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We're under surveillance. A new podcast from MSU Science Gallery and WDET talks about how.

Posted at 8:50 PM, Jan 12, 2022
and last updated 2022-01-12 20:50:00-05

EAST LANSING, Mich. — According the people who produce "Tracked and Traced," we're constantly under surveillance.

The new podcast from Michigan State University's Science Gallery and WDET, Detroit's NPR station, is named after the science gallery's 10 week exhibit, which also explored themes of surveillance.

"We're talking to folks like Spencer Ackerman, who is an author and scholar on the Patriot Act. His book explores what it means to be a surveilled state in the post 911 era," said Antajuan Scott, head of programming at the MSU Science Gallery.

Much of our surveillance technology was created in the wake of 9/11. "Tracked and Traced," will explain how we may even be surveilled in the comfort of our own homes.

"Maybe you get Alexa or Google Home put in your house...but you don't really know what the Alexa might be listening to," explained David Leins, podcast producer and coordinator for WDET.

The podcast will also discuss how we're being watched, even when we don't realize it.

"We have an episode that will be about parking meters that have video cameras on them," Leins said. "Those parking meters are put in to help, I guess, make it easier to give traffic fines without having to hire a traffic police to direct you the ticket. But the problem is that those cameras are also on the street in a public space."

The podcast's 10 episodes will cover topics from drones to the effects of going viral.

"The exhibition, and the podcast, you know, which we're currently producing is not really meant to, you know, harm, it's just meant to inform is really meant to bring to light things that are often shadow," Scott said.

The first episode will be released on Jan. 9, episodes will be released bi-weekly up until June 8.

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