Maintaining your secret identity

[Umbran]

They may well be countries where the intelligence/security services have "interfered" with the blood donation services, but I suspect that's pretty rare and targeted if so because it would be an insane scandal if it came out and would harm blood donations to the point of itself being a serious national security risk.

Yeah, the loss of blood donations would be a bigger security risk than anyone you'd stop with the information.

However, in the UK, ever having been arrested and processed even once, even under entirely false or unreasonable arrest conditions where no charge was made or even really possible (in theory you shouldn't be processed in the latter case - in practice people often are), even if the arrest was later removed from the books does permanently put you on a police DNA registry though (which the intelligence services will have access to, and any paid spies for the mega-rich/corporations who have infiltrated the police and/or intelligence services will thus be able to access). Not sure if that's true in the US - I assume not....

In the US, you get a genetic sample taken if you are arrested for a federal crime. Many states have laws for collection of genetic samples on arrest for certain crimes. Most states have laws allowing collection of samples for conviction for some crimes (sexual assault being a common one).

All of this raises the point, though, that if you are Superman-level tough, you probably aren't leaving a lot of genetic samples around anyway. Supes needs to use his superpowers just to shave - his hair ain't coming off in a dust-up with unpowered thugs.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

All of this raises the point, though, that if you are Superman-level tough, you probably aren't leaving a lot of genetic samples around anyway. Supes needs to use his superpowers just to shave - his hair ain't coming off in a dust-up with unpowered thugs.

That is a very good point. I think the cameras would still let them track you down, but that would probably prevent any DNA-based approach unless you got into a fight with another super (if there even are any).

 

[monsmord]

Having donated blood does not put your genetics into a searchable registry from which authorities or super-rich villains can identify you based on a sample found in the field.

A couple years ago, Canadian Blood Services started partnering with Grifols, a private big pharma interest that manufactures and sells "finished plasma products", to offer paid plasma donation (article here). (There were similar occurrences in the years prior, but more localized and shorter term. Three provinces banned the practice due to ethical concerns with paying for blood, but I digress.) Thing is, much of the detail of that contract has not been made public, including any oversight on Grifols's practices; it's so sketchy, I've stopped donating because I can't be certain that my donation isn't supporting some big pharma profit scheme, or, for all I know, going into a private-but-available DNA library. (Seriously, I'd expect Grifols to be leveraging every possible avenue for profit with the donations they receive, including "research", so why wouldn't they keep the data, even anonymized, in the event they could be exploited sooner or later? Not superman related, even, but just because they can?)

In a world with a "superman" at large, I'd imagine that, at every opportunity for DNA, blood, bone, or tissue collection, some organization, private or otherwise, would be analyzing and cataloging that data, possibly surreptitiously. Some might do it to try to identify this Samaritan, others might be trying to suss out anomalies in the genome that might account for such a being. Heck, some governments might just use the "threat" of a superhuman to justify the invasion of privacy, or go further by changing the definition of privacy to enable the practice. I mean, just one superbeing flying around the world doing these great feats would be enough to panic governments, especially the ones doing bad things (so, like, not to be too cynical, but...most governments?)

What, me, paranoid?

 

[Umbran]

What, me, paranoid?

Yes.

For one thing, searching the blood supply for a single person you aren't absolutely sure gives blood is not a cost effective way of finding their genetics.

For another thing, if the guy's skin is knife- or bullet-proof, dollars to donuts he can't and won't give blood - needles won't piece his skin.

 

[monsmord]

Yes.

For one thing, searching the blood supply for a single person you aren't absolutely sure gives blood is not a cost effective way of finding their genetics.

For another thing, if the guy's skin is knife- or bullet-proof, dollars to donuts he can't and won't give blood - needles won't piece his skin.

Hey, I'm riffing here!

 

[Umbran]

That is a very good point. I think the cameras would still let them track you down, but that would probably prevent any DNA-based approach unless you got into a fight with another super (if there even are any).

Yeah, that's a tidbit there. Morrus has stipulated that you have powers. He didn't stipulate that anyone else does.

So, it becomes easy to get your community's support to help protect your identity. Your job isn't to beat people up and get in fights that cause major property damage - your job is to gather evidence of crimes, and deliver the criminals to the authorities, and save folks from disasters.

You cruise the docks, trainyards, and airports, using your X-Ray vision to find drug smugglers and sex traffickers, take lots of pictures and video documentation, wrap them up, and drop that off to the authorities. Pull people out of burning buildings. Fly to flood and earthquake zones saving people, and so on.

Honestly, you can probably make a good superhero not worrying about crime at all, and instead doing emergency response.

 

[Morrus]

For another thing, if the guy's skin is knife- or bullet-proof, dollars to donuts he can't and won't give blood - needles won't piece his skin.

I guess we don't know if Superman sheds skin or hair like we do, sweats, fingerprints, etc. Though those things are easily reduced by a suitable costume.

 

[Morrus]

Honestly, you can probably make a good superhero not worrying about crime at all, and instead doing emergency response.

I figure that's what I would do. I don't think I'd make a good detective, or always know what was the right thing to do.

