Stuart wrote: >What's to link? All that can be linked is that a metrocard was bought >in one place, be it a subway station, deli or whatever, and then used >somewhere else, the subway or bus. Hundreds of metrocards are bought >at every station every day, used once, and tossed in the trash. >All that can be linked is that one anonymous person, along with dozens >of others, bought a metrocard and got on the subway a few minutes >later, and then vanished into the crush.
This largely true except when an employer issues a chit for buying discounted Metrocards. Those can be traced to the employer and then to the employee. Thousands of employers in NYC take part in this program underwritten by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). This is another example of how a usually wary citizen can be induced into being surveilled by gov and biz by free or discount deals. If you think you can't be tracked by postage stamps, by cash-paid tickets, by a burgeoning gaggle of seemingly ordinary transactions, then you may need to read surveillance business literature more closely. Not the diverting, high-profile national security kind. El cheapo, giveaway is where the action is. Say, like the giants of telecom, food, clothing, medical, education, sports, autos, entertainment, lotteries, porn, religion, militants, political parties, and, and, oh no, hot tubs and wide-screen displays. Tracing ammo is a piece of cake, and condoms, and girls gone wild tapes. Bet you didn't know GGW is an official sting. So're prepaid phone cards. Name the thing you want most to keep to yourself and 10 to 1 it's dirty with panopticonical taggants. This is the gospel truth, pray, pitiful sinners. The eye's on you sucking your discounted good luck subway tokens. Now that rabbit's foot is being withdrawn by MTA in favor of "impossible to trace" Metrocards, like the C-notes stuffed around the globe until some dumb ass tries to use them, anonymously.
