Disclaimer: Safe Tech International is comprised of a diverse group of people from various countries who have come together to advocate for safer digital technologies. We do not have a uniform stance on all global political issues, nor do we feel this is necessary in advocacy for safer internet and telecommunications technologies. We support diversity of thought, and feel that well-researched blogs and outreach materials that both awaken and inspire others to seek the greater good are essential in our times. In light of that, please note that all members of Safe Tech International do not necessarily agree with every political statement made in the following excellent and well-researched blog.

The world would be a different place without smart technology, which is personified by the ubiquitous smart phone. However, more than that, the world would be a different place if smart technology didn’t come first – in every political decision.

These technologies have helped to create the police state of today. It is nurtured by the political climate in which Digital ID is being sold to us. Governments are digitally dividing society into an “us and them” equation – through AI-driven smart technology. In that world, the smart phone – a data-mining surveillance tool for the police state – is made conveniently mandatory.

Digital surveillance and Digital ID

The potential of the smart phone to disempower society, piece by piece, is no secret – phones are being tracked and personal information is leaking via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. It may shock people to realise that Wi-Fi “sensing” enables AI to see us through walls and monitor our movements in real time with 5G.

Our data, in a multiplicity of forms commonly derived from routine smart phone activity, is the prized possession of government agencies and, the corporations and organisations that profit from it, who are lobbying for Digital ID, which enables more intrusive data-mining. There are numerous consequences of this vast “data-mining”, proving that the smart phone is anything but an “empowering” device.

Some social groups more than others received a taste of this reality during the “pandemic” – notably activists, journalists and other campaigning professionals using social media and smart phones to raise political awareness when human rights were under assault. Reliance on smart phones exposed their data to increased scrutiny, left them open to international government, military and police efforts to target social media, control information, monitor persons of interest and deter protests. Society witnessed a hike in intrusive data-driven surveillance and algorithmic censorship, as well as calls for Digital ID in the form of digital “Vaccine Passports”, all of which could now be empowered by AI and 5G wireless infrastructure.

Climate of social and racial manipulation

Among the targets in the climate of social unrest was the “Woke” organisation Black Lives Matter (BLM), protesting in 2020, and invested in “smart phone activism”. However, soon BLM discovered that their smart phones were an “Achilles Heel”. Big Tech had been aiding the police, with social media surveillance and facial recognition technologies (FRTs), targeting protesters.

BLM had known social media surveillance for many years (targeted by police through the social media intelligence platform Geofeedia). However, they had never highlighted this technological side of “colonialism” in their midst.

In September 2020 – according to the BBC – officers at a [Black Lives Matter] protest in Washington’s Lafayette Square “…requested a “heat ray” weapon for possible use against protesters in a park next to the White House…The heat ray weapon [Active Denial System] uses a microwave beam [millimeter wave energy] to make human skin feel like it is burning.” That same month, Facial Recognition Technologies (FRTs) had also been deployed against the protesters.

BLM supporters toppling colonialist statues in recent times, have liberally targeted the past. However, they didn’t target the Big Tech companies, Big Tech figureheads or smart phones/smart surveillance technology, or microwave weapons of the present. An opportunity to highlight digital/electronic colonialism as the threat of contemporary Imperialism – exemplified by the symbiosis of Big Tech and the police to target and ID protesters with data-driven technologies – was ominously missed when unprecedented global attention was on the organisation in 2020.

BLM, it can be argued, avoided the technological “elephants in the room” and thus seemed to change very little for civil rights, because policing is inseparable from microwave and smart technologies.

A technological, data-gathering warzone

Predatory, data-driven policing is today at the heart of recent anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles, as are identity politics. The surveillance of and confrontations with protesters are portrayed as a crackdown on those in the US who may not have the necessary Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) documents that prove their identity.

Police brutality (with military tactics and manpower) aligned to “technological supremacism” characterises the “sweeps” on the streets of LA, which are fuelled by data from smart surveillance infrastructure and tools.

Biometric Update author Anthony Kimery, in the article “Police, federal video surveillance of anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles raise alarms”, observes that, “In the wake of escalating protests in Los Angeles over U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids and broader immigration enforcement policies, civil liberties advocates and technologists are sounding the alarm over the scale and scope of surveillance that’s been deployed against demonstrators…While aerial footage and law enforcement presence dominate the visible landscape of the protests, a quieter form of monitoring is unfolding in the digital realm where facial recognition tools, [Amazon] Ring camera footage, and social media surveillance intersect to create a sprawling matrix of protester identification.”

Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) has made significant investments in wireless Internet of Things (IoT) technologies – as admitted by Deputy Chief John McMahon who believes, “Virtual reality and technologies like the [wearable] Apple Vision Pro goggles, which double as a computer, offer endless possibilities for enhancing law enforcement operations.”

(The same has been said about smart glasses, wearables that are currently being used by law enforcement in China and the Middle East, and will be coming to a town near you, with facial recognition technology built in. According to Greenbot, “facial recognition in wearables may soon become common despite ethical concerns.” As Harvard Technology Review observes, “…while European regulations have restricted the use of real-time facial recognition, no such protections exist in the United States.”)

Smart technology automates much of policing, and supports the militarisation of the police, which has continued since 9/11 when “surplus combat equipment [was] procured and assigned to local police departments”. Source. The trend has seen units that “mimic Special Forces”. According to stopspying.org, in the US amidst anti-ICE demonstrations, “federal immigration enforcement have flown Predator drones, Black Hawk helicopters, and other military aircraft typically deployed in warzones overseas above the protests.”

Reports of “masked, unmarked agents” assigned to work with ICE that are targeting demonstrators and others reinforce the “Special Forces” dimension to the technologically assisted ICE policing. Arguably this is a terrorising tactic, and one that is challenging legal frameworks, undermining transparency and creating fear.

In a discussion in bylinetimes.com concerning the “militarisation of police departments, and the domestic deployments of armed units trained and staffed by Special Forces soldiers to our cities”, Professor Timothy Snyder of Yale – author of On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From the Twentieth Century – is quoted as saying, “This is a classic way that violence happens in authoritarian regimes… The people who are getting used to committing violence on the border are then brought in to commit violence against people in the interior.” Source.

MSN reported that, “Some city and Police Commission leaders have called on the LAPD to do more to identify masked individuals who are taking part in immigration sweeps.” The streets are becoming a technological, data-gathering warzone.

Smart technology for health, or authenticating ID?

As this “militarised” climate of fear over “proving identity” is raised to fever pitch, I’m sure it won’t be long before the subject of Digital ID becomes centre stage issue the US – targeting Americans with smart phones. Digital ID in the US is sold as “more convenient, secure, privacy-protective, and usable than a physical ID”.

A centralised database built by Big Tech data-mining firm Palantir is already proving more than attractive to the Trump government – which would support a Digital ID framework, and, ICE deportations. As Vice observes, “In a CNBC interview at Davos, Palantir CEO Alex Karp admitted that his company “[finds] people in our country who are undocumented.” Source.

For Digital ID to be a success, biometrics are a key dataset. Currently, “Palantir gathers biometric and behavioral data for removal operations“. The function-creep of smart phones has ensured this dataset can be obtained with ease, “conveniently”, for biometrics capture is hardwired into the technology – as it is in fashionable smart “wearables”.

In the US, health secretary RFK Junior recommends that all citizens own wearables, “envisioning that every American will use them within four years“. Like smart phones, wearable devices are a desirable “data-mine” for the police, and governments – and such data would greatly assist Palantir. Wearables offer many opportunities for “tapping” rich sets of data.

The safety of sensitive, personal health data remains in question, however, when Big Tech is greedy for it and is prepared to breech data guidelines. Fines seem inconsequential. For example, facial recognition company Clearview AI “was fined just over €30M (close to $32M) by the Netherlands’ data protection authority in September 2024. In 2022 it was also fined the maximum possible (€20M or around $22M, based on its revenue at that time) a full three times by DPAs in Italy, Greece and France.” Source.

AI-driven smart technology: who wants your data?

Influencers who are outspoken on social issues, like RFKJnr and Patrisse Marie Khan-Cullors Brignac (formerly of BLM), must see that smart technologies are invasive surveillance tools. However, RFKJnr believes that wearables are vital for health, which is questionable. Meanwhile, former Black Lives Matter (BLM) leader Patrisse Marie Khan-Cullors Brignac helped empower a movement against colonialism in the 21st century yet the movement hasn’t spoken out against targeted smart phone surveillance, Facial Recognition Technologies (FRTs) Digital ID, or AI algorithms that can be inherently racist or disciminatory, (proven in study after study).

Failing to politically highlight the invasive data-driven surveillance underway courtesy of smart technology has consequences. A centralised database of Americans is now on the cards whether US citizens of any colour agree or not. Murals of 2020 supporting BLM are torn up and military installations are renamed in support of the Ku Klux Klan, as the Whitehouse makes deals with Big Tech and data-mining company, Palantir. Meanwhile, wearables for every American is promoted as a mantra.

There is a deep political desire to control the public’s data, and to keep mining it, intrusively though smart technologies – something the police are relying on more and more. The “terrorising” policing tactics and data-driven technologies being rolled out at demonstrations today take on a different dimension when we realise that the US and UK police alike are being trained in Israel, a country that reinforces apartheid through surveillance technologies, and is engaged in ethnic cleansing in Gaza.

According to Amnesty International, “Public or private funds spent to train our domestic police in Israel should concern all of us.” Yet how many of us know that the police are adopting Israeli tactics? Consider also, that Israeli technologies like those made by Israeli spytech company Cellebrite – a digital forensics company that sells tools to access and extract data from smartphones – which has “contracts with the British police” may access “police and security surveillance data”, because they are part of the “The 2030 roadmap for UK-Israel bilateral relations” signed off by the British Government.

Concerningly, Cellebrite has a “disastrous human rights record” and assists repressive regimes. For example, in 2021, as the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre reported, “Evidence of surveillance technology being used by the Myanmar state [formerly Burma]…was revealed when it surfaced that the military used phone-hacking technology from Israeli spyware firm Cellebrite to arrest two Reuters journalists for investigating a military massacre of ten Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State in 2017.”

Cellebrite is interested in more than access to and data from smart phones, however. According to Cellebrite, “Digital wearables, such as Fitbit, record seemingly mundane activities — the number of steps we take in a day, our heartbeats, sleep schedules, locations, and distance traveled. To the trained eyes of criminal investigators, the data from wearables can be used to document our daily lives, right down to the last footstep and heartbeat. This data can prove invaluable when investigating crimes….extraction of data from wearable devices [has] led to arrests and prosecutions.”

Techno-anarchy in the UK

Clearly smart phones and wearables enable a society governed by Digital ID, underpinned by AI. It’s the direction the US, and UK, is headed, with the tragedy of racial unrest continuing, driven by technology that promotes over-policing and racially biased targeting.

In the UK as in the US, Palantir are at the centre of data-mining activities. According to Liberty, the “…controversial US spy tech firm [Palantir] has landed a contract with UK police to develop a surveillance network that will incorporate data about citizens’ political opinions, philosophical beliefs, health records and other sensitive personal information.”

In the UK, Digital ID is increasingly in the news. As the political dimensions around it are comparable with those of the US in so many ways, they deserve our attention.

The UK government launched “Gov.uk Wallet, a digital identity system that will consolidate government-issued credentials into a centralized mobile application. The initiative marks a significant advancement in the UK’s broader digitization strategy, following the country’s recent engagement with private sector stakeholders on digital identity solutions…The technical implementation will use facial recognition capabilities available on most contemporary smartphones for identity verification.” This offers clues as to how the UK’s vision of Digital ID will look.

The Digital ID initiative progresses as racial unrest in the form of Gaza protests and continuing immigration-related “troubles” spark police controntations where facial recognition technologies (FRTs) and smart phone surveillance are hastily rushed out (without ethical regulations) and serve to deter public demonstrations and “dissent”.

Regarding the Gaza demonstrations, these events are democratic rights that communicate to us all how unpopular Israel’s “genocidal” war is, and also show us that predominantly in the media, protesting against the killing of Palestinians and waving their flags in demonstrations is being sold as “anti-Israel” as if that type of protesting were “antisemitic”. UK Foreign Office “staff officials [questioning] the UK’s continued arms sales and what they called a “stark… disregard for international law” by Israel,” have been warned that they should consider resigning if they “disagree” over Gaza.

Citizens opposing Israel’s “genocide” can be labelled antisemitic for expressing alarm, or demonstrating – though when 100,000 Israelis take to the streets to oppose the war, the popular media either has no name for it, or avoids highlighting it. “Antisemitism” describes “bigotry, prejudice or discrimination against Jews“. “Bigotry, prejudice or discrimination against Palestinians” who are also “semitic” people is defended by the British State. In Israel the oppression of Palestinians has been progressed over decades of the authorities collecting biometric data on Palestinians (and even Jews) to control both populations, helped by growing smart phone use, and the rise of facial recognition technologies being developed in Israel.

Britcard: for silencing voices?

In the UK a Digital ID could equally be employed to silence criticism to the government line. “Government officials have suggested that digital IDs could be linked to facial recognition technology and biometric data, creating a system that closely monitors every citizen’s movements and interactions.”

In the context of this “autocratic” UK government stance, where political divides arise over Israel/Gaza and immigration-fuelled controversies, we’re seeing a biometric Digital ID emerge with the proposition of “Britcard”.

It is a proposition progressing from a speculative and “voluntary” status towards being pushed as mandatory – on the back of Britain’s infamous “Immigration” and protesting problems.

Immigration problems in the UK have fuelled protests and dissatisifaction for some time – but only after protests against wars (that have been causing the refugee crisis) failed, falling on the deaf ears of governments determined to support or wage them. Deterring protest with AI’s assistance has since become a priority of governments and the police. Silkie Carlo, director of Big Brother Watch (BBW), believes “…AI surveillance turns members of the public into walking ID cards, is dangerously inaccurate and has no explicit legal basis in the UK.” BBW found that “Over 60% of UK residents are concerned about the use of facial recognition in public spaces.”

Britcard should be viewed as an extension of this desire to control, for who would protest if their data could instantly be assigned to a “watch list” courtesy of an AI driven app and deprive one of essential services? It is an existential threat, along with the growing arsenal of FRTs and Drones to support the program.

“Britcard”, is presented as a proposition for a national Digital ID, and is being advertised a solution for “immigration out of control” though deserves closer scrutiny. As CCN reports, Britcard is touted as a way to “help Britain control illegal migration and secure its borders.”

“What else could Britcard be used for?” is a question everyone should be asking. What about backing a national conscription program? National ID cards introduced in 1939 assisted in conscription – the last time a mandatory ID system was introduced in the UK. Could that happen with Digital IDs? Its happening in Europe which seeks to conscript 300,000 troops as a deterrent to Russia.

Beyond the obvious and advertised

Talk of resuming UK conscription was in the air recently, concerning Vladimir Putin who is seen as a threat because “Britain sees its number of soldiers dwindling“. Europe also appears to be preparing populations for conflict aimed at Putin.

However, according to inews.co.uk, “Downing Street has dismissed a warning from the head of the British Army that members of the public could be called up to fight in the event of a war with Russia.” Governments have been known to U-turn. The UK government seems desperate to implement national Digital ID. Any war might help achieve that, from the “immigation war” to the world war three scenario suggested by the spectre of Putin.

War is spoken of a lot today, though some seek to create it casually through their influence. Big Tech attempted to fan the flames of immigration discontent in the guise of Elon Musk, partner in the techno-eugenecist rebrand of politics under President Donald Trump who is deliberately engineering a racially tense atmosphere in the US, in every way possible (while Elon promotes the idea of “Smart-people” enhanced by smart technology). “Sir Keir Starmer [became] embroiled in a war of words with Elon Musk, after the tech billionaire suggested that “civil war is inevitable” following violent unrest in the UK”, as the BBC reported in 2024.

Britcard remains a politically divisive “us and them” type of proposition. CITIZENS vs IMMIGRATION is currently the main narrative to convince people to accept a life where digital proof of ID permits access to private and public sector services digitally. Fear and “othering” are the UK government’s usual tried and tested ways of introducing more surveillance on the population, and biased AI algorithms ensure that will continue be the case.

No doubt “othering” comes into play in conscription as well, as it did in the UK in 1939 when ID Cards were forced on the population, and resisting conscription was frowned upon. In a similar way, Digital ID could be used as a coercive tool for purposes beyond the obvious and advertised, empowering governments in gaining the compliance of citizens for a multiplicity of political goals.

The UK and US governments are funding energy guzzling data centres and utilise Real Time Crime Centres (RTCC) (spearheaded by Fusus “the most widely used and trusted real-time crime center platform in US public safety”). Here police use all the latest bells and whistles of surveillance technology and data analytics, so we are seeing the foundations of a Digital ID being built.

The RTCC system brings together the smart technology platforms of Big Tech to policing to carry out the State’s divide and rule political and strategic tactics on society. Digital ID will be a critical data-driven tool linking to these systems. According to breechmedia, “While creating the centres, police forces have sought out advice and technology from major corporations like Motorola, IBM, and Palantir, many with controversial ties to military and spy agencies.”

The UK’s future – who is allowed to join it?

We’re at the threshold of the QR code society, which is a surveillance economy – where you are the product, giving your profitable data through every digital transaction with a smart phone Digital ID app. Like a product on a shelf, a human acquires an ID number and barcode (QR code), to be tracked anywhere like a pet or a prisoner with a GPS bracelet. Wearables can only assist in the “progressive” Digital ID world.

A think tank closely aligned with the government called Labour Together believes that “For a progressive society to work, it needs to be able to collectively agree who is allowed to join it. Because it will exclude those who cannot join it, it needs to give its members proof that they belong.” This is the logic behind the UK’s Digital ID scheme “Britcard”.

According to The Week, “Number 10 appears to be…rolling out [the] voluntary scheme that could become mandatory at a future date. Labour Together has estimated the BritCard system would cost up to £400 million to build and around £10 million a year to administer as a free-to-use app.”

State in a Smart Phone

A Digital ID is already being used in the UK-backed Ukraine as the country endeavours to achieve a state of technological supremacy, and guard against Russia. A Digital ID backed by a government app drives the Ukraine into deeper autocracy, and an “us and them” world. The “State in a Smartphone” project handled by the Ukrainian Ministry of Digital Transformation passed a Digital ID law and now all authorities and private business are equipped “to be able to scan the relevant QR-code of the New Digital IDs” to verify identities.

Ukraine, by adopting Digital ID places itself on a par with other repressive regimes that have imposed the same with the aid of profit hungry Big Tech companies like Palantir. “Currently, Diia, the national government’s app which is used by over 20 million people.

Today, nearly all of Kyiv’s adult population relies on the apps”. This ensures complete digital dependency, meaning that with immediacy, access to healthcare, resources, and vital services can be refused and withheld, on the basis of the political control of a person’s data. Victoria Itskovych, Chief Information Officer of Kyiv City (CIO) said: “For any emergency – be it floods, earthquakes, or pandemics –…cities need a trusted channel of communication that cannot be hijacked to spread fear and panic.” Clearly only the voice of the State matters, when State-driven apps come into town.

Digital ID, for the Ukraine, establishes a questionable form of technology for a questionable “democracy” that has faced massive protests over government corruption, and brought “draconian” anti-protest laws that curb protest rights, free speech and NGO involvement in these processes. Deterring protest is also an agenda in the UK and US, today, with governments employing Facial Recognition Technologies (FRTs) and social media surveillance to build watch lists and target protesters or “dissidents” – a police state gaining power.

Can a Digital ID promote “Humanness”?

This interpenetrating Digital ID surveillance system, wherever it is implemented, UK or Ukraine, requires sustaining fast wireless networks (5G for example) and massively expanding data-centres, a drain on earth’s resources – fundamentally in the name of mass surveillance – and, it means sacrificing our freedom and “humanness” to “belong”, when our existence is digitally organised by AI algorithms.

