Stay Off the Grid, Win $10,000 228
DariusD writes "Last summer, Wired writer Evan Ratliff wrote a story about how people erase their identities and start over. After it ran, he tried to disappear — spending 25 days on the lam until a few enterprising Wired readers tracked him down through some brilliant hacking and sleuthing. Now we're going to try the experiment again. Evan, Wired, Loneshark Games and I are working with Universal Pictures to do another, similar contest connected to the new film Repo Men, and this time we want you to go on the run. We need four applicants willing to disappear from their lives from late February to late March. If they can stay hidden for that time period, they'll end up with $10,000 each."
Re:Seems easy (Score:4, Interesting)
Provided your country allows that. Mine doesn't. "Wild camping" is not permitted, it's considered a form of squatting (which is also not allowed).
Police state? Just 'cause I have to inform the authorities when I spend more than 30 days in one place (or not in my usual place)? How dare you say that?
Navy solution (Score:3, Interesting)
Sign up just before beginning a deployment on a nuclear missile sub.
Re:Uh, but you can't drop off the grid... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:The Instruction Manual (Score:3, Interesting)
Interesting link. Ironic though that you have to supply information to the site just to get the guide- isn't it a bit of a violation of the rules of the game giving out information to get info on how to become anonymous? (Hey, I thought that all you need to become Anonymous is be lurking around on 4Chan...)
Re:Seems easy (Score:4, Interesting)
Welcome to the wonderful world of the EU. Of course, my guess is that this law is a relict of about 70 years ago. We still have a few of those.
The worst isn't the law itself, the worst is how people view it. It has been this way for so long that people got used to it and don't even question it anymore. They just do. I'm guilty of that behaviour as well. It wasn't until my first visit to the US that I started to wonder. When you travel to the US, you have to state where you will spend the first four weeks of your trip. No problem for me, I was used to that. It wasn't until I asked where I have to go to inform the authorities that I was going to change my place of residence that I got weird looks.
Until then, even I didn't wonder what this should serve questioned it. And I'm usually quite sensitive to privacy invasion concerns. So I guess if we want to fight the erosion of privacy rights, we have to do it now before people get too used to it.
Re:The Instruction Manual (Score:3, Interesting)
5. Head back-country for some extended camping. Alaska, Montana, Idaho, Minnesota or the Dakotas come to mind.
Bah, you call that backcountry? Go to Nahanni [wikipedia.org] ;) Under 1,000 people visit the ~11,500 mi^2 park each year, and the only realistic way to get in is by bushplane. Most of the people who do visit stay clustered around the river. It's a place so remote that they actually *encourage* you to not camp or hike in the same places as other people, in order to spread the impact around. Infrared would be pretty worthless at finding you (unless high resolution) due to the high population of large mammal species (bear, moose, etc). And the presence of geothermal features could be used to hide against IR as well. The place has the biggest glaciers in the Northwest Territory, as well as Canada's biggest mountains and deepest canyons, as well as caves, sinkholes, etc -- again, making it hard to find you. And it's highly wooded in most places. You could hike the park naked and as long as you stayed away from the rivers, most people would never know.
Come in with a PLB, 40 pounds of dehydrated food (~4 weeks worth), and backpacking gear. Get everything to a secluded location. Once your food mass is down enough to do so, move around every day (preferably from day 1 if you can carry all of your gear and food at once). Once the time is up, activate the PLB.
Re:I'm in ! (Score:5, Interesting)
This is stupid. Anyone able to camp for a month could just go live in the bush. Or draw as much cash as you'd need and go hire a camper van for a month if you're a sissy for the outdoors. Double points if you find a way to park your camper van 100 yards from the offices of the guys holding this competition. Triple points if you wear a disguise and use their lobby toilets every day.
Re:Easy (Score:4, Interesting)
We will provide you with vital technology and seed money to get you through your month on the run.
like a GPS enabled phone?
Applicants must be willing to abide by all contest rules...
and from the application:
Official Rules will be provided to Runners before being officially named a Runner.
Why not post the rules?
The application looks like something my nephew might vomit out of MS Word in a few minutes.....this doesn't look terribly well thought out.
Re:Just 10K? (Score:3, Interesting)
That wouldn't even cover the expenses incurred covering your tracks, nevermind having to get by after the fact until you can find a new job.
