Rebellion

By Bill Bonner Editor, The Rum Rebellion

Picking up from where we left off…

…our poor callow youth have been dealt some low cards.

This week, we’ve struggled to connect the dots. What was the connection, we wondered, between…

• Fewer people owning their own homes
• Millions of people facing eviction when the feds’ reprieve expires
• A ‘transitory’ society…with cars, houses, offices shared, rented, or leased, rather than owned outright
• Falling rates of marriage; falling births
• The Federal Reserve’s ultra-low interest rates (the Fed has been lending money at below zero for nearly 12 years straight); rising asset prices
• And the towering wall between the many, who are poorer today than they were 50 years ago…and the few, who are much richer?

It was while we were wondering that another news item came in, from journalist Allan C Brownfeld:

‘In a Gallup Poll this June, only 63% of American adults say they are “extremely proud” or “very proud” to be American, the lowest level of patriotism ever recorded since Gallup first asked the question in 2001. Among the youngest people surveyed, only 4 out of 10 respondents age 18-34 claim to be extremely or very proud of being American.’

Is it any wonder?

The US’s capitalists

The other day we looked at why young people find it hard to buy a house.

They’re now bidding against investment firms like Blackstone and other big players with access to billions of dollars at near-negative real rates, provided by the Fed.

And they’re not about to join the US’s capitalists any time soon, either.

At today’s prices, it would take them 1,400 hours of work to buy the Dow…compared to only 160 hours for their parents.

It’s similar even for automobiles.

While not the same kind of asset, an auto is a major purchase.

And as prices rise, it becomes harder and harder for marginal earners to afford it. They have to rent…lease…or string out car payments.

Fantasy currency

We have given the basic figures many times. We do so again just to highlight the plight of the callow youths of today.

We entered the workforce, with no student debt, in 1971. That was also the fateful year in which Richard Nixon turned the dollar into a fantasy currency and began the War on Drugs.

In 1973, the F-150 sixth generation came out, with a manufacturer’s suggested price of US$2,889.

At an average wage of US$4 an hour, we could have worked 722 hours (forgetting taxes) to buy the truck.

Today’s young man, just starting out, would have to work 1,200 hours for his wheels — even the most basic model.

To make a long story short…

Queering our money was bound to have unexpected costs. The young are now getting the bill.

Let’s look at how this came to be.

Quack economics

First, the new, fake dollar financed the transfer of the US manufacturing sector to lower-cost labour markets overseas.

It was easier to print money than to earn it. So the US allowed China, Vietnam, and Mexico to do the work. We merely printed the money with which to buy the finished products.

This brought a flood of cheap goods into the US and helped to put off the inevitable consumer price inflation.

But it left a whole generation of young people with few good-paying jobs.

The lack of a good paying, blue-collar career track caused young people to go to college.

And so, they spent some of the best years of their life being indoctrinated in the latest fads and fashions of quack economics, sociology, and anti-racist training.

And now, they believe the US invented slavery…and that if we don’t all get vaccinated and begin driving electric cars, we are damned to Hell.

Soft hands, mush minds

Alas, in the real world, you get wealth not by handing out claptrap…but by providing real goods and services.

And now, with soft hands and mush minds, what are the young to do?

Their fathers (and often, mothers, too) made things. But in the 21^st century, the good jobs in manufacturing are largely gone. Young people are much more likely to find work in the ‘service’ sector.

Trouble is, manufacturing workers earn an average of US$70,000 a year. Accommodation and food service workers (to take the lowest category) don’t earn half as much.

Pew Research reported last year that more than half of these young adults, 18–29, are now living with parents. That’s more than any time since the Great Depression.

What happened?

In this glorious age of artificial intelligence, blockchain, and the Fed’s nifty ‘dynamic stochastic’ model…

…you’d think all these bright eyes and bushy tails would be able to afford their own digs…their own cars…and their own families.

Instead, they are less likely to have a driver’s licence…and less likely to own cars or houses…than their parents.

And as the bills for the Fed’s money-printing debauch come in…and young people’s costs of living rise…don’t be surprised if they get a little cross.

Regards,

Bill Bonner,
For The Rum Rebellion