Evangelical app 'Bless Every Home' is mapping personal information of immigrants and non-Christians in a bid to conduct door-to-door religious conversions and “prayerwalking” rituals targeting them.

ForgottenFlux@lemmy.world to Technology@lemmy.world – 590 points – How Evangelicals Use Digital Surveillance to Target the Unconverted
newrepublic.com

It puts a lot of features at the fingertips of the faithful, including the ability to filter whole neighborhoods by religion, ethnicity, “Hispanic country of origin,” “assimilation,” and whether there are children living in the household.

Its core function is to produce neighborhood maps and detailed tables of data about people from non-Anglo-European backgrounds, drawn from commercial sources typically used by marketing and data-harvesting firms.

training videos produced by users show the extent to which evangelical groups are using sophisticated ways to target non-Christian communities, with questionable safeguards around security and privacy.

In one instance, he points to the sharable note-taking function and suggests leaving information for each household, such as “Daughter left for college” and “Mother is in the hospital.”

increasingly popular among Christian supremacist groups, prayerwalking calls on believers to wage “violent prayer” (persistently and aggressively channeling emotions of hatred and anger against Satan), engage in “spiritual mapping” (identifying areas where evil is at work, such as the darkness ruling over an abortion clinic, or the “spirit of greed” ruling over Las Vegas), and conduct prayerwalking (roaming the streets in groups, “praying on-site with insight”).

newly arrived refugees might well find a knock on the door from strangers with knowledge of their personal circumstances distressing—and that’s before these surprise visitors even begin to attempt to convert them.

placing people of different ethnic and religious backgrounds on easy-to-access databases is a dangerous road to go down

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can we poison this data?

I tried but they want you to give them your home address and I didn’t feel like doxing myself. I’m going to have to come up with a different home address that’s valid in their system. At the same time I don’t want to cause grief for the person whose address I use. Maybe I can use a church address.

Use the churche of Scientologys address

Yeah I’m wondering what happens if we download it and start giving it bad data. Just say everyone is Christian, or that you’ve met with everyone in your town every day.

Just giving it random data should be good enough. If the users can’t trust the validity of the data, they might stop using the app.

Why would you say everyone's a Christian? Might as well have some fun. Change all the ones marking themselves as Christians to say that they're gay liberal polygamists or something.

I figured obviously incorrect data on potential users of the app would be sussed out rather quickly, but posing as a devout bigot who has been converting everyone in town would be more “believable.”

Betcha their tracking the shout out of their users.

But you could spoof that with a simulator.

So, in theory, The Satanic Temple could make an app to mark all the Christian households then. I wonder if they'd be interested in that.

What do you mean? That app is already made, it’s the one mentioned in this post.

I suppose that app of theirs would work both ways 😂 But the temple app could open with a splash page of the Baphomet statue with the children.

Do you think if the Satanic Temple made a line-by-line copy of their app, but painted it black/red, the Evangelists would cry foul and complain about everything we're complaining about?

What am i saying? Of course they would.

Imagine how upset they'd be to see their homes marked out in a "Satanic" app with notes like 'has three young children'.

I bet they have enough members in the field to have it built for free. Hell, if I was an app dev I would chip in on the project.

Interesting.

If they've built an app that can target non-christian demographics, then they've also built an app to target christians.

I wonder if they've made that realization yet.

Fucking Christians, they just can’t believe in their fairy tale daddy in the sky and leave the rest of us alone, they have to smear their god like shit everywhere. Religion is a mental illness, it’s long overdue we start treating it that way.

This feels more like a ‘convert’ who do we kill when they tell us app to me.

lol, it’s going to turn into a hunting app with best times to hunt, type of heathen, etc. it would be funny if it weren’t so scary.

Wow, the Christian app that lets you sort people by religion ALSO lets you sort them by race and ethnicity?

I am shocked. SHOCKED!

Well, not that shocked.

Big brother who art in heaven, surveillance be thy name. Thy data come, recon be done, stored in SQL as it is in heaven. And lead us not into frustration, for thine is Consistent, Available, and Partition tolerant. COMMIT ;

select * from prayer_requests where response = 'yes' ;

0 rows returned

I want to have your children. In the nicest possible way.

Well according to his user name he’s a friend of Satan so that’s pretty cool

Very much creepy and very much on brand with evangelical assholes who prey on the less fortunate.

Still, I suppose it will give me more of an opportunity to tell them to kindly fuck the hell off my property when they ask for the 'nice Asian family that lives here' when my very Italian wife answers the door as they stand there looking very confused.

That may work at first but if the religio-fascists take over the government, they won't be asking anymore.

The fact white supremacists hijacked the Christian religion and is using it to effectively push their ideology is telling. I remember when they tried to take over punk music and were quickly told “ Nazi Punks Fuck Off”. Turns out punks have better morals than Christians. Hilarious.

Turns out punks have better morals than Christians.

I don't think that any reasoning person thought otherwise.

Were you around for the satanic panic bullshit in the 70s or 80s? They painted punks (which were lumped in with metalheads and anyone who didn’t dress like yuppies) as dangerous degenerates back then.

