A Quote by Trevor Paglen

I think mass surveillance is a bad idea because a surveillance society is one in which people understand that they are constantly monitored.

Trevor Paglen

Quote Topics

Bad Bad Idea Because Constantly Idea Mass People Society Surveillance Think Understand Which

Quote Author

Trevor Paglen
American - Artist
Born: 1974

Our movements and feelings are constantly monitored, because surveillance is the business model of the digital age.

Katharine Viner

We have to call mass surveillance mass surveillance. We can't let governments around the world redefine, and sort of weasel their way out of it by saying this is bulk collection.

Edward Snowden

The issue I brought forward most clearly was that of mass surveillance, not of surveillance in general.

Edward Snowden

Orwell wasn't right about where society was in 1984. We haven't turned into that sort of surveillance society. But that may be, at least in small part, because of his book. The notion that ubiquitous surveillance and state manipulation of the media is evil is deeply engrained in us.

Ramez Naam

What is the society we wish to protect? Is it the society of complete surveillance for the commonwealth? Is this the wealth we seek to have in common - optimal security at the cost of maximal surveillance?

Tom Stoppard

Closed Circuit' came out of a general anxiety about surveillance. Government surveillance and private surveillance.

Steven Knight

No matter the specific techniques involved, historically mass surveillance has had several constant attributes. Initially, it is always the country’s dissidents and marginalized who bear the brunt of the surveillance, leading those who support the government or are merely apathetic to mistakenly believe they are immune. And history shows that the mere existence of a mass surveillance apparatus, regardless of how it is used, is in itself sufficient to stifle dissent. A citizenry that is aware of always being watched quickly becomes a compliant and fearful one.

Glenn Greenwald

Someone recently talked about mass surveillance and the NSA revelations as being the atomic moment for computer scientists. The atomic bomb was the moral moment for physicists. Mass surveillance is the same moment for computer scientists, when they realize that the things they produce can be used to harm a tremendous number of people.

Edward Snowden

No system of mass surveillance has existed in any society that we know of to this point that has not been abused.

Edward Snowden

The concept of surveillance is ingrained in our beings. God was the original surveillance camera.

Hasan M. Elahi

Martin Luther King was a victim of surveillance, and had great solidarity with victims of surveillance.

Cornel West

When people understand that they are constantly monitored, they are more conformist - they are less willing to take up controversial positions - and that kind of mass conformity is incompatible with democracy.

Trevor Paglen

When you try to grasp the way the Western world is going, you see that we are on a ratchet towards a surveillance state, which is coming to include the whole population in its surveillance. This is our reward for accepting the restraints on the way we live now.

Tom Stoppard

Digital surveillance programs require concrete data centres; intelligence agencies are based in real buildings. Surveillance systems ultimately consist of technologies, people, and the vast network of material resources that supports them.

Trevor Paglen

When we have some horrible terrorist attacks happen in some country we see in the recording that follows, that the intelligence community already knew about these people in advance. We know that these countries were involved in intelligence sharing premiums, that they benefited from mass surveillance, and yet they didn't stop the attacks. Yet at the same time we immediately see intelligence officials running to the newspapers and claiming that we need more surveillance, that we need more intrusion, that we need more expense of powers because it could have stopped an attack.

Edward Snowden

I don't think there's much distinction between surveillance and media in general. Better media means better surveillance. Cams are everywhere.