{"id":638,"date":"2013-10-16T16:00:24","date_gmt":"2013-10-16T16:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/?p=638"},"modified":"2013-10-16T16:58:49","modified_gmt":"2013-10-16T16:58:49","slug":"outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/","title":{"rendered":"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tracking is moving offline as computers get smarter, and face recognition technology is gaining steam rapidly with distributed systems. There are already prototype glasses that identify people in your field of view and superimpose their names on them \u2013 such devices will end anonymity. The demand for the technology is immense, and no wonder: I would buy those glasses myself in a heartbeat.<\/strong><\/p>\n

One of the key challenges in policymaking right now is to make politicians understand that you can\u2019t have separate rules and rights for the offline and online worlds, as it makes no sense even trying to separate them for the growing-up generation. The people coming of majority age today were born after the Web had its breakthrough in 1995; they have never been in a world where the Web wasn\u2019t the go-to resource for everything. To them, trying to have different social contracts for offline and online is as foreign as having different social contracts for the oxygen and the nitrogen in the air we breathe.<\/p>\n

There has been a consistent problem in the rights online not mirroring those offline. We don\u2019t have freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, or freedom of opinion online, rights that are taken for absolute and inviolable in the physical space. Censorship, tracking and wiretapping has become acceptable for governments that audit their own compliance with civil liberties, even if found totally revolting by the populace subjected to the abuses.<\/p>\n

Our civil liberties are also being eroded offline. Following the hawkish complete re-interpretation of \u201creasonable\u201d following September 11, 2001, most governments see every right and rule as being subject to exceptions in anything they call terror. People can be imprisoned indefinitely without trial if this is invoked. The word \u201cterror\u201d, in turn, has degraded so far as a concept that it is now basically defined as \u201canything the government doesn\u2019t like\u201d.<\/p>\n

Seeing this erosion (or downright unilateral revocation) of the offline social contract, it can be expected that those rights cease to be honored online as well. There is some liquidity in the erosion \u2013 the rights that cease to exist offline will cease to exist online as well. But we can also observe an erosion in the opposite direction \u2013 namely with anonymity.<\/p>\n

Google Glass is probably the most well-known example of a personal heads-up display, but there are many similar devices in the works. Some of them have facial recognition technology and cover your entire field of view. This means they have the ability to superimpose people\u2019s names directly onto what you see.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take that again, because it sounds like science fiction but already exists: there are glasses that automatically identify people you see and superimpose their names right by their faces as you see them.<\/p>\n

If this sounds scary, it\u2019s because it is. This makes it possible for Law Enforcement to find wanted people with a minimum of patrol resources. That\u2019s not even science fiction \u2013 this technology already exists.<\/p>\n

Glasses for law enforcement that highlights suspected criminals directly in the field of view of police officers were field tested five years ago.<\/strong> They were tested by filling a cinema hall with people, and programming the officers\u2019 glasses with the faces of some simulated \u201ccriminals\u201d that were highlighted on sight for the officers.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not hard to see the downsides of this in terms of the social contract. If you can\u2019t take a single step outside without being recorded and tracked, how does that change our behavior?<\/p>\n

But it sounds like an awesome social aid, that\u2019s because it is that, too. I frequently forget people\u2019s names and pretty much everybody I know complain about the same thing \u2013 the social requirement to recognize professional and personal connections is so strong, that I would buy such a device in a heartbeat, especially if it was small and unintrusive enough that the people around me didn\u2019t see me using it.<\/p>\n

With the addition of face tagging from Facebook and other sources, there is effectively already a gigantic database of what everybody looks like.<\/p>\n

It is futile to even attempt to try keeping back this technology, simply because everybody will want it, not just governments: everybody. But it completely rewrites the social contract \u2013 online as well as offline. When everybody is identified all the time, by everybody watching, things change.<\/p>\n

