soc.octade.net is a Fediverse instance that uses the ActivityPub protocol. In other words, users at this host can communicate with people that use software like Mastodon, Pleroma, Friendica, etc. all around the world.
This server runs the snac software and there is no automatic sign-up process.
If passed, the #GUARD Act would would require all users of chatbot services in the United States to submit to mandatory verification: https://u.fsf.org/4bq #UserFreedom #FSF #FreeSoftware #surveillance
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A new toolkit for attorneys in Massachusetts targets the technologies police use—and conceal—to build criminal cases, from facial recognition to AI-written police reports.
‘Adversarial clothing’: are garments designed to confuse facial recognition systems about to go mainstream?’
https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/articles/adversarial-clothing-garments-designed-confuse-090005960.html
This is not one isolated policy, one organisation or one government.
It is a global convergence of UN frameworks, WEF partnerships, AI infrastructure, digital identity, finance, surveillance, NGOs, corporations and national legislation—all moving in the same direction.
Follow the links. Follow the funding. Follow the implementation.
The architecture is already being built around us.
#Agenda2030 #ArtificialIntelligence #DigitalID #WEF #UnitedNations #Surveillance #CBDC #GlobalGovernance
Student government ID cards with RFID chips allow schools to track student location throughout campus and create attendance records automatically.
Different nations. Different cultures. Different beliefs.
Yet ordinary people everywhere are facing the same expanding systems: digital identity, programmable finance, surveillance, automated governance and increasingly powerful AI.
This lecture is not designed to divide the world into sides. It is an invitation to recognise what we share.
Watch it. Verify it. Share it across borders.
If you don't want unknown entities spying on your emails, setting up email encryption is a great way to protect your #privacy and use your #UserFredom: u.fsf.org/1bq #surveillance #FSF #FreeSoftware #GNU
‘Adversarial clothing’: are garments designed to confuse facial recognition systems about to go mainstream?
Designers say that as well as offering a degree of protection from #surveillance , their clothes make a powerful fashion statement about the importance of #privacy
#adversarialclothing #fashion #facialrecognition
Amazing and fun workshop using make-up to fool face recognition software.
Thanks @vecna and N.I.N.A. for bringing it to Genova!
You can play yourself with Ghostmaxxing
#Genova #G8 #G8Genova #surveillance #surveillanceState #faceRecognition #surveillance #stateSurveillance #makeup
Victory! #Flock Ends Rollout of Audio “Distress Detection” of Human #Voices
Reversing course, #FlockSafety —the #surveillance technology vendor most known for its extensive network of automated #licensePlate readers—has announced that it will end a pilot for its acoustic #gunshot detection devicesto identify signs of “human distress.”
In October 2025, @eff warned the public that Flock was rolling out a new feature called “#DistressDetection ” that would be deployed through their acoustic gunshot detection devices (formerly known as #FlockRaven , now called #AudioDetection ). This feature purported to use high-powered #microphones scattered throughout a city to search for sounds of human distress, with original advertisements from the product indicating it would search for “#screaming.” (Since the publication of our original blog post, Flock quietly amended the ad on this webpage to say “distress” instead of “screaming.”)
#privacy #security
The SAVE Act does not mandate biometric ID—but it places federal identity verification inside the electoral process as governments worldwide build interoperable digital identity, biometric, payment and data systems.
This investigation separates provable infrastructure from speculation and reveals how the pieces could eventually converge.
Read the full investigation:
https://thomaster.substack.com/p/the-save-america-act-the-domestic
#SAVEAct #DigitalID #Biometrics #Surveillance #Privacy #ElectionIntegrity
Another privacy-facing Guardian article (hey I can't help it if the posts are decent), this time on a fashion line marketed as deceiving/confusing facial (& body/gait?) detection systems.
Would be good to see Adam Harvey (@adam_harvey ) get a mention when these comp vision surveillance camouflage projects are in the press. His CV Dazzle project was years before this went vogue, years as in 2010:
"The border is open" was the headline. It's true, and it isn't the whole thing.
The fence at Gibraltar's crossing with Spain is genuinely gone — a real win for the 15,000 who cross daily for work. But the checks moved rather than disappeared: Spanish officers now check you at the airport and the port.
And where the fence stood, there are now 26 cameras, facial recognition, and plate readers.
