Monitoring Weapons Bans With Social Media 71
Harperdog writes "Kirk Bansak has a great article outlining a coming revolution in non-proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and bio-weapons, courtesy of smart phones and social media. Early theory on arms control foresaw 'inspection by the people' as a promising method for preventing evasion of arms control and disarmament obligations and serves as a starting point for understanding 'social verification.' As Rose Gottemoeller recently stated: '[Cell phone-based] sensors would allow citizens to contribute to detecting potential treaty violations, and could build a bridge to a stronger private-public partnership in the realm of treaty verification.'"
Yeah, that's called "whistleblowing" (Score:5, Insightful)
And it's a great way to get your ass killed or thrown into prison if you do it in the wrong country. It's also a great way to get shitty intelligence from fake reports [wikipedia.org] of WMD's. Hell, even in the U.S., whistleblowers are VERY rarely thanked (usually it costs you your job at the very least). How do you think some guy downloading the "Monitor My Country's WMD Activity" app will be treated in the third world?
Re:Better than... (Score:4, Insightful)
Crowdsource actionable violations? What a great idea. You'd have domain-expertise, on the spot, in real-time - for all cases.
There's no way that could be co-opted or manipulated by social engineering!
It would be like "Kony 2012" on steroids. [keepittrill.com]
All you'd need to do is add automated drone-strikes to this plan, and we will be living in the Humanitarian Utopia promised us by technology.
Re:Yeah, that's called "whistleblowing" (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean like the USA?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_Manning [wikipedia.org]
Re:Yeah, that's called "whistleblowing" (Score:3, Insightful)
There is a line between whistle blowing and treason. I suggest you look it up.
Re:Let's apply the standard 2nd amendment argument (Score:5, Insightful)
Nuclear weapons have arguably been the greatest force for peace in the history of the world. The only problem is that if the deterrent effect breaks down, we all die.