FBI: Copper Thefts Threaten U.S. Infrastructure > Theft

said by RayW:

The Gov knows what you are doing.....A lot of people think that what you do is private business and not the Gov's, talk on the phone, buy something, sell something, no one else needs to know.

Yet all of the above can be done for nefarious reasons, do you violate privacy for them or do you lock down privacy for the honest and ignore the bad?

said by moonpuppy:

O.k. the loss of privacy has been gone for several decades now. Your phone records, your financial statements, your day to day life is available with the click of a mouse and it is not always the government doing it. Living "off the grid" is very close to impossible. You have a house, the government and private business knows about it. You have a job, they know what you make. Get the picture?

Because a few bad apples (scrappers and scrap yard owners both), we now need a way to track where all this stolen copper is going.

Once you do business with someone who does have to report to the government, you lose that privacy.