I work, pay taxes, buy consumer goods, have a bank account, travel to work, eat food, go on holiday and surf the web. Fairly straightforward stuff that millions of us do, every single day all over the world. I decided to look at the way in which society is organised (e.g. its industrial and political components) that enable all sorts of people to know what I do and how I do it. My bottom line is: pay cash whenever possible as it is amazing to me to realise that so many people and organisations know what we do and take a great interest in how we live and organise ourselves, especially our consumer and consumption habits. Even better, try and barter your skills for someone else’s and do away for the need for cash transactions where possible.

Is it not strange that our salaries are automatically paid into a bank and we must have a bank account before we can access our hard earned monies. Is there a legal proviso somewhere that says you must have a bank account before we hire you? Are there no alternatives? Why are we not paid in cash? Just a thought.

I detail some of the changes in how I live my life to ensure that what I do in my private life stays exactly where it should be, with me and with no-one else.

(1) I live and work in London and use the London Underground with its full compliment of over 68,000 CCTV cameras (very helpfully positioned every 2 metres or so to ensure that we poor commuters do not get lost). I buy a monthly pass called an OYSTER card that I swipe at the entrance and exit to each tube station I travel into and out of. In essence, the OYSTER card records all my journeys with exact time and date, each time I use it. I can also use this pass on the London buses so that if I decide to use a bus, this use is also logged to my ‘account’. Therefore, whether I travel to work or go out for fun, there is a record of where, when and what time I went out (and came back). I have no idea how London Underground uses this information and I do not really care but, I have decided on one thing: if I have to travel on the Underground, I will pay by cash each time I travel. Due to the bombs which went off on 07/07/2005 I have also decided to travel to work by other means that may not involve catching buses or going on underground tube stations, especially after what happened to one Brazilian man who was shot in the head by the police by mistake. By doing the above and not using the OYSTER card, I claw a bit of my privacy back.

(2) My bank account details how much I earn and what I spend it on if I decide to buy something using one of the credit or debit cards. I have no problems telling people what I earn (which ain’t much but I guess this is relative) but in future, I will draw cash and not pay by card. Hopefully, this will stop my bank sending me (spamming) stuff they think I might be interested in based on what I regularly buy and consume. I honestly wish that I could be paid weekly in cash so that I do not have to use a bank account but paying our salaries into a named bank account is almost enshrined into our work contracts nowadays. By doing the above, I claw a bit of my privacy back.

(3) I buy my food from numerous places but inevitably, I am forced to buy it in supermarkets. Supermarkets have so-called ‘loyalty cards’ and by using this card, the supermarkets know what we buy, how much we spend and how regularly we shop. Its also amazing to think that they give you less than 1% back on everything you spend e.g. if you buy £100 you ‘get back’ £1 on your bill (big deal, not). When I buy food now I use cash, do not use a ‘loyalty’ card and keep my cheque book and card in my wallet. By doing the above, I claw a little bit of my privacy back.

(4) I use a ‘pay as you go’ mobile phone and when its credit runs out so will its use as I have decided to scrap it. Mobile phones like most pieces of kit have some useful features but they also provide all sorts of personal information that should remain personal to me e.g. where I am and whom I speak to. Firstly, I do not like the idea that via their use of satellites, I can be tracked to roughly within 2 metres of where I am making the call. If I go abroad, I get a little message that says, ‘welcome to wherever’, e.g. the phone says that you have gone on holiday. A second and perhaps more important reason for scrapping my use of mobile phones is that I am not convinced by the studies carried out (financed by the mobile phone industry) on the safety of transmitting UHF radio waves into your brain tissue. In this way, I claw back a little bit of my privacy back.