Firmin DeBrabander, the Cambridge University Press author of Life after Privacy: Reclaiming Democracy in a Surveillance Society, believes that, “In the digital net that envelops our everyday lives, it will become increasingly more difficult and rare to perform any task without revealing ourselves, and opening our lives to spying eyes. And our spies are not content to watch us from without; they will install sentinels in our very bodies, and monitor us from within.” Source.

This is the future being constructed. Digital ID is a political choice, and it advertises that a fascist surveillance state is the preferred existence, above all other possibilities. Where is that future going to lead us?

Moonshot R&D calls the intensely surveilled future we’re heading towards a new world of inspiration “where people, robots, and biological cyborgs collaborate and co-evolve”. It’s the so-called “fifth stage of human evolution”, a prospect Japan is embracing, where a “Super-smart” Society 5.0 (an agenda evolved since the advent of 5G in 2016) represents “a visionary roadmap for the future of human civilization”, as described by innovaromorir.com.

Sounds like the endgame of the “Great Reset” which advances the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and, dictates technological evolution. How does that work? Sociable.co asserts that, “…the unelected globalists at the World Economic Forum (WEF) are envisioning an “augmented society” ruled by digital identity and transhumanism via the Internet of Bodies….They want digital identity…embedded into every aspect of our lives — even under our skin…” where sensors on or inside the body “monitor, analyze, and even modify human bodies and behavior.”

Such views and observations no longer seem outlandish. Smart technology, and in particular wearables and implants, are posing many ethical questions, though Big Tech companies are banking on what Klaus Schwab calls “a fusion of our physical, our digital, and our biological identities” while no ethical oversight can prevent any movement in that direction.

Put in this light, we can see how an acceptance of Digital ID is like throwing “humanness” onto the trash heap in favour of inhabiting a “post-human society” (discussed by the Global Posthuman Network) where people are, through new markets like smart dust and implants, technologically augemented (which in today’s parlance means people are being “progressive”).

People accepting of a Digital ID are trading any other alternative life for a digitally “remastered” and reinforced “self” (as populations under repressive regimes have discovered) consenting to centralised surveillance, and technologically targeted control over individuals, using health data (digital health), and mental health status or any other data of strategic value that can set limits and reinforce Big Tech monopolies and government policies.

Digital ID is not about setting anyone free, but nudging the population to a place where AI comes to dominate life more. Government has a revolving door with Big Tech companies which accelerates the pace of digital surveillance transformations, which are about implementing AI for profit and control.

AI and the lens of repression

Keir Starmer of the UK Labour government said, with AI “…there are huge opportunities and risks, and we need to marry the two…We need to push it through”. Today, the UK like everywhere we know, is a surveillance economy, being pushed through, which can be measured in the sheer density of data-collecting CCTV cameras alone which are, to be clear, a technology invented by the Nazi regime.

CCTV cameras are now enhanced by AI, and are the eyes of the AI-data-driven State today, using facial recognition and other algorithmic surveilance tools – biased towards destroying dissent and activism, while proving inherently “racist”.

Speaking out on the issue of AI’s racist interpretations and language models, Timnit Gebru was fired by Google in 2020. She had been “supporting rigorous research on AI ethics and algorithmic auditing” while the company romanced Black Lives Matter (BLM), Diversity politics, and Civil Rights to bask in “political correctness”, to promote products to a wider audience. This is a road that Big Tech in general has walked profitably, though now distances itself from as the political climate changes towards one of technologically assisted intolerance, a climate which Big Tech arguably now exploits, and assists.

Google’s credibility to “Do No Evil” has waned immensely with the development of Project Nimbus, which is enabling data-driven AI surveillance for Israel. As Middle East Monitor explains, “Beyond the sphere of social media, Google and Amazon’s collaboration with the Israeli military under Project Nimbus casts an even darker shadow over the tech industry’s role in this conflict [the war in Gaza]. The $1.2 billion cloud computing contract…provides critical infrastructure to power Israel’s AI-driven Lavender and Gospel targeting systems – systems that are directly linked to the mass civilian casualties in Gaza [and use facial recognition].” It’s a lesson for us all, especially when it is clear that Israel has a grip on our police and governments, and seeks to influence strategies and technologies.

Israel’s grip on Western police forces

In April 2025, aoav.org.uk reported that “In a delayed response to a Freedom of Information (FOI) request submitted by Action on Armed Violence (AOAV)”, Essex Police in the UK “…refused to confirm or deny whether any of their officers have met with representatives from Corsight AI, a controversial Israeli facial recognition technology company whose software has reportedly been used in IDF military operations in Gaza….a practice that human rights organisations have condemned as constituting “automated apartheid”.

This lack of transparency is similar to the US government refusing to be open about its facial recognition agenda, a policy of secrecy that raises concerns. The UK appears reliant on intrusive surveillance tactics and tools from Israel. It is worth asking, to what extent?

What power do Israeli tech firms have over police in the UK?

According to Inside Telecom, “Over 500 Israeli tech and non-tech companies operate in the United Kingdom (UK), and the UK Israel Tech Hub is located within the British Embassy in Israel…This raises multiple questions about the relationship between the UK and Israel. The main aim of the organization is to secure private and public sector contracts for Israeli technology companies in the UK. Earlier reports from Palestine have also suggested that several Israeli tech firms act as fronts for Zionist intelligence agencies.”

Further, “…NICE Systems, [is] another Israeli company with a contract with the British police to handle parts of their investigations. NICE Systems also holds a contract in Scotland for facial recognition in CCTV.”

A freedom of information request asking “Has the Met Police run training or exchange programmes with Israel’s police or military from 2020 to present?” received the following reply from the government:

“Confirming or denying that…information is held relating to the types of training, meetings and exchange programmes provided to other countries between The Metropolitan Police Service and the Israeli Police, Israeli Civil Administration or Israeli Defence Forces between 2014-present, would provide terrorists with a greater understanding of where specific training and exchange programmes are provided…In a partial answer to your first and third answer, On Wednesday 18 May 2022, the Met’s Central East Command Unit hosted an Israeli police delegation.”

Further information reveals that “The purpose of the visit from the Israeli Police delegation was so they could learn from the MPS about how we work with communities…Policing authorities rely on international co-operation when combatting crime, particularly that which is cross-border in scope.” A meeting was held at Stoke Newington Police Station. An official redacted PDF disclosed an agenda concerning the policing of “Faith and Hate Crime” and “Policing COVID” and centred on “Community Key stakeholders and partners”. Stoke Newington (an area in the northwest part of the London Borough of Hackney) has a high white demographic with black and other ethnic minorities, and a history of police brutality against minorities, suspicious deaths, and alleged police cover-ups. “Stoke Newington Police Station in Hackney, east London, was infamous in the 1980s and 1990s for police corruption and racism,..” according to Socialist Worker in a very revealing article where the behaviour London police forces echoes violent law enforcement tactics of Israel that for years has brutalised Jews and Palestinians.

Further involvements with Israel have been disclosed by aoav.org.uk. “The UK government has confirmed it is actively training Israeli soldiers on British soil…[casting] fresh light on Britain’s ongoing military relationship with Israel amid continued conflict in Gaza and military escalation in southern Lebanon….Dr Iain Overton, Executive Director of Action on Armed Violence (AOAV), said: “The UK’s training of Israeli forces during a period of alleged war crimes raises serious questions of moral complicity. The British public deserves transparency when our armed forces are directly engaged with a military accused of violations that have left thousands of civilians dead.”

Other links to Israel influencing UK police are reflected in a report by Global Research, concerning the policing of 7/7 bombings in London, which can be read here.

What power do Israeli tech firms have over police in the US?

According to Forbes, “If you’re in New York City today, there’s a very good chance your face will be captured by surveillance cameras and run through facial recognition software. If you’re in a predominantly Black, Asian or Hispanic community in New York City, that chance is even greater.” Forbes also highlights “…the NYPD’s purchase of more than $277 million in secret surveillance equipment that had previously been hidden from the public.” According to incarcernation.com, since 2012, the NYPD has a “strategic partnership” with Israel, “…focused on counterterrorism, urban warfare, and crowd control.”

truthlytics.com goes further, “The NYPD, one of the largest and most well-funded police departments in the world, has long faced criticism for its use of excessive force and discriminatory policing, particularly in communities of color. These patterns of behavior, critics argue, echo the tactics used by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) in the occupied West Bank and Gaza—ranging from mass surveillance to brutal crowd control techniques.”

NYPD: employing Israeli technologies and approaches

In the US, policing approaches are influenced by Israel. We may recall that Israel’s NICE Systems has a contract with the British police to handle parts of their investigations and holds a contract in Scotland for facial recognition in CCTV. Supply Chain Market in 2007 reported that “NICE Systems Ltd., the global provider of advanced solutions that enable organizations to extract Insight from Interactions to drive performance, recently announced that it has won a $9M contract from the City of New York (NYC), on behalf of the New York Police Department (NYPD) for NICE Inform, multimedia incident information management solution for its next generation 9-1-1 emergency call centers…NICE Inform will enable the City to capture, manage, analyze and reconstruct multimedia incidents.”

According to haaretz.com, in 2023, “New York City Mayor Eric Adams lauded security technology developed by Israel Police…vowing to bring Israeli tech to the New York Police Department.” moguldom.com reported in 2022 that, “Crime has increased by 23.5 percent in New York City during New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ first year in office, and the former cop-turned-mayor — a fan of facial recognition technology — is promising to implement new policing technology that he said more accurately identifies common criminal patterns and develops profiles of perpetrators….Adams has promoted the use of cameras and championed facial recognition devices…“

Adams said in an interview with Politico. “…Big Brother is protecting you.” Albert Fox Cahn, head of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, said, “The NYPD has a decade-long history of abusing its surveillance operations to target Black New Yorkers, Muslim New Yorkers, political protests and every aspect of dissent,” Cahn said. “These are technologies that would be chilling in anyone’s hands. But to give an agency with such a horrifying record of surveillance abuse even more power, at a time when they face dwindling oversight, is a recipe for disaster.” Source.

Howard syndrome and rejection of technological tyranny

It is interesting to hear a Jewish perspective concerning the brutality of Israel’s regime (now influencing our governments and police). In Israel as any society, there are those who are authoritarian and corrupt, and those who want peace and to denounce tyranny. The Israeli historian Shlomo Sand asks, “Is not the very fact of defining oneself as a Jew within the State of Israel an act of affiliation to a privileged caste which creates intolerable injustices around itself?” Source.

Sand’s observation of a “priveleged caste” that “creates intolerable injustices around itself” evokes the actions of our governments too, which are always employing deeper surveillance and eroding human rights, which can lead to brutality and racism.

In the UK, we are experiencing technological authoritarianism through the new Labour Party. It is almost a replay of the authoritarian zeal exhibited by the UK’s Home Office under Conservative Home Secretary Michael Howard, an authoritarian figure who imposed expensive CCTV installations all over the UK, pursued a National ID card scheme, and established controversial DNA databases in the 1990’s.

Britain, under successive Labour governments, interestingly, has inherited that “vision”, which takes on a notable complexion through Starmer’s “vision” of “Putting AI into the veins of Britain“. What did Howard do that Starmer continues to ardently pursue? He pursues a CCTV, ID-based police state.

Howard believed in cutting edge CCTV surveillance technology, operating with racial biases, at the expense of eroding privacy and human rights for society at large, reinforcing the vulnerabilities of minorities in the process. He used technology as a solution, without tackling first the underlying problems influencing crime, like rising unemployment. Technology seemed to be the priority, as now.

Howard established, while neglectful of privacy concerns and consequences for human rights, an intrusive police state in the midst of soaring unemployment and social unrest, which spied on people and held as much information on guilty and innocent alike. Howard, like many progressive politicians and futurists felt human rights policies, an obstacle to his ideals.

Howard felt that the Human Rights Act (which passed in UK law in 1998) and the the Regulations of Investigating Power Act (RIPA) of 2000, (affecting powers of surveillance and communications interception) placed “inhibitions on the ability of the police to tackle crime effectively” and thought adjustments should be made.

The Home Secretary didn’t entirely get his own way, and some of his policies were successfully legally challenged by the public. An ID card was passionately advocated by Howard, though despite his campaigning, became voluntary, not mandatory.

National ID had faced immense public resistance (a wartime card was abolished in 1952). CCN reports that “In the past, when the government tried to centralize the U.K.’s national identity system, it was met with stiff opposition.” From 2006 to 2010 as more mandatory ID card schemes were being planned, thankfully, public resistance stopped them.

Resurfacing, over and over

The ID card idea constantly resurfaces. The government has been keen to calm fears concerning the Digital ID agenda. According to www.gov.uk, “No, there are no plans to introduce national digital ID cards…Using a digital identity will be voluntary. People will be in control of their data and who it is shared with…People will still be able to prove their identity using physical documents if they choose.”

However, according to enablingdigitalidentity.blog.gov.uk, “On 19 June [2025], the Data (Use and Access) Act received Royal Assent. As well as putting the National Underground Asset Register on a statutory footing and supporting the future of smart data schemes…The new UK legislation formalises the system that is currently operating as a pilot. This will pave the way for trusted digital identities to be used in more places.” According to thinkdigitalpartners.com, “and has set digital ID as a key focus area for 2024. It will be a critical part of the UK’s national infrastructure.”

Labour Together have stated, Britcard “could lay the foundations for a fully-functioning digital identity system…building on the existing One Login and Gov.UK Wallet. Our polling suggests it would be immensely popular; around 80% of the public support use of digital identity for a range of use cases.” The aim is to “…rebrand the Gov.UK App and Gov.UK Wallet as the “BritCard app””. That is, to make Britcard from an existing placeholder entity, the Gov.UK App and Gov.UK Wallet being the “Trojan Horse” that was always meant to bring in a mandatory Digital ID.

Criticism

“Britcard”, was criticised by David Frost (who served as a Minister of State at the Cabinet Office between March and December 2021) who believes, “A normal ID card, bad as it is, is proof of your identity and status. A digital ID is also an instrument of control – because it can shape-shift according to the government’s wishes. That’s why introducing digital ID is to cross a Rubicon. It changes forever the relationship between government and citizen….Think back.

Have we forgotten the lessons of the pandemic, when we all had to have proof of our Covid test status on our phone before we could go certain places or access certain buildings? Briefly, at the end of 2021 – the issue that finally forced me to resign from the Cabinet – we introduced a “vaccine passport” system, which actually denied you access to certain environments unless you had a full vaccination record. This was all done via an app – in effect a digital ID. The government could change the conditions at will and you had no choice but to comply.”

Frost has a point, and as the World Health Organisation and other “Stakeholders” in the smart future relish achieving more gains with more powers, from mining our data, including the police and governments dismissive of concerns over AI ethics and the insecurity of our data.

A stake in the heart of freedom and privacy

People must not forget how controlling governments can be, obsessively, ideologically. With xenophobic overtones, Britcard has been sold in the UK on the basis of an “us and them” proposition, reinforcing “discrimination” to help “sort out” a persistent problem, namely the UK’s problematic Immigration crisis, that feasibly could have been prevented or managed in other ways beyond the scope of a “Digital ID solution”. Certainly, all the CCTV money could buy wasn’t enough.

“Today, police surveillance cameras disproportionately installed in Black and Brown neighborhoods [in the US] keep a constant watch” just as do they in the UK. According to National News, the “United Kingdom has the dubious honour of having the most CCTV cameras per head of any country in the world; the British Security Industry Authority has claimed that there is one camera for every 11-14 people.”

According to Liberty, the UK is “most intrusive mass surveillance regime of any democratic country.” With smart phones requiring mandatory status to make a national, mandatory Digital ID function, one smart phone to every person linking them to their digital self, would spell a definitive blow against freedom.

Big Tech and countless other corporate entities want your data, more of it than you can imagine, and Digital ID would serve it up without any problems through every QR code scanned to prove you exist. This enhanced data grab will not solve immigration and will more likely exclude large swathes of the population who rightfully live here, as happens in repressive regimes where any individual, or minority, suspected of dissent or any not acting as the government demands can be digitally disempowered, or, disappeared.

As salzburgglobal.org observes, “…the developing world has seen the rise of….national digital identity systems, promoted by the World Bank…not enough is done to shield privacy, embed protection safeguards…The implementation of Digital ID is a high risk territory for human rights.” This article lists some excellent cases that describe why. It covers developing countries and Digital ID issues, but could the same “issues” happen in the UK? Or US?

Most likely, they will. Because, “Digital IDs, especially those that integrate biometric data, can be used to track individuals’ movements, purchases, and online activities without their knowledge or consent. Governments may also unduly target specific individuals, using Digital ID blockage or other methods as a weapon against political opponents or vulnerable groups such as migrants.” We know this is happening already.

Collecting information without limits

As the UK government becomes increasingly autocratic and presents technology as the solution for everything, UK citizens should thoroughly question the motivations behind any Digital ID proposition, especially as the government goes to great lengths to erode data privacy, and becomes more repressive.

The UK now has the “Snooper’s Charter” to assist in massive datamining. As Liberty asserts, the Snooper’s Charter allows “State authorities to collect information about everything we do and say online and order private companies to store it…[with] wide-ranging powers to scoop up and store all of our emails, texts, calls, location data and internet history. They can also hack into our phones and computers and create large ‘personal datasets’ on us – all without needing to suspect us of any criminal wrongdoing.” It has many implications for UK citizens, leaving nothing private.

A Digital ID system can only add to this concerted effort for government and corporate stakeholders to control and own data on the population. Clearly this goes well beyond any Immigration policies and drives a stake into the heart of freedom and privacy for all.

That our governments and police enlist the tactical help of Israel (viewed by many as an ideological, repressive regime) has been revealed and can’t be left out of the current political technological situation in which we find ourselves.

The Jewish historian Schlomo Sand is critical of that regime. Of it, he says Zionism, “…was an ideology deeply rooted in a European vision of the nation-state, one which had a racial dimension, required a demographic majority and was permeated by European colonialism and orientalist thinking.”

Arguably, Israel is marred by exlusionist politics, with colonialist baggage. Exclusionist politics reinforce the “digital colonialism” at work in Israel and across the world, which includes campaigns involving smart technologies and biometrics databases, moving towards achieving Digital ID. Politicians and the media so often highlighting border control and other immigration issues seek to drive support of Digital ID, often in divisive language. Keir Starmer, for instance, in relation to immigration issues warned of an “island of strangers“.

Digital ID is being implemented at scale in the EU “mandating compliance from Big Tech and member countries in supporting the EU Digital Identity (EUDI) Wallet”) Source. “Many countries have already announced wallet project and pilots, and some have even rolled out production digital ID wallets at population scale.” Source.

Digital IDs can bring many risks worth noting. According to Reclaim the Net, “…these IDs are susceptible to hacking and identity theft, placing individuals at risk of financial and reputation damage. Often, citizens are coerced into participating without genuine consent, and the lack of transparency and oversight in these systems increases the risk of misuse.”

Digital colonialism

Michael Kwet, observing the strategies of domination waged through digital technologies, states, “…just as they did in 20th-century South Africa, today’s largest U.S.-based technology corporations see an opportunity to profit from Israeli apartheid—a by-product of U.S.-driven digital colonialism.”

Author Renata Avila, also recognises that we are living in times of “digital colonialism” “referring to the deployment of imperial power over a vast number of people, which takes the form of rules, designs, languages, cultures and belief systems serving the interests of dominant powers. In the past, empires expanded their power through the control of critical assets, from trade routes to precious metals.”

Big Tech has long been under scrutiny over its “conflict minerals” supply chains from oppressed, developing colonies in countries like the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Central African Republic, South Sudan, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Zambia and Angola. Big Tech companies have regularly been accused of complicity in slavery and abuse of ethnic labour forces, as well as fuelling conflict, and assisting repressive regimes. This represents racial abuse in order to achieve infrastructure targets, and technological supremacy in global geopolitics.

Author Renata Avila, asserts that, “Today, it is not states but technology empires that dominate the world through the control of critical digital infrastructures, data and the ownership of computational power. By collecting the personal data of citizens on a scale unprecedented in human history, companies can serve as conduits of misinformation campaigns that can alter the flow of global geopolitics and even change the outcome of elections.”