#Gibraltar #Surveillance #Travel
https://www.thebluf.news/p/gibraltar-border-checks-moved-not-gone
"The retail sector [in Australia] has been so interesting, with broader surveillance technology. They're at the point where staff are wearing bodycams to protect them from customers, who are frustrated that there's no staff because everything's been automated."
https://burningplatforms.podbean.com/e/the-palantir-primer/
#BurningPlatforms #CentreOfThePublicSquare #PerCapita #privacy #surveillance #podcasts
"Police departments around the country have used Flock cameras at least hundreds of times to search for specific people, not cars, using searches such as “heavy-set male with a black and white hat,” “person on skateboard,” and “person wearing orange vest and construction hat,” according to data reviewed by 404 Media. Sometimes searches reference a target’s race or signs of their political affiliation.
The searches highlight that while most people associate Flock cameras with scanning license plates and tracking vehicles, some of the cameras are also capable of following the movements of particular people or groups of people. Flock’s nationwide network of cameras lets police officers in one state search for a vehicle across many other states at once; the people searches do a similar thing, typically on a smaller scale, sometimes querying many hundreds of cameras at once. These are called “FreeForm” searches, and allow cops to use Flock’s system as though they would use a search engine, with Flock’s AI and image recognition interpreting what footage and which people are relevant to a police officer’s search."
https://www.404media.co/how-cops-use-flock-to-track-people-not-cars/
"This technical analysis provides the most detailed view yet into the inner workings of the Pegasus spyware system. This includes confirmation of key technical capabilities such as the infection vectors and methodologies used to infect devices, supported by analysis of internal NSO Group documents, that until now had only been identified via forensic investigations. It also presents new material further validating the accuracy and significance of the dataset underpinning the original Pegasus Project investigation. Finally, this research provides an updated analysis, drawing on previously published Pegasus forensic evidence and newly released materials, to validate the technical methodology used to forensically link Pegasus spyware attacks targeting different victims as originating from the same Pegasus customer.
A key aim of this publication is to document and demystify the functionality and operations of technological systems like Pegasus. We hope that it will inform the wider spyware accountability community on how complex surveillance systems such as Pegasus are used by government customers, and also illustrate the key and ongoing role of spyware vendors in keeping such systems operational. We believe this public understanding is of critical value to technologists, researchers, and policy makers and others with an interest in understanding the targeted surveillance ecosystem and threats posed to human rights by surveillance technologies.
The contents of this technical research draw heavily on a large pool of confidential NSO Group training material, presentations and internal technical documentation which were disclosed as part of a long-running civil case taken by WhatsApp and Meta against NSO Group in U.S. court. This new material provides an unprecedented insight into the evolution of NSO Group’s spyware."
#CyberSecurity #Spyware #NSOGroup #Pegasus #Surveillance #Privacy
"Health data is increasingly an important part of law enforcement or government investigations. Wearable data has been critical in a number of cases, where information about heart rate and steps was used to determine the whereabouts of individuals. And the surveillance company Penlink calls fitness trackers and wearables an “overlooked source” for law enforcement since they tend to show movement patterns and changes in heart rates. Law enforcement can try to get access to this data through subpoenas or warrants.
There are many potential privacy issues with these sorts of devices, including whether the companies who make them share or sell information to third-parties. But here we are choosing to focus on two facets we’re concerned with around health data itself: 1) whether the company shares information with law enforcement and governments and 2) if they offer end-to-end encryption, which means the company itself can’t access that health data to begin with."
#SmartObjects #SmartWatches #SmartRings #IoT #Surveillance #Privacy #CyberSecurity #Encryption
"The social media giant Meta partnered with controversial TV personality and cosmetics mogul Kylie Jenner for the design and marketing of an “entry-level” line of its widely criticized camera glasses late last month. The collaborative campaign quickly provoked a wave of public backlash over unresolved concerns about privacy, consent, and personal safety as surveillance technology rapidly evolves.
Based in the United Kingdom, the class-based activism group Everyone Hates Elon (EHE) visualized those concerns in a lenticular spoof ad that, based on where a viewer is standing, flips between a branded marketing photo of Jenner wearing a pair of Meta glasses and a black-and-white image showing a skeletal, X-ray version of her with the tagline “We’re always watching.”
The transformation element and the poster design appear to reference the politically charged sci-fi film They Live (1988), in which the main character encounters a pair of sunglasses that not only expose the extractive messaging of advertisements but reveal that humanity is being controlled, subdued, and exploited by a secret population of aliens masquerading as people. In the film, it’s later revealed that some humans have accepted monetary bribes to collaborate with the aliens."
https://hyperallergic.com/guerrilla-london-bus-ads-mock-kylie-jenners-meta-glasses-campaign/
#Meta #Rayban #SmartGlasses #Surveillance #Artivism #Privacy
#Meta #RayBan #Surveillance #Privacy
(5/5)
...need for vision aids for target groups in need, but in public places, they should not be allowed at all.
