Digital surveillance; talk of mandatory vaccine ‘tattoos'

“Along with the vaccine, a child would be injected with a bit of dye that is invisible to the naked eye but easily seen with a special cell-phone filter, combined with an app that shines near-infrared light onto the skin. The dye would be expected to last up to five years, according to tests on pig and rat skin and human skin in a dish.”

In developing this idea, which the article proudly notes avoids using “iris scans” that might violate privacy, was “funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.” It “came about because of a direct request from Microsoft founder and philanthropist Bill Gates himself, who has been supporting efforts to wipe out diseases such as polio and measles across the world.”


Governments are ramping up their surveillance on citizens.

Reuters reported yesterday:

Digital surveillance rolled out to curb coronavirus should be limited in time and scope, more than 100 rights groups said on Thursday, warning governments not to use the crisis as cover for pervasive snooping.

From facial recognition to phone tracking, governments are turning to technology to trace infections and keep tabs on the population as they enforce lockdowns, curfews and quarantines.

But without appropriate safeguards in place, tools deployed to save lives could cause lasting harm to people’s rights, leading civil society organisations, including Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Privacy International, said in a statement.

“An increase in state digital surveillance powers, such as obtaining access to mobile phone location data, threatens privacy, freedom of expression and freedom of association,” the groups said.