Outdoor anonymity will be severely eroded in ten years, and will be effectively gone in twenty.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tracking is moving offline as computers get smarter, and face recognition technology is gaining steam rapidly with distributed systems. There are already prototype glasses that identify people in your field of view and superimpose their names on them \u2013 such devices will end anonymity. The demand for the technology is immense, and no wonder: I … Continue reading “Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nOutdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Tracking is moving offline as computers get smarter, and face recognition technology is gaining steam rapidly with distributed systems. There are already\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Tracking is moving offline as computers get smarter, and face recognition technology is gaining steam rapidly with distributed systems. There are already\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"PIA\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/privateinternetaccess\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-10-16T16:00:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-10-16T16:58:49+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/ogimage.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"630\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Rick Falkvinge\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@http:\/\/twitter.com\/Falkvinge\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@buyvpnservice\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Rick Falkvinge\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Rick Falkvinge\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/8153559f44e1b6f9738dd6c7d33046a4\"},\"headline\":\"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20\",\"datePublished\":\"2013-10-16T16:00:24+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-10-16T16:58:49+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/\"},\"wordCount\":746,\"commentCount\":5,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"articleSection\":[\"General Privacy News\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/\",\"name\":\"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-10-16T16:00:24+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-10-16T16:58:49+00:00\",\"description\":\"Tracking is moving offline as computers get smarter, and face recognition technology is gaining steam rapidly with distributed systems. There are already\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"PIA\",\"description\":\"Online privacy news from around the world.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Private Internet Access\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/pialogowhitekglogo.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/pialogowhitekglogo.png\",\"width\":1200,\"height\":1200,\"caption\":\"Private Internet Access\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/privateinternetaccess\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/buyvpnservice\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/piavpn\/\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UClyJZ47Rizb1xnwuKXDI0_w\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/8153559f44e1b6f9738dd6c7d33046a4\",\"name\":\"Rick Falkvinge\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ad30e41b6591c75d90c6002e54553bdd55f419d89a54b72241efa308b84a7f03?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ad30e41b6591c75d90c6002e54553bdd55f419d89a54b72241efa308b84a7f03?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Rick Falkvinge\"},\"description\":\"Rick is the founder of the first Pirate Party and is a political evangelist, traveling around Europe and the world to talk and write about ideas of a sensible information policy. Additionally, he has a tech entrepreneur background and loves good whisky and fast motorcycles.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/falkvinge.net\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/http:\/\/twitter.com\/Falkvinge\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/author\/rick\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20","description":"Tracking is moving offline as computers get smarter, and face recognition technology is gaining steam rapidly with distributed systems. There are already","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20","og_description":"Tracking is moving offline as computers get smarter, and face recognition technology is gaining steam rapidly with distributed systems. There are already","og_url":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/","og_site_name":"PIA","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/privateinternetaccess\/","article_published_time":"2013-10-16T16:00:24+00:00","article_modified_time":"2013-10-16T16:58:49+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":630,"url":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/ogimage.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Rick Falkvinge","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@http:\/\/twitter.com\/Falkvinge","twitter_site":"@buyvpnservice","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Rick Falkvinge","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/"},"author":{"name":"Rick Falkvinge","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/8153559f44e1b6f9738dd6c7d33046a4"},"headline":"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20","datePublished":"2013-10-16T16:00:24+00:00","dateModified":"2013-10-16T16:58:49+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/"},"wordCount":746,"commentCount":5,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#organization"},"articleSection":["General Privacy News"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/","url":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/","name":"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-10-16T16:00:24+00:00","dateModified":"2013-10-16T16:58:49+00:00","description":"Tracking is moving offline as computers get smarter, and face recognition technology is gaining steam rapidly with distributed systems. There are already","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/outdoor-anonymity-will-be-eroded-in-10-years-gone-in-20\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Outdoor Anonymity Will Be Eroded in 10 Years, Gone In 20"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/","name":"PIA","description":"Online privacy news from around the world.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"Private Internet Access","url":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/pialogowhitekglogo.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/pialogowhitekglogo.png","width":1200,"height":1200,"caption":"Private Internet Access"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/privateinternetaccess\/","https:\/\/x.com\/buyvpnservice","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/piavpn\/","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UClyJZ47Rizb1xnwuKXDI0_w"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/8153559f44e1b6f9738dd6c7d33046a4","name":"Rick Falkvinge","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ad30e41b6591c75d90c6002e54553bdd55f419d89a54b72241efa308b84a7f03?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ad30e41b6591c75d90c6002e54553bdd55f419d89a54b72241efa308b84a7f03?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Rick Falkvinge"},"description":"Rick is the founder of the first Pirate Party and is a political evangelist, traveling around Europe and the world to talk and write about ideas of a sensible information policy. Additionally, he has a tech entrepreneur background and loves good whisky and fast motorcycles.","sameAs":["https:\/\/falkvinge.net\/","https:\/\/x.com\/http:\/\/twitter.com\/Falkvinge"],"url":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/author\/rick\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=638"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":645,"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638\/revisions\/645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}