Worked as a nice filter to gain more independent thinkers into those genres though I guess, so it worked out in the end.

I wasn't around personally but I'm familiar with the story.

My point is really that any reasoning person sees that the punk mindset is generally pretty morally sound.

I don't think the parents, preachers and politicians involved in the satanic panic were super logical people tbh.

"Hijacked" implies they weren't a welcomed part of it from the beginning.

Yes they’ve always been racist, But this time it’s much different. Nazis and white Supremacists have blended in with them. I believe this a very important nuanced distinction.

No doubt, yet I feel the movement (to expand) has been organized and pushed by white supremacists and not Christians.

Never seems like a good thing when a religious group starts counting

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That's such a weird passage. I can't be understanding this correctly. God tells David to count the people. David sends his generals to count the people. They report the count back to David, who apologizes and says he sinned for doing what God told him to do? IDGI

prayerwalking calls on believers to wage “violent prayer” (persistently and aggressively channeling emotions of hatred and anger against Satan)

In other words first they will use words then move on to more "persuasive" methods when that doesn't work.

Okay, so this app is super messed up, but this take on prayerwalking is the equivalent to satanic panic for D&D.

Prayerwalking is just what the portmanteau describes. Sometimes it contains an evangelistic bent of looking for specific people to pray with or whatever, but mostly it's just people out praying for people and places.

ok but accosting strangers with your religion, and using an app to target them, does seem a bit beyond the pale.

Completely agree. I genuinely believe everyone should be allowed to believe and behave how they want, free from coercion, so long as they aren't inhibiting anyone else's ability to believe or behave as they please.

I think there's plenty to criticize here without resorting to the same outlandish polemics they employ.

"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. ... But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you." Matthew 6:5-6

I don't disagree with the sentiment, though the historical context makes the statement very different. The point wasn't that you can only pray in private. The point was you can't use apparent piety to increase your social collateral.

Doubtless, some of these people are only out there for exactly that reason. Others because they genuinely care and are deeply misguided in how best to demonstrate that concern.

They won't accept historical context for anything they believe in. Why should this be any different?

Because we should at least be consistent in our arguments even if they're not. That's why I'm saying anything at all.

This is going to be real Handy for them the day they try to put us all up against the wall.

So many people in this comment section not getting it. This is a list of people they will send to the camps. They're preparing for when the fascists take over.

Of course it's some shit-stain in Florida doing this.

Just Google map search Mapping Center for Evangelism and his home address pops up.

I had such an apologetic coming up to me. When i told them my name was "'Julia'); DROP TABLE neighborhoods;" they were immediately irate!

Aw, little Julie tables! I wondered how you turned out after your sister left town. How's the transition coming?

It's fine. Transitioning to Couchbase was fine. Was a bit weird getting used to NoSQL... Oh you mean my hormone therapy!

And how is... Mr? Neighborhoods?

So is it removed from the appatore yet? Or does it need some motivation?

Can it be flagged or something? That could get it removed.

This shit is pretty fucked up.

i reported it as doxing, looks like they're recording names and addresses. maybe those in the EU can raise gdpr concerns?

I doubt GDPR can reach this in any way as it's foreigners' data collected and stored in a foreign country.

I'm not sure if it's directly EU-level, but unauthorized identity registries collected without consent are very illegal here; a certain religious organisation already got into trouble for keeping track of households that might want to talk about jesus. If this app is legal in US, the law really needs to be changed.

I don't know the details of this app, but if it's specifically US streets and notes on households there, then GDPR does not apply, as they're not mapping EU households. GDPR is only invoked if the personal information of Europeans is at risk.

Still here. Lets all report it.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.blesseveryhome.bealight&pli=1

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/the-bless-app-pray-share/id1541313484

Reported. Still up on both stores. People are failing to recognize the danger of stupid people in numbers.

Is anyone familiar with automating emulated android? It would be really fun to setup an emulator and just flood the database with nonsense data.

Wow, this is absolutely fucking horrific. I assume they've imported everything from Kiwi Farms incarnation too? Bunch of evil fucks.

I'm kinda sick of all' the evil, actually. I get that it's very popular but maybe it shouldn't be? I'll just live in my own mind until people pull their heads out, I guess 🤷 What could possibly go wrong.

Too bad none of these Christians follow a single teaching of Jesus. If he exists, he's probably pissed about it.

I sincerely hope that when they come to my door again, I am in the middle of carving up a side of beef, again. Last time some Mormons knocked on my door, I opened the door, and what they saw was a 6'3" blonde Viking with no shirt, a bloody carving knife, and wiping blood off my hands. When I saw who it was I yelled over my shoulder, (to an almost empty apartment,) "Hey guys, you can let the goat go! I just found us a couple of virgins!"

They retreated rather quickly.

!thathappened@lemmy.world

Even if it didn't, what's the point in spoiling the fun fantasy that it did? I choose to think of it happening fondly.

It's creepy that they are collecting data about us without our knowledge nor consent. And having strangers then telling us private details about ourselves.