(5) The Internet is a very interesting place and I am continually amazed at what goes on under the surface. I have broadband but do not keep it on continually as it makes it easier for people and organisations to hack into your computer. I have various layers of security on my machine and in spite of it all, do suffer from virus and other forms of attack. I ensure that I monitor so-called ‘cookies’. Cookies are little bits of code that huge numbers of websites like to put on your machine. Cookies send information back to base on how often you use their software and other bits of information. I also use an up to date antivirus package and beef up security with additional programmes to monitor adware and spyware. Most of the bad stuff I receive is sent from sites that end in dotcom e.g. sites that trade /sell software. I have a long list of so-called reputable software programmes that have spyware built into their programmes so that those back at base can monitor the use and frequency of their software. I also have programmes that clean and delete my computer habits e.g. what software I use, what I delete, copy, burn files, what music I listen to etc. Inevitably, I use a windows operating system which appears to be designed to enable certain types of people and organisations ‘backdoor’ entry into my computer. It cannot be any other way as the reputation of windows operating systems in terms of its security is pretty bad by anyone’s standards. I guess I would call myself an average user e.g. I use my computer to send and read email, surf the internet for information etc. However, I now feel like a network administrator as I need to update all the security programmes, ensure my spam software is up to date with all the latest variants of say, c.1.a.lis etc. I am also aware of the ‘Echelon’ project which has been in operation for a number of years now in which a number of countries have the ability to snoop into our emails and monitor our telephone conversations via the use of ‘keywords’. There are also other areas of using the Internet which also lead to a loss of privacy e.g. the use of search engines. Some search engines are notorious for ‘mining’ all sorts of information on you and some of the bigger ISPs (internet service providers) blatantly install an amazing array of programmes and software to track your computer use and what you do on the Internet. In spite of it all, I behave as a network administrator on a regular basis because I am determined to claw back, a little bit of my privacy.

(6) One last thing before I close on this huge subject (which could easily fill many pages) is to chat about our fear-based media and how they manipulate and distort our centres of emotions and discernment. The pace of death and destruction and its reporting via newspapers and TV from around the world appears to be at a phenomenal level. It is clear from the content of daily newspapers that there must be an element of 'goodness' for the people who control these empires because they report the same old shit on different days. Real news is censored and a form of 'Alice in Wonderland' mentality reigns supreme, especially when the papers are quoting the latest 'double-squeak' from politicians. This is something that you can see or not, depending on your point of view. But, I just want to point out that following a 'terrorist' or other atrocity, a number of the daily newspapers are so keen to get their version of events out that they give their papers out for free. This does not include the 'free' newspapers that you can pick up at your local Metro or London Underground station every morning. This seemingly trivial event flies in the face of those people who defend the content of newspapers by saying that 'bad news sells' and no one is interested in 'good' news. In other words, what we read is designed for mind control /propaganda purposes. This was made clear when the official story of events that unfolded in the shooting of an innocent man from Brazil who was shot 7 or 8 times whilst sitting in a London underground tube. The so-called 'official' order of events as described by the media, newspapers, radio, TV, BBC etc. were about as reliable as going to Wimbledon and seeing some tennis before it starts raining. In other words, a manufactured reality was put before us to shape our perceptions of what had actually happened to make it (the shooting of a totally innocent man caught up in the 'moral panic' of a nation-state caught up in its own 'terrorist' rhetoric) more acceptable to the unbelieving public. By not buying newspapers and seeking my information on world events outside the traditional mainstream journalists and TV broadcasts, I decide my own version of reality, think for myself and claim back my privacy of thought and originality from those who think we are too stupid to notice. I also switch off my TV for 95% of the time and rarely listen to the 'dumbed down' talk radio shows in the UK. By doing the above, I claim a little bit of my privacy back.

These are just a few things that I have decided to change in my life and they relate to the sorts of things that you think would not interest anyone, but, they do. Until someone can explain to me why almost every aspect of our lives is monitored and sent to numerous ‘super’ databases to be consolidated, classified and no doubt interrogated by unknown persons and organisations, I will begin the big ‘shutdown’ to the antics of Big Brother. I am me, I am free and I do these things because I am determined to claw back a little bit of my privacy.