"Moon the Balloon" -- Privacy and Surveillance on the Border, 2009

Collected by: Web Curator of Atlantis

Archived since: Aug, 2009

Description: Located at a major intersection of land and sea cargo traffic, the border towns of Port Huron, Michigan, and Sarnia, Ontario, are connected by the world's only internationally-owned bridge. In summer 2009, a private US company began to fly overhead a 50-foot helium balloon with a surveillance camera capable of reading a ship's name from 14 km (more than 8 miles) away. The sudden presence of a far-seeing camera in the sky sparked strong reaction on both sides of the border -- from formal protest by the Canadian government and US and Canadian elected officials to grassroots actions. Organized through word of mouth and online social networking tools, the "Moon the Balloon" protest, from which this web archive draws its name, delved into a rich symbology for expressing the sense of surveillance having gone too far, and a primal protest rooted in the local area's tradition of independence and personal liberty.

Subject: Computers & Technology , Society & Culture