I wonder how they would react if we did this to them.

The crowd of "I have nothing to hide" that also has the highest incidence of minor sexual assault, domestic violence, and infidelity? I think they think they're talking to God who forgives whatever if you just say sorry and say a couple poems

i’m a christian myself and… god, this is fucking disgusting

Damn it. We already have to deal with the Mormons and the JWs periodically bothering us. Now numerous evangelical churches will be doing it too? I wish they'd all just get lost and leave people alone.

You misunderstand. This is how they're going to figure out who to send to the concentration camps.

They're crowd sourcing genocide.

That's a dark-as-fuck take. But honestly, you are probably on to something with it. Many evangelical 'followers of Christ' have a very different view on who he was than I and others do. Their Christ is a gun-wielding, xenophobic, intolerant, white skinned, white nationalist.

Of course, if they ever get their wish and pass some of these restrictive, oppressive federal laws against 'non-believers', the next phase will be ruthless infighting. Because they will inevitably turn on each other over trivial differences of opinion.

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Good luck with that in our town lol. We recently passed a town wide ordinance against "door to door salesmen" which would cover this bullshit

Plus, my driveway is 100 yards long, and my dogs are very barky.

It's not about door to door missionary work. It's about building a list of enemies to target when Trump takes over

Yup, this is a hitlist, not a "prayer list" or whatever.

That town ordinance certainly won't get abused, like it has in the past. Also, it goes against 1A. Just put up a NTP sign and a fence, they're not suppoed to bother you with that.

Mormons have been doing this for a while, but not quite at the creepy level as this.

If you tell someone that they are trespassing and to leave and not come back. Can you make a citizens arrest if they return?

IANAL, but I don't believe so. Most/all states have laws that allow people to access your property to come to your front door/porch, I forget the exact name, unless your property is fenced with clearly visible "private property/no trespassing" type signs.

However, once you've asked them to leave, they have to leave or they can be arrested/escorted away for trespassing should they refuse to and police become involved. In your example, if they were to come back after being asked to leave, I believe yes, but you couldn't arrest them, the police would have to.

In that last case, where you have asked them to leave and not come back... but they do. There is a thing called a citizen's arrest. Allowing nonpolice to make an arrest and detain a person. But what the law says and what you can do is often not the same. I just imagined haveing your doorbell record you saying to never come back, then slapping handcuffs on them if they do. Kinda sounds like fun.

Could be, but personally, I wouldn't recommend it. While there are citizen's arrest laws and I'm sure they've been used, I can't think of any examples off the top of my head, and it appears each state has different standards that need to be met to constitute a "citizen's arrest," with some states not allowing/defining it.

Personally, my concern with attempting a citizen's arrest would be doing so without meeting my state's/country's standard to do so. My state's statute explicitly states it is a crime to illegally restrain someone against their will, and even states that doing so is skirting the line of kidnapping.

Having a kidnapping charge thrown at me doesn't seem worth it for a jackass who doesn't want to leave my property but isn't doing anything else (like attempting to harm me or damage my property). I'd play it safe and just let the police handle it, their qualified immunity will let them do whatever they want and face no consequences anyway.

But again, IANAL, and YMMV, so do with all this as you will.

Yeah, wouldn't be me. I have kids and no time for the disuption. I also don't live in an area where I would have to worry about such things. But I would love to see someone who does test it. Might put a damper on these people.

While they're both bad and creepy in their weird ways I do find the sovereign citizen types more understandable than the creepy nosy cultists.

With them it's at least more understandable cause a lot of them it's desperation. I don't have sympathy for the ones who are desperate because they don't want to pay child support, but I atleast understand it. The nosy cultists just want to be superior

Do you want to weaponize the autistism against you? Cause this is how you weaponize autism against you.

Ask Shia Lebouff how well that goes.

I always kind of wonder how it would go if I ever actually answered the door to proselytizing folks.

They'd clearly be unprepared to answer about the late insertion of the fundraising reversal in Luke.

Or the ambiguous engendering of God.

Or the eroding of a matriarchal tradition in early Judaism.

Or that a lot of the stories were probably appropriated from elsewhere.

How long before they fold their arms and say "well I don't know about that" or "I'll have to ask my preacher"? Will I stay on their list for another round of discussion, or not?

To date the only folks I've interacted with around my neighborhood were Mormon missionaries, who are just so well mannered and youthfully naive I didn't have the heart to pull out a map that shows the distance between Manchester, NY and Jerusalem.

'Angry' proselytizers though I feel like I'd have at least a few words for their deaf ears to balance things out for the rest of the neighborhood having to hear their words in turn.

Are you trying to convince them they're wrong? Or just get them to leave you alone? Wouldn't it be simpler to just tell them you're a believer (in whatever thing they're preaching to you) and then wish them a blessed day or whatever? That would surely get them off your back.

If my name, or the names of anyone I care about, is on the list it won't be on for long.

Edit: they have virtually no security and it took me about a minute to see my neighborhood and see my address as well as half my block.

Let them come. I take this as an opportunity to radicalise them.