So, $5 per litigant after legal fees, assuming the DOJ doesn't step in and claim to be the defendant.

Down-payment probably included a binding arbitration clause

But will they?

The social contract is broken, everything is legal now, for the right people

Because both parties agreed to the contract, both the grifter and the grifted.

It’s bad, but also… it’s extremely complicated. China has a surveillance state. The EU, UK, and US are all flirting with surveillance state technology. You have companies like Palantir, Pegasus, Flock, … promoting their products to governments like magic hat solutions to issues such as terrorism. You have data aggregation companies selling private data to the 3 letter agencies. You have cops willingly using these networks because it makes their job slightly more effortless. You have Trump And Co with their own motives, who would love to find any possible leverage over their perceived enemies. You have AI companies riding the bull of the US economy, all desperately looking for catchy use cases. You have this idea of an AI arms race.

Whatever world we walk into, it’s not looking pretty. It’s looking like we might actually develop something which is going to be damn near impossible to turn off.

True.