On Fri, 20 Feb 1998, Information Security wrote:
From: sunder <sunder@brainlink.com>
1)From: "George Martin" <gmartin@kic.or.jp> Subject: News Release: High-Tech Surveillance
Here's a sampling of how state and federal agencies are using this terrifying technology to spy on Americans:
* In North Carolina, county governments use high-resolution spy satellite photographs to search for property improvements that might increase property tax assessments.
Was this cost authorized by taxpayers?
I have lived in Raleigh, North Carolina my entire life (over 30 yrs). County governments consist of an elected board of commissioners who have the power to make such decisions and expenditures without holding public hearings on these matters. Unless the local media jumps on one of these proposals weeks in advance, nobody will even know about it or have an opportunity to petition for a public hearing. Once the county commisioners vote on and approve it, our money is spent and the public has no recourse (until the next election). Here in Raleigh, Wake County, NC, for instance, we have a Republican county commissioner and a board of members. When I heard from his daughter, a personal friend, about his plans to cut funding to drug education and rehab programs and redirect all of those funds to the county prison system, I decided to act. I contacted the commissioner himself, his office, and even had lunch with his wife and daughter to discuss this issue. As a family friend, I thought I would at least be able to get a friendly, receptive ear. His wife and daughter were in full agreement with me, but the commissioner dismissed all of my suggestions and pleas. In fact, he told me that I was "high on crack" for even suggesting that he *not* cut spending to drug education and rehab programs. i then appealed to the media, the public, and various county drug rehab and education facilities and tried to petition for public hearings on the issue. After getting stonewalled by the GOP-controlled county board of commissioners, funding to drug rehab and education programs was cut by over 50%. Since that time (two years ago), drug arrests and convictions, violent crime, murder, non-violent crimes, and admissions to treatment centers have all risen, in all of the basic statistical measurement categories. Wake county taxes have increased dramatically (almost 50%), and we have just completed building a new county jail and several county jail annex facilities. In both percentage and numbers, our county jail population is at the highest rate it has ever been. On a related note, seven of the Wake county sherriff's deputies, who all had laptop computers (with Internet access) in their cruisers, were recently busted for spending all of their time on the clock surfing the web and going to porno websites and adult chatrooms. One of the deputies has been arrested for using a sherriff's department scanner to scan in a picture of his genitals which he then sent to a young girl, a minor, from his cruiser while on duty. Additionally, the officer in charge of the weapons armory for the sherriff's department, which contains full-auto weapons such as the HK MP5 and the M16, was recently dismissed because it was discovered that he had been spending all of his time on the clock in another section of the building surfing adult sites on the web. Meanwhile, the armory was left unlocked, deputies were unable to get their weapons serviced within a reasonable period of time, and an M16 "disappeared". My tax dollars at work...
No amount of control over the population is enough for the U.S. Government. ---guy
Next...i'll fill you in on some of the more interesting discoveries I made while working for the NC Dept of Crime Control and Public Safety. They don't need satellites to watch you here in Raleigh...they have hi-tech, hi-res cameras perched on top of all the tallest buildings, in the projects, at selected street corners, and various other points. so much for your privacy... TATTOOMAN /--------------------------[ TATTOOMAN ]--------------------------\ | ORG: NC State Computer Science Dept VP of The E. H. A. P. Corp. | | EML: jkwilli2@adm.csc.ncsu.edu ehap@hackers.com | | EML: jkwilli2@unity.ncsu.edu ehap-secure@hackers.com | | WWW: http://www4.ncsu.edu/~jkwilli2/ http://www.hackers.com/ehap/ | | FTP: ftp://152.7.11.38/pub/personal/tattooman/ | | W3B: http://152.7.11.38/~tattooman/w3board/ | | PGP: finger tattooman@152.7.11.38 | \----------------[ http://152.7.11.38/~tattooman/ ]----------------/