> Back in the 80's, I remember that people were protesting without internet and mobile phones, with very successful results.
Back then, the governments didn't have that either. Pigs on the streets with barely working (or understandable) radios, outdated huge paper maps, and if they were lucky a barely working chopper for a bit of aerial surveillance. The only tools were water cannons, batons, tear gas that didn't work against drunk people, shields and live ammo.
These days, the abilities of governments in counter-protesting are absurd:
- each pig has not just a radio with high quality audio transmission, but also a digital data channel for streaming video and other intel in both directions
- tons of surveillance cameras with high definition imaging sensors
- cheap-ass drones
- there are multiple vendors offering "data fusion" for command centers. Think of platforms that fuse everything into one cohesive environment: a Google Maps map and satellite view, with individual position markers for each unit, live feeds from thousands of surveillance cameras, live feeds from officer body cameras, live feeds from drones and choppers, AI analyzing all of that to predict movements of the masses, incoming firehose feeds from Twitter and Facebook...
- highly effective tear gases, mobile walls on tanks to lock down streets [first photo of 1], tasers, rubber bullets, LRAD acoustic weapons and other non-deadly tools for crowd control
It's hard to mount successful protest against nations that have half the stuff I just described, and as HK shows all but impossible against a nation that does have this kind of abilities.
Yup, the other side of the coin is even darker. To add to the list - the recent trend to phase out cash in favor of electronic payments.
Protesters can just have their accounts frozen, and/or deposits confiscated, as we seen in recent examples.
(Those young kids who use their latest Apple watch to pay for coffee in the morning just because it's "convenient" really do not understand what they are sleepwalking into...)
Back then, the governments didn't have that either. Pigs on the streets with barely working (or understandable) radios, outdated huge paper maps, and if they were lucky a barely working chopper for a bit of aerial surveillance. The only tools were water cannons, batons, tear gas that didn't work against drunk people, shields and live ammo.
These days, the abilities of governments in counter-protesting are absurd:
- each pig has not just a radio with high quality audio transmission, but also a digital data channel for streaming video and other intel in both directions
- tons of surveillance cameras with high definition imaging sensors
- cheap-ass drones
- there are multiple vendors offering "data fusion" for command centers. Think of platforms that fuse everything into one cohesive environment: a Google Maps map and satellite view, with individual position markers for each unit, live feeds from thousands of surveillance cameras, live feeds from officer body cameras, live feeds from drones and choppers, AI analyzing all of that to predict movements of the masses, incoming firehose feeds from Twitter and Facebook...
- highly effective tear gases, mobile walls on tanks to lock down streets [first photo of 1], tasers, rubber bullets, LRAD acoustic weapons and other non-deadly tools for crowd control
It's hard to mount successful protest against nations that have half the stuff I just described, and as HK shows all but impossible against a nation that does have this kind of abilities.
[1] https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/12/14/france-police-crowd-cont...