According to www.europeandatajournalism.eu, “Far from the free and open platforms they were upon their inception, Big Tech companies and social networks have risen to an unprecedented level of power from which they play an active role in politics through vested financial and political motives, exerting influence through algorithmic alterations, subjective censorship and calls to action on their platforms.”

For control of everyone’s data

The “….emerging trend of data colonialism (Couldry & Mejias, 2019) is of critical importance given the fundamental reliance of AI technologies on data, and because organizations gain access to, control data, and develop algorithms in ways which not only emphasize the digital divide but increase data inequality (Zheng & Walsham, 2021). Source.

“Data colonialism” according to Ulises A. Mejias and Nick Couldry in their book Data Grab is “the continuation of colonialism’s inherited inequalities and colonialism’s acquisition of new tools that potentially affects human life in radically new ways…” This “toolset” which exploits data-driven surveillance enables the companies to “explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate.” As lawfaremedia.org highlights from Mejias and Couldry’s research, data colonialism facilitates “the [harmful] classification of people into disadvantageous categories”.

Today, the UK government is arguably advancing data colonialism’s harms by pushing ahead with a Digital ID “with major financial and tech companies, government agencies and regulators and the likes of the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, among the prominent forces behind the push…”, according to Reclaim The Net.

The UK government sees digital identity as “one of the cornerstones of a modern digital economy [a surveillance economy]” and seeks to promote adoption of “these secure and trusted [data-mining] technologies.” Digital ID remains a controversial idea, for many reasons. As Rebecca Vincent of Big Brother Watch points out, “The debate about digital ID isn’t really about immigration; it’s about access to, and control of everyone’s data.” Source.

Case of digitally-assisted genocide

We know now that the UK’s ID initiative is called “Britcard”. Marketing an ID system to the public has always been a challenge of governments, and in recent times the public has become divided over immigration which relates to UK government inolvement in more overseas war efforts (colonialism) whicle the public reaps the refugee crisis (fuelling data-driven suerveillance at home).

With datamining becoming so expansive and intrusive, and, with governments and other agencies like the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change and Big Tech pushing for Digital IDs in the UK (which can link together numerous datasets including biometric data), are any of these corporate political actors really acting in our best interests, and, if not, are they able to be held legally accountable if found aiding and abetting genocide, through abuse of our data, for example? Is a Big Tech company able to be held accountable if discovered complicit in the killing of citizens?

You might be shocked to know the answer…

Michael J. Kelly, Professor of Law at Creighton University School of Law states in “Prosecuting Corporations for Genocide”, that, “While corporations can realize enormous profits from such complicity [in genocide], they are immune from international prosecution in The Hague…As key participants in the world economy, corporations have been accorded tremendous latitude and granted extensive rights…If a state or a person commits genocide, they are punished. International law demands such. But corporate actors have successfully avoided this through an array of legal arguments…”



Kelly makes it clear that, “while multinational corporations have been complicit in genocides over many years, none have been prosecuted.” Source.

Today Big Tech companies, assisted by US and UK support, together are an asset to Israel supplying high-tech data driven systems and weapons. International condemnation grows over what is clearly a case of AI fuelled, biometrical oriented techno-genocide against the Palestinian people – demonstrating that this could, and most likely will, happen again.

There is plenty of historical precedence for utmost caution regarding National ID programs, and especially regarding trusting Big Tech with any data on the population.

Blast from the past

According to the British Medical Journal, “Eugenics is too frequently overlooked in histories of both the United States and Europe, even though the story is a fascinating and important one.” Social changes brought about by Eugenics and “Big Tech” in the US fascinated the Nazi regime which aquired IBM’s Hollerith Machines, (punch card computer systems) being used in America (which gave the US government important population data and assisted in evolving “the quantified self” (a being defined by computers and collected data)).

Collecting population data with Hollerith Machines, the US of the 1930s was steeped in eugenics (a “racist” pseudo-science). At this time Americans performed the “Bellamy salute” that inspired the Nazi salute, and sought to oppress black communities, (leading to discrimination and sterilisation programs inflicted on Blacks and minorities which ultimately gave rise to pushback and the civil rights movement years after the Second World War).

With IBM’s assistance, the fascist government of Nazi Germany exploited stratified datasets on the public sorting people into groups. According to historian Edwin Black, “IBM technology was used to organize nearly everything in Germany and then Nazi Europe, from the identification of the Jews in censuses, registrations, and ancestral tracing programs to the running of railroads and organizing of concentration camp slave labor.”

In Nazi Germany, segments of the populace simply had no right to live and were considered by the eugenicist technocracy as “life unworthy of life”. Nazism fuelled social divides, fanned flames of hate, and facilitated euthanasia programs like Aktion T4, organised round-ups of targeted populations, and “discretely” sterilising selected groups. All was the result of enforced structural racism by “supremacists” using eugenics and technology hand in hand to re-organise society along technocratic lines – with much of it financed by US corporations. Nothing has changed, today Big Tech still assists and profits from apartheid regimes and exploiting data in ways that create harmful discrimination, which conforms with a technocratic, eugenicist outlook.

Dehumanisation into data points

We may remember the Rwandan genocide, characterised by the use of data to eliminate people. As KTPress reports, Rwanda saw genocide facilitated by National ID data. Despite the “hard lesson”, today, as reported by Biometric Update, “The government of Rwanda is investing 12.2 billion Rwandan francs (approximately US$8.5 million) in the upcoming 2025-2026 fiscal year to advance the rollout of the nation’s digital identity program, including fingerprint and iris biometrics enrollment.” KTPress reports that, “At the World Economic Forum, Minister Ingabire announced that Rwanda expects AI to contribute up to 6% of GDP in the near future.” Turning people into data points is the future, in the context of the Internet of Things (IoT), a system connecting everyone to an infrastructure of smart technology.

Anasuya Sengupta, Fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy and co-director and co-founder of “Whose Knowledge?” addressing issues of power, privilege, and accessibility, states that, “…the Internet not only helps to promote solidarity and connect people in different places, but also reinforces existing injustice, discrimination, and violence. Technology and algorithms are not neutral, they are political. Technology follows a certain architecture, which is why it reinforces discrimination and prejudice – depending on who designs it…the majority of the world is not represented on the Internet…People have turned from consumers into data points – and therefore into products.”

Ulises A. Mejias and Professor Nick Couldry from the State University of New York in their book “Data Grab” show that little has really changed since the Nazis or Rwandan governments exploited machine data, as technological empires utlising the IoT “…explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate”. In an interview with the London School of Economics (LSE) Couldry explained that, “human experience, potentially every layer and aspect of it, is becoming the target of profitable extraction.”

Demand the end of Digital ID

From the UK to Ukraine, and from the past to the present, we can see what is becoming of our world. Through intrusive forms of smart surveillance allied to military-style policing, the streets of some cities are becoming technological, data-gathering warzones.

In this authoritarian atmosphere, of technological “supremacism” smart phones – as demanded by industry and governments, for Digital ID-based digital transformations – are gravitating towards becoming mandatory devices. This is to guarantee one’s very existence, and, extract the profitability of one’s identity, with AI algorithms that contain uncomfortable biases and are known to be highly discriminatory.

This trajectory, devoid of any ethical oversight, promotes the predatory data-mining environment of the Big Tech companies and other corporate “stakeholders” exploiting the unfettered digital monitoring of everyone’s lives. This is life in a “surveillance economy” powered by “Digital Colonialism” – which operates to the benefit of dominant powers while limiting individual autonomy.

This AI-driven digital colonialism amounts to unprecedented surveillance of the population, or “datafication” driven by profit, where corporations and governments claim ownership of data generated by individuals. Nobody owns their data, or knows for sure how it may ultimately affect their lives.

As I said at the start, the prospect of a national Digital ID should amplify myriad questions, highlighting, in addition to any notions of convenience, the inescapable darker sides, that we dismiss at our peril.

With wireless radiation still posing a threat to black and white communities alike – in terms of posing a health risk – as well as being the means by which data is conveyed to empower the AI-surveillance society we never wanted, we have every reason to challenge the erosion of our rights and demand the end of Digital ID which, if made mandatory, brings huge potential to disempower more of our freedoms, choices, and human rights, including activism and protest itself, which will push us further into darkness.

Smart wearables, associated with “Digital Health”, are body-monitoring, data-collecting, wireless devices that interface with the internet and Big Tech companies.

We have learned to our cost that the internet isn’t neutral. It “…weaponises neuroscience by using the brain’s reward system to drive continuous engagement” Source. All internet-connecting devices (generally referred to as smart devices) promote addictive behaviours, functioning to inflict a deep, biologically induced, reliance on internet connectivity so we can be isolated and targeted for our data by corporations, government agencies and, often, hackers.

The internet has enabled a culture of digital dependency and further, digital addiction – centered on smart technology. Comforting convenience is part of the addiction and AI automation is further accelerating society’s “dependency” on smart technology, as the virtual reality and wearables industries know.

“Health” move?

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in the US is promoting such a dependency, recently advocating all US citizens invest in wearables to improve health. This type of initiative chimes with the World Health Organisation (WHO), which has a “Digital Health” agenda that encourages smartphones and wearables, devices that give up troves of health and other data to corporations. The US is withdrawing from the WHO but seems determined to take advantage of digital health. But is it about health? As startus-insights.com reports, wearables are “biometric technologies [that have] become integral to security, authentication, and identity…”

Kennedy’s move draws attention to data privacy issues, as well as the health issue of radiofrequency exposure. We can only wonder what has led to his advocacy of technology that enables wireless body area network (WBAN) architecture and sensor-based human activity recognition (HAR) which are integral to the growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) and wireless technology markets associated with the Internet of Bodies (IoB). These frameworks for smart technology promote deep data acquisition through implants and smart dust, and includes “…electronic sensors and computer chips embedded in edible pills“.

Data sharing

Grand View Research reports that “This industry is expected to rise as a result of a number of factors, including strong government initiatives, growing use of contactless biometric in context of the pandemic, and expanding usage of face recognition in both public and private sectors.”

Speaking about facial recognition technology to Politico, Albert Fox Cahn, head of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, said, “The NYPD has a decade-long history of abusing its surveillance operations to target Black New Yorkers, Muslim New Yorkers, political protests and every aspect of dissent,” Cahn said. “These are technologies that would be chilling in anyone’s hands. But to give an agency with such a horrifying record of surveillance abuse even more power, at a time when they face dwindling oversight, is a recipe for disaster.”

There are biometric data sharing schemes between police forces and the private sector. Can we imagine wearables data landing in the hands of the NYPD, for example, adding to their surveillance data?

Has Kennedy been lobbied? After all, stakes are high and it’s a big year for Big Tech companies, and the wearables industry which catalyses other industries like AR and even, Neuralink – Elon Musk’s company. Meta’s Reality Labs, according to The Verge, is working on all kinds of wearables, boasting that, “If there’s a part of your body that could potentially host a wearable that could do AI, there’s a good chance we’ve had a team run that down.”

2025 is the year AI is set to transform wearables with “predictive analytics,” and generative AI features. Altogether wearables represents a multi-billion dollar industry that is a critical part of “automating” society, supporting smart cities and harvesting data to influence behaviour as well as health choices.

The data we leave behind, cannot be left behind

Battery-free wearables (smartwatches, fitness trackers, smart rings, and smartglasses) are a class of smart technology that can interface with smart phones and personal computers to collect a variety of data, which is a security concern, especially with data synchronization. According to Stetson Law, “owners may be unaware that the data collected by these devices is discoverable [and admissible in court].”

Wearables empower smart dust technology (tiny sensors using nanotechnology), and 5 GHz backscatter technology that is “a way for a device to communicate with a WiFi router [or a 5G cellular network] by reflecting the very signals it sends out back at it….to send data back and forth” for energy harvesting and efficiency.

Wearables technology is rapidly evolving and collects biometric data, which is highly valued by Big Tech firms and governments that can use these datasets, working in concert, to support controversial immigration policies, for example. Today, Palantir’s reach into biometric and personal data has become unprecedented, and is raising concerns. According to The Debrief, “the enigmatic tech company Palantir, co-founded by entrepreneur and venture capitalist Peter Thiel…has reportedly been contracted to assist in building a centralized database that will contain sensitive personal information on American citizens.”

People have come to believe that smart devices like wearables can improve wellbeing and may even make people ”smarter”. Though, as Economic Journal suggests, “Whether technology makes us smarter or just plain stupid is an ongoing debate. It is a fact that current technology changes us – the way we function, perform tasks and think. It also changes the way we obtain and retain knowledge.” As a result, ”…memorising, critical thinking and contemplation are skills we seem to lose.”

This raises additional concerns about reliance on wearables and smart phones, and so we can appreciate that these technologies contradict, in some significant ways, the idea that health, wellbeing or “smartness” are ultimately being reinforced. Only the dependency on such technology is being reinforced, beyond doubt, which is a boon to the smart technology economy. Whether lives are “improved” is a sticky question.

RFK Jr’s recommendation of wearables to citizens is likely to profit Big Tech companies, including the wireless industry, not just in traditional economic terms, but from amassing data and from the ability to monitor populations.

Surprising move

This potentially huge data-grab relating to Digital Health and manouevres towards a “centralized surveillance infrastructure” involving Big Tech firms like Palantir, represents a surprising move for RFK Jr, whose recommendation of smart wearables also reinforces the idea – challenged by an immense body of research and science – that exposure to radiofrequency emitting devices 24/7 is not a health risk. All of this seems to represent a massive U-turn for him politically.

Stepping toward Digital ID

A wearable for everyone can also function as a stepping stone to Digital ID, something many Western governments are now obsessed with implementing, and a big reason 5G was implemented. Needless to say, further intrusions into our privacy are on the horizon.

RFK Jr is a political figure who formerly chaired The Children’s Health Defense who had this to say about wearables:

“We agree that people should be able to monitor their health in innovative ways using the technology they choose. But we do not think the federal government should try to push wearables on every American…We do not share this vision,” said Miriam Eckenfels, director of the Children’s Health Defense (CHD) Electromagnetic Radiation (EMR) & Wireless Program. “Quite the contrary, we oppose governmental pressure to incentivize the widespread use of wearables. They pose serious health risks, especially to children, and they threaten privacy.””

Kennedy has been well-regarded for challenging Big Pharma and the predations of the tech industry. That he is now encouraging 5G smart technology as a health enhancement for all is a development that raises many questions.

RFK Jr, who according to pcmag.com, “wants everyone to wear a smartwatch, fitness tracker, or other piece of wearable health tech as part of his “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) agenda”, is in the “vipers nest” so to speak, immersed in a government culture obsessive about surveillance and now fully infiltrated by Big Tech in the guise of Elon Musk.

Surveillance

There is likely more to Kennedy’s politics than first meets the eye and we can continue to observe. The Trump government certainly has a technological agenda, which reaches all of the way to Israel, and, despite tussles with Musk, the Trump administration continues to “deify” Big Tech as an instrument of American Imperialist domination putting it at the top of the agenda. Since 9/11 and the War on Terror, with the Snowden disclosures following, from the PATRIOT Act, to Facial Recognition Technology (FRTs) rollouts more recently, the US government’s agenda to “dominate” and surveil populations is relentlessly assisted by Big Tech.

Wearables exemplify Big Tech’s desire to make smart technology in various guises addictive and ubiquitous in the extraction of data. With Digital Addiction at an all time high and statesmen siding with Big Tech to promote a society controlled by smart technology from dawn to dusk, there is every indicator that a new Cold War is being waged from inside the White House against citizens who are not onboard with the smart technology agenda, or the political agendas in flow, such as the ICE controversy, which is also bad news for those on the wrong side of the digital divide.

Technological smart surveillance, which wearable technologies promote, is giving governments and corporations unprecedented powers over populations. We are reminded of the wisdom of Edward Thurlow, who said, “Corporations have neither bodies to be punished, nor souls to be condemned, they therefore do as they like.”

Corporations and statesmen alike believe they can support Big Tech and “…therefore do as they like.” This is deeply concerning and surveillance agendas have been called out from within the Big Tech companies by employees over recent years.

“I refuse to build technology that powers genocide, apartheid or surveillance.”
– Google Cloud employee (protesting at Google’s role in Project Nimbus)

Conclusion

Society is becoming very digitally divided. However, we all have an interest in unifying over the issues concerning digitally enabled erosion of privacy and the misuse of data through wearables and other technologies. We must decide what kind of society we are building.

Supporting the proliferation of smart technology is a sure way to entrench surveillance and deter democracy, as well as exacerbate racial discrimination. Is that the future we want?

“Emerging digital technologies driven by big data and artificial intelligence are entrenching racial inequality, discrimination and intolerance.”
– Tendayi Achiume, UN Special Rapporteur on racism

When we are now being told by government officials that biometrics-collecting wearables technology provides an effective means of caring for our health in the 21st century, we have every reason to be cautious. “Racial biases in the science behind wearable tech” can prevent “equitable health care for certain segments of the population“, as wesleyan.edu reports.

Nothing from Big Tech is “neutral”. Digital health is not neutral. Governments are not being transparent on the issues surrounding Digital Health. We should consider the ultimate consequences of adopting wireless smart technology and wearables, which not only enable further technological agendas for control, they also expose us to wireless radiation, can promote digital addiction, and may expose us to considerable data risks and algorithmic biases that are anything but “healthy”.

Moss Landing Image credit: https://www.facebook.com/groups/652815133743333
https://neveragainmosslanding.org

Moss Landing, California:  Did you know a huge environmental disaster is unfolding in Northern California which may impact our food supply and wildlife, and is poisoning locals? 

Dubbed by Forbes magazine Tech’s “Three-Mile Island” moment, Moss Landing Lithium Power Plant caught on fire January 16, 2025. Moss Landing, which houses the world’s largest battery storage facility, burned for five days leaving a toxic plume that reached into agricultural and farmland in Monterey and into two other counties.

After the fire, Dr. Ivano Aiello, Department Chair at San Jose State University, home of Moss Landing Marine Laboratories, discovered at Elkhorn Slough (two miles from the plant) heavy metal toxins at levels 100 to 1,000 times greater than normal soil levels.  

80 Percent of 100,000 Batteries Ignited – Not a “Little Fire”

“These fires are not done yet that they keep reigniting, even just the smallest one can still put toxins in the air,” – warns one local.

 When lithium batteries burned for a week, smoldered for a month, and then reignited, many began questioning why the world’s largest lithium battery power plant was approved near Elkhorn Slough State Marine Conservation area, an area with the highest marine biodiversity in California (see San Jose State blog) and home of 150 endangered sea otters­­­­­­. What will be the impacts of this contamination given these sea otters, when healthy, birth a single pup every other year?

Heather Higgens, who kayaks at Elkhorn, stated in an interview with Tina Berg from Status Coup News:  

“50 sea otters gather in rafters at a time and hold hands, and you have sea lions to the entrance, we were all in shock, we couldn’t believe this [the fire] would happen.”

Filming Sea Otters at Moss Landing

Is Moss Landing Fire the Result of Unexamined and Reckless Sustainability Measures?

“If you can’t easily extinguish one battery, how are you expected to extinguish tens of thousands?  You can’t. You have to let the batteries burn themselves out” – Comment at the Monterey Board Meeting

The Battery storage at Moss Landing with frequent toxic fires is in violation of California Environmental Quality ACT (CEQA) §30240.

Locals didn’t know:

• These fires cannot be controlled, thermal runaway is a “phenomenon in which lithium-ion cells start uncontrollably heating up.“ Bay Nature Magazine
• Battery fires can severely impact human health from toxic corrosive gasses: hydrogen fluoride, hydrogen chloride, hydrogen cyanide (a toxic compound), and heavy metals, all of which require a respirator when in proximity.
• Prior to the January 2025, Vistra Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) fire, both agencies and the public were not informed how often BESS facilities catch on fire – nor were they alerted to the potential for hazardous toxins to be released after a thermal runaway event.
• There are 93 reported BESS failures worldwide, a veritable ticking time bomb.

