If you thought that Mark Zuckerberg has had a drastic change of heart regarding our private data after facing Congress, well…think again.
Even more, the next move Facebook is planning to make is the most intrusive one yet…and frightening at the same time.
While at an annual conference about the role technology plays in our society at Harvard University, Facebook CEO revealed, among others, how he plans to read the minds of future users.
He did this in a blatantly manner that absolves him of all decisional guilt, because users will allegedly share their thoughts voluntarily.
How will this happen? Obviously through technology.
To be more precise, Facebook is researching a device that will let users connect and interact in an augmented reality environment by using only their thoughts.
This novel brain-computer interface that Facebook is actively researching will allow people to do specific actions without having to type or even speak. Everything will be coordinated in total silence by the brain.
In theory, this doesn’t sound bad at all for the sake of convenience and for gaining some extra time.
It won’t involve a chip implant either, because Zuckerberg knows that “if you’re actually trying to build things that everyone is going to use, you’re going to want to focus on the nonintrusive things.”
Even if this means that no one will seek to drill a hole in your brain, it still has extremely intrusive repercussions, since someone will have access to your inner thoughts, the only place that still remains private…for now.
And since we’re talking about Facebook, it means that all that data will fall into the hands of big corporations and, of course, our ever-faithful government.
This sneaky device will resemble a shower cap, as Zuckerberg described, and will encompass the brain in an attempt to reveal links between specific thoughts and various other brain processes.
The device will be interconnected to the Oculus VR (also a Facebook brand), and will complement its functions.
The technology has already gained ground, with researchers being able to decipher when somebody is thinking of a lion or a gazelle, for example.
Although eavesdropping on one’s thoughts may sound like the beginning of a totalitarian regime, in reality, Zuckerberg is only trying to carry on with his mission of connecting people worldwide for fun and profit.
As a matter of fact, Facebook already follows you all day through the GPS in your mobile device, and knows all the actions you make on the internet using the code embedded in your browser.
If nothing went bad until now, what could go wrong once they get inside your head, right?
With world government’s attempt to interconnect every electronic device into a smart city grid where every bit of information is shared, it seems only logical to include the missing link into this equation, namely the human brain.
And this will be accomplished soon enough once this ‘breakthrough’ technology is perfected and will enter the mainstream.
It will first take the form of glasses that augment your physical reality, and then ramify into products like these seemingly harmless, yet extremely intrusive brain-meshes.
We still have until the end of this year until augmented reality devices will enter the mainstream.
Until then, you might also want to know that Zuckerberg will also create its own Facebook Supreme Court – an external entity responsible with filtering the inappropriate content that goes on the social platform.
This will lift much of the decision-making pressure on Zuckerberg’s shoulders, since he won’t be “able to make a decision that overturns what they say.”
As he openly admitted in front of the Harvard audience, “I would not want so many decisions about content to be concentrated with any individual.”
With this being said, Facebook’s CEO will have less responsibility and more time to sit back and enjoy the extremely intrusive fruits of his labour.
Hopefully for us, in the wake of emergent technologies, more libertarian social platforms will come to light and people will migrate towards them after they understand what Facebook is doing.
For now, we can only lay in hideout and practice our day-to-day living without interacting so much on social media.
After all, trekking the wild or building a shelter in the middle of nature is exponentially more fun than hanging out with virtual buddies who, by the way, could be experimental bots designed to get a better understanding of you.
