Nowhere To Hide from Big Brother
The phrase “Big Brother is watching you” doesn’t carry the same weight it once did. When author George Orwell coined this phrase in the 1940s, Big Brother did not have a way to monitor the activity of the average citizen. Today, "big brother" technology such as closed-circuit television cameras (CCTV) have become almost as commonplace as street lights.
Earlier this week, I was driving around Omaha, and I noticed there are cameras at key locations all over the city. Every major intersection has a camera watching the traffic; the three main malls are wired; and every Wal-Mart or Target in town has cameras on the rooftops and in the stores.
Terry sent me an article about a city near him installing a camera to control vandalism in Lowell, Arkansas. The new camera, which will have zoom capabilities, is perched atop a 200-foot-tall cell phone tower. It will be able to sweep over a wide area.
These cameras are not connected to the CIA. The ones owned by the highway departments are there to monitor traffic flow, and the ones controlled by cities and local businesses are there to control crime. What is interesting here is that no one really cares whether these cameras are plugged into security operations.
I remember in the 1980s, the civil liberties organizations would object to any attempt to install cameras in the public places. Since 9/11 and other major terrorist attacks, opposition to the use of surveillance cameras has largely collapsed.
The British people are now the most spied-upon citizens on earth. In an average day, a Brit will be surveyed by around 300 cameras. Four million cameras watch them in the lanes, streets, public squares and highways across the land, more than in any other western democracy.
China is launching a surveillance program that may quickly dwarf the one found in the UK. Starting this month in the port city of Shenzhen, a city of 12.4 million people, residency cards fitted with powerful computer chips will be issued to most citizens. Data on the chip will include not just the citizen’s name and address but also work history, educational background, religion, ethnicity, police record, medical insurance status and landlord’s phone number. Even personal reproductive history will be included for enforcement of China’s controversial “one child” policy. Plans are being studied to add credit histories, subway travel payments and small purchases charged to the card.
Shenzhen already has 180,000 indoor and outdoor closed-circuit television cameras owned by businesses and government agencies, and the police will have the right to link them on request into the same system as the 20,000 police cameras, according to China Public Security. If all this technology isn't disturbing enough, the system will be guided by sophisticated computer software that can recognize a face in a crowd.
If the program is successful in Shenzhen, Chinese officials plans to expand it to all major cities. The Chinese government has already ordered all large cities to apply technology to police work and to issue high-tech residency cards to 150 million people who have moved to a city but not yet acquired permanent residency.
The internet has been a key factor in the ability to track number numbers of people. A US web firm is preparing to launch an ambitious Internet search engine that it hopes will eventually track down the names of the world's six billion people. Spock.com says it has already indexed 100 million people and is adding a million names per day on the invitation-only, beta version of its website, which will be made available to the public in mid-August. If some small-tech company can put together this many names, one can only imagine the capabilities of the federal government.
One of my biggest concerns is that the prophecies related to the mark of the beast technology will come to pass ahead of the rapture. Because the rapture is predicted to be surprise event, I highly doubt the Church will have to deal with the mark, but I wouldn't totally rule it out as a possibility. I've already been amazed at how blind the average Christian has been to last-days events. All we need is a global financial meltdown to trigger the implementation of a world financial system.
The Bible says that anyone who refuses to take the devil's mark will be locked out of the financial network. I can't imagine being put into a position where you can't buy the necessities of life. Adding to this misery, is the fact that there will be no place to hide for people who refuse the mark. Most tribulation saints will find martyrdom to be their only option, which makes being rapture ready now all the more important.
“And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name” (Revelation 14:11).
-- Todd
......................................................benny
