Comment by quantumgarbage
14 hours ago
On this topic, I can't recommend enough the movie "The life of Others" (2006). Depicts surveillance in Eastern Germany and the state of sheer fear and paranoia its citizens had to live in.
14 hours ago
On this topic, I can't recommend enough the movie "The life of Others" (2006). Depicts surveillance in Eastern Germany and the state of sheer fear and paranoia its citizens had to live in.
Stasiland by Anna Funder is also a great read on the topic. And then there’s Katja Hoyer’s “Beyond The Wall” which takes a comprehensive look at the DDR.
From wikipedia surveillance movie list, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_featuring_survei..., these might interest a tech audience:
Have you seen it available somewhere in Europe recently?
I've been looking for it for a while, with no success. I'd be happy with anything from DVD to archive.org/youtube upload or whatever.
You can check: https://www.justwatch.com/de/Film/Das-Leben-der-Anderen
Seems to be available in Germany and some other countries, but not here in Sweden at the moment (I think it used to be on Netflix here).
It is available from Amazon.de on blu-ray (probably also on Prime Video depending on the country), under the original German title: Das Leben der Anderen.
You can find it on bittorrent: https://bt4g.org. That's a DHT search engine. Put in your query and sort by seeder count, then use the magnet link to load it onto a bittorrent client (e.g. qbittorrent).
In some European countries, if you apply to rent an apartment, the landlord can see you failed to pay 1 month rent several years ago.
That's just a tiny example.
Is this control and surveillance or ... democracy and freedom ?
I have a tenant who has been living in my garden house for two years without paying rent. It is almost impossible to solve this situation. I am not even allowed to turn off the water or electricity. There are always two sides to every coin.
That’s just crazy. Were they ever a paying tenant and stopped paying. or just random stranger who broke in and decided they now lived there?
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That sucks. What law protects your renter?
4 replies →
What country?
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You wish to increase his rent 10% annually and after move out keep his deposit 6 months. Then confiscate 50% of the deposit for "damages". You wish!
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Comparing agents that will go into your home and move things around to drive you crazy and directly torturing you, with a debt registers is not a comparison I see as successful.
It is way more democracy and freedom than living in a state with an entity like the Stasi, a mixture between the NSA and the Gestapo, which is used to curb any opposition, at least.
It's not perfect, but this alternative is way worse.
And in the US, landlords can pull credit reports from private companies, and if the private company says you missed a credit card payment a year ago they'll reject you.
If the private credit score company returns a wrong score because someone else has the same name as you and they mixed up some records, well, it's a private company, you have no recourse.
Since it's not the government, but a for-profit private company, it can and will also sell your information.
If you opt out of this private company's system, landlords can and will reject you.
It is well known that the US is the most free country in the multiverse, so I would say no, having a government do it is not freedom (that's a social credit system like china has), but if instead it's a private company creating that credit score, that's freedom.
What law do you want to have to prevent this? Companies are people, and if your two previous land-lords are free to gossip about whether you paid rent (free speech), of course equifax should be able to sell that information (also free speech). People's right to privacy stops where free speech, and the ability of private entities to profit and raise GDP, starts.
This system absolutely sucks.
If you ever find yourself on the wrong end of it, read this article for advice but also explanations: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2017/09/09/identity-theft-credit-r...
Understanding how the system works, which buttons work and which don’t is half the battle.
Free speech does not include slander or lies. Like when credit score company makes a mistake.
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That statement needs a fact check. Which countries exactly?
In the US, the government is using everything you ever said on any social medial to deny you access to your job, the country, or benefits.
Just a tiny example.
Too scary and sad.