Just reading this article could put you in danger

You are not safe. Your statements are being monitored. Your freedom is at the discretion of people who hate you.

They see everything you “like” or forward. They’re aware of who you follow. They know you are reading this article. And they can, and will, use all of this against you.

That information from your social media accounts and network activity is readily available should come as no surprise. How often have you been discussing a topic on FaceBook, Twitter, or even Blue Sky only to have that same topic offered up to you in a video on your next visit to YouTube? How many times has something you were sure you only mentioned in passing "coincidentally" appeared as the subject of a deal on Amazon's front page?

It happens so often that you've probably stopped even noticing.

Silicon Valley has spent the last two decades weaving together an internet that has no secrets—at least not when it comes to your personal information. You don't have to go shuffling along the corridors of the "dark web" to gain access to everything from the details of where you live, what services you subscribe to, and what you buy in your weekly trips to the grocery. All of those things are readily available from any number of data brokers at an ever lower price. Services that promise to "hide" are not much help.

Your photos have been used to train AIs. Those same AIs have scanned those images to learn where you've been, what you've done, and who you know. Every video you've watched, every phone call you've received, and every item you purchased in the last decade—online and off—has been recorded.

Here's just what the "don't be evil" people at Google know about you.

Google keeps track of your search terms, videos watch, views, and interactions with content and ads, plus your video and audio information if these features were used. They’ll also keep track of your purchase activity, and, if a third-party site uses Google services, your activity on those sites or apps. They’ll also keep track of your browsing history if you use a Chrome browser synced with a Google account. Finally, if you’ve used Google to make calls or text, then they’ve also collected the calling and receiving party numbers, forwarding numbers, times and dates of your calls and texts, call durations, routing information, and types of calls.

The history of the internet has been one in which individuals surrender more and more privacy in return for convenience. After all, how is WayFair going to know it's time to offer you a big discount on a new couch if it doesn't learn that you've been asking Google about the best upholstery cleaners on Amazon?

This sea of data represents a tremendous threat in the best of times. But these ... are not the best of times. The combination of Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and big data tools that are absolutely excellent at spotting the most arcane connections means that all this personal data isn't a ticking bomb; it's a bomb in the process of exploding.

That explosion is made infinitely worse by the access Musk and his DOGE bros have been given to data through a series of government agencies. That information includes not just the obligations that Social Security and Medicare owe to you, but bank account and fiscal information of everyone who ever accepted a payment—including an income tax refund—from the government.

The information that Trump and Musk have available to them is already being used against people who have spoken out against Trump. Like a French scientist denied access to the U.S. because he made social media posts against cutting funds for research. Or a U.K. punk band held in detention and sent back to London because they made statements critical of Trump. Or a Brown University professor deported despite a court order for expressing pro-Palestinian views. Or a Georgetown researcher detained because his wife, a former Al Jazeera journalist, is Palestinian American.

In some sense, these are people on the edge: visitors, visa holders, and lawful permanent residents. But they, along with many others, have been held by ICE or Border Patrol without charges or even justification while denying information to judges who attempt to intervene.

There is absolutely no reason to think that citizens are immune to the kind of treatment that has seen a legal resident shipped off to slave labor in a country he had never before even visited because ICE didn't like his tattoos.

There's also no reason to believe that Trump and Musk won't use the information they've gathered against citizens. Citizens are especially vulnerable to being punished by being denied resources they have paid for. Social Security is only one example.

• Musk has been pushing the idea that Social Security is a "Ponzi scheme."
• Trump has been parroting claims of huge Social Security fraud with no evidence.
• Schemes are already underway for expanding identity requirements in ways that could deny benefits to millions.
• Social Security is cutting both phone and online support, making it far more difficult for people to deal with issues and forcing people to visit offices for assistance.
• But Social Security is making policy changes eliminating previously simple processes to flood these offices and make the program as close as possible to unworkable.

The ease with which Musk's ragtag collection of programmers could reduce or eliminate someone's Social Security payments simply because they made a social media post complaining about Trump — or Musk, or DOGE, or Tesla — is hard to overstate. The difficulty that someone being tortured in this way would have in addressing the problem is massive.

Repeat these same threats for Medicare, Medicaid, government and military retirement, SNAP, or any of a hundred other programs.

And good luck getting anyone in media to listen to your story about the difficulty you're having with a government agency. After all, they've been dutifully repeating Republican claims that the system was overwhelmed by bureaucracy and fraud for decades. That Republicans are making this fever dream into reality is not something that screams "page one."

This kind of punishment can be done against individuals or groups. It's almost invisible and any complaint is likely to be met with a shrug and a "We told you Social Security was a scam, this is just more evidence that it should be privatized." Deporting citizens to Guantanamo, or putting them to work at a private prison in Louisiana, is likely to be far more limited. If only because it's far more visible. For now.

The combination of personal information that includes your speech and associations, with a vindictive government out to punish anyone who voices opposition, is a nightmare that would have made Orwell shiver.

Trump and Musk are currently doing everything they can to make more information and power available to them, but less information and assistance available to you. Congress and the press aren't generating anything close to the amount of pressure that would be necessary to slow this process while the judiciary is being increasingly ignored.

When Elon's new algorithm determines your chances of receiving Social Security or sets your shipping date to a private prison "hell hole," expect that formula to include every time you said something defending DEI, or every joke you made about a Cybertruck ... or every article you read on Uncharted Blue.

And the only real way to deal with this is not to hide, but to charge ahead; to not just keep up what pressure you can bring, but increase it. Join protests. Hit Musk where it hurts. Pressure your Senators. Find your local Democratic organizations and help push them to be more oppositional.

Stand more. Speak louder. Fight harder. Because if you don't, you're just handing them more power. And they will use it against you.

After all, you read this article.

Update: On Thursday, DOGE was blocked from accessing personal information through the Social Security Administration by a U.S. District Judge. However, there is no guarantee that this info has not already been extracted Or that Musk will obey the judicial order.