Penguin Marginalia - no cash

When I first read the casual statement in Neuromancer (I think it was, might have been Count Zero) about cash having been made illegal, I thought that was a weird piece of futurism gone too far. It was however, like all the best sci-fi, based on good extrapolation from the present; only I don't think cash will become technically illegal in the near-to-mid future (that would cause a massive outcry and also massive problems) it will just be useless for doing much more than buying a packet of Polos.

You can see here, for instance, Geraint Davies saying that people shouldn't be allowed to buy prepaid credit without identity checks because paedophiles might use it to get child porn - also going for the "think of the children" double by saying that kids use it to buy knives, the little buggers. (Clearly there are no other ways paedophiles or children might get hold of child porn or knives respectively.) Prepaid credit cards are basically internet cash; they can be purchased directly for physical cash, for an extortionate fee of course but that's how it works, with no notice, identity checking or credit reports. And cash is messy stuff. It lets people avoid having their economic transactions surveilled. We can't be having that.