You want to use it on private premises? Be my guest.
//
#Meta #RayBan #Surveillance #Privacy
(4/n)
..it is unacceptable for eyeware cameras to do the same thing with its surroundings.
Explain toe, why there needs to be an upload channel (if there is one so far) or even a permanent-storage (flash?) chip?
5) In some cultures, it is offensive to even take a picture without first asking consent.
From my point of view, filming me, in particular storing the pictures as you go, is offensive and unacceptable.
I do see a...
#Meta #RayBan #Surveillance #Privacy
(3/n)
...we all know Putin and MBS dies it.
3.) Why must there be a recording function? Biological eyes don't record, neither should mechanical aids.
4.) Likewise, we've all read the articles about these driving surveillance outfits, better known as #TESLAs, constantly filming its environment and its interior. (TESLA operators are reported to have made fun of their clients while observing them in the cars).
OFC, this is...
404 Media: How Cops Use Flock to Track People, Not Cars
Jul 16, 2026 at 9:56 AM
Cops have used Flock's FreeForm search feature to look for people with tattoos and wearing specific sport shirts, and searches sometimes include the target's race, according to data reviewed by 404 Media.
https://www.404media.co/how-cops-use-flock-to-track-people-not-cars/
#Meta #RayBan #Surveillance #Privacy
(2/n)
1.) Does *everyone* really need such a tool, given the very serious #Security issues of #Meta's (Sp)AI glasses?
As this article shows, the downloads of these connected #RayBans can be sufficient to identify and track down a complete stranger's home address:
https://mastodon.social/@HistoPol/116928975023533388
Anyone can imagine fanboy and stalker problems. How about sexual abusers? What if the data is used to hunt down regime critics...
#Meta #RayBan #Surveillance #Privacy
(1/n)
I can see your point, Elena, the glasses are but a tool. (Also, I've worked with people with disabilities.)
So is a handgun, regarding which people in most countries think that it's distribution to people should be minimized.
Also, many people have concerns even about #SecurityCameras in public spaces with security issues.
So, I'd like to throw in a couple of discussion points for all:
Plate readers on police cars scan every passing car, not just suspects. Vendors like Flock and Motorola now pool billions of scans into a nationwide searchable database any officer can query to map where your car has been for years. #Flock #privacy #ALPR #surveillance #indigoprivacy
Chat Control : la surveillance de masse votée par la petite porte. (2026)
https://www.informassue.tuxfamily.org/pages/technologies_surveillance.php?art=chat_control_2025&st=eu_chat_control_09_07_2026
Le vote du 9 juillet 2026 : adopté malgré une majorité d'opposants. Seule consolation, une messagerie chiffrée de bout en bout comme Signal.org est épargnée, pour l'instant...
#ChatControl #Surveillance #EU #Messagerie
From Dave's Garage on Youtube:
The Controversial Flock Cameras Tracking Every Car — Full Breakdown
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJSgsf9ro38
#surveillance
We live in the sort of timeline where I had to spend extra effort while shopping for my new prescription glasses frame to make sure it was unambiguously clear that these aren't surveillance pervert glasses.
Yep. We're there.
These horrifying non-consensual surveillance glasses are everywhere now. That's life now. I hate it 🤓
#BanRayBan #Meta #PervertGlasses #SmartGlasses #Surveillance #Privacy #Consent
"The criticism of eye-worn gadgets capable of surveillance isn't new, though the online discourse — "Meta Glasses" repeatedly trended on Meta's own Threads app last week, for the wrong reasons — seems to have intensified following the release of Meta's latest cheaper lineup, as well as reports about an unreleased facial recognition feature for the product. For whatever reason, this time the backlash seems to be having a real effect.
Engadget spoke with five creators, photographers and others who were once enthusiastic about Meta's smart glasses about how public perception has changed their habits.
"A lot of men and their behaviors have ruined this product," Danielle, a Florida-based creator and travel host who asked to be identified by first name only, told Engadget. Initially she enjoyed using her smart glasses for capturing travel content from the international trips she hosts. Then she read a story about how contractors working for Meta said they had been tasked with reviewing intimate images and other sensitive details captured by glasses owners.
Further reporting of men using Meta-branded glasses to film videos of themselves harassing women in public sealed the deal. She says she hasn't used them since. "I wouldn't feel comfortable around somebody wearing them, so I wouldn't expect anybody to be comfortable around me wearing them, no matter where I am.
