A Conundrum of Privacy/Surveillance: Will You Give Them a Stool Sample to "Feel Humane"?
Yesterday in Daily Links we included a report about South Korea becoming even more creepy than it already was (surveillance- and censorship-wise it is a spooky nation). SN has taken note of one additional report [1] about it and I still laugh inside when people act all stunned and shocked that my wife and I don't use a mobile phone, nor does RMS [2]. Apparently many people (see the comments in [2]) don't know what a landline is or forgot that such a thing exists (typically part of the price of Line Rental for an Internet connection in the UK). Just two hours ago I received a "text message"; the landline rang, I picked up the phone, and it read out to me a menu and message ("press 1 to listen to the message" is a common one after confirming who you are). No issue, done in 30 seconds, put down phone to hang up, back to work. I think it would be a lot harder to "get by" with a skinnerbox ("smart" "phone") than without one. People who carry one around seem overly distracted if not oftentimes distressed by it. We don't have this kind of issue; we're disconnected most of the time, entirely. Being offline can be good.
Wouldn't it be nice to have gyms and spas where skinnerboxes are banned? Well, those exist already. People are fed up. There's now a genuine demand for skinnerbox-free zones (like quiet coaches).
The news from South Korea, which we first mentioned yesterday, is another reminder of how inhumane a trajectory we get for being skinnerbox addicts. It's definitely possible to live in the UK without one; skinnerboxes have no real "use case" that challenged us (except once during the lockdowns). Not having one (at all) sometimes gives you an advantage, such as actual service done by a real human being, a specialist in tasks who can be held accountable for mistakes.
What if skinnerboxes in South Korea also required that people provide urine and stool samples? Apparently Taiwan has long subjected workers to such dehumanising requirements. Some countries treat people like a "piece of ****" or "piss of something". █
Related/contextual items from the news:
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South Korea to require facial recognition for new mobile numbers | The Record from Recorded Future News
South Korea will begin requiring people to submit to facial recognition when signing up for a new mobile phone number in a bid to fight scams, the Ministry of Science and ICT announced Friday.
The effort is meant to block people from illegally registering devices used for identity theft.
The plan reportedly applies to the country's three major mobile carriers and mobile virtual network operators. The new policy takes effect on March 23 after a pilot that will begin this week.
"By comparing the photo on an identification card with the holder's actual face on a real-time basis, we can fully prevent the activation of phones registered under a false name using stolen or fabricated IDs," the ministry reportedly said in a press release.
In August, South Korean officials unveiled a plan to combat voice phishing scams that included harsher penalties for mobile carriers that do not sufficiently act to prevent the scams were reportedly a central feature of that plan.
South Korea has been plagued by voice phishing scams, with 21,588 reported as of November, the ministry said.
In April, South Korea's SK Telecom was hacked and SIM card data belonging to nearly 27 million subscribers was stolen.
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How can Richard Stallman even live without a mobile phone?