The Government's Latest Killer App.

From: Artemia Salina <y2k@sheayright.com>
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Date: Mon, Apr 23, 2001 12:17 AM

www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/17805.html

US Government Tracking Individual Free Speech Participants

The government's secret anti-Free Speech software, formally known
as Internet Thought Suppression System, less formally as Thought
Tracker 2.1, has been brought out of the shadows.

The software, developed by the International Federation of Thought
Suppression Industries (IFTSI), mimics all the commonly used and
less-well-known internet communication protocols used to share information.
The software can be used to keep an eye on IRC chatrooms and newsgroups,
among other services, according to a New England Free Speech Advocacy Web
site, which has obtained what it claims are screenshots of Thought Tracker
in operation.

The pictures appear to have been leaked from a thought suppression
operative in the IFTSI's UK affiliate, the British Thought Suppression
Institute (BTSI).

Thought Tracker builds up a list of topics, the networks they're
being discussed on, the participant's IP address and the name of
their host or ISP. The date and time at which a given idea was
discussed is also recorded. All this is held in a database that
can be used to cross-check individuals' thought patterns and to
locate ISPs with a high percentage of free thinkers among their
subscribers.

"The system is capable of performing follow-up queries of
machines that are known offenders and if found to still be
engaging in free speech, criminal action could be launched,"
says an anonymous BTSI insider.

Indeed, one facility of the software seems to be the ability to send an
instant mind control email to offending users or their host ISP.

The IFTSI's initiative ties in remarkably well with off-the-cuff
threats made by a high ranking IFTSI official last summer.
At the International Conference on Information Suppression,
IFTSI senior VP Dennis Furmanski said the institute would
block free speech.

"We will develop technology that transcends the individual user,"
he said. "We will firewall free speech at its source - we will block
it at your cable company, we will block it at your phone company, we
will block it at your ISP. We will firewall it at your PC."

Scary stuff, and it looks like that's broadly what the government has
indeed attempted to do. The privacy and data protection implications
are clear.

While free thought may at last have been neutered, that still leaves
the likes of Ivan Stang and the Church of the Subgenius - "a new and
worrying generation of crackpots", according to IFTSI - to tackle,
either through direct action against devotees, or their ISPs.

--
Artemia Salina -- http://www.drpez.com/drali1.htm
Taking the 'rhetorical' out of 'rhetorical question' since 1958

"My name is not really Bob Dobbs" -- purple

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Subject: Re: The Government's Latest Killer App.
From: Hulkturds@crappagammabrick.ouch (HellPope Huey)
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Date: Mon, Apr 23, 2001 7:08 PM
Message-ID: <Hulkturds-2304011708070001@pool-209-128-154-19.hs.ipa.net>

> While free thought may at last have been neutered, that still leaves
> the likes of Ivan Stang and the Church of the Subgenius - "a new and
> worrying generation of crackpots", according to IFTSI - to tackle,
> either through direct action against devotees, or their ISPs.

Gives the phrase "Shut UP, Pink Boy" a whole new sinister gleam, don't
it? But they'll close my mouth only when they've pried my cold dead lips
from Connie's ASS, I so SWEAR! Perform the Salute, especially if you're
doing that blubbing thing you usually do to babies on Sister Special K's
belly button.

HellPope Huey, hellpopehuey@subgenius.com
Rabid weasels are an apertif
and I can pick my teeth
with the claws for a week.
Sounds like a line from NIN or
Marilyn Manson, don't it?

"Trust me."
"That's usually my first mistake."
- "Lethal Weapon 3"

"If the truth is that your goose is cooked at
the altar, then the truth can be made wrong too,
you know; can be made to look like a dope
in a single spur-of-the-moment decision
to be gentle and patient
against the jeering numbers and hoots outside."
- Roger Rosenblatt, "The Man In The Water"

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Original file name: The Government's Latest Killer - converted on Friday, 29 June 2001, 22:34