Batteries Continue To Smolder, Risk of Another Fire Remains High as Moss Landing has Remaining Batteries Yet To Be Disconnected

Fallout from Moss Landing fires on January 16 and February 18 flare-up, included worsened symptom for locals residents: metallic taste, skin rashes, burns, bloody noses, difficulty breathing, severe headaches and more. Salinas Valley, known as the “salad bowl” of America, is situated a mere twelve miles from the power plant. It’s common sense not to consume vegetables or fruit that potentially have been affected by heavy metal fallout including impacts to the soil and water?

“These heavy metals will chemically transform as they move through the environments and potentially through the food web, affecting local aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems,” according to San Jose University  

Salinas Valley in Monterey County produces 70 percent of the United States lettuce as well as artichokes, strawberries, broccoli, wine grapes, cauliflower, celery, and spinach. Monterey County supplies our nation’s school lunches, and supermarkets such as Sprouts, Trader Joes and Whole Foods. With locals and animals in the area getting sick, people are now questioning the quality of local produce despite Monterey County assurances of safety.

The Erin Brockovich Lawsuit

Renown environmental activist, Erin Brockovich, is a spokesperson for the Moss Landing lawsuit against PG&E, Vistra, and LG.

“I am concerned with lithium power storage facilities so close to farmland and …communities because these accidents happen.  There didn’t seem to be any preparedness. People were going to the emergency room, having respiratory problems, sore throats and getting no answers. Every single situation seems to start like this. What concerns me is that it just feels like somebody knew. They did. They’ve got infrastructure inside there. Did they jerry rig something? Did they allow it to happen? The truth’s not coming out. So, my concern is that information is being concealed.”

– Erin Brockovich, Mercury News 

Knut Johnson, an attorney from Singleton Schreiber who is suing Moss Landing, reported seeing pictures of people with “horrible rashes and clients with toxic substances on their property.” 

While local scientists are checking the soil and finding toxic pollutants, and Hunterbrook New Data shows elevated heavy metal exposure 20 miles from Moss Landing including agricultural land, the EPA is minimizing the impacts assuring locals and farmers there is no problem for humans or wildlife,see report here and here. 

Vistra issued a statement in response to Erin Brockovich’s comments:

 “Air quality monitoring, which has been ongoing since the start of the fire and continues today, has been conducted by the U.S. EPA, Monterey Bay Air Resources District, and others and has not detected risks to public health at any time. Additionally, soil and water testing conducted by Cal EPA/Department of Toxic Substances Control, Monterey County, and Santa Cruz County have not detected risks to public water supplies or soil in the community.”

Norm Groot with Monterey County Farm Bureau has assured constituents that Moss Landing “product” didn’t enter the food supply, (see letter here), yet this position differs from scientifically validated heavy metal toxicity which includes Hunterbrook results of 150 surface wipe samples of the area.

Image credit: Hunterbrook New Data

Locals are calling for further real time, transparent testing, of air, water, and agricultural products across the Monterey Bay, including Santa Cruz, and inland – and to be informed of battery pile conditions, flare-ups and off-gassing.  As of March 8, local residents shared multiple reports of the same sulfur and chlorine tastes/smells once again and noticed the Slough devoid of birds. 

Sick and Dead Banana Slugs the California State Icon?

“I collected a couple of sick or dead banana slugs up here which is quite unusual. So the impacts are very real far and wide, wherever the wind pattern, fog pattern takes the blend of particulates and they are part of the atmosphere. So much worse than CO2 emissions as even the trees can’t absorb the chemicals in the air.”
– local reporting on Moss Landing Fire from Moss Landing Environmental FB group. 

Never Again Moss Landing

“Never Again Moss Landing is a fast-response grass-roots all-volunteer resident group which advocates for our community’s voice and interests in response to the Moss Landing BESS Fire.”
See Moss Landing News:

Image credit: https://neveragainmosslanding.org/news/#local

Brian Roeder from Never Again Moss Landing shares that a lot of folks are reporting terrible symptoms since the reignited fire from Feb 18^th.  However this KSBW News report does not acknowledge people’s symptoms nor the testing that showed elevated heavy metals in Elkhorn slough and surrounding communities.

Following are some of what locals are sharing on the Moss Landing Vistra Power Plant/Fire Symptoms Facebook page:

“The last couple days have been extremely bad with coughing up blood and the metallic taste in my mouth and my tongue being numb hard to talk.”

 “I was out at Elkhorn Slough reserve for 10 minutes – so impacted that my sinus flared up, my eyes are burning.”  

According to Dr. Calvin Luther Martin, those who live and work near Moss Landing could have been inhaling caustic hydrofluoric acid and hydrochloric acid.Locals comfort each other offering advice on first aid such as eye drops or suggesting the use of blood pressure cuffs, as many are experiencing eye and blood pressure issues from long-term continual exposure. 

The following image is a map of 647 individuals who reported unusual and often severe symptoms from the Vistra fire.

N.B.: The location of individuals reporting symptoms extends from Santa Cruz to Carmel.  Locals are asking for oversight: for the California Coastal Commission to be involved in overseeing demolition and cleanup at Moss Landing, an analysis of the burn pile, and for Agricultural Inspectors to share knowledge and to be fully transparent on what is happening in the fields. 

Following is additional information from Brian Roeder of Never Again Moss Landing.

Thousands within 10 miles of this battery fire disaster need help. The Moss Landing Power Plan/Vistra Fire Symptoms Facebook page has hundreds of personal entries testifying to injuries, fear, and broken lives.  (20+) Moss Landing Power Plant/Vistra Fire Symptoms | Facebook

Few are listening. Patients and in particular women are being dismissed as hysterical when they go to their doctors.

The critical next step is to call State Senator John Laird’s three offices. Laird is a huge proponent of BESS plants.  He has a direct line to the Governor’s office.  Laird can request critical state resources that have not been on the ground.  Testing. Toxicology.  Financial assistance for families.  Medical and environmental guidance.  Help for the agricultural community and school district.  Fire mitigation strategies and wildlife impacts.

What is so tragic is that families have been and are continuing to be injured after (February’s) follow-on fire. The county authorities have gotten very little direction or resources from the State. The state toxicologist has dismissed the attached scientifically validated data and has stated publicly that he has not even looked at it. 

Please call Senator Laird and demand that he get involved:  Capital Office: (916) 651-4017, or Monterey District: (831) 657-6315, San Luis Obispo District: (805) 549-3784, Santa Cruz District: (831) 425-0401

Website: www.neveragainmosslanding.org. 

What would the three wise men say if we could no longer see the Star of Bethlehem because Starlink satellites blinds us from seeing the stars in the night sky?

“For centuries, scholars have suggested the Star of Bethlehem may have actually been a ‘great conjunction’ of bright planets. Jupiter and Saturn came together in a ‘Great Conjunction’ in 2020 that was unlike any seen in nearly 800 years,” according to this article in Astronomy.com.

In the 17th century, Kepler suggested that a conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 7 BCE could be the astronomical origin of the Star of Bethlehem.

Why Starlink satellites blinds us from seeing the stars in the night sky

Starlink satellites are positioned in low-Earth orbit, so appear particularly bright and move rapidly across the night sky. Sky gazers fear that Starlink satellites may outnumber the stars there are to see. Starlink satellites appear as a trail of lights several days after launch and easily visible to the naked eye. What would the three wise men say if Starlink was in place thousands of years ago?

During this holiday season, you too can check for satellites in your night sky, in addition to the Bethlehem star:

“Astronomers warn bright light and electromagnetic radiation from thousands of Starlink satellites could be interfering with ground-based telescopes … limiting our study of the universe.“

“We’ve had satellites ever since Sputnik 1 launched in 1957. But today, the numbers are mind-boggling. In 1958, eight satellites were launched. By 1967, that number rose to 159. After that, roughly 40 to 150 satellites were launched annually. Fast forward to 2023, and more than 2,600 satellites were launched,” – CBC News

What would the three wise men see with SpaceX ‘mega constellation’ of 42,000 satellites in the sky – a train of lights instead? Would we have the same holiday stories if in ancient times there was an appropriation of our night sky by private entities such as SpaceX?

Credit: Victoria Girgis/Lowell Observatory Trails made by Starlink satellites

SpaceX is set to be even brighter with cell tower in space!

SpaceX’s new Starlink satellites that connect directly to phones are nearly five times brighter than traditional Starlink cites recent study. “SpaceX plans to form what it calls ‘a cellphone tower in space’ with thousands of direct-to-cell (DTC) satellites around Earth that offer service straight to unmodified smartphones ‘wherever you can see the sky.’ The higher luminosity of these DTCs compared to regular Starlinks is partly because they circle Earth at just 217 miles,” according to Space.com.

How do ‘mega constellations’ of thousands of satellites damage our earth atmosphere? Andrew Bacon of Space Forge and Jonathan McDowell, Astronomer at Harvard speak out about satellites burning up the atmosphere with aluminum ash in this Space.com expose: “There is now a Starlink reentry almost every day,” McDowell told Space.com. “Sometimes multiple.”

Satellite launches create ozone “mini holes”

“NASA aircraft showed that (Solid-rocket motor (SRM) oxidizer) …plumes create dramatic ozone “mini holes” that persist for several days after a launch,” according to Scientific American.

Next steps!

If you want to hold the legacy of three wise men seeing the Star of Bethlehem, or our ability to view our Milky Way, the starry sky needs our help! US Public Interest Research Group has a grassroots petition that members of the public can support.

“Tell the FCC: Satellite mega-constellations need environmental review. We’re in a short window of time when we can prevent making a mess of space and our atmosphere.”
– US PIRG

Please feel free to share the petition with anyone you think might be interested!

Exit humans, enter robots?

Drones and humanoid robotic machines equipped with Artificial Intelligence (AI) are on the rise. At the same time a significant population crisis is on the horizon. This investigation recognises how the penetration of “intelligent” technologies, role of population planning, and post-pandemic policy implementations – serving the rapid development of data-driven “smart” societies based on sustainability politics – are all contributing to an unfolding population crisis and health impacts that favours the rise of robots.

According to demographers at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) this population crisis could “completely reconfigure the global economy and international balance of power – and will necessitate the reorganising of societies”. It has been suggested that, as this is a population replacement crisis, technology will be a part of the replacement crisis “solution.” It is anticipated that “AI and automation will…pick up the slack”, as the Financial Times puts it.

5G networks integrating cloud and AI digitalisation are already creating the foundations for artificial life to bloom and assert its influence on our populations – but at what cost? Is all of the “blue sky” thinking concerning implementations of robots and artificial intelligence really for solving society’s problems, or to sustain mega-profits and questionable political gains that ultimately fragment the populace and, quite possibly, dismantle democracies? Significant issues deserve our attention, as our future’s trajectory becomes massively influenced by the politics of AI and robotics.

Robots and the workplace

Replacing humans with robots is becoming a norm. Artificial Intelligence (AI) fuels forms of robotics that are displacing humans across the spectrum of employment. MIT researcher and economist Daron Acemoglu’s finding that adding a robot to the workforce can replace around 6 people represents a concerning prospect. The increasing abilities of robots, is also driving the replacement factor.

Goldman Sachs Research “…points out that there’s been significant progress in end-to-end AI, through which models can train themselves, removing the need for a human engineer to code everything by hand. That’s speeding up robot development, allowing these devices to do more tasks and adapt to new situations (such as working outside of factories) more quickly.” You can see the 2024 Goldman Sachs report on Global Automation, here.

Supporters in favour boosting robot numbers and responsibilities in the workplace often spin the developments as a “good thing” for society. For instance, the World Economic Forum reports that many “…robots are managing jobs that have high-accident rates or long-term health consequences for humans.” While it is recognised there may be positives to robots handling dangerous tasks, the comprehensive deployment of robots and automation in other areas of employment accelerates the process of replacing people with technology.

According to The Conversation, “…surveys show AI researchers overwhelmingly agree AI will achieve human-level “thinking” within this century.” It becomes ever more apparent that the replacement of humans in various roles will be continually reinforced.

Robots and AI automation may help many manufacturers streamline production, and save a fortune in insurance and benefits and other relative “human” costs. However, from factory workers, to teachers, to drivers and surgeons, to the fields of agriculture, medicine, and environmental management, for example, the reality is that automation will not only exponentially increase unemployment, but threaten a range of skills (including the emotional and social skills that make us human). Beyond the seductive scenarios advanced by industry, robotic automation spells trouble for society with humans gradually left unable to compete with this technology in many sectors.

According to Future Learn, the business network PricewaterhouseCoopers International Limited (PwC) predicts that up to 30% of jobs could be automated by robots by the mid-2030s. Recently, entrepreneur Elon Musk announced that he wants 1 billion humanoid robots in the workforce by 2040. If actualised, that would mean that around 6 billion jobs would disappear, based on what is suggested by the research finding of MIT’s economist, Acemoglu.

As AI increasingly impacts the workplace and is poised to “pick up the slack” for a declining population, wouldn’t that feasibly sustain lower populations – indefinitely in developed countries? And, possibly even sustain further population decline? After all, a robot doesn’t have human costs, needs or limits, and are considered assets that defy illnesses and mortality as they replace human labour. Generally, in the political climate of “sustainability” governments in progressive Western technological societies aren’t encouraging larger native human populations, with the “demographic shifts” happening, trends are towards artificial population replacement (elevating the influx of migrants, refugees, and strategic deployments of AI / robots, for example).

Challenges of depopulation, social transformation, and the rise of robots

The UN, which deeply guides policies of its member states to pursue technological goals, believes, “…high population densities accelerate disease spread and strain already overburdened health services” – according to populationmatters.org. The UN encourages lower populations, which has been more successfully achieved in developed countries. It’s the bitter “logic” of the UN’s sustainability drive that populations are now creating more robots than people to facilitate increased automation.

The United Nations (UN) now guides developed societies with shrinking populations to transition into robotised smart cities monitored and automated by AI. According to earth.org, “Since the Sustainable Development Goals’ (SDGs) establishment in 2015, numerous engineers have developed robots to help nations accomplish their sustainability goals.”

The alignment of technology to sustainability goals gives a green light to industry to help the UN and its specialised agency for information and communication technologies, the ITU (International Telecommunication Union) realise a digital future dominated by robots that assist in managing the population.

Automation may eventually destroy the social fabric of our society over time. As Monash University (MU) states, “After liberating us from “uncreative”, routine work and rote repetition, digital automation promises to relieve us of creativity and sociality itself – of the decisions that embody and reproduce our social and political commitments.“

MU also observes that, as society embraces increased AI automation, decision-making processes are becoming centralised and controlled. As “the decision-making process itself is being automated, we should be wary of the concentration of power in the hands of those who control the databases and write the algorithms. They’ll be deciding not just how products get built, but how society runs.“

The UN is deciding how society “runs” through the policy-building 2030 Agenda that sustains this politically motivated trajectory towards digital automation, bringing “together experts, policy-makers and business leaders”.

It is interesting how the UN’s Population Division has influenced population reduction in developed member states (which are rapidly developing digital technologies and AI powered robots – with some robots becoming almost “human-like” in their “biomimicry”) yet in underdeveloped countries, like Africa, the populations are above replacement levels with a population enjoying improved mortality rates.

“The [UN’s] Population Division has created and maintains a comprehensive World Population Policies Database , going back to the mid-1970s….Monitoring of government views and policies on population issues is important for tracking progress in the implementation of the Programme of Action of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, and other internationally agreed development goals that are related to population, including the Sustainable Development Goals.”

The Hoover Institute posits that Africa will “be the source of virtually all labor force growth in the world, and by far the youngest region, in the 21^st century.” The population may “reach 2.5 billion by 2050….growing to 4.5 billion by 2100.”

A significant population decline by comparison is expected to impact developing countries where supplementing native populations with “displaced peoples” and “replacement migration” – as well as synthetic appropriations – to help manage society, is on the cards.

It is also expected that the UK’s natural population is expected to start declining by 2025 according to the Office of National Statistics (ONS), where “deaths will surpass births two decades earlier than expected….” as reported in the Financial Times in 2022. In this climate of population decline it is worth noting that robotisation in society brings further social and demographic repercussions.

A study published by The Journal of Human Resources has found that, in “regions that were more exposed to robots…marital fertility declined” for there was a decrease in the number of marriages. It was highlighted that this occurred because robots reduce gender wage gaps and so diminish the value of men in the marriage market by increasing the relative economic status of women. A study published by Elsevier titled Robots, gender economic opportunities and household adjustment: Evidence from China clarifies that, “These technologies [robots, AI, Automation] primarily replace low-skilled, physically demanding jobs traditionally held by men, thereby improving employment opportunities for women….[which] correspondingly diminishes their satisfaction with the economic and domestic contributions of men within the household, thereby shifting their priorities toward career advancement rather than marriage and childbirth.”

Such studies show that populations exposed to robots experience a significant lowering the fertility rate (which drives population reduction). The role of robot technology in global depopulation, and also fertility enhancement, cannot be underestimated.

Researchers at the Institute for Integrative Nanosciences at IFW Dresden has developed a technology called “Spermbots” which they want to replicate inside the human body to propel sperm using “tiny robot suits that can help sperm become more mobile”. The technology is classified as “assisted reproduction” and targets couples struggling to conceive. According to ScienceAlert “These ‘spermbots’ are miniature metal helixes just large enough to completely wrap around the tail of a single sperm and help it along its way towards the egg. The bots are powered with the assistance of a magnetic field controlled by the scientists.”

Such innovations, which also pave the way for the development of “robotic micro-systems”, are sold as helping solve population issues. However, introducing nanotechnology into the reproduction process attached to cells in the reproduction cycle represents increasing steps towards the infiltration of electromagnetically powered nano-robots into the human body that sets disquieting precedents, and are not without risks.

The hazards of nanobots in the body are being studied. Man-made electromagnetic fields (EMFs) from wireless infrastructure and devices are known to negatively affect sperm motility, and fertility. Ironically, motility, and fertility are the problems “being addressed” by these “wireless” nanobots. Introducing artificial electromagnetic fields for propulsion and monitoring of the bots clearly represents a health risk.

Other risks have been highlighted in a study titled Environmental and health risks of nanorobots: an early review, including “…(i) the use of hazardous materials and UV light in nanorobots, and (ii) the loss of propulsion/targeting control.” The long term health impacts of nanorobots and robotic micro-systems on human populations are unknown, yet the impacts could be significant, and push humanity towards a transhuman existence with AI and nanobots being used to constantly monitor human bodies.

Ray Kurzweil, Google’s Director of Engineering believes, “One application of these medical nanorobots will be to extend our immune systems. These robots will also go into the brain and provide virtual and augmented reality from within the nervous system rather than from devices attached to the outside of our bodies.” Source.

A race to robotise society: The dawn of humanoid robots and Society 5.0

According to McKinsey & Company, “The AI revolution is not in its infancy, but most of its economic impact is yet to come.” Some societies are more economically predisposed to welcome the rise of robots (or even biosynthetic life), like Japan for example which has suffered economic decline since the 1990s, and more recently this has been exacerbated owing to natural disasters, political problems and a worsening demographic situation.

As population prospects worsen, the concept for a “better” future has been developed, focusing on the Japan’s alignment with the UN’s sustainable development goals (SDGs) to transition the country to a digitalised “Society 5.0”.

The “sustainability” pathway believed essential for Japan’s economic “recovery” is also a road to a post-human future which buys into technological augmentation and the data-driven “smart” society promoted by the UN, a symbol of humanity’s closer alignment with technology, blurring the lines between cyberspace and physical existence.

With robot penetration into society heralding problems for marriage (already a problem in Japan, with the value and identity of men in crisis) and sustaining demographic problems (with increasing numbers of Japanese men migrating as a result), Society 5.0 could lead Japan into deeper social and economic upheavals. However, the “blue sky” message of “sustainability” has been effective in drawing Japanese society into the UN’s vision of the globalist, robotised future.

