---
title: "Here come the \"digilantes\", citizen snoops are us"
date: 2006-01-13T00:08:25Z
modified: 2006-01-13T00:08:25Z
permalink: "https://redmonk.com/jgovernor/here-come-the-digilantes-citizen-snoops-are-us/"
type: post
status: publish
excerpt: ""
wpid: 451
categories:
  - Uncategorized
timestamp: 2006-01-13T00:08:25Z
tags:
  - Uncategorized
---

I am a fan of participatory culture and community-created insights.



But everything has a dark side.



Remember how in the novel 1984 Big Brother used citizens as snitches…well in Shoreditch, London, just down the road from my office, we’re doing just that.



The UK government is running a trial where citizens will be not only given access to local closed circuit television in order to keep track of any undesirables (those that have been issued with [anti-social behaviour](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASBO) orders), but also given a set of mugshots of those ASBO recipients in order to keep track of them in the local area. 



Robin Wilton today gives the phenomen a name – “digilantes”.



As Robin says, “asbolutely” incredible. We’ll see a lot more of this in future. The UK is increasing its lead as the world leader in surveillance technology and “business” models. The “Respect Agenda”. Nice.





hat-tip to [KableNet](http://www.kablenet.com/kd.nsf/Frontpage/A9A9E5AC1F17DE27802570F100568621?OpenDocument).