(...)
Other creators who have previously purchased the frames now say they are using the product less often due to fears that people around them will assume they're doing something "creepy."
Christian Eisenbarth is a Los Angeles-based videographer who was gifted a pair of Ray-Ban Meta glasses by his girlfriend. He says that while he had previously been eyeing a pair for use on his video shoots, he has yet to use them outside of his home "mainly due to being afraid of being labeled as a creep.""
https://www.engadget.com/2212604/the-meta-glasses-backlash-is-changing-how-or-if-people-use-them/
Vindication #2? India’s biometric and digital-control infrastructure is no longer dismissible as fringe speculation. Gates is now openly celebrating the Indian model—without calling it “capture.”
This update preserves the original date-stamped article, shows what was predicted accurately, what is now verified, and what remains hypothesis.
https://thomaster.substack.com/p/indias-bio-nano-web-of-control
#BillGates #India #DigitalID #Surveillance #Technocracy #Aadhaar #DigitalPublicInfrastructure #CBDC #UN #WEF #GlobalGovernance
Grocery Outlet Bargain Market is deploying #AI facial recognition in their stores.
It’s used for profiling.
“The system takes images of customers and runs them against a “watchlist,” a database of people who have previously been identified after “causing harm in some way,” said Chris Ochs, who works at SAFR at RealNetworks, the AI company that created SAFR Guard, the security system being used at Grocery Outlet. If there is a match, a phone notification is sent to the retailer using the system.”
#california #sfba #surveillance
https://missionlocal.org/2026/07/sf-grocery-outlet-facial-recognition/
"The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) is reportedly ending its deal with Flock Safety, a surveillance company that helps law enforcement track vehicles using thousands of its license plate cameras placed across the United States.
A senior LAPD official told news outlets, first reported by ABC7 and the Los Angeles Times, that the police department would allow its three-year contract with Flock to expire when it ends on Saturday. The department cited “serious concerns” around civil liberties and privacy. Flock’s cameras are operated by the Atlanta, Georgia-based company and not the LAPD.
“This contract is not being renewed because of serious concerns around civil liberties and civil rights issues, particularly around privacy and the data that is being collected from these cameras,” LAPD’s chief information officer Dean Gialamas was quoted as saying. “The LAPD had to make a difficult decision, in this case discontinuing using Flock services until we can get those data, privacy, security and sharing concerns ironed out through a contractual relationship.”
A spokesperson for the LAPD did not respond to a request for comment from TechCrunch over the weekend, and it’s unclear if Flock’s cameras will continue recording in absence of an active contract. According to ABC7, the police department is seeking new language in its contract addressing privacy and data storage concerns."
#USA #LA #LosAngeles #Flock #LAPD #Privacy #Surveillance #CivilLiberties
#LAPD Regularly Pulled Over #Innocent People Because #LicensePlateReaders Flagged Their Cars As Stolen
The #LosAngeles Police Department (LAPD) announced it will let its #surveillance contract with automated license plate reader company (#ALPR ) #Flock expire, becoming the largest police department in the country to drop its contract. Notably, the decision came after an audit of ALPR technology found that, in a two-month period, the LAPD had improperly "investigated" 161 people whose cars were flagged as stolen in the LAPD’s ALPR system but were not actually stolen.
The news that LAPD pulled over 161 innocent people in two months because of improper tagging in the department’s system comes after several high-profile incidents in which people in other states were accosted by police because of data entry or clerical errors in ALPR systems.
#privacy #security
WIRED - The Latest in Technology, Science, Culture and Business [Unofficial] » 🌐
@wired.com@web.brid.gy
The SFPD’s exposure of hours of videos from drone platform Skydio reveals how broadly it’s watching the city from above—and how the results can spill online.
The EU built mass surveillance disguised as child protection.
Our investigation found German police data proving 48% of alerts aren't crimes, 40% target minors.
Thorn (Ashton Kutcher's company) helped write the law. Thread below 👇
“ Today, the European Parliament allowed the suspicionless mass scanning of private communications (“Chat Control 1.0”) to pass, a measure it had rejected twice in March. Although a majority of voting Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) actually opposed the regulation (314 against, 276 in favor, 17 abstentions), the motion to reject it failed to secure the required absolute majority of 361 votes. As a result, mass scanning is now permitted again until 2028.
A symbolic exemption was adopted for encrypted communications—though in practice, service providers do not scan these anyway. Furthermore, while a majority of voting MEPs wanted to restrict the scanning of private communications strictly to suspects identified by the judiciary (322 to 255 votes), this amendment likewise fell short of the required absolute majority.