Society 5.0, according to UNESCO is the “super-smart society…as it envisions a complete transformation of our way of life….Society 5.0 will help to overcome chronic social challenges such as an ageing population, social polarization, depopulation and constraints related to energy and the environment….autonomous vehicles and drones will bring goods and services to people in depopulated areas.” That is a very polite way of saying that “cyber-physical” systems and other technologies will replace face-to-face human interactions, while replacing vast numbers of human beings and human labour. Cyber-physical systems refers to robots and automation, both controlled by wireless networks and real-time data processing.

With technology expected to drive economies in need of “post-pandemic” recovery, Japan won’t be the only society embracing accelerated technological transformations. The ultimate consequences of societal transformation could push humans closer to a “transhuman” existence, the ultimate biosynthetic merging of society with the machine “nervous system”. Integrated Information Theory (IIT) already posits that humans are heading for a “hive mind” resulting from a merging of all minds and data, which has been called a “singularity.” As The Conversation notes, “Hypothetically, if a hive mind were to emerge, one could imagine it would mark the end of individuality and the institutions that rely on it, including democracy.”

All of this is possible, and societies following the UN’s lead (through accepting the stipulations of the “sustainability” goals and “climate change” narrative) are on track to that future.

Humanoid robots for the world

What is a robot is in today’s terms, and, what developments are under way to “sustain” them in the “smart city” society?

According to Future Learn, today’s “Robotic systems can be defined as interconnected, interactive, cognitive and physical tools that are able to perceive the environment using sensors, reason about events, make plans using algorithms implemented in computer programs, and perform actions enabled by actuators.’ 

The “humanising” of robots matters in tomorrow’s world. Developments in China have resulted in “human-like” robots with nuanced facial expressions becoming almost indistinguishable from human citizens in the near future.

Already, “Companies across the world are in a tight race to develop the best suitable robot that can give us human-like feel” according to Interesting Engineering. It’s the perfect camouflage for robots to bend into society, but will humanoid biomimicry bring more acceptance of robots in our midst?

As populations are set to decline, and as robots are politically elevated for an increasing role in our world, so-called “bio-inspired” robots (with some developments now incorporating human skin) seem likely to proliferate and are likely candidates to supplement the original human population seamlessly. Their convincing human appearance may overcome the intimidating appearance of the rigid metallic humanoids that resemble something like “Terminator”.

5G and emerging 6G wireless infrastructure (sensors and networks – the nervous system of AI) promises to give robots (including devices and appliances) a shared electronic consciousness (hive mind) courtesy of the internet and the cloud, making real-time analyses of data possible, where robots and devices make independent decisions.

Data-driven “smart” societies like Communist China politically operate like a “hive mind” as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) regards individuality as a threat. This “threat” is largely neutralised by China’s utilisation of AI technology and automation to manage society. China intends to lead the current technological race towards a robotised society. Can we expect anything other than the domination of robots?

Prospects of this seem likely in technological societies where fertility rates have been lowered and a population crisis is playing out. China has an “irreversible” fertility decline, one that could more than halve the population. As ABC reports “the population is aging mainly because the birth rate is falling.” China’s economy is set to weaken, and “this weakness will present challenges to the world’s economic recovery”. China’s answer to the potential challenges? Robots.

China is aggressively pursuing labour automation to raise productivity despite a shrinking population, and is set to supply the world with “humanoid” robots and the components for building them. Source.

Fortune Business Insights has its eye on the global market and says “the market for humanoid robots is projected to grow from USD 3.28 billion in 2024 to USD 66.0 billion by 2032.” These robots are “entering into the real world for various applications such as research, space exploration, personal assistance caregiving, education and entertainment, among others.”

According to the centre for International Governance Innovation, “… robots are now increasingly capable of…complex human tasks. Unlike specialized industrial robots, humanoid robots can be designed for general purpose application across a range of working environments. This includes agriculture, manufacturing, mining, health care, education, entertainment and even defence…Chinese planners hope to control the global supply of core components for the robotics industry by 2025 and achieve global dominance in the manufacture of humanoid robots by 2027.”

A world made for robots, or of robots?

We are witnessing the emergence of forms of artificial life relying on “data.” Known generically as robots they are also referred to as “cyber-physical” systems (CPS). Martin Rees (Emeritus Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge) states, when asked if robots will take over the world, “…we are increasingly dependent on computer networks…” and “…these could behave like a single ‘brain’ with a mind of its own, and with goals that may be contrary to human welfare.”

Katherine Richardson PhD, an anthropologist of robots believes, “…as a culture we tend to imagine they [autonomous machines, robots] are greater and more powerful than they really are and subsequently they become so.” Source.

It is always being suggested to us, especially by the media, that digitalisation, AI, and robots empower society for a “sustainable future”, or “economic growth”, for example – but it is also reasonable to assume that they may also disempower society. AI experts have warned us of the non-negligible chance that human extinction could be caused by AI.

This existential risk hasn’t discouraged the appetite for “robotic ecosystems” that are changing our world, driven by entrepreneurship, wealth and investment. As Built In reports, “In light of recent investments, the dawn of complex humanoid robots may come sooner than later. AI robotics company Figure and ChatGPT-maker OpenAI formed a partnership that’s backed by investors like Jeff Bezos. Under the deal, OpenAI will likely adapt its GPT language models to suit the needs of Figure’s robots. And microchip manufacturer Nvidia revealed plans for Project GR00T, the goal of which is to develop a general-purpose foundation model for humanoid robots. These announcements come in the wake of Elon Musk and Tesla introducing the humanoid robot Optimus in 2022, although the robot is still being trained.” Musk anticipates selling the “Tesla Optimus Robots” for an estimated $20,000 per unit – according to Fox Business. 

If it seems that our world is made for robots. Another factor drives the appetite for robotic ecosystems. The International Federation for Robotics (IFR) highlights that “…the integration of robots and robotics technologies is emerging as a powerful tool in contributing to the achievement of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).”

This situation was being prepared for, politically, decades ago. The UN’s Brundtland Report of 1987 (a.k.a. Our Common Future: Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development) urged a “global agenda for change.” This document gave birth to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of UN Agenda 2030. It described various crises that would afflict society and how technology would be aspirational, yet also prove to be a double-edged sword for humanity.

A section of the report titled “The Interlocking Crises” expounds the familiar idea that technology is here to save the planet. The report also acknowledges that technology is also a gamble with our planet’s future. It stated that, “A mainspring of economic growth is new technology, and while this technology offers the potential for slowing the dangerously rapid consumption of finite resources, it also entails high risks, including new forms of pollution and the introduction to the planet of new variations of life forms that could change evolutionary pathways.”

Changing evolutionary pathways

Technology advancements since the Brundtland Report of 1987 have connected half of the global population to a wireless-powered artificial ecosystem of telecommunications networks and data servers referred to as “the cloud”. Some have called it a “nervous system for the earth.” This evolving synthetic organism (of multiple networks of automation and cyber-physical systems) may eventually eclipse the native spectrum of life on our planet.

Today, the earth, oceans and skies are being drawn into the data-gathering “nervous system.” The Internet of Underwater Things (IoUT) and the Internet of Flying Things (IoFT) and Internet of Space Things (IoST) are in progress as component projects within the “mother” datafication project, the Internet of Things (IoT). Space X is launching 250 5G satellites to assist in the transformation of our world into a wireless taxonomy of trackable objects and lifeforms.

The earth’s atmosphere is under artificial transformation. Its native electromagnetic fields are infringed upon by artificial industrialised ones (like 5G) which are powering the wireless digitalised surveillance economy dependent on the IoT for Big Data and Machine Learning. ALAN (Artificial Light At Night) is a global disruptor causing significant ecological impacts. These significant, widespread artificial adjustments caused by digital technology are registered by the earth’s native life forms, playing havoc with their biological sensitivities as the world caters increasingly to the prospect of introducing more and more digital devices and intelligent machines – predominantly in countries facing the prospect of sharp population declines.

Collectively we might call these artificial biological and ecological impacts an act of concerted modification, the effect of which has been to reduce and weaken native species (including humans) with unprecedented exposures to radiofrequency transmitting devices, CO2-reducing geoengineering projects, and LED radiation pollution – all of which are scientifically known to change the longevity, behaviour and fertility of ecosystems, and populations, yet persist in the public imagination as “sustainable” technologies.

The unfolding side-effects, such as the declination of species and a plethora of other negatives, continue to be widely neglected, remaining at the periphery of societal consciousness. Light pollution, exacerbated by the excessive light spill and glare from LED street lights, car headlamps and electronic screens, affects us in very specific ways. It targets hormone levels, ultimately destroying sleep, and fertility, by hampering reproduction. Source. Similar effects take their toll in the natural world’s ecosystems. In insect ecosystems, for example, light pollution is a recognised driver of species decline.

“Sustainable Development” goals drive not the emancipation of societies, but dependency on technologies that will modify and take-over societies, even reduce their populations. Yet, society believes all of these technological changes are the product of eco-wisdom guiding us to a sustainable utopia. However, society is in danger, and 5G and LED lighting is only the tip of the iceberg.

No-one knows this more than Gro Harlem Brundtland who chaired the Brundtland Report. She helped introduce society to the concept of “sustainable development” in 1987, paving the way for our current digital paradigm and its acceleration. However, she has discovered that the EMF radiation from technology brings unexpected consequences, and has come to accept that the wireless radiation powering the “sustainable” technological paradigm is a significant threat to her health.

Brundtland is a medical doctor and Master of Public Health (MPH), who faired as Prime Minister of Norway (1981–1996), as well as becoming director-general of the World Health Organization. She is convinced “of the link between health and the environment.” She has openly challenged WHO’s conclusions about harm from wireless radiation.

According to Physicians for Safe Technology, while still heading the WHO “…she went public with her self-diagnosis of EHS [electromagnetic hypersensitivity]…while the agency was refusing to acknowledge that EHS symptoms were directly caused by EMF exposure.”

In her 2012 speech at the opening of a new School of Public Health and Health Systems at the University of Waterloo in Ontario she responded to questions by Dr. Magda Havas PhD. where she “…cautioned about the overuse of cell phones and went on to explain how she became allergic to microwave radiation.” Brundtland also stated that “…the environment needs to be modified to reduce electrosmog exposure in order to protect health.”

EHS, also referred to by researchers as “Microwave Syndrome”, is aggravated by electromagnetic fields (EMFs) from cell phones and other artificial EMFs in the environment and is affecting over 5% of the population. Evidence points to this number increasing with the roll out of 5G, a new modulation of the electromagnetic spectrum utilising barely researched millimetre waves for the advancement of a “sustainable” robotised digital paradigm that necessitates a latency free bandwidth for real-time data processing for the IoT.

The novel deployment of “robot pollinators”, automated animal surveillance, and impacts of 5G on fertility and food security

A health report compiled for the European Parliament (EP) called the “Health Impact of 5G” suggests there is more than meets the eye concerning fertility issues in the population. There is “sufficient evidence of adverse effects on fertility in men and limited evidence of adverse effects on fertility in women” from wireless radiation in the range of 450MHz to 6GHz, which covers the history of DECT phones and mobile phones up to more recent models using 5G infrastructure.

It’s an arresting finding, especially when it is becoming clear that many countries won’t sustain the human populations they’ll need for growth and security in the years ahead. Demographers anticipate fertility rates dropping below replacement levels earlier than expected – possibly by 2030.

Predictably demographers attribute the population’s precarious status to “factors such as higher education levels among people who give birth, rising incomes, and expanded access to contraceptives.” However, on the road to digitalisation, other factors come into play and wireless radiation continues to be one of them as “The Health Impact of 5G” strongly suggests.

Some countries are beginning to act, realising that wireless radiation poses a threat to populations. According to a report by Environmental Health trust, “India dropped their RF limits by 1/10th after a research review documented the majority of research studies found adverse effects to wildlife, birds and bees.” This is the precautionary principle (PP) in action, mostly ignored by the rest of the world in pursuit of digitalisation.

The World Wildlife Fund’s (WWF) “Living Planet Report” illustrates severe population decline in the natural world. In the report, the WWF issues a “climate change” alert urging action in the language of the UN’s sustainability goals, suggesting that wildlife is being decimated because of human populations causing global warming. At the same time, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) promotes AI, and automated wireless devices, for the surveillance of animal populations. Projects called “Eyes on Recovery” and “Wildlife Insights” supported by Google, rely on motion sensor activated camera traps. These operate continuously with powerful LED flashes taking millions of images to collect species data. This activity could be disrupting ecosystems with ALAN (Artificial Light At Night which is recognised as a significant impact on ecology). These projects are executed in the name of protecting animals, so that “scientists, land managers and other stakeholders can better anticipate threats“. Technological ecological disruption is arguably a threat.

WWF’s Living Planet Report highlights threats to ecology, yet not all. It neglects the influences of technologies on wildlife, including the wireless expansionism in recent decades (which creates ecologically impacting electrosmog emissions), and, the modalities of extraction that serve the appetites of the semiconductor and lithium battery industries. It emphasises a UN-friendly conception of how the world should quantifiably change without acknowledging how digital wireless technologies represent a threat to wildlife populations.

The UN advocates wireless technology to solve problems, and advocates smaller populations – and demands a radically different society, one where wireless technology and robots will systematically monitor populations, and be used to replace wildlife species, just as humans are being “replaced”. This is playing out to extraordinary degrees across the world.

While bees and other pollinators are dying from EMF exposure causing colony collapse disorder (CCD) – very commonly blamed on “climate change” – action to support ecosystems today includes deploying wireless robots to make a difference. According to howtorobot.com robotic pollinators are being despatched to replace pollinators (population replacement), which as we know, are averse to exposure from the wireless transmitters powering wireless robots systems like these.

It is believed that, “these robots, designed to mimic the actions of bees, can help maintain plant populations and genetic diversity within ecosystems…[though] there are concerns about its effectiveness and potential impacts on natural pollinator populations.”

In a similar vein, as the BBC reports, “…new Biotracks technology tracks the harmonic radar tags attached to bees with a receiver carried on a drone in a bid to improve understanding of what is happening to pollinators” in research led by a team at The University of Oxford in the UK.

Despite research that suggests bees are not at all benefiting from man-made EMFs, such novel “science” projects gain publicity and support while they promote IoT technologies like drones and wireless devices.

According the the website beeing.it, a “study conducted at the Beekeeping Application Centre of the University of Bayburt offers valuable insights into the disturbing effect of electromagnetic radiation on bee behaviour….Implications of these findings go beyond bees’ welfare. As crucial beings for pollination, bees play a vital role in agriculture, contributing to the fertilization of numerous crops, including fruits, vegetables and nuts. The loss of their ability to navigate accurately could lead to a decrease in crop yields, affecting food production and threatening global food security.” New Scientist has also acknowledged the negative influences of EMFs on the bee populations asserting that “Electromagnetic fields…are messing with honeybees…Transmission towers emit electromagnetic fields that can disrupt honeybees’ ability to pollinate nearby plants, which could reduce biodiversity in these areas”.

Sadly, the vulnerability of earth’s species to EMFs – which are decimating pollinators and adding to growing food insecurity – may drive increased demand for “solutions” such as the aforementioned robotic pollinators. We live in a politicised technological climate, which is biased towards implementing wireless technology in mainstream research and in solving environmental problems – even to replace pollinators. Concerns about EMF radiation impacts on wildlife (or human populations) are hastily being dismissed, and this is not in the best interests of the environment or declining populations.

Mass die-offs: another decline of populations, amidst the rise of wireless robots

The global technological “arms race” that now depletes our world of life was known by the original architects of the UN’s sustainability project as entailing “high risks, including new forms of pollution and the introduction to the planet of new variations of life forms that could change evolutionary pathways.”

Society’s technology consumption now heralds populations pushed to the limits, and declining across the spectrum of life on earth, presenting security issues and widening global disparities. Within this unfolding scenario AI-powered robots are guaranteed a starring role in managing the fall-out as the natural order of things is increasingly infiltrated by synthetic life forms, on queue for population replacement and other duties.

As wireless robot ecosystems expand, we are also facing the daunting reality of “mass die-offs” in the natural world which “…can reshape the ecological and evolutionary trajectories of life on Earth” as discussed in National Geographic, where “…Researchers reviewed historical records of 727 mass die-offs from 1940 to 2012 and found that over that time, these events have become more common for birds, marine invertebrates, and fish.”

Scientists researching the publicised die-offs cannot say for certain why this is happening, and when offering hypotheses, commonly assume it must be “climate change” related. That’s a predominant theory with a broad sweep, but it does not put the problem in the context of the rapid technological developments that are taking their toll on earth’s ecosystems.

The die-offs continue. In 2020 in Mexico “hundreds of dead birds were discovered in numerous spots across the New Mexican landscape. With each new, grim find, researchers began to realise these clumps of carcasses were not isolated incidents.” Martha Desmond from New Mexico State University (NMSU) told Las Cruces Sun News “We’re losing probably hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of migratory birds.” According to the researchers “the birds seemed “to act strangely before their deaths, spending more time on the ground than perched in trees, and generally appearing dazed, sleepy, and lethargic…the affected birds also look different.”

According to The Independent, the “dead birds were found in states including New Mexico, Colorado, Texas, Arizona and Nebraska.” Scientists could only speculate as to the cause. This is only an example of a widespread (and sudden) “die-off”. Another bird population event in Mexico was filmed by a security camera, as blackbirds fell dead from the sky in mid flight. Watch here.

Another infamous case in the Netherlands offered the same theory as for the birds grounding in Mexico, that a hunting bird may have frightened them. The Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy (which encourages cooperation between research institutes and businesses to invest in a powerful, sustainable country) were quick to point out that it “wasn’t 5G”.

However, it is fully acknowledged that EMFs disrupt bird navigation though it is never offered even a possibility in relation these events when it most likely should. Scientists believe the effect of EMFs on birds “…is greatest when birds fly over urban areas”, as reported by the BBC in 2014. As we know, in recent times the sources of EMF have multiplied dramatically to accommodate global wireless expansion, and cell towers with a high-density population produce high EMF radiation emissions affecting birds. The position of the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy, allied with the wireless industry was most likely political rather than scientifically defensible.

Amidst the mushrooming of uncharacteristic syndromes and mortality rates in the earth’s ecosystems, notably, the military is developing an arsenal of autonomous robotic weapons (specifically drones) and is studying the swarming behaviours of birds, as well as fish and marine creatures so that wireless drones have the “ability to act in concert, combined with the inherent adaptability and versatility of individual drones, results in a force that can swiftly respond to changing conditions on the battlefield….enhanced by AI and space technology.” Source.

5G infrastructure has been rolled out on earth, in the seas and in the skies to make way for drones and other synthetic life forms at are now infiltrating the habitats of native life forms in a big way. As a side effect of the 5G technological agenda, ecosystem levels of ambient electromagnetic radiation are affected, with man-made electromagnetic radiation (electrosmog) becoming an increasing burden on wildlife around the world – including swarming birds, fish and marine animals.

According to a scientific report in Nature, it is recognised that “Anthropogenic EMFs, represent a poorly understood, yet potentially important and increasing emission into the marine environment, which may disrupt or mask vital environmental cues to EM-sensitive species….Ubiquitous anthropogenic sources of marine EMFs include ships, bridges and subsea cables^1,14.” As the Internet of Underwater Things (IoUWT) develops to drive the monitoring and robotisation of the oceans, this problem will become severely exacerbated. You can become acquainted with the implications in an MDPI report called “Recent Advances, Future Trends, Applications and Challenges of Internet of Underwater Things (IoUT): A Comprehensive Review” which states that “The key enabler technology for the IoUT is the underwater wireless sensor network (UWSN).”

There is no question that the comprehensive wireless sensor networks advancing the Internet of Things (IoT) present a danger to the sensitive species of our planet. A landmark “150 page study of over 1,200 peer reviewed studies finds that birds, insects and animals are uniquely sensitive to wireless radiation. It identifies low-level wireless as a pollutant and warns against escalating radiation levels with 5G technologies.”

Man-made radiofrequency modulations experienced by birds and fish can interfere with their navigational behaviours, and health, which are tied to the native electromagnetic resonances of the earth. Radiofrequency radiation is scientifically acknowledged to be causing species decline, so plausibly could be influencing mass die offs. Our skies and seas will be subject to more radiation pollution in the years ahead, from the political and economic drive to accommodate robots while displacing populations of native species as the “wireless nervous system” of 5G networks and sensors grows.

