Department of Homeland Security (DHS) fusion centers have started monitoring anti-surveillance activists, according to records obtained by Reason.
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centers → start → Reason
An intelligence report compiled in Massachusetts and redistributed by a Wisconsin fusion center shows that the government is tracking online critics of automated license plate readers (ALPRs) like Flock Safety.
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government → compile → Safety
Included among the critics is a website, SparrowMap, that uses ALPR technology to track police vehicles in real time.
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that → include → time
"Recent social media and forum users have called for the surveillance of government vehicle movement, to include law enforcement vehicles," the Massachusetts intelligence product states.
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product → call → vehicles
"Users have mapped the movement of government vehicles across the United States through SparrowMap.
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Users → map → SparrowMap
The Commonwealth Fusion Center is providing this information for situational awareness.
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Center → provide → awareness
The CFC has no indication threat actors within the Commonwealth intend to leverage this information for criminal or nefarious purposes.
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actors → have → purposes
The platform processes publicly available livestreams from municipal cameras and footage provided by volunteers using everyday cameras, whether on an old laptop, iPhone, or Ring doorbell.
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platform → process → laptop
Out of the 300,000 vehicles picked up by the network's 14,196 cameras every day, only a few dozen are police vehicles, and the rest of the data are quickly deleted.
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rest → pick → data
Per SparrowMap's own how-to guide, "Volunteers point cameras at public roads, and everything they see goes into one shared database that anyone can read — no account, no login, no permission.
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anyone → point → that
Recognition happens on the contributor's own machine, so no video is ever uploaded.
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video → happen → machine
A person confirms anything before it is published as a government vehicle.
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it → confirm → vehicle
Everything else becomes an anonymous dot that fades in forty-five seconds and is deleted in fourteen days."
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that → become → days
The organization's code is publicly available on Github, and its founder, Matthew Montney Jr., posts his heavy metal music to the Instagram account tied to SparrowMap.
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founder → post → SparrowMap
Despite the Massachusetts fusion center's standard caveat that it is not accusing anyone specific of criminal activity, the report hints that SparrowMap is linked to threats identified by the Trump administration.
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SparrowMap → accuse → administration
"On 12 August 2026, Reddit users encouraged the collection of government vehicle information, to include law enforcement and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and uploading it into SparrowMap.
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users → encourage → SparrowMap
One user called for the creation of a 'mesh network' of cameras and forming a public oversight committee.
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user → call → committee
The user also suggested surveilling the movement of government officials as retaliation for purported government surveillance," the report states.
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report → suggest → surveillance
Under National Security Presidential Memorandum 7 (NSPM-7), titled "Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence", President Donald Trump instructed federal law enforcement to begin criminalizing opposition to the administration, including by persecuting those opposing its surge of federal law enforcement into the Midwest as part of a nationwide immigration crackdown.
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Trump → title → crackdown
In response to the memorandum, then–Attorney General Pam Bondi issued her own directive explicitly directing the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, U.S. Marshals Service, and U.S. attorney's offices around the country to focus on "ending political violence against ICE."
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Bondi → issue → ICE
Part of this effort also included seconding local police into a newly created federal "ICE Protection Task Force."
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Part → include → Force
By linking SparrowMap to threats against ICE, the fusion center flagged for federal surveillance and potential prosecution an activist group that it recognizes as law abiding.
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it → link → that
The federal government created 80 fusion centers around the country in the wake of 9/11, as an effort to eliminate the intelligence-sharing gaps that led to the deadliest terror attack in American history.
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that → create → history
These centers are usually headquartered within the offices of state police departments, and they compile local and state intelligence products before circulating them to the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI.
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they → headquarter → Security
The information also flows the other way around, with both FBI and DHS memos routinely circulating intelligence reports to statewide fusion centers before making their way down to local police departments and sheriff's offices.
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memos → flow → departments
In recent years, both federal law enforcement and state fusion centers have increasingly described activists who oppose mass surveillance—as well as AI and data centers—using language usually reserved for domestic terrorists.
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who → describe → terrorists
Fusion centers and the analysts manning them are equipped with extraordinarily powerful open source intelligence tools, whose prohibitive cost means that law enforcement and corporate security are their most frequent customers.
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enforcement → man → tools
Tools integrated into LexisNexis, like ShadowDragon, query millions of posts and dark web breaches in an instant.
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Tools → integrate → instant
Ironically, this system allows the government to surveil those opposing the very surveillance the government is engaged in.
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government → allow → surveillance
The Massachusetts fusion center report on SparrowMap combines two novel threat categories that have been building momentum inside federal and local law enforcement agencies and the nonprofit think tanks that advise them.
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that → combine → them
Earlier this year, WIRED reported that federal law enforcement and the New York Police Department (NYPD) intelligence bureau were circulating memos using a new term, "anti-technology extremism," to describe opponents of data centers and AI systems.
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enforcement → report → centers
"We expect anti-technology violence, and violence leveraging technology," NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence and Counterterrorism Rebecca Ulam Weiner wrote in an article for Police Chief Magazine reflecting on the 25th anniversary of 9/11, adding that "2027 will be no different" when it comes to anticipating and counteracting new threats.
But as widespread resistance to mass surveillance builds across the country, it seems that the threat category "anti-technology extremism" fails to capture activists groups like SparrowMap, which are set on utilizing technology to oppose and counteract mass surveillance.
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which → expect → surveillance
Instead, a new threat category is taking shape, dubbed "anti-surveillance extremism" by Simon Purdue, director of the Violent Extremist Threat Monitor at the nonprofit Middle East Media Research Institute.
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category → take → Institute
The institute was co
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institute → co → ?
-founded by Meyrav Wurmser, who worked in a variety of neoconservative think tanks and is married to David Wurmser, the adviser to former President George W. Bush who helped push false information in support of the Iraq War.
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who → - → War
It regularly shares reports with federal law enforcement.
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It → share → enforcement
In an article for Homeland Security Today earlier this month, Purdue warned of "the emergence of anti-technology and anti-surveillance extremism targeting public infrastructure, including [London's Ultra Low Emission Zone] cameras, data centers, telecommunications assets, and related technological systems.
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Purdue → warn → Zone
These incidents reflect growing hostility toward perceived mechanisms of state, corporate, and technological control and demonstrate how anti-government sentiment is increasingly translating into attacks against critical infrastructure.
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sentiment → reflect → infrastructure
When an external partner invents a new threat category, federal law enforcement tends to follow suit.
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enforcement → invent → suit
But the federal government's desire to beat back the growing wave of "anti-surveillance extremism" will have to contend with the reality that impassioned sentiment opposing the companies and methods of AI-powered surveillance are now a majoritarian position across America.
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sentiment → beat → America
…and 5 more, not listed.
The Aporia
