4 ms·

What will happen when hiding even small illegal activities becomes impossible?

• lifeisstillgood 5y ago
  This depends on your threat model (what is illegal, who chooses to prosecute, etc) I was driving home today and the satnav warned us about driving over speed limit (74 mph on UK motorway). Ok. But the solution to that is technology - and organisation. There are speed cameras on this road. But most of the time they don't take images or don't trigger an action. If every road camera triggered a warning / fine on every violation then speeding would stop in a few months. Is that something socially beneficial ? Probably. Would it be disruptive and cause great anger and political resentment? Yes. That is one tiny example but I think that pretty much every criminal act can be detected with technology - it's going to become which one we care enough about to prosecute and which we give up and decriminialise?
  • zizee 5y ago
    > which we give up and decriminialise Or governments will continue to have those laws on the books and prosecute them with discretion (which is what happens today). It is very convenient for those in power when every person is already guilty of something.
    • lifeisstillgood 5y ago
      That is the point - a "free and fair" society will prosecute everyone equally. And the impact of that will either make us all modify out behaviour so we are not all guilty or modify the laws so we are not all guilty. If society is not free or fair, that's the problem to fix first.
  • wolverine876 5y ago
    The problem is applying those rules to people whom the government wants to persecute.
• hedgedoops2 5y ago
  Selective prosecution