The Defense Advanced Projects Research Agency (DARPA) is advancing research in biomimetics (also known as biomimicry) where robotic weapon systems imitate animals. According to Drone XL, “Northrop Grumman has built the Manta Ray, a mysterious 
Underwater drone for…DARPA”. It’s described as an “…innovative craft, reportedly four years in the making, [that] could revolutionize long-range military missions by hiding in plain sight and harvesting energy from the seas.”

Meanwhile DARPA’s “…OFFensive Swarm-Enabled Tactics (OFFSET) programme is another “biomimicry” project aimed at enabling small-unit infantry forces to use swarms of small weaponised drones – 250 robots or more – to complete complex missions.” Source. Swarms of wireless drones resemble shape-shifting bird formations and murmurations but are used to remotely kill. In imitation of nature, autonomous weapons systems are being created that defy the principles of international humanitarian law – representing a “paradigm shift in warfare.” Another imminent threat to populations.

From here to Africa – A world to be dominated by robots?

All of these developments pave the way for a world dominated by robots – especially as earth’s native populations are being politically manipulated into accommodating them, and accepting them. In doing so society gives the green light to become further dominated by technologies that may not, after all, serve their best interests.

Unprecedented animal population reductions and mass “die offs” that coincide with our rapidly accelerating digital era of cyber-physical transformations leave our population ever more vulnerable to industrial-political manipulations and troubling prospects for our species if we don’t alter our path. We find ourselves in a situation eerily predicted by the Brundtland Report’s architects of “sustainability” – for we are on the road that politically prioritises the technological economy, which “entails high risks, including new forms of pollution and the introduction to the planet of new variations of life forms that could change evolutionary pathways.”

The UN’s Agenda 2030 is an influential political tool for supporting industry goals, and securing society’s support in advancing technology to support questionable globalist projects. With the developed world suffering population decline and accelerated technological output, Africa by contrast is still developing and has averted a population crisis. Africa is proving fertile ground to continue the “globalist project” – and to roll out 5G. Much development in this direction is being done in the name of “philanthropy” and under the guise of “sustainability goals” but ultimately is an agenda and an investment.

The Rockefeller Foundation, for example, is branding infrastructure projects in Africa as “sustainable development” with an initiative called Mission 300, which anticipates a case for 5G in Sub-Saharan Africa where electricity is an issue. According to intelligentcio.com, “Africa’s lack of infrastructure, expensive hardware, and limited technological background are all issues impacting IoT deployment.” Mission 300 is an “ambitious initiative to connect 300 million people to electricity in Sub-Saharan Africa by 2030” while opening the door to 5G wireless developments that will assist the robot revolution in Africa.

According to, 5G in Africa: realising the potential “Operators and tower companies operating in the region have pointed to the following as the main barriers to using more solar: high upfront cost for solar panels and batteries; theft and vandalism, especially in remote locations; and space limitation on cell sites to assemble the solar components.”

The Rockefeller Foundation is actively invested in resolving these solar energy supply issues, a process that fits with the “green communications and networking paradigm” where solar/renewables assist the 5G infrastructure roll out. The Rockefeller Foundation is laying the groundwork for 5G networks and the IoT as part of “doubling down on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)” prompted by the “pandemic”.

This ultimately opens the door to “…a broad set of industry stakeholders, including Google Cloud, EdgeQ, Gigabyte, Marvell, Nvidia, NXP, Qualcomm Technologies, Dish Network, Vodafone, Accelleran, Mavenir, Parallel Wireless, Radisys, Saankhya Labs and Tech Mahindra.” Source: 5G in Africa: realising the potential, PDF.

Africa Center Senior Fellow Aleksandra Gadzala acknowledges in “Coming to Life: Artificial Intelligence in Africa” that “many African nations still lack the statistical capacity, infrastructure, and good governance necessary to see AI take off. However, in a select handful of countries, AI solutions are already being successfully deployed at scale….what African governments need to do to strengthen the ecosystem necessary to see these technologies flourish…to advance sustainable development and inclusive growth.” It is only a matter of time before the robot ecosystem emerges in Africa in the name of “sustainability”, of course.

The social, political, and economic “terraforming” of earth for a robotised future dominated by AI continues at remarkable pace. What this all really means for the diversity, distribution and longevity of earth’s native species remains a big, and urgent, question as our world continues to be transformed by a political-industrial imperative that artificially alters our atmosphere – and existence – to accommodate a burgeoning ecosystem of synthetic life on our planet.

Leading illustration by Sean Alexander Carney.

Screenshots have been used in this article for non-commercial educational purposes. The sources are credited, and links are supplied. The Copyright Act of 1976 outlines the statutory framework for determining and identifying Fair Use and when one can use copyrighted material without permission. Teaching, criticism, reporting, commenting, and researching are all activities that often qualify as fair use.

Introduction:

Sensing the Zeitgeist of the times, our team at Safe Tech International felt perhaps a renewed and internationally coordinated initiative focusing on local communities might be timely.

The idea was to invite people around the world to simultaneously send a letter to their local officials communicating strong dissent to the proliferation of EMFs in their community or city.  

We considered two possibilities: A Notice of Liability (NOL), or perhaps a more cordial but firm awareness raising letter. 

What emerged, while still a “letter” so to speak, could more aptly be called an ode to a simpler and saner way of life, with a special emphasis on the role of technology in our lives. A kind of invitation for ourselves, elected reps, and others to hold in our mind’s eye and heart the innate desire we humans share:

A desire for a life of health, well-being, wholesome relationships, a humble place to call home, a modest livelihood, and a way to contribute to the local and global family of life…and of course, all to the backdrop of world peace.   

The letter, or ode, has a very different style from how we usually communicate with our elected reps. This was intentional as for our civilization to open to the changes that life seems to be thirsting for, we must be authentic. No pretenses, role playing, or hierarchy. Just honest and open connections. 

The letter offers specific suggestions, many about technology, but also about education, the commons, healthy food, the skies, the ocean, and peace. Suggestions that emanate from common sense and a life centric perspective. 

If the letter resonates with you, please consider sending it as is, or edited, to your local officials or to anyone else you think may be interested. A link to both a PDF and Word version of the letter are provided at the end. An audio and video reading of the letter are provided as well.

I would like to acknowledge some of the many authors, podcasters, and speakers who have deeply informed my thinking: These include Nate Hagens, Vanessa Andreotti, Iain McGilchrist, Daniel Christian Wahl, Jeremy Lent, Helena Norberg-Hodge, Daniel Schmachtenberger, and Charles Eisenstein, among many others.  

And now…the letter. (To read, click on Page 2 directly below.)

Audio only – (Recommended as it’s far less energy and data consumptive than video) 
Video – 12:58 

Here’s our Complaint letter from Safe Tech Advocates

To hot springs community:

We love this sacred healing place with its legacy dating back hundreds of years.  All members of this region’s Native people went to the hot springs for safety, to enjoy the waters, and abide in peace. This area used to be a Victorian resort, a hunting lodge, and more. In modern times, the hot springs has taken on a sacred trust to be the guardians of the land, and have agreed to honor the legacy of the ancient native protectors.

Then came the wildfires, and it took years to rebuild this paradise.  This summer, we saw an EV charger in the middle of the forest in an area with burnt out trees from the last wildfire. People love your place but share, “The one thing that certainly is transparent about EVs is the fire hazard.” Please relocate the EV charger to a safer place given any fire can spread like wildfire. Please provide guests with a low Electromagnetic Radiation (EMF) option for fire safety. Please consider the responsible thing and investigate EVs, charging concerns and smart meters.

The hot springs wrote back only few words –  they take our concerns seriously. The EV charger in the forest haunts me, as if there is no escaping the fire controversies of tech, even in the wilderness, KCRA reported on Sierra Nevada’s latest EV fire in August, 2024: Hazmat teams stood by during a Tesla Semi fire.

Reinette Senum, former Nevada City mayor, wrote: “Tesla big rig recently crashed into a tree on Interstate 80 close to my hometown, Nevada City, sparking a fire that closed the highway for over 15 hours. Yes, you heard that right—an electric truck… turned into a flaming beacon of what could go wrong. Hazmat teams stood by, helpless, as the battery burned, emitting toxic smoke… Fortunately, this incident didn’t spark a cataclysmic forest fire like the one currently raging near Chico, known as the  Park Fire- the fourth largest wildfire in California, which has already consumed nearly 500,000 acres and continues to burn.”

EVs are up to 30% more likely to catch on fire while charging. What would ancestors hundreds of years ago have said?

Are EVs really clean, free, safe, and sustainable? Annie Leonard, in the Story of Electronics, talks about increased mining, industrial manufacturing, habitat destruction, and the creation of toxic waste.  These externalities are especially true for EVs.

EV charger fires command attention worldwide:
• 25 buses destroyed at a bus depot in Germany.
• EV fires at US charging stations: California, Colorado, Louisiana and Pennsylvania, Florida, and Nashville Tennessee.

“NFL wide receiver Randall Cobb and his family survived a house fire that apparently started with their Tesla charger in their garage.”

NY Post

“A Mercedes EV caught on fire recently,” Katie Singer shares. “Two and a half days after its owner parked a Mercedes EV in an underground parking lot, it caught fire, injured 23 people with toxic smoke inhalation and destroyed 140 other cars.” 

The list of fires goes on and on. Just google: “why do EV chargers fail”, or “why EV charging stations are bad”. According to research, “The number of EV battery fires that occur while connected to EV charging sits in the range of 18% to 30%.

EV fires are less frequent than gas cars according to Consumer Reports, yet insurers claim Hybrid fires come in number one. Autocar UK explains EV fires as “incredibly difficult to put out.”

The sustainability numbers don’t add up. 

• If 40,000 water gallons are needed for EV fires, how are EVs considered sustainable? 
• Fire fighters remain on the scene in New Jersey more than seven hours to make sure the battery doesn’t reignite and go into thermal runaway (you think the battery fire is out, but it isn’t).
• Lithium battery may reignite hours, days or weeks later (Tesla in a junkyard),
• Fires in electric vehicles… can reach 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit, compared with 1,500 degrees in a gas-powered car fire.”

Downtown LA Lawyers are among many lawyers that put on their Physicist hat to explain about EV batteries: “thermal runaway are fires from defective failing batteries, it can release a large amount of noxious and toxic gasses, catch on fire, jet out flames or even explode on the spot. These injuries can be serious and even fatal, causing death to the person using the charging station.”

Why do we need lawyers to unpack the science so we can understand the dangers we were not told about by industry scientists or our regulatory agencies? “An electric car can be a high hazard when it is charging. Many factors can make it a ticking time bomb that will catch fire quite easily,” i.e., not charging the battery enough or over charging it, not keeping the car in the shade, here’s a complete list of many potential battery problems of what can go wrong:

EVs are the largest source of demand for lithium, and lithium mining means dire consequences for water, food supplies, biodiversity, and Indigenous rights. How will the electrical grid, already at capacity, be able to handle millions more EVs? The more EVs that require electricity, the more we dedicate land use to power generation devices.

The dirty secret behind EVs are the tens of thousands of children in the Congo, knee-deep, mining for cobalt used for EV batteries, toxic to touch, toxic to breathe, the ore can have traces of radioactive uranium. The demand is so great, companies can’t dig it out fast enough. What would the ancient natives, say about children mining?  Natives understood that all parts of an ecosystem connect – children, animals, and rock are dependent on each other in the ecological niche. Eco-philosopher John Muir stated:

“Indians walk softly and hurt the landscape hardly more than birds or squirrels.”

Leave no trace, preserve for seven generations, don’t ask why this land is out of balance, ask why are we out of balance? Our letter to the hot springs cites: The smart meters on cottages, are yet another fire/safety concern that could have been avoided with analog meters. Is it true smart electrical meters can cause fires? Yes. Fires have been reported after smart meter installations, along with shorting or burning-out of appliances and electronics. Are commercial establishments required to have smart meters? Please help us understand, given smart meter residential opt-outs. Smart digital meters lack adequate surge arrestors and circuit breakers to protect electronics from extreme voltage surges. Surge arrestors prevent fires and electrical equipment damage.

See Katie Singer’s substack for a deep dive – why all things smart are not necessarily environmentally safe. “Electrical technician Sean Polacik explains to Keith Cutter that smart meters aren’t meters. They’re data-collecting computers. Contrast this to traditional analog meters that measured electricity use, worked as surge protectors, and did not generate dirty electricity.”

Research shows, “Analog meters are safer, do not emit RF, and do not contain any flammable electronic parts, nor do they have a switching mode power supply (that will create RF frequencies that enter the electrical wiring of the house/electrical. More on the science around smart meter fires can be found here, here and here.

Its not hard to provide a low EMF cottage, here’s how:

Many people want to avoid exposure to artificial radiation, and we applaud the no electronics rule. No doubt this hot spring is in alignment with providing a low electromagnetic radiation (EMF) cottage, please consider retrofitting cottages with analog meters, or Bill Bathgate’s DE Filter Iron Maiden to reduce pulsed radio frequency? We are curious how many hot springs guests were EMF-disabled prior to the smart meter rollout? Many hope for a safe cottage, especially with mobility issues. Under the ADA, analog meters would likely be allowed. Please do the right thing.

Signed by water/forest protectors, activists and community change agents, the leaders of safe tech organizations, and ancestral guardians of the land – (we are also signing on their behalf)

Great Salt Lake is the largest saline lake in North America. The lake and its wetlands form a
keystone ecosystem that supports biodiversity and human economy throughout the Western Hemisphere. – Source

Framing Others

In Massachusetts and beyond, the Karen Reed murder trial is a made-for-reality-television- story that has divided a town and captivated the public’s attention CNN reported, “Her defense has accused off-duty police inside that Canton home of killing O’Keefe and framing Read.” The prosecution’s case [] has been hampered by a series of missteps and unusual investigative practices. Rita Lombardi, a local Read supporter outside the court, told CNN [] “This woman was framed, and there is overwhelming evidence, overwhelming scientific evidence that she was framed for murder by the very people we trust to protect us.”  Central to the trial is the question of how the police department conducted its investigation, and whether Karen Reed has been framed. The case is on-going.       

This article is not as titillating of a story as the Karen Reed trial – but asks a few questions.

Regarding the disappearing Great Salt Lake in Utah, what if the farmers and ‘climate’ are being framed, by the very people we trust to protect us? Are we unwittingly relying on ‘unusual investigation practices’?

My colleague Kate Kheel recently sent me an email. “On the way to Baltimore today, I listened to NPR’s coverage of The Great Salt Lake that is projected to be completely dry within 5 years. The reasons given included global warming and agriculture.

But surprisingly (not), the huge NSA data center erected in 2014 for surveillance purposes, and Facebook’s META were not mentioned. That got me to researching.”

Do we have an incomplete picture of what is driving what we call climate change?

“By computing the water usage rate, one could ultimately determine the computing power and capabilities of the Utah Data Center,” wrote the NSA’s associate director for policy and records, David Sherman, in an undated letter filed with Bluffdale in response to the Tribune’s public records request. “Armed with this information, one could then deduce how much intelligence NSA is collecting and maintaining.”

Who Counts What, – Counts

In November2023, in the article Military emissions – the weak point in the war on climate change? Army Technology reported that international climate accords do not take into account military emissions. ‘As the largest institutional consumer of energy in the US, the Department of Defense (DoD) has faced criticism for not instigating change on military emissions reporting.'[] “The US has a larger military expenditure than any other country, amounting to $877bn in 2022, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.” [] Scientists and academics from universities including Oxford, Columbia, Harvard, Lancaster, Stanford, Durham and Queens Mary have released numerous studies outlining the hundreds of millions of tonnes of military carbon emissions that have gone unaccounted for in the stocktake.”– SOURCE

Likewise, when we look at “farmers” and water consumption, are we also factoring in water-guzzling data farms?

In addition to ‘not counting’ military carbon emissions, how does the planet’s hydrological cycle respond when accurate data about data centers is not factored into consideration? Are we causing avoidable planetary desertification by not accurately counting technology’s footprint?

In reverse chronological order, some of the resources that Kate uncovered point to a possible scenario; the excessive water consumption of data centers via evaporation differs from farming consumption patterns and may be changing the climate and contributing to or causing drought, and not just in Utah,

AI’s Outrageous Environmental Toll: July 2024 (Futurism and Wired)

On July 14, 2024 in the Substack News Summary for Safe Tech International , we highlighted an article by Frank Landymore published by Futurism:  AI’s Outrageous Environmental Toll Is Probably Worse Than You Think 

He wrote, “Consider the obscene amounts of water that’s needed just to cool the data centers that train and host generative AI models, which is somewhere in the millions of gallons per year. Internal estimates from Microsoft about its data facility in Goodyear, Arizona, for example, show that it’s set to annually consume 56 million gallons of drinking water — which is more than a drop in the ocean for such a water-scarce region.

But as Wired reports, the way data centers waste water is even worse than how households would waste it by leaving the tap running. “The water that is available for people to use is very limited,” Shaolei Ren, a responsible AI researcher at UC Riverside, told the magazine. “It’s just the fresh surface water and groundwater. Those data centers, they’re just evaporating water into the air.” “When we get the water from the utility, and then we discharge the water back to the sewage immediately, we are just withdrawing water — we’re not consuming water,” Ren continued. “A data center takes the water from this utility, and they evaporate the water into the sky, into the atmosphere.” And once evaporated, that water doesn’t come back to Earth for another year. 

“For basic services, those were very light in terms of the amount of data that needed to go back and forth between the processors,” he said, estimating that these generative AI applications are 100 to 1,000 more times intensive. Other estimates put Google’s AI search in the ballpark of consuming ten times as much energy than a regular one.“ To re-iterate:

Those data centers, they’re just evaporating water into the air.” “A data center takes the water from this utility, and they evaporate the water into the sky, into the atmosphere.” And once evaporated, that water doesn’t come back to Earth for another year.

The quote is sourced from a July 11th Wired article. AI’s Energy Demands Are Out of Control, Welcome to the Internet’s Hyper-consumption Era. Generative Artificial Intelligence tools, now part of everyday user experience online, are causing stress on local power grids and mass water evaporation, by Reece Rogers.

March 2024, Great Salt Lake Utah, (NPR)

Farmers accused of drying up the imperiled Great Salt Lake say they can help save it In a lawsuit filed last year against the state, Deed’s group (Center for Biological Diversity) and others went on to call the drying Great Salt Lake — the American West’s largest and one of the world’s few remaining giant saline lakes — a looming ecological collapse.

That suit came on the heels of a report by Brigham Young University scientists that set off alarm bells for many in the state saying the lake could dry up within five years if no action is taken. The lawsuit seeks to force state leaders to drastically cut how much water farmers use and let it flow into the lake.

But as Spring planting time approaches, many farmers say fears about the lake drying up are being overblown. Environmentalists want to stop alfalfa farming in the desert. The Great Salt Lake’s shrinking is already killing the brine shrimp that feed migratory birds. []

Seed says Utah leaders just aren’t making the tough political choice to cut water to alfalfa farms and dairies north of the lake. “We can’t afford to continue to do that with our water in the West,” she says. “Those farmers need to be compensated so they can retire from farming.” This is a popular refrain right now from California to Utah where precious river water channeled through irrigation canals is used to grow thirsty feed crops, some for export, even as droughts in the West are getting worse with climate change. Utah is the second driest state in the country yet it also has the highest water use per capita. But farmers say they’re being unfairly maligned in the fight over the imperiled lake. []

January 2023, Brigham Young University

The NPR article links to the BYU study Emergency measures needed to rescue
Great Salt Lake from ongoing collapse (Download available, 34 pages) The BYU study states “Causes of decline After millennia of natural fluctuations, human water use has pushed Great Salt Lake into structural decline.

