Smart Cities
The government aim for 5G as repeatedly published since 2017 is for many transmitters and sensors/devices to be interconnected and for the data to be interrogated and patterns of relationships within to be discovered using AI. The proliferation of these RFR emitting devices automatically leads to a smart/surveillance grid which can be mapped onto areas of any size. The vision is for smart surveillance cities. This is being done without the precautionary principle applied and without proper scrutiny or debate.
The situation is growing in urgency with the discussions of Digital ID which have been re-started after the election. This allied to the use of the 5G network to implement Smart cities is chilling and can easily produce an automated privacy-free, turn-key tyranny. Especially since the governments in recent times at the very least have been poor in ensuring privacy laws are adhered to. The necessary densification of the network of transmitters will have biological effects. The government has not kept up to date with studies on this topic since 2011 and even then, their view on the matter is partial as Dr Sarah Starkey highlights.
Why the energy and resource use of 5G is important to highlight (https://envirotecmagazine.com/2021/11/08/how-green-is-5g/). Imposition of Smart/surveillance cities are being wrapped in the climate emergency narrative: https://off-guardian.org/2024/06/26/exposed-how-climate-racketeers-aim-to-force-us-into-smart-gulags/
The C40 envisioned smart city involves far more than ULEZ. It has been long planned, now prior to its full activation, we find the infrastructure is being rapidly installed around us. It involves:
- Tracking individuals using sensors as they go about their lives doing various things, making various transactions (https://bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/campaigns/no-spycoin/) in various places.
- Collecting and storing in bulk the resulting data.
- Analysing, finding and refining relationships between data, sometimes in real time, using machine learning/AI (https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2021/662937/IPOL_BRI(2021)662937_EN.pdf) such that it could become predictive.
- Automating systems to prevent or punish people from doing what is outside the bounds as set by supranational bodies like the C40 Cities Group. (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/09/15/sadiq-khan-green-london-net-zero-ulez-c40-mayors-2030/)
This all requires a dense wireless network like 5G which can be both spread across all directions and unlike previous generations, be directed at specific targets.
It also requires countless sensors (https://www.innovateproject.org/)of all kinds (https://www.wired.com/2012/03/petraeus-tv-remote/) dotted around in geographical space, in homes (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/consumer-affairs/smart-meter-why-say-no-get-one/) and even in bodies. (https://www.rand.org/about/nextgen/art-plus-data/giorgia-lupi/internet-of-bodies-our-connected-future.html)
From interconnecting these myriad sensors the smart city (https://odysee.com/@5GinMerton:2/5GinMerton-Boris-5G-Speech-25-09-19:5) emerges- the interconnection is the government’s vision for what 5G should enable (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a75c1c3e5274a4368299bb3/Next_Generation_Mobile_Technologies__An_Update_to_the_5G_Strategy_for_the_UK_Final_Version_with_Citation.pdf)
It’s not cheap, the expense of these digital systems of control by remote bodies will be funded by the public upon whom it will then be imposed.
To get the money for the pre-planned smart city that government regardless of party have in mind, the public will have to be made more amenable or conditioned to acquiesce. https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/sites/default/files/publications/MINDSPACE.pdf
The “climate emergency” and “sustainability” mantra and being seen as “doing your bit” by neighbours/peers will make for a forbidding social environment for dissent or even questioning.
This London Assembly meeting (https://www.london.gov.uk/who-we-are/what-london-assembly-does/questions-mayor/find-an-answer/climate-emergency-and-c40-cities-group) on the C40 Cities Group shows the above being narrowly focused upon by representatives, it creates the idea that nothing else is worthy of discussion.
The bitter irony is the very infrastructure (https://www.greenpeace.org/static/planet4-eastasia-stateless/2021/05/a5886d59-china-5g-and-data-center-carbon-emissions-outlook-2035-english.pdf) framed as being good for sustainability is extremely wasteful of energy and damaging to the environment. (https://envirotecmagazine.com/2021/11/08/how-green-is-5g/)
Apart from the new tech, new legislation has to be put in place to push things through: Privacy protections of the public need to be removed. (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/19/extreme-surveillance-becomes-uk-law-with-barely-a-whimper)
The significant anti-democratic tilt of power towards state institutions and away from the public they are meant to serve will also clear the path and make dissent more difficult.
An important example of the above trend is represented by the (very shocking) Covert Human Intelligence legislation (https://eachother.org.uk/covert-human-intelligence-bill-controversy/). It has now become law having received royal ascent. https://bills.parliament.uk/bills/2783
The creep of illegal unwarranted excessive surveillance keeps happening but none of our representatives treat it with the seriousness it deserves: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13545891/Network-Rail-Amazon-AI-cameras-railway-passengers-emotions.html and https://bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/Biometric-Britain.pdf