In 2004, there were campaigns to ban Linux, it was painted as an “urgent threat to national security”. Opposition against technology is not new. If crypto helps people break free from the chains of TradFi, distractors will do everything to keep people cha

Came across this article from 2004, a group lobbied hard to put an end to linux, terming it as evil and a threat to national security. Microsoft founders were repeatedly bashing Linux for various reasons.

https://ghs.com/news/20040517_threat.html

"Given that juvenile delinquents are able to find and exploit Linux security vulnerabilities in their spare time, imagine how easy it is for foreign intelligence and military services with enormous resources. And unlike juvenile delinquents, hostile agents do not revel in their success when they compromise one of our systems; they secretly collect data, passwords, encryption keys, and other intelligence. After a foreign intelligence or military service compromises one of our systems they install a back door so that even if the exploited vulnerability is eventually patched, the system will remain compromised.

"It is not too late to prevent Linux from compromising national security. So far, Linux has only been deployed in a few defense systems, but its use in the development of new defense systems is spreading rapidly. That is why we must act now. The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing."

Today you can find the same kind of arguments against crypto. Everything tag from foreign controlled money to national security risks to the choice of currency for criminals has been used to describe crypto.

Coming to the attempts to ban Linux, in retrospect it seems kinda easy to see who would have benefited from Linux being banned.

Hint: Here you have Steve Ballmer of Microsoft claiming Linux is communism: https://www.theregister.com/2000/07/31/ms_ballmer_linux_is_communism/

A year later, he said Linux is cancer. https://www.theregister.com/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_cancer/

Finally after fifteen years, he said he loves linux. https://www.zdnet.com/article/ballmer-i-may-have-called-linux-a-cancer-but-now-i-love-it/ By 2015, MSFT was well entrenched in Linux offering many of their enterprise services like Azure on Linux.

Now with crypto, while the degree of crypto adoption today can be debated, it cannot be denied that giving people custody control over their own funds instead of banks will severely threaten the retail banking industry that thrives on taking customer deposits and in return giving them a pittance as interest, while also using customer funds to make out loans to other customers. Native crypto assets and even decentralised stablecoins can firmly put an end to middlemen institutions like banks and PayPal holding customer funds hostage because "terms & services".

So you have banks flipping back and forth on crypto, calling it criminal money in 2017 but in 2022 claiming it will take the place of gold.