Since 2020, the lake has lost just over one million acre-feet of water each year [], much more than predicted by current hydrographic models [] If this rate of water loss continues, the lake would be on track to disappear in the next five years. The lake is now 10 feet and 6.9 million acre-feet below its minimum healthy level, which has only been attained once since 2002[]

Saline lakes are highly vulnerable to water overuse because they depend on a delicate balance between streamflow and evaporation. Consequently, there is a strong relationship between the area of irrigated agriculture in a saline lake’s watershed and the severity of its shrinkage Agriculture began affecting Great Salt Lake levels in the mid 1800s. However, it wasn’t until the 1900s that humans became the dominant force controlling the lake. Federal and state construction of dams, canals, and pipelines in the 1900s allowed more of the watershed’s natural runoff to be diverted for agricultural, industrial, and municipal use. These subsidized water projects led to unsustainable water consumption and plummeting lake levels through the 1960s.

Over the last three years, the lake has received less than a third of its natural streamflow because of excessive water diversions. In 2022, the lake dropped to a record elevation of 4188’—the lowest level on the state’s contingency charts10,18,64. The depletion of water is even more severe than it appears because groundwater is not included in these estimates. Approximately 26 million acre-feet have been lost from the lake itself, but twice that amount may have been lost from the aquifers around the lake due to water table drop. These empty aquifers could slow the rate of rebound after runoff is increased.” –BYU Study

February 2024: AI, West Des Moines, Iowa (Hyperscaler)

In February, HyperScaler published, Water Consumption of AI, How Tech Giants are Draining the Planet 2024.

The Extent of Water Usage by AI According to a recent study in Nature, the water consumption of AI is projected to reach between 4.2 billion and 6.6 billion cubic meters by 2027. This is equivalent to nearly half of the UK’s annual water consumption. The primary reason for this high water usage is the need to cool the servers that run complex AI models, especially those utilizing generative AI for processing and generating text, data, and other forms of information. These AI models operate in massive data centers, where chilled water systems absorb the heat generated by the servers. While some of this water can be recycled, a significant amount evaporates, leading to substantial water consumption.

Additionally, the production of electricity required to power these data centers indirectly contributes to water usage through energy production methods such as thermal power plants and hydroelectric dams. The growing water consumption by AI data centers has several negative repercussions on both the environment and society.

Environmental Impact The excessive use of water by data centers exacerbates the global water crisis, which already affects over two billion people who lack access to safe drinking water. Furthermore, it intensifies the effects of climate change, contributing to severe droughts, floods, and wildfires that jeopardize ecosystems and human communities.  Social and Economic Impact The strain on water resources can lead to conflicts and inequalities, particularly in regions where water is already scarce. For instance, in West Des Moines, Iowa, a cluster of data centers hosting OpenAI significantly depleted the local aquifer, reducing water pressure and impacting residents’ quality of life and property values. Additionally, popular AI services like OpenAI’s ChatGPT are heavy water users. Research indicates that generating responses from ChatGPT could consume as much water as a 500ml bottle for every 10 to 50 prompts, depending on various factors. Newer, more powerful models like GPT-4 are likely to consume even more water, though exact figures are not yet available. –Hyperscaler

The growing water consumption by AI data centers has several negative repercussions on both the environment and society. The excessive use of water by data centers exacerbates the global water crisis, which already affects over two billion people who lack access to safe drinking water. Furthermore, it intensifies the effects of climate change, contributing to severe droughts, floods, and wildfires that jeopardize ecosystems and human communities.

July 2022 Utah (Standard Examiner)

Yes, data centers use a lot of water. One Utah company shows it doesn’t have to be that way.

“The United States accounts for about 40% of the world’s large cloud and internet data sites. Utah is home to at least 25 “colocation” data centers, according to a Data Center Map estimate, most of them near Salt Lake City. Those sites, like Novva, rent servers to a variety of customers, from gas stations to medical companies. The figure doesn’t include big centers run by single entities, like the U.S. National Security Agency’s operation in Bluffdale or Facebook’s facility in Eagle Mountain.

And most data centers, regardless of their operators, rely on evaporative cooling to keep their servers at optimal temperatures. Some gulp down millions of gallons each month. “It’s a worse story than you can imagine,” Swenson said. “They’re using culinary water, not irrigation [water], so it’s been treated by the city. … It’s a complete waste of a resource.” [] Data centers further treat their water with chemicals to prevent things like scale buildup and Legionnaires’ disease. Some of the water is lost through the evaporative process, while the rest can be reused only a few times before it has to be flushed from the system. Unfortunately, Swenson said, “the places where evaporative cooling works the best are the places where there is the least amount of water.”

As climate change fuels drier conditions and the West’s current “megadrought” shows no signs of ending, some of those arid communities are protesting water-guzzling data facilities. In the early 2010s, Utahns worried so much about the NSA data center’s water consumption — along with Edward Snowden’s revelations that the agency was illegally spying on U.S. citizens — that a Republican legislator proposed shutting off its supply. [] Facebook’s parent company, Meta, has adopted sustainability goals for its own data centers. Still, it consumed 13.5 million gallons in the year between June and May at its 970,000-square-foot Utah site, according to information provided by Eagle Mountain.

The C7/DataBank center in Bluffdale — which is a tenth the size of the NSA and Facebook campuses — used 6.9 million gallons in the past year. Novva, meanwhile, has consumed about 1.1 million gallons since its servers went on line in January, according to West Jordan. In May, it used 585,000 gallons — its highest monthly rate of consumption to date. By comparison, Facebook used 1.3 million that month and the NSA chugged nearly 13 million gallons. [] Why some say data centers are worth their weight in water Beyond water consumption, data centers don’t create many jobs. They also eat up a lot of energy [] Still, the Utah cities that welcome the facilities say they offer a lot of benefits. [] In a statement, an NSA spokesperson said the agency is working to limit water use and be a responsible member of the community. [] What about data centers’ high energy demands? Water improvements aside, data centers devour a lot of electricity. – SOURCE

June 2017 Mesa, Arizona (NBC news)

Drought-stricken communities push back against data centers

As cash-strapped cities welcome Big Tech to build hundreds of million-dollar data centers in their backyards, critics question the environmental cost. But keeping the rows of powerful computers inside the data center from overheating will require up to 1.25 million gallons of water each day, a price that Vice Mayor Jenn Duff believes is too high. “This has been the driest 12 months in 126 years,” she said, citing data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “We are on red alert, and I think data centers are an irresponsible use of our water.”

The spike in use of data-intensive cloud services such as video conferencing tools, video streaming sites like Netflix and YouTube and online gaming, particularly as people quarantined during the pandemic, has increased demand for the computing power offered by data centers globally. And this means more data centers are being built every day by some of America’s largest technology companies, including Amazon, Microsoft and Google and used by millions of customers. According to the Synergy Research Group, there were about 600 “hyperscale” data centers, massive operations designed and operated by a single company that then rents access to cloud services, globally by the end of 2020. That’s double the number there were in 2015. Almost 40 percent of them are in the United States, and Amazon, Google and Microsoft account for more than half of the total. – NBC news

The spike in use of data-intensive cloud services such as video conferencing tools, video streaming sites like Netflix and YouTube and online gaming, particularly as people quarantined during the pandemic, has increased demand for the computing power offered by data centers globally. And this means more data centers are being built every day.

July 2015: Utah (Sage Journals)

From Data flows and water woes: The Utah Data Center

“Using a new materialist line of questioning that looks at the agential potentialities of water and its entanglements with Big Data and surveillance, this article explores how the recent Snowden revelations about the National Security Agency (NSA) have reignited media scholars to engage with the infrastructures that enable intercepting, hosting, and processing immeasurable amounts of data. []

Specifically, I explore the NSA’s infrastructure and the million of gallons of water it requires daily to cool its servers, while located in one of the driest states in the U S [] this article questions the emplacement and impact of corporate data centers more generally, and the changes they are causing to the landscape and local economies. I look at how water is an intriguing and politically relevant part of the surveillance infrastructure and how it has been constructed as the main tool for activism in this case, and how it may eventually help transform the public’s conceptualization of Big Data, as deeply material.”

[] during the Obama Administration, the NSA has created a colossal network of backup hard drives ensuring that failure at one facility is easily recovered from another. The NSA spreads and duplicates storage across multiple locales, including in Georgia, Texas, Colorado, and Hawaii, with a sizeable expansion at its headquarters in Fort Meade, Maryland (scheduled to open in 2016). This $860 million 70,000 square feet of datacenter space in Fort Meade is estimated to require 60 MW of energy to run and makes huge demands on water; up to five millions gallons a day. This location would then detour wastewater (“gray waters”) from the Little Patuxent River, for the purposes of cooling its servers. – Sage Journals

March 2014 (Wired)

Why Does the NSA Want to Keep Its Water Usage a Secret?  The National Security Agency has many secrets, but here’s a new one: the agency is refusing to say how much water it’s pumping into the brand new data center it operates in Bluffdale, Utah.  According to the NSA, its water usage is a matter of national security. If it revealed how much water it’s using in Bluffdale, the agency believes, outsiders could get a good idea of the scope of NSA surveillance. “By computing the water usage rate, one could ultimately determine the computing power and capabilities of the Utah Data Center,” wrote the NSA’s associate director for policy and records, David Sherman, in an undated letter filed with Bluffdale in response to the Tribune’s public records request. “Armed with this information, one could then deduce how much intelligence NSA is collecting and maintaining.” But, oddly enough, water usage has become a very contentious issue for the NSA. An anti-government group called the Tenth Amendment Center is calling for Utah to simply cut off the NSA’s water supply, saying that water is the $1.5 billion data center’s “Achilles Heel.” And last month, a state Republican lawmaker named Marc Roberts said he would introduce a bill that would do such a thing. – Wired

2014: Victory! NSA water records to be released in Utah This month, the Utah State Records Committee ruled that the City of Bluffdale must release water records pertaining to the massive NSA data center located there.  Salt Lake City Tribune reporter Nate Carlisle pursued the information, and his success shows how a series of small, seemingly insignificant actions can lead to a major victory. The committee voted unanimously to require the city to make details of the NSA’s water use public last week. “We felt the law was on our side,” Carlisle told KUTV News. “We also felt there was a public interest in knowing how much water the NSA is using in Utah, so Utahns are informed about the role of the NSA in their state.”  The city of Bluffdale and the NSA were both initially unwilling to give up the details about their arrangement. Water usage estimates range between 1.2 and 1.7 million gallons of water per day, but the NSA was very ambiguous regarding the specific figure, insisting it was a matter of “national security.”  See Short I minute video:  No Water = No NSA Data Center. #NullifyNSA campaign from OffNow.org, https://www.youtube.com/embed/8ANUo8BnYoo

July 2024 Politico Did You Know? The Politics of Reclaiming “Safety“

In the July 25th Safe Tech International News and Notes we included an article from Politico: AI and POLITICS: What voters want on AI from Trump But what would voters actually want, if Trump won? 

The article indicates that many Americans are questioning the wisdom of lax regulation, while re-thinking safety. Questioning the explosion of surveillance of U.S. citizens, fueling the demand for more data centers and more water and energy consumption, may be emerging more quickly from the right than the left.

“The Artificial Intelligence Polling Institute asked nearly 1,000 respondents last week, sharing the results exclusively with Digital Future Daily. The online poll asked them to rate the sometimes conflicting views that Trump allies and the man himself have expressed on AI. What they found might give pause to open-source acolytes and out-there accelerationists alike — and, perhaps unexpectedly, to the Republicans who are ready to line up behind Trump’s desire to repeal President Joe Biden’s sweeping AI agenda. 

Those who responded to the poll, while often conflicted, have serious concerns about the safety of the technology itself. [] The poll also tackled an AI-adjacent issue that has become a key GOP talking point: AI’s thirst for energy. Trump recently suggested that Biden-era environmental regulations would stymie the technology’s development. A mere 33 percent of Trump voters agreed that “regulations should be eased on power generation” for AI, with 37 percent opposing such a move and 30 percent saying they weren’t sure. [] Asked whether Trump in a second term should prioritize keeping the U.S. ahead of China on AI or keeping Americans safe from it, they prioritized safety by a margin of 15 points. HERE

The Case Against Water Metering Infrastructure

In the 2023 report Emergency measures needed to rescue Great Salt Lake from ongoing collapse, researchers at Brigham Young University included a list of things NOT TO DO. The list includes the call not to: Build more infrastructure. There continue to be calls to build more reservoirs and pipelines as a response to the ongoing drought. However, our current situation is not caused by inadequate surface-water storage. In fact, reservoirs represent a major source of consumptive water use. We don’t have enough water to keep current full, and most suitable reservoir sites have already been developed.

In addition, policies to control water consumption via the use of RFR (radio frequency radiation) powering wireless smart meters are examples of poorly conceived tech infrastructure solutions that will

a) create more data and the demand for more data processing and data centers

b) increase surveillance

c) create a built-in cycle of obsolescence and increased e-waste for meters and infrastructure

d) discriminate against certain classes of customers on the basis of health

e) consume resources unnecessarily

See more here:

Smartmeters Health and Safety FAQs – Environmental Health Trust (ehtrust.org)

Physicians for Safe Technology | Smart Meter Radiation Health Effects (mdsafetech.org)

(In addition, scrutiny of the impact of microwaves on the structure of water, for example from installing antennas on water towers, increasing the ambient RFR exposures, and installing wireless meters and banks of meters, is inadequate, despite reported harm. )

Previously, fire alarms only sent a signal when there was a fire. We are now creating over-lapping mesh networks that continuously send signals, unnecessarily, and without regard for safety or for the environment. Smart meters are often promoted for their ability to detect leaks. They do not have to transmit continuously in order to address this need.

Closing Thoughts:

1. When we don’t account for all forms of energy and water consumption, we do not have accurate data, despite the enormous growth and grotesque water and energy consumption of data farms.
2. When we give military and security NSA interests a free pass for planetary environmental impacts, our data and decision making is corrupted.
3. When we attribute blame to farmers and climate, it seems like someone else’s distant problem, and responsibility.
4. The decision to diminish water access for farming and to ignore water use by data farms will have consequences.
5. Our consumption of data is being insidiously increased, without our conscious awareness, including by the introduction of AI.
6. Our unexamined, increased demand for data, (activated by the lockdowns and trauma) offers one avenue for personal decision-making and empowerment. We can begin to embrace digital sobriety, needed in nearly all ways, nearly everywhere, and needed now. Rather than blanketing the planet and its atmosphere with wi-fi, we need a tsunami of awareness that recognizes the Rights of Nature, including the Great Salt Lake’s rights.

Highly Recommended:

Financial Sense Newshour’s Jim Puplava speaks with Mark Mills, Executive Director of the National Center for Energy Analytics about the collision between policy goals and economic realities when it comes to green energy, growing electricity demand from AI, data centers, and onshoring of semiconductor manufacturing. Mark explains how the US is not building enough electrical plants to keep up with demand, let alone enough wind and solar, so it will have to be provided by natural gas and coal, which is also seeing exploding demand globally. Mark also discusses the role of nuclear power, small modular reactors, and why places like Germany and California are seeing outright deindustrialization due to their aggressive green energy policies by not factoring in the difficulty, if not near impossibility, of switching away from the use of hydrocarbons and nuclear for electricity production. This is an eye-opening interview packed full of economic and financial market insights that you won’t want to miss with one of the smartest and brightest minds when it comes to understanding the current conflict between policy, energy, and reality.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/financial-sense-r-newshour/id306759846?i=1000655229628 (1 hour 13 minutes)

(National Center for Energy Analytics Fact-based Perspectives on Energy “NCEA’s scholars are devoted to data-driven analyses of policies, plans, and technologies surrounding the supply and use of energy essential for human flourishing.”)

Related Article:

When Politics and Physics Collide The belief that mandates and massive subsidies can summon a world without fossil fuels is magical thinking. – Mark P. Mills

There’s another category error in analogizing energy tech to computer tech. Consider the IMF’s musings on smartphone substitution and energy substitution. Unshackling the personal phone from wired connections didn’t doom wires and cables for communications—instead, it created an enormous expansion in communications traffic that, collaterally, drove greater need for wires and cables. 

[] neither political rhetoric nor financial largesse can make the impossible possible. 

Be on the right side of history.

Nomophobia is the fear of being without a mobile phone, which can lead to Anxiety Disorder and Panic Attacks.

What is coherence? Does it require access to a device?

Cultures of Coherence

There is something rare and precious about driving in the Cape Ann fishing port of Gloucester, MA. The city has a culture of courtesy on the roadways, built on a foundation of attention, presence, waiting, and….yielding.  

This is a coherent field.

Gloucester drivers yield to large, refrigerated tractor trailers carrying fish along impossibly narrow streets. Drivers yield, to wide turns, to trucks seeking to enter the roadway. The tractor trailers always create a delay in the traffic flow due to sheer size and weight, but drivers yield. No one honks.

If a Gloucester driver approaches a vehicle from the opposite direction waiting to make a left turn, the Gloucester driver will slow down or stop and wave the other car across its path – especially if other cars are also lining up and blocked by the turning driver.  

Those that don’t yield ‘aren’t from around here.’

A friend once remarked that it is ‘totally ridiculous’ to yield to an approaching left-turning driver if you are the only other car on the road. The other driver can easily wait another minute or two and turn after you pass.  But he didn’t understand the culture of courtesy and the grace of making eye contact, waving a driver through, and receiving a small nod of gratitude in return.  

My friend did not perceive or recognize the unified, coherent, field – of patience and presence that nurtures the greater good – with the knowledge that the driver behind you in the rear-view mirror is also paying attention and will also yield, and not blare the horn at you. Unassisted by tech.

It’s a touchstone – of humanity.

Drivers Not Driven by Time Urgency

I think that one reason why the seaside community offers the gifts of patience, presence, courtesy and Time to others is due to the relationship Gloucester holds with the rhythms of the sea, and the Laws of Nature.

It is about Time… but not the time shown on a cell phone or ‘smart watch’, – the industrialized, inanimate, left-brained averaged form of time -which is a tool to coordinate, manipulate, surveil, control, and monetize the masses, and which is irrelevant to the rhythms of the life force and the cosmic current.

In Gloucester, locals know that the highest tide on Monday is not going to happen at the same time on Friday, or on the same day next month. Fisherman and surfers do not rely only on the Gregorian calendar which rules the modern lifestyle, or a clock out of synch with the sun. They live the rhythms of the full and new moons and the tides. The sky still serves as a timepiece.

Each interaction on and off the roads, every day, is an invitation for connection and collaborative ‘right rhythm,’ which is local, inclusive, relevant, and grounded in biology.

We have been missing the boat.

The Cut Bridge and the Art of Waiting

Drivers in Gloucester cannot predict or control when the cut bridge will need to be raised, temporarily closing the vehicle road as boats travel from the harbor to the Annisquam River, or vice versa.

On a summer day, there can be a very long line of boats and crafts of all sizes. The drivers simply wait, in a most civilized manner. Travelers not impatient and not on devices look out on the horizon where the sea meets the sky, connecting with Nature, – and yielding.

You can watch a 5-minute video of the Blynman Canal Draw Bridge Gloucester MA here – patiently, as if you were a part of the coherent field.

Every horizon, in every moment, can offer a moment of calm and integration, and a reset, not via the World Wide Web, but via coherence with the Web of Life.  

We are reaching a critical choice point.

Those Lost at Sea

I believe there is another reason for Gloucester’s respect for one another and for Nature.

The names of the deceased lost at sea are engraved on the Fisherman’s Memorial, some recent.  “Men [] honored here:  5368”

One of 10 plaques mounted in a semi-circle, with the names of those lost at sea, at the Fishermans’ Memorial in Gloucester MA “Numbers alone can never chronicle the loss of human life, yet the statistics reflect the magnitude of Gloucester’s sacrifice. On these plaques are the names of men known to have been lost. This memorial also stands to honor those men and ships lost without record. Men known to be lost at sea and honored here: 5368 Of the nearly 1,000 ships lost, those lost with all hands: 265, Thousands of widows struggled to survive and raise their children and many of those fatherless children entered the trade of their lost fathers. Between 1860–1906, a staggering 660 ships sank. While many of the fishermen were saved, 3880 men were lost. A single storm in 1862 claimed 15 schooners and 120 men, while another devastating storm in 1879 took the lives of 159 men.”

