Living in London has benefits, mainly the public transport. Living here means you do not NEED to have a car, as getting to work using the busses or tube is a fairly uncomplicated affair, and on the whole, just as reliable as going by car.
But there has been a scary trend in the pricing...since 1997 the price of a single bus fare has risen from 40p to £2. A 500% increase, easily outpacing the rising cost of housing. However, there is an answer; the Oyster card.
This pre-paid invention is a touch-based payment system, recharge it when you can with credit, then just touch in and out of busses and tubes.
It was initially meant to work similar to a single-sign on system. Charge up your Oyster card with cash, and use it to pay for goods wherever you see the Oyster sign. Except, you dont see the sign anywhere, because the idea flopped...I mean, what is wrong with using ££££'s?
So, the mayor and crew sat down and had a rethink. *THEY* really wanted people to use the Oyster card. else the hidden agenda wont work. and we cant have the hidden agenda not working.
The rethink came through and was approved, and we now have dual pricing schemes. Use an Oyster card, and only pay £1 for the bus fare...a normal cash paying customer has to pay £2. Yes, it seems an Oyster card it such a powerful item is makes busses use 50% less fuel, and you arse takes up 50% less space on the seats. Not only that, but amazingly you can board the bus 50% quicker.
I hope they got a patent on this thing.
Discrimination? Perhaps...but it goes deeper than that.
This week *THEY* announced the Oyster card has now been blessed by the Pope with even more extraordinary prowess, and the fare for Oyster card holders has been reduced to 90p. A full 10% decrease.
The rest still pay £2, cash, queen's money. The Oyster ruleth grand.
This recent announcement made me sit up and take fresh notice on this Oyster issue..previously I had wondered "why", but now I was genuinely curious. Where is the motivation? Sure, cash has some disadvantages, but £1.10 difference in price for a simple bus journey? What if you elect not to have an Oyster card? As a free society, surely I can choose not to get an Oyster card, the same way I choose not to get a credit card, yet still have a bank account?
It would seem *THEY* will do almost anything to get everyone using an Oyster card, and the pricing reduction is a very strong motivator. Unpuzzling the puzzle leaves me with unanswered questions, but most of them point to 1984.
Mr de Menezes was shot on the tube in 2005 when he was a suspected terrorist.
Several others detonated a few crude bombs recently.
Tracking these poeople wouldve been a heck of a lot easier using an Oyster card.
Lets look at the requirements to get an Oyster card.
...
actually, I cant find the list anywhere online, but having asked a few Oyster users it seems that personally identifiable information IS needed. You cannot get an Oyster card anonymously. So, we have our bait, and we have the catch. This is almost like a little id card now isnt it..packed full of travel habits.
The Oyster card blurb (available here https://sales.oystercard.com/oyster/lul/registerCustomerCard.do?method=display )
mentions
You can view your pay as you go journey history
(p.s. naive travellers, this means so can we....)
Jackpot!
Excuse me, but how is having my travel information available to me any benefit? Do I have such a bad case of altzheimers that I cant remember weekdays I went to work, and then came home?
What price freedom? £1.10 seems to work for most of the London residents. And passwords can be exchanged for candy bars.
I'm not getting an Oyster card. It doesnt inconvenience me too much, as I only use the busses twice a week to go to the pub and get drunk. But I can see how they are using pricing pressures to get us to hand over our details, bit by bit.
When doing Penetration Testing on vulnerable systems, very often one crack leads to another, and another, and another, until you open bigger cracks that didnt really exist. The only way to have a strong unbroken chain is to inspect all the links. An Oyster card is definitely a very broken link in your privacy and anonymity.
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3 comments:
Hey!!! I remember the Oyster card. I went to visit friends of mine in Birmingham and for my one travel into London they borrowed my their Oyster card. All I had to do was swipe it, no PIN or any such thing needed. So if someone steals my Oyster card, and commit an act of terrorism, then I go to jail because my Oyster card was used to get on the tube or bus or train?
Actually on my request my mother bought 4 on her credit card, (for her, my cousin, his girlfriend and myself.)
So it looks like she's all over the place.
And all of us get to retaining "plausible deniability " on our whereabouts.
Hmmm...I should set up an Oyster Exchange Program, We can get a bunch of likeminded tin-foilers and buy £20 credit and switch randomly each week!
less tits, more tats
I dont think its a bad thing been trackble as long as the info is used responsible.... and there lies the problem. How do you put those checks in place ? Further more if you think this is bad what about mobiles. There have been a few cases recently of police tracking people EVEN with the mobile off. Now I've not seen this my self how ever I understand there is some thing built in to these things where by on stand by the phone can still be located. Ego the only sure way of non detection is to take the battery out. Is this true ? Is this an urban myth ? Well the case I was told about allowed the police to track this person and catch them red handed how ever the method of how this was done could not be reveiled in court for legal reasons and the fact its handy to keep in secret..... how ever this is what I was told only so I have nothing as proof to offer. IMHO if this IS the case I have no problem as I dont exactly do any thing wrong in the first place.... and again as long as its used responsibly I have no problem of this system been in place to stop repeats of recent events.
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