Freedom Under Attack - Slowly Dying
I ran into this today on a tech site I read. The article refers to the city of Bozeman Montana and applying for city employment. On the employment application they request not just if you have participated in any social networking sites or other on line participation but also your USERNAMES and PASSWORDS for those accounts. I read this twice and three times just to be sure I read it correctly. There were many commenters on this and one person says he checked it out and confirmed it.
This is an indicator of just how much the mentaility of government is changing and how abusive government power can become.
It should come as no surprise that our government has been the driver of so many awful results of late. Our elected officials are truly clueless. This nation is being swept away in a flood of ignorance and stupidity.
Guard your pseudos. Only let close, trusted friends in on them, and even so, do not let anyone know all of them. Change them if you believe they've been compromised. It's easier to rebuild cred on a social site, than to repair damage to personal reputation caused by misinterpreted fooling around, or just a bit of trolling.
I suspect that as time goes on, and the sheer volume of internet data increases towards an almost real-time database of all, this will become less of a concern. Still, don't be stupid. If you are doing something you do not desire the whole world knows, do not allow pictures to be taken, and do not brag about it online, even anonymously.
June 19, 2009 3:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good post. On the bright side I gave up hope of employment in the public sector some time go.
June 19, 2009 3:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is crap. This in intrusive. And the problem is that a job applicant can do nothing about it.
I have spoken about that awful question on so many applications, maybe all of them in the private as well as public sphere asking:
Have you ever been arrested?
F...you. None of your goddamnable business. (Blesses himself)
Innocent until proven guilty. And people do not even know that most traffic tickets are citations under local statutes and not arrests.
But if you have been arrested so what? Were you convicted. Now that is a proper question and it would take ten pages to explain even that statement.
But this computer info. Geeez, if you refuse to answer the question, you will not be hired.
If you do answer the question, 'they' will know many things about you.
If you lie in your answer, you could be subject to federal or state sanctions including fines and imprisonment.
THIS IS A BIG DEAL.
June 19, 2009 3:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
DD, it is a big deal.
This is the direction we've been going in for quite some time and it is just gaining momentum. Computers are great but the threat to freedom from abusing information is going to be our undoing. This is my business (40+ years and counting) and I can say for sure that information, particularly private information, has become a commodity for sale to the highest bidder. Not to mention government is on a spree to collect and keep every bit of data it can get its hands on. That includes every communication or other piece of information about every citizen in this country. Of that I am convinced. We are moving in a direction, cradle to grave, where even our most meaningless activities are known. Yet our government is not held accountable for creating the most awful and harmful outcomes one can imagine. It is way creepy that our perceptions of everything are known and understood, which lead to and are manipulated in unscrupulous ways. And you can bet your ass that this is occurring and isn't likely to be stopped. I've watched this evolve all my career. The price of ignorance and stupidity will make everything happening now pale by comparison.
June 19, 2009 4:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
Read Naomi Wolf's book. She said we didn't have
much time and we don't.
June 19, 2009 1:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
Don't worry -- with the end of cheap energy, this type of stuff will go the way of the automobile.
At least the public officials asked for the info. They could have just scoured in silence like many employers.
June 19, 2009 3:34 PM | Reply | Permalink