I'd do it for half that, but my guess is they won't let somebody outside the US take part (site's slashdotted, so I can't check). They only want about a month's worth of hiding, so I'd need about $2500 for expenses. I'm willing to give up my time for another $2500. Might be an interesting way of spending a month.
Re:I'm in ! (Score:5, Interesting)
Hiding out in the bush is boring. Well, nice to experience nature, but not the best place to hide, especially if law enforcement is after you. If you're in a county, state, or federal park, you'll likely encounter a fish & wildlife officer or park ranger. If you're on private property, you'll likely get a visit from the local Sheriff's department, when the landowner or a neighbor calls. No matter how isolated you think you are, someone will notice you, and complain.
The best place to hide anything, including yourself, is in plain sight. In a rural area, you may be the only person for miles. In Manhattan, your face is mingled with hundreds of thousands of others, who wouldn't remember seeing you walking down the street. You're no different than anyone else they see.
But, the best way to hide is to not be obvious. Book a hotel room under another name, preferably with all the required credentials. You can be out of sight, and out of mind, without being out of the area.
The 100 yards from the organizers facility isn't a bad idea, but it has to be done right. Sleeping in your car or a camper in their parking lot will raise suspicions. A nearby hotel with a view of the front door of their building is much more advantageous. It's also more entertaining to provide pictures of the staffers entering and exiting, *AFTER* the contest is done. You'll get the urge to brag, and when you send the first picture, it's a matter of elimination to figure out where it was shot from.
As always, know your environment. In the hotel, there may be a main elevator to the lobby, and that would be watched. What about stairways? I spent some time in a hotel for work. The elevators opened in the lobby, in plain sight. From the 2nd floor, you could take the stairs closest to the room to the 3rd floor. From there, you could cross the floor and take the other stairwell to an outside exit, without tripping a fire alarm. I wasn't scouting it because I was worried I was being followed. I was bored and exploring. It turned out that if I took the stairs to the 3rd floor, walked the length of the floor, and took the other stairwell down, it was quicker to get to always empty parking. That was faster than going the lobby route.
Pay attention to available spaces. Can you go in the laundry room, and lock the door from the inside? How about a janitorial closet that's usually unlocked.
At some point, you'll need food. In a high density environment, you won't be noticed.
Sometimes it's easy to leave all traces of yourself in one state, while being in another. Give someone your credit card and cell phone. Have them use the cards, and phone on a regular basis, to give the illusion that you are still there. Loan him your car for the duration. Folks believe I am in one state, and I'm actually in a distant state. My friend with the phone knows my new disposable cell phone number. I wander around, turn the phone on, check my voicemails that the friend leaves, and then return to my "home base".
Where am I today? I could be at a friends house. I could be in a hotel. I may be sleeping in my car in between locations. My IP? VPN'd to the state where I want to appear to be, on a private VPN. If I even begin to believe my location is burnt, I move on. Don't settle in one place too long. Have your bags ready to move within 5 minutes.
Traveling on cash for gas, and sleeping in the car leaves little evidence of my travels. I be anywhere in the US within a few days, and I still look like I'm home. Use your car like the burn phones. Buy one on Craigslist, slap the old plate on, and keep moving. If you're caught driving with the wrong plate, you can produce the bill of sale showing that you just bought it, and say you are going to properly register once you get back to your home state. With the title in hand, it's easy to swap ca
Re:Seems easy (Score:3, Interesting)
I have camped just about anywhere in the Netherlands, one of those countries which do not allow 'free camping'. Once I had my tent set up next to a forest path in the province of Limburg (bordering Belgium, in the south) when a police officer came by on his bicycle. I happened to be cooking some food. Guess what the policeman did?
He wished me a pleasant dinner and cycled off.
Those rules about 'free camping' are in the books and will be enforced against those who misbehave by littering, making noise, destroying stuff or camping in places where it is clearly not wanted. If you keep a low profile (both figuratively and literaly - take a small tent and a bicycle or backpack, don't camp in groups) you'll probably find you get the same reaction.
Now I live in Sweden where we have 'allemansrätt' (the "everymans's right" mentioned above) so the whole point is moot. Yay for freedom!