I am feeling pessimistic man. We had a few decades of privacy and human rights progress post World Wars. But with Terrorism on the rise there is no way for privacy or human rights to make a comeback. We will see increasingly clever ways to water down laws we already have in place.
Terrorism in the US isn't on the rise (unless we're counting white supremacists marches, which the media doesn't) but the powers that be and their cohorts are still milking the teat and our fears from 9/11 on this stuff. People who have no reason to be scared of any of this also won't stand up to it ('I'm not a criminal so it doesn't matter...'). Also funny that when/if another attack does happen, it will be those of us in blue cities (NYC, LA, SF, etc.) sacrificing our lives even if we're against this stuff and the system as it is.
Fear is a business and some people are making bank. Osama would be proud.
This seems like the kind of ranting that we've already asked you not to post, so could you please stop? Generic tangents just don't bring about the kind of discussion we're after here.
The incentives are huge, and digital life makes it all the more easy. The more information someone has, the more lucrative it is collect even more.
You can find someones property address online - it used to take wuite a bit of effort in the past. Now the effort is on the property owner to protect his privacy - using land trusts or other estate structures.
What is worse is now people volunteer information on social networks. If you dont, your friends do - nullifying your effort.
I am not optimistic either, but i will do whatever i can ti protect my own privacy whenever i can. I stopped using fb, and making an effort to learn estate planning and so on.