I call them "ventriloquists"

They are actually cyborgs but they are also expert actors and con men.

Now their gist is that when connected to a network they can intercept many forms of electronic communications and alter them to say or show whatever they want. Almost without a trace of tampering. Almost.

At the least they alter forum posts to say the opposite of what you want. At worse they could turn a phone call between diplomats into declarations of war.

Why do these guys exist? They are the censors of an authoritarian government. They don't silence dissent rather they autotune it to be just the right amount of ridiculous or offensive.

They of course can beaten by paper communication and tape sharing. But any text, picture, video, or audio on the Internet can and will be subjected to their seamless vandalism.

So what do you think?

Mr. Stallman would want a word. Of course, there's no reason to say that we're using modern computer tech, and you could equally Handwave it away, but overlooking that falls into Hollywood Hacking.

edited 20th Jun '11 1:36:32 PM by Yej

Even digital signatures can be forged by these guys.

They operate outside of "normal" tech. Remember they are cyborgs.

They put words in your mouth as if you were just a mere puppet; hence the name.

The only way to detect the tampering is using the same tech as employed by that of the cyborgs themselves. Sadly very few countries actually have access to it.

edited 20th Jun '11 1:47:17 PM by Worlder

Unless there's Handwavium involved, forging a cryptographic signature is impossible, since the numbers involved are simply too large.

Imagine you have 1 million processing cores, each of which can check a given key combination in 1 nanosecond. It still takes you 5 hours to crack one 64-bit signature. And 64-bits is actually quite weak. The really paranoid folks use 256 bits.

edited 20th Jun '11 2:01:51 PM by Yej

Yes, I would need to make some adjustments.

Handwave it is.

Hmm, digital signatures are more easily forged by these guys. They can actually feel when the keys match. Gut feelings FTW.

edited 20th Jun '11 2:14:08 PM by Worlder

also, don't forget that tapping into the lines and altering the data can be detected, what with the heisenberg uncertainty principle stating there would be a drain in resources.

figuring that out would be kinda tricky though.

Well I can't have them be 100 percent undetectable.

Some of them have to get caught and when those that do get caught...

Drama!

If you've got an authoritarian government, just have them ban any form of computational cryptology. (Except for their own use, of course.)

There will be rebels attempting the same methods, or try to evade the government's censorship by not using the Internet.

edited 20th Jun '11 9:01:56 PM by chihuahua0

EDIT: Don't need spoilers.

edited 21st Jun '11 9:17:32 AM by Worlder

The ventriloquists basically piss off activists in other countries. They don't bother with their own dissenters who often get killed by a vigilante mob of loyalists.

edited 21st Jun '11 9:23:47 AM by Worlder

(Incidentally, the title reminded me of the ventriloquist scene in Kung Pow)

Protests become endorsements.

The counterculture is appropriated and mass marketed.

How would a dissenter feel about being used like this?

Being turned into a poster boy for The Man unwillingly.

How's that for hurt?

Disposable I Ds?

Yeah they could always do that.

Hey what should be their motto?

It should be something ironic or witty.

I'm not sure of my candidates.

"Speak out and remove all doubt."

"Let your voice be heard."

Ah, I just spotted the weakness in this system: the ventriloquists have a finite amount of time. The activists have, presumably, a lot more.

edited 22nd Jun '11 2:25:22 PM by Yej

Well that is felt as a really unpleasant cacophony for the cyborgs plugged in. It more or less forces them to disconnect.

But since you brought up the DoS topic everything manufactured in this country with an OS and a Internet connection are programmed to be used as part of a government bot net.

Oh and previously D Do S are seen as a really annoying nuisance to these cyborgs... until they learned how to commandeer the enemy bot net. You a need a few defeats to make a victory all the more sweeter.

EDIT: Of course commandeering isn't easy one has to sift through all those machines to make them under your rule.

edited 22nd Jun '11 2:55:45 PM by Worlder

So which motto do you like?

Or would you like to suggest one yourself?