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I've never been one to follow AI capabilities all too closely - I knew they've been rapidly improving but the particulars have never interested me beyond the headlines. However, with the rise of AI agents like ChatGPT Dot, the increasing integration of AI systems in consumer operating systems, and the growing prevalence of surveillance infrastructure, I'm coming to the conclusion that things are going to get very bad, very quickly.
Essentially, I've developed a belief that everyone is going to be surveilled to the maximum extent possible, and that surveillance is going to be used in all the conventionally dystopian ways. Advanced advertising, thought policing, price discrimination via social credit systems, etc. The usual rebuttal to this is, "well, you should have nothing to hide." I can understand the instinct toward this: who would care to closely watch the data of an ordinary person like myself? The key difference is that capable AI agents remove the labor bottleneck, so we can be monitored 24/7 without requiring a person to tediously comb through hours of data.
I've begun preparations to completely detach my life from big tech, switching to Linux, GrapheneOS on mobile, and taking whatever steps I can to anonymize my data. While AI models might not be capable of this surveillance right now, I want to get ahead of it so by the time they are capable, I've already become as much of a ghost as possible. Am I overreacting? How have you all prepared for the upcoming data revolution?
I agree that the bottleneck may be gone (depending on if AI is really market-efficient or just being held up by subsidies right now). I don't believe "you should have nothing to hide" in the traditional sense, but more the security through obscurity sense. Everyone has stuff they do that's bad. How exactly is that going to be used to take advantage of us, though? If everyone is blackmailed by the state, I would hope that would lead to massive backlash. I also would hope that if we're talking about insurance companies starting to institute micro-price increases based on every little thing you do, that it would also be accompanied by a general improvement in the baseline insurance prices. I may be being too optimistic, but if you're could be really concrete and specific about how you expect the exploitation will be happening, I could comment more on whether it really sounds likely.
I think I can't offer much about the future other than speculation. The following seem possible to me:
I recognize that some of these scenarios are far-fetched, and I do not think they are all equally likely. I also generally have a commitment to interpersonal authenticity and analogue relationships, so I'm ideologically opposed to online surveillance. No one should have extensive information on me, precisely because I can't predict how they will use it.
I also think that if we reach AGI, all bets are off and it is nigh-impossible to determine how AI will use our data. I can't say I really trust the leading AI companies to handle our data responsibly. I don't know precisely what AI will cook, but I don't want to provide any of the ingredients.
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