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Commission for the Panopticon

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Panopticon Department

Panopticon Department Banner.png

Official March: The Secret Deployment


Active: 1631 AN - present

Allegiance: Benacian Union Benacian Union

Personnel: classified

Type: Union law enforcement and intelligence services

Nickname: "The Watchful Eye"

Current Commissioner: Brugen Aldef (on behalf of the Mithui)
Conflicts & Deployments

The Commission for the Panopticon (also referd to as the Panopticon Department or simply the Panopticon) is the intelligence service of the Benacian Union. It reports directly to the Commissioner of the Panopticon. The name of "Panopticon" derives from the principles explored by Babkhan penal reformers whereby a small group of prison guards would be able to watch all prisoners in the circular prison.

Structure

The Commission for the Panopticon is overseen by the Main Office, which has the responsibility for the coordination of all departments of the security apparatus within the Department. The Main Office, chaired by the Commissioner, is authorised to undertake whatever actions deemed appropriate for the security of the Union-State and shall be granted immunity from prosecution for any actions undertaken in accordance with their role, subject to the discretion of the High Presidium of the Benacian Union. Under the Main Office are six lower offices, each with their own Director.

  • Office A: Internal Security
  • Office B: Criminal Activities
  • Office C: Counter Intelligence
  • Office D: Identity, Moral Rearmament & Enlightenment
  • Office E: Mass-Observation (added 1709 AN)
  • Office F: Postal Services (added 1712 AN)

Aside from these standing offices, the Commissioner's Panopticon Department (Main Office) may raise any ad hoc units and formations as Legatine Colleges. The reforms of 1711 consolidated these into two new investigative bodies within the Corps of the Gentlemen-at-Cudgels (CGC), the Legatine College for Domestic Investigation and the Legatine College for the Inspection of Guilds.

The "Panopticon System"

Elwynnese information poster celebrating the introduction of the first Panopticon system on the Horus Blimp.
An advertisement in the first 1712 issue of Gentlemen Weekly Magazine for the new "Panopticon Small-Systems Technology" touting new miniaturized blimp-drones.
1712 image of a Panopticon postal patrol using PSST

Originating from Babkhano-Elwynnese surveillance technology employed by their department of the CGC, the Panopticon System (PS) was conceived as a hybrid-network designed to capture and process information in a manner that greatly enhances the battlefield commander's situational awareness, removes ambiguity - the notorious fog of war - and reduces the time taken for each step in the decision making cycle.

In time, the PS was integrated into nearly every major city in the Benacian Union and the majority of its coast. Cooperation between the Commission and the Honorable Company served to vastly expand PS coverage beginning in 1709 during the administration of Brugen Aldef, who served as both de facto Commissioner and Benacian Director of the two agencies respectively.

Late 1711 saw the introduction of smaller semi-autonomous surveillance units that would be both easy to use and cheap to manufacture primarily thanks in part to research and technology recovered in Sovereign bunkers a decade after the Scouring. By 1712 , the spread of this "Panopticon Small-Systems Technology" was immediately apparent in urban centers and any communities near ESB outposts.

The "Digital Yoke"

After the Second Elwynnese Civil War, and the great displacement that occurred in its aftermath, it was considered necessary to encode the biometric data of all subjects and displaced persons found within theUnion, so as to avoid a repetition of the catastrophic data loss that occurred in the wake of the Scouring. In those areas that had the facilities for safe installation, all subjects would receive the digital yoke; data chips and processing units which were embedded into the spinal column at the neck and fused into the central nervous system, connecting the digital yoke to the cerebellum of the recorded person. Standard homes and residential apartments built in the Union thereafter included a remote syncing station in addition to their BDN terminal and panopticon view screens, to which the key metadata related to the recorded person's daytime activities would be uploaded. Collected data is typically interrogated remotely during the night-flights of the Panopticon Department's PSST drones and transferred to the Panopticon Nodes of each locale for entry into the data vaults of the bailiwick, available for review at all higher levels of authority.

There were subsequent issues of practicality and resourcing which hindered the roll-out of this programme across the Union-State, obliging the continuation of more traditional methods of mass-surveillance to counter ongoing resistance in the Benacian Union. In 1709, these systemic gaps were filled by the Panopticon's newly minted Office of Mass-Observation and more thoroughly in 1712 with the foundation of the Office of Postal Services in partnership with ESB Benacia.

The implementation of the digital yoke and the widespread collection of biometric data raises several ethical and privacy concerns. Critics argue that the forced implantation of the digital yoke violates individual autonomy and bodily integrity. They also argue that the collection and sharing of biometric data without consent raises serious privacy concerns and could lead to the abuse of personal information by the authorities. Additionally, the use of remote syncing stations and panopticon view screens to monitor individuals' activities raises concerns about surveillance and the potential for the misuse of this information by the government. Overall, the implementation of the digital yoke and the collection of biometric data in the Union raises concerns about the erosion of individual privacy and autonomy in the pursuit of security and control.

Leadership

List of Commissioners
Portrait Officeholder Took office Left office
1 Regina the Weisz.png Regina Verion 1671 1675
2 Baldur Zyrion.jpg Baldur Zyrion 1675 1676
n/a n/a Directly administered by the Corps of the Gentlemen-at-Cudgels 1676 1679
3 - Ivar Ragnarsson 1679 1687
4 Nizam ul-Mulk.png Nizam al-Mulk 1687 1695
5 Augustus Krenk.png Augustus Krenk 1695 1704
6 1704-Aldef-SC.png Brugen Aldef (as Representative-Commissioner on behalf of the Miþuï) 1704