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Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.

turnkey tyranny en · NOUN

Etymology

From turnkey + tyranny.

Meanings

  1. (uncountable) An institutional, legal, and technical infrastructure — particularly mass surveillance, data collection, and centralized state power — that is built up to a point where it is likely to be abused for authoritarian ends, or could be activated by any government so inclined with little additional effort.
    • Civil-liberties advocates warned that the expanding surveillance apparatus had created turnkey tyranny.
    • And it will be turnkey tyranny. 2016 November 10, Alex Hern, “Worried about the NSA under Trump? Here's how to protect yourself”, in The Guardian: