Category: NATSEC

For older generations, Beirut had a particular relevance. October 23, 2023 was the 40th anniversary of a bombing of U.S. Servicemen that killed 241 people in 1983. My first experience with Beirut was far less dramatic but jarring nonetheless. On August 4, 2020, while sitting in an online classroom at Harvard Business School at the height of COVID-19, I watched a classmate fly out of the frame of his web camera as his wall crumbled behind him. That explosion claimed 218 deaths and over 7,000 injuries. Unaware of the carnage of the moment, our professor continued the class. A screenshot of the moment captured my classmates in confusion, unaware of what happened until the news caught up with the chaos.

Believe it or not, there are a number of areas where retail (and its droves of consumer data) meet and surveillance. After the 45th President of the United States survived an attempted assassination, it was revealed that the suspect had a relatively small internet footprint. Even so, it didn’t require spy work by a government agency to understand the failed assassin. Rather, using location and consumer data, the job was attempted by the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project (with questionable results). A media report on the matter noted: 

China has perfected a model of state surveillance that is as pervasive as it is effective.