Various industries (you know who they are) heavily opposed to peer-to-peer file sharing and are pushing ISP’s to crack down on it. So as a way to facilitate P2P file sharing which is truly anonymous, the ‘dead drop‘ has been created.
‘Dead Drops’ is an anonymous, offline, peer to peer file-sharing network in public space. I am ‘injecting’ USB flash drives into walls, buildings and curbs accessable to anybody in public space. You are invited to go to these places (so far 5 in NYC) to drop or find files on a dead drop. Plug your laptop to a wall, house or pole to share your favorite files and data. Each dead drop contains a readme.txt file explaining the project.
Probably the first thing you will think is this is just going to be a hub for viruses and porn (not to mention pulling out your laptop on the street probably isn’t the best idea for your personal safety), but overall I think it is an interesting idea. For example, this could potentially be a great way to market local bands and/or restaurants to people which may not normally find this information. If used as intended, this project could gain traction.
Of course, tech savvy people understand P2P file sharing is not the problem as it is has many valid uses, rather the way some people choose to use it gives it a bad name. Does a concept like ‘dead drops’ have any merit or is it just another idea that won’t go anywhere?
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Can you be sure that there is no video surveillance of the dead drop? If not it isn’t anonymous. An interesting concept perhaps, but not one I would embrace in its current form.
I don’t see it’s purpose unless you have something illegal to hide.