A new terrorist is threatening America. The CIA has long been keeping watch on
this emerging global power in fear that it will usurp the American economy. This
dangerous entity has received hundreds of thousands of votes for the U.S.
presidency--the only rodent ever to make a bid for the country's top post. Terror
has a name. And it is Mickey Mouse.
Sound far-fetched? Not according to the CIA. There is one very unique aspect of
this fictional rodent which may make the spooks a little nervous: Just like our first
president, Mickey's face graces his own $1 bill. That kind of funny money funny
business is serious business to the CIA. Even something as innocuous as Disney
Dollars is watched and regulated very closely by the government to ensure that it
doesn't become a real currency and carry a real economy. It's all
fun and games when we use Disney Dollars to buy some Goofy clothes or Mickey
Mouse watches at the Disney Store. But once we start using Disney Dollars to buy
Cokes from the soda machine or--heaven forbid--to pay Disney Store
employees' salaries, the government will crack down.
That's because currency is the exclusive domain of the U.S. government. They
literally make money, with printing presses, secret dies, counterfeit-proof
magnetic strips, special paper recipes and serial numbers. But it's not enough to
make the money; they must keep track of it too. When Disney pays their
employees, it must be in U.S. legal tender, and not Disney illegal tender, because
the Internal Revenue Service needs to know exactly how much money changed
hands in order to take the "proper" share for itself.
However, far more threatening to the government than Disney Dollars is an
emerging technology known as digital cash. With the
increasing popularity of electronic accounting systems such as ATMs, credit cards
and automatic paycheck deposits, the American economy stumbles ever closer
toward a society with a currency entirely composed of pieces of data.
Imagine a scenario in which private companies are legally allowed to own,
develop and export encryption that the National Security Agency cannot crack. In
this scenario, encrypted commercial transactions are made anonymously with the
swipe of a plastic card. Suppose that I buy some gas from the local
Gas 'N' Grub chain owned by an offshore company. If the transactions were
digitally encrypted, how would the IRS know if any sales tax had been paid? How
would they collect my income tax if salary transactions were privately-encrypted
transactions?
Digital-cash advocate Bill Frezza has been quoted as saying, "Encryption is to the
Information Revolution what the Atlantic Ocean was to the American Revolution.
It will render tax authorities as impotent in projecting their power as the ocean
crossing did to King George." Our government will not surrender its tax revenue
any more readily than King George did. And despite the vociferous clamoring of
civil libertarians over these issues, the right to personal encryption is not
guaranteed by law. And even if encryption becomes protected, the law will
certainly be changed, either legally or illegally, to protect the tax interests of the
federal government.
Despite people's fears about censorship, the government finds bomb recipes,
pornography and communist newsletters petty. The far more heinous crime is to
rob the government of its tax revenue. If the IRS were rendered impotent, the CIA,
NSA, FBI, DEA, ATF, et al. would collapse in short order. Therefore, it
is the ultimate goal of every government agency to protect the authority of the IRS.
The conflict is that encryption, and the privacy that it enables, is a friend to the
people. We expect our government to protect our privacy rights, but encryption,
and the anonymous economy that it may bring, tears at the roots of taxation.
Several solutions have been proposed by the government to meet its
needs, but they have been unsatisfactory to the people. As the government tries to
keep up with the relentless pace of progress, citizens must scramble to make sure
that the laws which protect the government also serve the interests of the people.
Tomorrowland is crashing in on us faster than we think, and the debate over
encryption will be a far wilder ride than any found in Disneyland.