I’ve been mindful of the ways companies can track my spending habits, and so have been increasingly keen on using cash and avoiding mobile banking/payment apps like the plague. I realize that this varies by country and might be a bit far out, but the thought does linger in the back of my mind. If current trends continue, how much longer until they take cash and browser-based banking from us? Or will there be a reason those options should continue to exist (and be easily usable) far into the future? And perhaps:
- What else can I, as an individual, do about this?
- Is there a tendency for larger banks or smaller credit unions to push towards mobile-only online banking?
- What does it look like in countries where cashless and mobile payments are the norm?
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The situation is dire in the UK. Surveillance up and about everywhere — it never stops. It seems like none of the politicians actually listen to anyone other than the GCHQ experts!
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There’s always barter. The vast majority of human beings that have ever lived never once handled currency of any kind.
Bartering is a replacement for currency. There is no anthropological evidence of bartering existing before the introduction of currency. You would think somewhere there would be, but there’s not.
True. But gift economies aren’t really something that can just be implemented by individuals living in a modern state. That requires an entire society to be organized around it. Barter can.
I would argue that it is currently a big part of the current economy if you know where to look. Lots of labor works via the principles of a gift economy.
E.g., you help your friend move to a new house, they help you redo your deck, you babysit your brother’s kid, they cook you dinner, etc.
The problem with bartering is that it doesn’t handle 3+ way trades (i.e., person A needs something from person B who needs something from person C, who needs something from person A), and it doesn’t usually handle asynchronous trades.
In gift-based systems, people can literally retire based off the goodwill that they’ve cultivated. There are many old people who serve their families/communities for years who then get taken care of when they need it.
Yeah, except that most people are lazy and will default to whatever is most convinient, even if it goes against their best interest. People use social media services that creates entire psychological profiles on them simple because they friends are on it.
I didn’t see any English articles about that, bit just recently it made the rounds in German speaking news outlets that cash is very well trackable. Thanks to the individual serial number on every euro bill, they can track you from the ATM to the bar. And banks, big supermarkets etc. already do it. There is even a German company selling this data.
More information (unfortunately in german): https://netzpolitik.org/2025/bargeld-tracking-du-hast-ueberwachungsinstrumente-im-portemonnaie/
To be fair - it’s peoples own fault, that they take away cash. They don’t use them, because they are lazy…
- Use privacy respecting cryptocurrencies for exchanges. This can be done between two individuals or at businesses, especially small businesses.
- Yes, it seems like they’re doing it on a consensus level in the UK. This is because consumers would rather use banking apps because it is convenient for them.
- In the UK it is very common to use a card and contactless payment. It’s very concerning because this trend is bringing the government to trace UK bank accounts to prevent “fraud”. Which could target people on benefits for instance. Many are worried that benefits claimants will have their application scrutinized based on their spending habits. Disability rights is now becoming a political conversation about how and where they spend their money, which is mortifying.
If we go by the WEF, then certainly before 2030.
At least in Canada, friends at the bank I used to work in IT were briefed in 2024 that CBDCs were coming down the pipe at some point in the future.
