Virtual Reality, Real Spies (Atwood)

[Fiona Shnapple]

Was I eerily prescient, what with my Blood Elf powers and all? Sorry
to disappoint, but information about pixel portals was readily
available by the time I started writing the books, back in 2001.
Articles had already been written about the fact that a corner of
imagery on, for instance, an art gallery website, could be chosen as
the entranceway to a virtual location that you might not want everyone
to see. Many transactions and exchanges were already being done via
pixel portal. A lot of porn changes eyeballs by that method, just for
instance.

[...]

Many knew: for instance, anyone who’s read a bit of history, such as
the history of cryptography, or some thriller literature, such as John
LeCarré. Or even mythology, come to that: Open Pandora’s box or the
genie’s bottle, and it’s really hard to put things back the way they
were. If the break-and-enter tools are provided, human nature will do
the rest. We’re inherently nosy, we love secrets, we open locked boxes
whenever we can, and we’ve been spying ever since the Book of Joshua
and planting warriors in disguise ever since the Trojan Horse.
-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l