Maybe these losses are one reason why many locals do not delude themselves into believing that humans, machines, or technology are detached, or separate from, or superior to the natural world. There is no illusion that some portion of humans at a distance, with tech, can or should be in control.

When Exiting a Coherent Field: Harmonizing with Incoherence

It is usually not possible or safe to practice “Gloucester driving courtesies” in other locales, because the coherent, unified cultural field is not present. It is especially not possible when approaching a driverless vehicle, or with a car following too closely behind, or a driver on a device, who is not integrated and present. Off island, over the bridge, safety and courtesy are not sustained by others because ‘the field’ is often one of detachment, rushing, and/or competition.

In living history, over the last few decades, humans have shifted further and further into these incoherent energies.  

It’s about our inattention, distraction, and our devices.

Outsourcing Attention, and Response-Ability

While driving, those rushing, and those on screens, do not recognize that they are outsourcing the responsibility for their safety and the safety of others – to others on the road.

Attentive drivers have to be on the lookout for cars that are not staying in their lane, with drivers who are distracted and in a state of incoherence.  

Technologies, as currently adopted by humans, have created this culture, and it is getting worse, not better, and it’s not only on the roads. 

When in the gym, a portion of patrons will be sitting on machines, texting or scrolling or adjusting their music, oblivious to the effects on others in the space, – who are waiting.

In the grocery store, some portion of shoppers will be talking on the phone or looking at the phone while heading down the aisle, or stopped in front of some section of the store, oblivious to others in the area,  – waiting.

Some portion of walkers on the rail trail will be talking on a cell phone or texting, and looking at their device, outsourcing the responsibility for coherence to others.

By definition, when a human being focuses on a small screen, they are directing their senses away from the outer environment. This narrowed screen-based focus is literally damaging posture and eyesight, including in children. Screen use and social media are also disturbing the balance of brain chemicals serotonin, dopamine, gaba, and acetylcholine.

We are no longer aligning with one another in the present time and place, fully embodied in all of our senses, nurturing the greater good.

The cost of lack of integration with both the inner and outer environment and with each other is unfathomable.  

The number of humans at any one point in time who are wholly aware of their environment, of others, of nature, of their own bodies, is at an all-time low on Earth – due to devices.  

“Smart Meters: My Name is Marguerite”

Over a decade ago, I witnessed coherence, community, and compassion when wireless smart utility meters began to be installed in Maine. A sweet elderly woman contacted our Massachusetts activist group asking for help. She started to suddenly collapse in her kitchen after a wireless smart meter was installed. Her son contacted us also, explaining that she was in her 80’s and perfectly healthy until the day the meter went in. Her family had reached out to many decision makers including industry, ecology groups, and politicians involved with the deployment of smart meters, to no avail.

Her fourteen neighbors, upon hearing her plight, immediately chose to opt out of having a smart meter installed on their homes. They were not willing to accept that the supposed energy and cost savings were worth the price of destroying their neighbor’s health.

This question of smart meter harm should have been addressed decades ago. In the meantime, deployments continue, and decision-makers in some areas are prohibiting the practice of opting out, and/or imposing punitive surcharges.

This represents an incoherent, unstable, unsafe field that must be sustained at great expense, through falsehoods, manipulations, and abuse of power.  

We are safer, in all ways, when everyone is watching out for others and for the coherence of the field, and not lying, exploiting, or treating others as collateral damage. Device use is sustaining an artificial reality about the safety of wireless tech – to sustain wireless tech. AI will not solve this.

The Art of Pausing – With and For Others

What do humans usually do when forced to wait, – that new behavior adopted the last two decades?

Humans detach, and scroll, and text, individually, everywhere.   

We didn’t realize what the consequences were of screen-centric behaviors adopted during the pandemic, and the harm it has caused to the” field” of our consciousness.

Whether intentional or accidental, a growing portion of the population is either drunk or drowning in wireless frequencies, including children.

We face countless choices every day, about how to fill spaces in time.

We have been acculturated to look at a small screen that in itself seeks to manage and control our reality, just as previous generations were acculturated to smoke cigarettes. Both have been justified as beneficial to health.  

Excessive “device-ing” is an increasingly unconscious and addictive choice, altering our reality, not for the better.

Right vs. Left Brained Consciousness

Part of this unbalanced dynamic has been caused by loss of right-brained, holistic processing discussed here recently by Kate Kheel of Safe Tech International.  “The 2009 treatise, ‘The Master and His Emissary, The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World’ by Iain McGilchrist discusses at length how the different world views of the left and right hemispheres of the brain impact us both individually and as a society.

The left sees the world in parts, is detailed oriented, and has a single-minded focus on achieving a given task. In Iain’s words, it favors, “manipulation – grabbing, getting and controlling” and is an inanimate universe. It’s like a map of the world which leaves out the sentience, flavors, and nuance of the actual world. The right hemisphere sees more holistically and senses our interconnectedness with all life. Iain explains, “[It] sees not the representation but the living presence.” The right brain understands that life is ever morphing and evolving, and experiences an animate universe of richness, complexity, potential, and imagination.  In principle, the two sides of the brain complement one another enabling us to go about our daily activities and accomplish necessary tasks (more left brain skillset), while still sensing we are part of a grander interconnected and integrated living system (a right brain skillset).

Iain opines that since the Enlightenment, our Western civilization has moved increasingly to the left (i.e. left-brained thinking), “…drunk on the belief that it knows everything and can fix everything.” – Kate Kheel

(See the 2021 4-minute overview of the book about the asymmetrical brain with Iain Gilchrist here.  See the entire 1-hour interview here.  See the Feb. 2004 46-minute Creed Culture interview with Dr. Iain Gilchrist here. In this episode, Luke and Iain discuss his work, focusing on the importance of rediscovering the sacred, viewing the world holistically, and engaging the imagination alongside our reasoning faculties.”)

AI is a force multiplier of the imbalance between right and left-brain processing.

Replacing ‘Sailing Too Close to the Wind’ with ‘Digital Sobriety’.

There are an increasing number of efforts emerging towards establishing coherent fields, by challenging inaccurate narratives about tech, including wireless.   

# 1 Digital Sobriety, To Protect Nature

Guidelines governing wireless exposures have never considered the effects of RFR on the nature environment.

On April 17, Arthur Firstenberg of the Cellular Phone Tack Force published his alarming narrative “Whirling fish, bees, worms, sheep, turtles, penguins; More Than Fifty Species Of Fish Circling And Spinning Until They Die” culled from reports from the public – i.e. citizen science. See his other newsletters here.

See also: Microwave News

https://microwavenews.com/short-takes-archive/review-emf-and-rf-effects-flora-and-fauna

#2 Digital Sobriety, to Protect Children – It’s Still a Man’s World

Guidelines governing wireless exposures have never considered the effects of RFR on pregnant women, infants, and children.

Read about how cellphones are tested on a dummy – that represents the head of a male military recruit: We Are Not SAM.

Regarding mental health, John Haidt’s “After Babel “ Substack (free to all subscribers) chronicles his extraordinary research around the supposition that “the transformation of society in the 2010s was not caused by anxious college students. They were simply the “canaries in the coal mine” — the first generation whose social lives have moved onto smartphones and social media platforms. As soon as they did so, in the early 2010s, an epidemic of mental illness began.” Learn more here.

#3 Digital Sobriety, Regarding Neurological Health, EHS, Brain Cancer, DNA Damage, and More

Guidelines governing wireless exposures have never considered the non-thermal effects of RFR, assuming that the only mechanism of damage is heat.

See the Bioinitiative Report 2022:

See EMF Medical Conference 2021 59 videos (29 hours) of highly informative expert presentations and panel discussions. Trailer and more details: https://emfconference2021.com/online-cme-ce-courses/

The Return of Reason: Replacing NOMOPHOBIA (Fear of Being Without a Cell Phone) and FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) with LOMO (Less on Line – More on Life)

Those not yet actively questioning technology and technocracy are outsourcing responsibility for the safety of the Earth and humanity to those who are not ready, willing and able to confront an incoherent worldview.

Wireless, in particular, is a harmful environmental pollutant. Nature does not recognize placing radio frequency transmitters on wildlife as conservation, or AI’s grotesque water and energy consumption or carbon credits as progress towards stewardship. Technology harmful to biology is violating the Laws of Nature. Promoting AI alongside scarcity and carbon narratives, and smart grid/smart meter manipulations that deny access to basic services when needed, is obscene.

We face a perilous crossing.

Digital Sobriety and Scientific Diplomacy

As individuals, we can begin reclaiming our own habit fields, to move towards digital sobriety and scientific diplomacy in response to real world damage already unfolding.

Most likely we can and will continue to use devices and technology, but first we need to backtrack to hold ourselves accountable for coherence, true inclusion, and safety.  

From mining to energy consumption to water use to disposal, we have unleashed a tsunami of outsourced damage, with new sights set on colonizing and exploiting space -competitively.

We need to make our choices and decisions about tech more conscious, more inclusive, more ethical, more truthful, and more protective of nature and human health, everywhere.

Screen Time (Perhaps) Can Recede to its Rightful Place

One way to start is to hard wire wherever possible as the first choice (especially in schools), and the minimize using screens and devices when in motion, for example when driving and walking.

There are so many good reasons and opportunities to forgo screens altogether, or to share screen experiences, rather than seeking faster, more ubiquitous wireless connections.

“Red, right, returning.” This Earth Day, more than ever, we need to call ourselves home.

“The real energy crisis, which exists upon this world, is the spiritual energy crisis and if this was solved all other crises would cease to exist” – George King – Western Master of Yoga

Image courtesy EPIC | Electromagnetic Pollution Illnesses Canada Foundation (EPIC) (iexistworld.org) To order bumper stickers and other LOMO items, send an email to epic@iexistworld.org.

There are two moments each year when the sunrise and sunset are twelve hours apart, when the Sun lies directly above the Earth’s equator, and neither the North or South pole point toward the Sun. Equinoxes have long been associated with contemplating the balance between polarities, including yin and yang, darkness and light, right and wrong. Equinoxes and solstices were pivotal to human societies when the sky served as the clock and calendar and cultures were aligned with Natural Law and the Cosmic Current. The equinox occurs on March 19, 2024. Juxtaposed with the equinox, this blog is part of an on-going discussion about the need to heal the growing divide between telecommunications technology and nature and health.

When my children were young, parents began driving their children to and from the school bus stop. It started only during inclement weather, but then the habit became the norm.  Cars often sat with the engines running (although many towns have since passed anti-idling laws) with older children and parents often on their cell phones.

The change in behavior unfolded insidiously and most likely was unintentional.

But from a health perspective, families who followed the crowd adopted dysfunctional behaviors with quantifiable negative impacts on air quality. They would have benefitted more from walking together, interaction, and access to the sun and nature, rather than the unexamined comfort and convenience.  

Humans slipped in their inborn capacities and intelligence. They made unwise choices, mostly unaware or in denial.

Course Corrections in Consciousness

On the other side of the equation, there have been remarkable examples of attempts at course corrections.

Consumer opposition against Nestle’s exploded in the late 1970s when the corporation was convincing poor African mothers without access to clean water that their infant formula was superior to breast milk, resulting in infant deaths.

The Catholic Church played an enormous role in promoting the ethics underlying the boycott. Another example of engaged activism unfolded during the historical action against the Gallo wine company.

Societal Change, Sensibility, and Individual Choice

Societal norms can be changed for better or for worse.

For example, Politico’s “Digital Future Daily” has the tag line “How the next wave of technology is upending the global economy and its power structures” implying that tech is ushering in a more enlightened age. Whereas Silicon Valley historically presented itself as anti-establishment and “for the people,” the reality is that Silicon Valley has unleashed its own grotesque tsunami of consolidation of wealth and power, and abuses, including its ties with the military industrial complex.

At this point in history, a growing but marginalized portion of society is at an inflection point. Experts and consumers recognize that screen technologies, including wireless devices and infrastructure, promoted under the guises of safety, security and sustainability, are in fact none of these.

Informed advocates recognize that we have surpassed the threshold where the antidote is to wait for more tech innovation to address the social, safety, and security risks. They are calling out the entrainment, addiction, greed, delusion, and willful ignorance. The emperor has no clothes.

For the mass consumer culture, lack of insight is inherent in the devices themselves, even without virtual and augmented realities. Focus is diverted to a narrowly contained field. Users are distracted from witnessing both the inner and outer environment. Even eyesight is already being harmed.

Moore’s Law

Delusions about tech and wireless have prevailed in sustainability and carbon-based climate efforts, despite reported harm.  

One contributing principle was delineated in 1965 – Moore’s Law.

Investopedia describes Moore’s Law:

“In 1965, Gordon Moore posited that roughly every two years, the number of transistors on microchips will double. Commonly referred to as Moore’s Law, this phenomenon suggests that computational progress will become significantly faster, smaller, and more efficient over time. Widely regarded as one of the hallmark theories of the 21st century, Moore’s Law carries significant implications for the future of technological progress—along with its possible limitations.”

An implication of Moore’s law is that as efficiency and availability increases and consumer costs decrease, overall consumption actually increases.  

This creates a conundrum for efforts towards conservation.

Digitally-based technologies are not decreasing energy and resource consumption.

See The Conundrum: How Scientific Innovation, Increased Efficiency, and Good Intentions Can Make Our Energy and Climate Problems Worse (2011) “[] David Owen argues that our best intentions are still at cross purposes to our true goal – living sustainably and caring for our environment and the future of the planet. Efficiency, once considered the holy grail of our environmental problems, turns out to be part of the problem. Efforts to improve efficiency and increase sustainable development only exacerbate the problems they are meant to solve, more than negating the environmental gains. We have little trouble turning increases in efficiency into increases in consumption.”

See Coal Plants Staying Online Because Ai Needs So Much Power “We Still Don’t Appreciate The Energy Needs Of This Technology.” Nationwide, the AI industry’s energy demand seems even more fearsome. According to an analysis from Boston Consulting Group cited by Bloomberg, the electricity consumption at US data centers alone is expected to triple from 2022 levels by the end of the decade. In the analysis’s summary, that’s equal to the electricity used by about a third of the total homes in the US, and about 7.5 percent of the entire country’s projected energy demand.

See: An increasingly energy-gulping digital world. The fast expansion of ICT leads to a rapid increase of its direct energy footprint. This footprint includes the energy used for the production and the use of ICT equipment (servers, networks, terminals). This direct footprint has been increasing by 9% per year. Compared to 2010, the direct energy consumption generated by 1 Euro invested in digital technologies has increased by 37%. The energy intensity of the ICT sector is growing by 4% per year in stark contrast to the trend of global GDP’s energy intensity evolution, which is declining by 1.8% per year. The explosion of video uses (Skype, streaming, etc.) and the increased consumption of frequently renewed digital equipment are the main drivers of this inflation.

When did we go so far off course?

In part, via trauma-based, uninformed choices regarding cell phones, broadband consumption, and infrastructure, powered by regulations that expressly prohibit protecting health and the environment – to facilitate economic growth.  

This is an extinction paradigm.

September 11 and Cell Phones

Media depictions of Sept. 11 (including a phone call made from an airplane) were one factor that translated directly into consumers seeking a sense of safety and control – by having cell phones where they could reach anyone, anywhere, and any time.  (The trauma of school shootings also contributed.)

The fear-based consumer shift was not accompanied by scrutiny regarding the safety of the technology for human health or the environment, and consumers held an unfounded presumption of safety.

Broadband Usage: Pandemic Trauma and Hollywood Writer’s Strike

On February 13, in his blogpost “Another New High for Broadband Usage” Doug Dawson of CCG Consulting reported Openvault’s statistics for combined upload and download usage in the United States from 2018 to 2023.  He wrote, “The average U.S. broadband customer used 54.3 more gigabytes per month than a year earlier. That alone is a pretty amazing statistic – 54 gigabytes is a lot of usage in a month. With roughly 120 million broadband subscribers, this equates to over 6.5 billion more gigabytes of data used each month than just a year ago.” []Open Vault always includes other interesting statistics in its quarterly reports:

The average upload usage per household grew to just over 40 gigabytes per month – up from 15 gigabytes at the end of 2019.

6% of homes now use over a terabyte of data per month.

Median household broadband usage is 423.7 gigabytes – half of homes use more broadband than the median, and half use less.

OpenVault showed the differences between residents and businesses for the first time. The average residence used 652 GB at the end of 2023, while the average business customer used 345 GB.”

Power brokers, ranging from environmental groups to liberal politicians, who identify with conservation goals, have ignored the costs, and in fact continue to enable the dramatic curve in increased broadband demand.  

Written Word, Voice, or Video? Who cares? Who Counts?

This increase in screen time was insidiously ushered into the mass culture during the pandemic, when many other alternative activities were limited, and when family members began using multiple independent devices.

A colleague noted, “In terms of consumption, a page of text is the equivalent of a mosquito; an image represents a fly; and video is the equivalent of a jumbo jet.

5 kilobytes (0.005 MB) for 1,000-word text web page

150 kilobytes for (0.150 MB) 800 x 1000 pixel jpeg image

150,000 kilobytes (150 MB) for HD/1080p ten minute Youtube compressed video

300,000 kilobytes (300 MB) for 4k/2160p ten minute Youtube compressed video”

More Data and Video Necessitates More Infrastructure

The article Cell Tower Range: How Far Do They Reach? explains. “On average, the maximum usable range of a cell tower is 25 miles. While the typical coverage radius of a cell tower is 1 to 3 miles and in dense urban environments, a cell tower usually reaches 0.25 miles to 1 mile before handing off a user’s connection to another nearby cell site. [] . However, people began using their cell phones for more than just phone calls, specifically, for applications like texting, mobile internet, and e-mail – all of which used more data than voice services. As a result, the radius that a cell tower could theoretically cover was still 5 miles, but only people in the first 2.5 miles could receive enough spectrum and thus, cellular service to their phones.”

Will the tide turn?

Course Correction Example: Zoom Galleries 

When and how does corrective social change unfold? When awareness translates into action.

Last week, I participated in a zoom call with over 100 participants, featuring a presentation followed by Q and A. Every person in the gallery had their camera turned off, except for the presenter and the moderator.

Earlier in the month, I was invited to participate in another group zoom call.  For this gathering, every participant was required to turn their camera on.

Both groups express intentions around problem solving, community, environmental stewardship, and supporting human rights. But the first group has already pivoted away from the unexamined, unconscious and grotesque video, screen, and telecommunications consumption that was fueled by the pandemic’s trauma.

The other group is fearful of infiltration and remains unaware of the burgeoning implications of screen-based telecommunications, 5G, and wireless technologies.  It is not intentional or malicious; the group is simply mirroring the dominant culture’s lack of awareness of cultivated demand for constant screen connectivity that was intensified during the pandemic.

Smart Meters and 5G

Quantifiable harm from new wireless technologies became apparent when utilities began rolling out the next generation of smart meters around 2009, Harm was reported from both PLC and RF applications,

With the wireless industries increasingly in control of the media’s message (note the impact of industry advertising). society ignored the carnage. Industry ridiculed those reporting health harm.

The deployments continue, with the very real risk of stranded assets for ratepayers and taxpayers, because the technology is not safe for all users in all circumstances.

Another wave of concern about telecommunications technologies exploded a decade later when 5G began to be installed in front yards and neighborhoods to support autonomous vehicles and remote surgeries, and to enable the US to win the race against China for 5G.

The informed opposition was halted during the pandemic by 3 factors:

1. The pandemic artificially inflated the demand for connectivity.

2. The pandemic stopped the growing protest movement. (Global protest days against 5G began in early 2020 and were the brainchild of Dorotea Radoš Čulina of Croatia, Tanja Katarina Rebel of the U.K. and other colleagues around the world. Read the history here.)

3. Advocates identifying the risks associated with 5G were widely portrayed in the media as low-intelligence, right leaning, irrational arsonists fueled by Russian disinformation.

How did so many fall so easily for this narrative?

This equinox, get yourself, and this Earth free.

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