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The anatomy of a technological scare

How patents, paranoia and state silence collide in Hungary

By an Economist-style correspondent

A catalogue is circulating among Hungary’s disaffected and fearful: a numbered list of American patents, each said to prove that modern states possess the means to invade the human mind. Microwave “voice-to-skull” devices. Brain-wave manipulation. Subliminal emotional control. Directed-energy weapons. Remote biometric surveillance. Taken together, the list purports to demonstrate that neurological warfare is not speculative, but already operational—and, some allege, deployed against civilians.

None of this has been proven. But dismissing the list outright would miss the deeper failure that allows it to flourish.

How the list is built

The patents most frequently cited share three characteristics.

First, they exist. Each is a real filing in the American patent system. Second, they describe phenomena that are not imaginary: the microwave auditory effect can cause clicking sensations; brain waves can be nudged by light or sound; radar can measure breathing; lasers can be weaponised. Third—and crucially—they are interpreted far beyond what the science supports.

Take the oft-invoked “voice-to-skull” patent (US 6,470,214 B1). It describes a method related to the microwave auditory effect, known since the Cold War. The effect produces simple noises—clicks, pops—caused by rapid tissue expansion. What it does not demonstrate is the remote transmission of intelligible speech into unwilling subjects at distance. That leap exists only in imagination.

The same pattern repeats across the list. Brain-wave “induction” patents resemble meditation aids or light-therapy devices. “Ventriloquist effect” filings concern sound localisation, not thought insertion. Alleged implant patents describe medical imaging or dental devices, not covert surveillance hardware. Subliminal-message systems have long been known to have weak, inconsistent effects. Even remote vital-sign monitoring—real and increasingly commercial—detects physiology, not thoughts.

The list’s most alarming entries—directed-energy weapons—are real military technologies. They are also large, power-hungry and tightly controlled, designed for battlefields and satellites, not for silently tormenting individuals in apartments.

What emerges is not a secret arsenal of mind-control tools, but a collage of misunderstood technologies, stripped of context and woven into a single narrative.

Why it feels convincing

The story persists because it fits the times. Neuroscience and artificial intelligence are advancing quickly. As Nature recently noted, brain–computer interfaces can, in laboratory conditions, predict intentions or mental states before conscious awareness. That research is aimed at medical rehabilitation—but it unsettles the public imagination.

Meanwhile, governments communicate poorly. They hide behind classification, avoid nuance and treat public anxiety as a nuisance. In Hungary, this problem is acute. Independent oversight is weak. Institutions are politicised. Minorities and critics are routinely portrayed as threats. Trust has collapsed.

In such an environment, technological ambiguity becomes existential fear.

Alleged effects, real suffering

Some individuals report auditory disturbances, cognitive distress or the belief that their bodies have been interfered with. There is no independent medical evidence linking such experiences to weapons or implants. There is abundant medical literature linking them to stress, trauma, isolation and prolonged fear.

The Hungarian state’s failure is not that it secretly possesses fantastical machines. It is that it refuses to engage seriously with the suffering itself. No transparent inquiries. No public explanation of what technologies can and cannot do. No independent mental-health response that treats people with dignity rather than contempt.

By responding only with dismissal, the government ensures that fear metastasises.

Secrecy as accelerant

History shows that secrecy does not suppress conspiracy; it fertilises it. Havana syndrome—an unresolved cluster of reported symptoms among diplomats—demonstrated this globally. The lack of a clear cause, combined with official reticence, produced myths far more durable than facts.

Hungary appears determined to repeat the error domestically.

The sharper indictment

There is no credible evidence that any government is deploying mind-reading weapons on civilians. There is compelling evidence that the Hungarian state has created a psychological environment in which citizens can plausibly believe such things—and be destroyed by that belief.

That is not science fiction. It is governance failure.

A responsible government would confront the fear directly: open investigations, external scientific review, clear public communication, and robust mental-health support. Hungary has chosen silence instead. Silence, in this context, is not neutral. It is corrosive.

The truth that endures

The patents do not prove the weapons. The weapons do not explain the suffering. Power does.

Hungary does not need machines that read minds to damage lives. It has perfected a subtler instrument: opacity backed by authority, and a refusal to care what happens inside the heads of those it marginalises.

That, not imaginary hardware, is the scandal that deserves scrutiny.