Over two decades, the US and its allies spent hundreds of millions of dollars building databases for the Afghan people. The nobly stated goal: Promote law and order and government accountability and modernise a war-ravaged land. But in the Taliban’s lightning seizure of power (they have now seized much of the Panjshir valley, too, the last province not in their control), most of that digital apparatus—including biometrics for verifying identities—apparently fell into the Islamists’ hands. Built with few data-protection safeguards, it risks becoming the high-tech jackboots of a surveillance state. As the Taliban get their governing feet, there are worries it will be used for social control and to punish perceived foes. Since Kabul fell on August 15, indications have emerged that government data may have been used in Taliban efforts to identify and intimidate Afghans who worked with US forces. People are getting ominous and threatening phone calls, texts and WhatsApp messages. A 27-year-old US contractor in Kabul told The Associated Press he and co-workers who developed a US-funded database used to manage army and police payrolls got phone calls summoning them to the defence ministry. He is in hiding and changing his location daily, he said.