I’m going to have to catch this one!
Cats: hollywood and celebrity, ppp, television|I only blog about things that interest me, or that catch my eye, and this is definitely one of them.
It’s about USA Network’s Burn Notice.
If you were a spy, what tools and techniques would you use to successfully accomplish dangerous missions without revealing your true identity?
Starting June 28th Michael Weston, a CIA Operative on USA Network’s new TV series, Burn Notice, will have to accomplish a similar task!
It’s an intriguing question. I’ve heard about some of the things people have done in the past to change their identity, or conceal their real identity… you know, finding someone who was born around the same time as them but died right away, getting that birth certificate and creating a personal history for that name…
Obviously, never give your real name, or address, or any sort of personal information out… to ANYone.
Fake IDs… more than one, in different names. Numerous made-up personal histories, even different sets of likes/dislikes to talk about with people as you go about your business.
Learning how to change one’s appearance, maybe? Not just hair color and contacts of the eyes, but posture, behavior, tone of voice, inflection…
Yeah. I was exposed to all sorts of things growing up. My Dad had a hobbyist interest in reading about the things survivalists and conspiracy theorists would do, or have done, or think might become necessary. (Not that he’s wacky enough to have really bought into it, but really… admit it… this stuff is kind of intriguing… what WOULD you do if you had to go ‘underground’?)
I don’t know, though, what one could do in this day and age of more and more identity tracking. I think there are people out there that know more about my buying habits than *I* do. It’s getting more and more likely that various aspects of our lives (medical records, school history, buying habits, criminal record, social contacts) will all be linked easily to our identities.
It might be harder… then again, it might be easier if one knows how to confuse the system.
So, really, I’m not sure what I would do to conceal my true identity so I could accomplish a dangerous mission or two. I’m very interested in seeing what the show writers have come up with for this guy. I think it would be fascinating. And, of course, I wonder just how realistic it will be, as opposed to the ‘hollywood’ version of such things.
Still, this could be some really fun viewing.
