IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2015 - 18

opinion

Brian Martin

nce or twice a year,
I receive a call or
email from someone claiming to be
under intensive targeted surveillance by the government. They contact me because
there's a lot of material on my
website about whistleblowing, and
some about surveillance. I know
governments carry out massive surveillance operations, for example
collecting all sorts of electronic
communications. However, these
callers believe they have been specially selected as surveillance targets, and sometimes for electronic
or chemical bombardment too.
One caller said he had written
a political novel - unpublished -
and therefore the government was
monitoring his calls and following
his every movement. He was very
convincing. I suggested that he
obtain evidence of the surveillance,
but he always had some excuse, so
after several calls I became skeptical. Then, during one call, he said a
helicopter was above his house spying on him right then. I said, "Grab
a camera, go outside and take a
picture." He immediately changed
the topic, which convinced me that
he was imagining the surveillance.

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MTS.2015.2425613
Date of publication: 19 June 2015

Learning
from Delusions
With others, the delusion is more
obvious, for example when they say
that a television program contains a
message specifically designed and
inserted to affect their minds.
My friend Steve Wright used
to work for the Omega Foundation in Britain, which studies the
technology of repression, including technologies for surveillance
and electronic assault. He told me
the Foundation would regularly
hear from people who believed they
were being electronically harassed.
He calls them "wavies" after the
electromagnetic waves they believe
are beamed at them. (Steve and I
have written about tactics against
the trade in torture technology and
about possible uses of such technology in border control [1]-[2].)
I could believe a story about longterm continuous targeted surveillance of leading figures in organized
crime syndicates, terrorist cells, or
radical trade unions. For most othIEEE Technology and Society Magazine

ers, it just doesn't make sense: there
is no obvious reason for them to be
an ongoing target of personalized
surveillance and harassment.

The Truman Show Delusion
With this background, I noticed a
book entitled Suspicious Minds. On
the book jacket is the teaser "The
Truman Show delusion and other
strange beliefs."
The Truman Show is the name
of a film presenting the fictional
story of Truman Burbank, a man
who is unsuspectingly the center of
a reality TV show, seen worldwide.
From birth, he has been surrounded by artificial sets, with cameras
recording everything he says and
does. Everyone he meets - even
members of his own family - are
actors. Eventually he discovers the
grand deception.
After this film appeared, a few
individuals began presenting at Bellevue Hospital in New York, where
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june 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2015