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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forumspressure cookers, backpacks and quinoa, oh my!
Wow.
https://medium.com/something-like-falling/2e7d13e54724
It was a confluence of magnificent proportions that led six agents from the joint terrorism task force to knock on my door Wednesday morning. Little did we know our seemingly innocent, if curious to a fault, Googling of certain things was creating a perfect storm of terrorism profiling. Because somewhere out there, someone was watching. Someone whose job it is to piece together the things people do on the internet raised the red flag when they saw our search history.
Most of it was innocent enough. I had researched pressure cookers. My husband was looking for a backpack. And maybe in another time those two things together would have seemed innocuous, but we are in these times now. And in these times, when things like the Boston bombing happen, you spend a lot of time on the internet reading about it and, if you are my exceedingly curious news junkie of a twenty-ear-old son, you click a lot of links when you read the myriad of stories. You might just read a CNN piece about how bomb making instructions are readily available on the internet and you will in all probability, if you are that kid, click the link provided.
Which might not raise any red flags. Because who wasnt reading those stories? Who wasnt clicking those links? But my sons reading habits combined with my search for a pressure cooker and my husbands search for a backpack set off an alarm of sorts at the joint terrorism task force headquarters.
Thats how I imagine it played out, anyhow. Lots of bells and whistles and a crowd of task force workers huddled around a computer screen looking at our Google history.
NYC_SKP
(68,644 posts)WTF with that? Is the beef industry worried that we'll find our complete protein in the plant kingdom?
J/K
K/R
warrant46
(2,205 posts)TalkingDog
(9,001 posts)And welcome to DU!!!
Michele Catalano
Former music contributor at Forbes, freelance writer published in The Magazine, Maura Magazine and at Boing Boing http://www.michelecat.wordpress.com
Catherina
(35,568 posts)I think the attention is overwhelming and it wasn't all very nice either. She did give the Guardian permission to reprint her story and will talk with them but for everyone else "Media: I'm not giving interviews. Sorry."
nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)I wish I were kidding
boston bean
(36,219 posts)TalkingDog
(9,001 posts)sweetloukillbot
(10,974 posts)Not giving interviews, no reporting other than her word. I don't trust it.
northoftheborder
(7,569 posts)bmbmd
(3,088 posts)I have looked at pressure cooker weights and backpacks on Ebay, and have googled quinoa on the web. Guess I can expect a call?
laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)TalkingDog
(9,001 posts)So add that to your search and maybe throw in searches for the Anarchist Cookbook and so on. Then you might be graced with a visit.
Response to TalkingDog (Original post)
jmercer This message was self-deleted by its author.
TalkingDog
(9,001 posts)n/t
The Straight Story
(48,121 posts)it's losing not loosing And no comments on my overuse of commas either (or...under use LOL)
Now, that said - I am all with you the day the federal government allows us the same access to them as they want to us.
But that, I am sure, will be a cold day in hell.
The government has nothing to fear from the people as long as they are the doing the job we asked them to do. Apparently, they are not doing that job or they would not be so afraid.
NYC_SKP
(68,644 posts)Have you ever even stepped foot on a true philanagannon?
Good lord.
nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)But I fear it's a waste.
By the way, congrats on breaking the all time record for going on ignore.