[pp.int.general] Big Brother in NL?

[Reinier Bakels]

>
> On 29.11.2009, at 20:55, Edison Carter wrote:
>
> > It should not require that at all.
> >
> > If the conductors carry an internet-enabled (GSM or whatever, I
> > think many trains even have wifi these days) scanner then they could
> > scan the barcode and simply check with a central system that the
> > other details (price, journey) on the ticket are as they should be,
> > and that it had only been used once. End of problem. You can print
> > thirty copies of the ticket if you like, but only the first one
> > presented to a conductor will work and the rest are worthless.
>
> Exactly this is it how it is working with the german railway.
>
> And, as others allready have said, you can pay with cach
> in many travel agencys or a counter at the station (only
> on bigger stations) ot at the ticket machine and be completly
> untraceble.
>
> Gregory.

Have the German railways changed the system recently? A couple of months ago 
I still had to present the credit card I used to pay the ticket.

Counter or travel agencies are no alternative: extra cost and a lot of 
trouble, and not available for foreigners. Remember that you have to book 
early to get a favourable price. If you buy a ticket just before the train 
leaves you pay twice as much compared with a (common) reduction scheme.

I haven't tested the Dutch system yet. They now have a new system to sell 
tickets to Brussels.

BTW: one is also traceable via GSM. Fortunately you still can by anonymous 
prepaid telephones in NL (iirc the germans abolished this option some years 
ago on request by the police). But I am lazy, and replenish my prepaid 
account from my bank account. And they *may* guess that the owner of the 
bank account is the same person as the owner of the GSM telephone. I 
sacrfice my privacy because it is sooooo easy to do this if you are e.g. in 
the middle of Iceland.

Privacy is not just having a privacy-proof *option* available, if that 
option is cumbersome and/or expensive.

Incidentally, I recall a horror story of someone who became a secret service 
target because he occasionally switches *off* his mobile phone. Because that 
is what all terrorists allegedly do. The next step is basic logic: if all 
ducks are birds, all birds are ducks. So everyone switching off his mobile 
telehpne is a terrorist. QED.

reinier