Edward Snowden is warning that China’s social credit system – that monitors every person’s every move – has already started in the United States
Snowden says that algorithmic control is materializing very quickly in the U.S. pointing to an investigation that revealed China’s aggressive expansion of AI-driven “city brains” – saying the markings of digital control are well underway in the Western World
City brains are large networks that monitor a citizens’ every move, every purchase, every word, every action and are now serving as a prototype that the U.S. is quietly preparing for.
Snowden, whose 2013 leaks exposed global mass surveillance, points to the Digital IDs and predictive policing that have already started in the U.S. calling them the first steps in taking away personal freedoms, by tracking people under an unblinking digital eye.
Snowden says governments and tech giants are currently harvesting personal data to dictate our actions, using Artificial Intelligence to fuse camera feeds, transaction records, and behavioral data into a single, omnipresent overseer.
The data will be used to force compliance***
“Every photo, every purchase, every message, every movement — all of it is being fed into algorithms that decide your future.”
In China, AI “city brains” now track:
Where you live
Who you visit
How you dispose of your trash
Who you call
What you buy
Where you go
Every step you take in public
Whether you “follow rules” or not
If you break a rule, a camera catches you from three angles, your score drops and you’re not longer a part of society.
“If any of your activities differ from what the government wants, you won’t get on a train. You won’t board a plane. You won’t get a job.”
“An algorithm will decide your fate, And what they are selling… is us.”
Here’s what’s being tracked in China and coming to the US:
AI maps home addresses and visitor patterns via facial recognition on over 600 million cameras, flagging “undesirable” contacts.
Sensors in bins and public spaces score how well you dispose of your trash, jaywalking or littering triggers an instant score drop
Every footstep in urban areas is logged through geofencing and gait analysis, rewarding “rule-followers” with perks while docking scores for people who don’t act as told.
Purchases, messages, and online activity feed into algorithms that predict and preempt “untrustworthy” actions, as outlined in the People’s Republic’s 2025 AI surveillance blueprint.
A single violation – captured by overlapping cameras – can slash a person’s score, taking away opportunities overnight.
As Snowden put it “No system of mass surveillance has existed… that has not been abused.”
“An algorithm will decide your fate”
The European Union’s wallet system, rolled out this year, mandates biometric-linked profiles for services.
U.S. cities like Los Angeles already deploy predictive tools that flag “high-risk” neighborhoods based on data patterns, while the UK’s 2025 counter-terror framework uses AI to pre-empt “disruptive” behavior
The Global Risks Report 2025 highlights laws, like Australia’s Code of Practice on Disinformation, where platforms are required to algorithmically demote “harmful” content, silencing dissent under “trust” metrics.