Dr. Patrick Breyer, civil rights activist and former Member of the European Parliament (MEP), warns of the consequences:
“The fact that Chat Control is moving forward against the will of the majority of voting MEPs is a farce and damages democracy.””
"And then?"
https://mullvad.net/and-then
A short film about mass surveillance by Mullvad. Fun and sad at the same time.
(apparently it was banned on British TV)
RE: https://mastodon.social/@zackwhittaker/116884302738509527
"To the argument that certain technologies and surveillance are in some way inevitable, I don't believe that to be true. It certainly doesn't have to be. You don't need to buy or use these invasive technologies, and you can reject them. Friends don't let friends wear pervert glasses." - Zack Whittaker
#SurveillanceCapitalism #privacy #surveillance #resist
Smart glasses with cameras and microphones built-in and facial recognition to come are the latest fad in surveillance tech.
For my blog & newsletter ~ this week in security ~ I wrote about why the backlash against smart glasses — aka "pervert glasses" — is justified from a security and privacy perspective. Please read and share!
More: https://this.weekinsecurity.com/reframing-smart-glasses-as-pervert-glasses/
Sign up/RSS for my weekly newsletter: https://this.weekinsecurity.com
Eight Predator spyware victims filed a lawsuit against Intellexa in Athens. They demand massive compensation for severe privacy and data violations.
"In recent years, the Signal messaging app has become a newsroom staple, enabling journalists, colleagues, sources, and others to speak to one another securely with end-to-end encryption. This means no one except those in conversation — not even the service provider — can read your messages or listen in on your calls. Journalists use it individually, and we also see a trend toward using organizational Signal tiplines.
But it’s important to understand this is not a ”set it and forget it” decision. When talking to sensitive contacts, you do need to maintain your account to ensure it is safe and does not fall into the wrong hands.
Imagine if someone took over your Signal account. They could impersonate you, causing reputational damage, or worse, putting sources at risk. Unfortunately, this is not a hypothetical. We have seen at least one public example (and some less public) where newsrooms have lost access to Signal identifiers, sometimes leading to abuse.
There are a few simple things journalists can do to maximize the safety of their Signal account."
https://freedom.press/digisec/blog/signal-account-safety/
#Messaging #Signal #Privacy #Surveillance #Encryption #PrressFreedom #Journalism #Media
"I think this backlash against smart glasses is justified from a security and privacy perspective. Using technology to secretly record someone else isn't new, but bringing this audio- and video-collecting wearable tech into the mainstream has the potential to make it easier to carry out cybercrime and fraud by lowering the bar to entry for abuse.
The ability to covertly record and play back something displayed on someone's phone or computer screen or while someone taps in their password on a keyboard presents a major security problem — especially if that person is unaware of it happening. Recording sensitive data also creates a future risk of that information getting compromised, hacked, or obtained by a legal authority.
It is understandable why some are reframing smart glasses as "pervert glasses," by rejecting the sanitized marketing of tech companies and calling these products what they see them as: surveillance devices. It also speaks to the distrust that some consumers have with tech giants after years of abuses and scandals misappropriating people's data.
There are valid concerns that smart glasses on the market today could soon bake-in more privacy invading tech, like facial recognition."
https://this.weekinsecurity.com/reframing-smart-glasses-as-pervert-glasses/
Lucky this driver was not a person of color, because this would more likely than not ended in jail, with physical abuse, or a tragedy involving firearms.
How Flock Cameras Wrongly Tracked Me for Days Over ‘Stolen’ Plates and Sent Police After Me
A simple error got magnified by Flock's nationwide surveillance camera network and ended with four cop cars boxing me in.
Insurance companies have hired investigators to conduct physical surveillance on disability claimants, filming them in public spaces to challenge claims.
Insurance companies have hired investigators to conduct physical surveillance on disability claimants, filming them in public spaces to challenge claims.
The 415 - the MEPs who let Chat Control through, and the lobbyists in their diaries
Yesterday 331 MEPs voted to bring Chat Control back under an urgency procedure the President should never have allowed. Here is every one of the 415 who did not oppose it, with their voting records and every lobbyist they have met.
https://www.thatprivacyguy.com/blog/chat-control-the-415-who-failed-you
#csam #chatcontrol #eprivacy #charter #eu #surveillance #lobbying #law
**AI surveillance is being supercharged – and it will chill social progress** | Bruce Schneier and Jon Penney
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jul/06/ai-surveillance-policy