Even in emergency response situations, you'd need to find who's in charge and ask them what you can do to help. Otherwise you might just make things worse. If you get there before anybody else does, I guess you just hope the solution is obvious (grab that child from that burning building). Problem is, you mess up once and somebody gets hurt or worse, you then have to live with that.

 

[Umbran]

I guess we don't know if Superman sheds skin or hair like we do, sweats, fingerprints, etc. Though those things are easily reduced by a suitable costume.

Or a Gattaca-style scrubdown. Maybe bathe in fusion flame every morning, or something.

We can guess about sweat - in humans, sweat is first and foremost about temperature regulation. If Supes needed to sweat to keep from overheating, he'd be vulnerable to heat and dehydration, not just kryptonite.

 

[MoonSong]

Realistically against a modern surveillance state (US, China, UK, either Korea, much of Europe, Russia, etc.) I don't believe you could maintain a secret identity from the intelligence services of the state and other states for terribly long unless you had a full-body costume which didn't conform to your own body shape very closely (like a bulky space-suit-style outfit), and an ability to change in and out of it which superman doesn't really possess (so this seems outside the scope, I guess we're stuck with a conformant body suit and just super-speed quick change).

I think what would be harder than maybe people think is correlating times when you're not around and the superhero is, but that would be almost immaterial, because all they need to do is find one camera which catches super-you vanishing into an alley and normal-you walking out, and whilst they might have other suspects, you'd be on the list and they'll narrow it down fast.

If you were a shapeshifter and could teleport you could probably maintain your identity indefinitely, but that's not a superman-type's power set so outside scope.

So for 1. I think it would be weeks to single-digit months before the intelligence services figured out who you were. From the public? Almost indefinitely so long as you didn't have a distinctive appearance that made you easy to recognise (which I kind of think superman does, but that's a separate discussion).

However, with 2. in a non-superheroic world, what happens to you? Depends on the nation-state you primarily dwell in, and the attitudes of the leaders of that state and how the intelligence services operate.

I mean, the big problem is, with superman's power set, they probably can't do anything at all to you yourself. And threatening your friends and family? That seems like a surefire way to get their agents maimed or killed unless you are incredibly forbearing, and with the mindsets of intelligence services, they'll immediately think "We'd hurt people who pissed us off, so this person will too". They can't even really risk attempting to attack you directly, because if you worked it out, the consequences for them, or anyone you believed responsible, could be very terrible and swift. Some states, like the US, would almost certainly attempt to test your invulnerability by arming people and hoping you tangled with them, but that's risky, because what if you join the dots? Or just make a leap of logic informed by suspicion? Superman is, with love, slightly dim, very good-natured, and somewhat incurious (despite being a reporter). The same power set with someone with a very sharp and suspicious mind, especially one who leaps to conclusions, and a less forgiving nature? Terrifying. A huge risk to mess with them at all.

I think if we assume ultimately that rationality wins out over fear in the nation-state you dwell in, the intelligence services basically come to you in a grovelling mode, asking you to be a "patriot", to cooperate with them, please don't decapitate the government, and so on. Because what else can they do except basically appeal to your potential patriotism and maybe attempt to bribe you? I think that would probably factor in two. If you have a more venal personality, even if you're more heroic, they may well be able to subvert you with luxury and people sent to handle you, or they may believe they can.

Thinking of the UK, they could and probably would offer to just D-notice any media attempts to seriously dig into your identity, whilst planting fake stories, using lookalikes, etc. to throw people off and discredit reporters who refused to be thrown off as kooks and weirdoes or even "terrorists". So then we get into the more complex question of international inquiries into your identity. Realistically things are going to spiral as other nations' intelligence services work out who you are and want to gain your favour (or see if they can whack you, but again, it's very likely they realize this is a bad idea before trying anything), but that's kind of outside the scope here.

Also breaking the secret identity is likely to benefit you in the short term because you will immediately be seen as a god and worshipped literally or metaphorically, no two ways about it. Look at how media polishes the boots of even the very worst billionaires, even the ones who don't own media. Look at how politicians behave towards them. You think they wouldn't immediately start frantically boot-licking someone who is indestructible, unstoppable, and faster than a speeding bullet? In the longer-term it would destabilize pretty much the entire planet so I think people (probably including you, initially at least) would want to avoid that happening, and preserve a pretty fiction of an unknown hero who only helps and saves.

TLDR: Any modern surveillance state will relatively quickly figure out who you are, but they will almost certainly want to get on your good side and actually happily aid any deception about your identity (to the point of suppressing media enquiries etc.). You won't need to forge your identity papers etc. because the state will be doing it for you to try and get you to work with them.

My city and metropolitan area in the other state are covered by hundreds of cameras in two government systems (called c5 and c4) that are mointored 24/7. Doesn't really stop crime, but it will pick on a conspicuous figure that keeps popping up. And of course that's not counting the hundreds of private security cameras. Even if you personally live outside this area, your neighbors will eventually notice and know.

Your best bet is to cycle through a series of outfits that can be pieced from common mass-produced clothes. Anything custom will give you away, eventually. And well, as for the problem of your body shape giving you away, that is what capes and cloaks are for, to oscure your body shape.

There is a reason I set my superhero stories in the mid nineties to mid oughts. After that, I don't see secret identities lasting much.