SOPA and ACTA both have passed here in Ireland and it will be very shortly before the effects of this new legislation will be unleashed on the general public. They won't however be bringing them in as you may expect. There is already a formula in place which they have used in America that the Irish government will more than likely be using here. The new laws regarding SOPA and ACTA will be introduced like the Patriot Act was in America.

Does anyone here remember Operation Candyman?

Google it, read up.

After the Patriot Act passed in America the government decided to use it against some Americans. They knew there would be a backlash when they used the 'sneak and peak' warrants to go into suspects homes when they were away and root through their belongings and search their computers. They knew the idea of tapping every phone the suspect might use, meaning all phones in their place of work and every phone on the way home to their house along with the phones of their close friends and family would get people riled up.

They expected this.

So how did the US government overcome this potential flash point and mass uprising against the new law? Simple - they used it on a group of people no one would support, paedos. That's right, Operation Candyman which was the largest online paedo sting operation in history was the first test case of the newly instated government powers to search your home without a warrant while you are out, and not tell you, and listen in on the phone calls of everyone a person knows. Guess how big the backlash was? There wasn't one.

The US government chose a target they knew society would not step up and defend. No one wants the government snooping around your home while you are out, but they also don't like paedos. The US government chose a group they knew no one would publicly defend and would solidify their new powers without even a public outcry. It worked. In fact, there were dozens of court cases all which were settled and all of which set precedent.

How did they follow up with this? A year later they did the same thing to illegal bookies in New York City and New Jersey. They went after know 'mobsters' and used the Patriot Act to again search their homes secretly and tap half the phones in New York. Again, the public was silent and it furthered the powers of the Patriot Act as people sat quietly by.

This is what our government intends to do with the new SOPA/ACTA powers. They won't go after a grandmother who is caught downloading a song or a few kids who stream a film online, not YET, no - they will first find a member of society which they can single out, which is already a social pariah, and they will use the full powers against this person. They will make this person seem so bad, they will demonify this person, and then this is the person they will go after using the full extend of the new laws to codify their new powers.

There will be only one way to combat this, and luckily for us the powers that be have no real protection themselves.

See, it's easy for a TD to pass laws regarding things they know nothing about and that do not directly effect them. I mean, do you think a TD in Dublin gives two shytes about a law regarding the fishing industry? Hell no. They vote along party lines and since they probably never visit any areas where fishing is big they never think twice about it and it never adversely effects them.

Thats where the solution comes into play. The only people who care about certain types of legislation and those who are prosecuted under it are people with skin in the game. People who themselves or their families have been caught up in some TDs legislation.

So the solution is to make it equally as painful for the TDs who put these laws in place as it is for the average citizen, no matter who they decide to crucify first to try and set legal precedent. How do we do that you may ask?

Well, here is the thing I am betting most TDs have yet to even wrap their minds around - once ISPs have to legally monitor everyone and keep records on all citizens, it will mean TDs and their friends/families will be monitored as well. As we have already seen recently groups like Anonymous can been able to quite easily infiltrate the FBI. How hard do you think it would be for them or lets say even a disgruntled worker at Eircom to release monitoring records regarding the TDs and their families?

Want to know what a certain TD has been up to online? There will be electronic evidence. But you may say many TDs like the ones in charge now are too thick to even know how to operate email. This is true. However, their kids sure are on the ball. I wonder how many children of TDs right now are downloading pirated music or watching pirate films? You think just because their father is a TD they won't be on Facebook posting copyrighted clips or sharing copyrighted music with their friends?

That is the weakness in their system, they have forgotten they too along with their friends and family will be equally as monitored. I say we make sure they are scrutinised first. As soon as they start monitoring everyone, make sure the first cases brought to court involve the friends and families of the very men who put these laws in place. We will see how quickly their support for the very laws they enacted stand. I mean, it's easy to say arrest all of 'those people', but when 'those people' are your friends and family you will find many of the TDs will change their tune quite quickly.

Thanks to our short-sighted and dimwitted government we are all now going to be subjected to draconian laws and Orwellian surveillance in our own homes. I say they should have just as much right to suffer under these conditions as the rest of us.

If recent history has taught us anything, I'm betting there are enough people out there in Ireland and online who would support such a strategy and will be actively involved enough that this, when the time is right, will happen.

Expect it.