PRIVACY IS AT RISK

Privacy is at risk with extensions of technology’s “potential” use. Technology offers the potential of delivering a means to monitor every person’s movement and track and collect recorded human daily events. Is that necessary? What are the consequences? There are consequences and those consequences must be assessed in balance with the potential harm to society. The potential use of technology is limitless, but such extensive use leads to other uses. In the world of technology there is always evolutionary ‘next generations’. Next generations are always appearing with greater capability than what was once envisioned. Science’s and technology’s evolutionary tendencies that threaten society’s essential fabric of freedom and peace, require conceptions of governing science and its future next generations.

Privacy is at risk with the potential for limitless evolution of technology that overruns humanity into nonexistence. There is the notion of making society a better place to live. But what life can be had in a realm of surveillance? Does humanity need such surveillance? The equity of privacy and the technological use of the potential for government use of such data for control begs the question.

Laws will inevitably need to be rewritten. A new means of embracing governing science and technology is needed. Not enough has been done, up to now, and society is vulnerable. New case law on what is allowable in a society where government’s record collection fascination of daily life’s activity becomes the acceptable norm will have to develop. The irony of all this is that while governmental institutions stand to record and collect every metadata of human lives for its purposes, government usually stalls to provide production on information requests under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Governments and technology companies exert hernia inducing effort to prevent disclosure of their data and records.

There is evidence that the concern is present and true. Already governments, for example China, as reported by the Wall Street Journal in a piece by Liza Lin,[1] is seeking to implement functionality on cell phones to track citizens. In the United States, the NSA has developed a system called Mainstay, a development covered in a recent story by Barton Gellman, Wired magazine about NSA’s tool for mapping social networks [2]and much, much more. With every “next generation” the envelope is pushed further into a realm that may not be livable. Law and society will need to develop as well, or society and the law will need to put limits on the extensive use of technology that infringes on social dynamics of privacy and life in general.

Privacy is at risk at every reveal of the next generation of a device’s technological function and it is a concern that we all should embrace with both eyes open. As stated before, laws are currently not equipped to handle such intrusive use of data collection, behavioral monitoring, social control measures, associational restrictions, and movement sensing. At what point will the invasion of privacy cause of action apply to government’s use of the data, to the privately owned social network that facilitates garnering of data sequences, and to intermediary parties that buy such data? Will citizens have a say on their own fundamental aspects of their own lives, i.e., where they go, how far they go, who they talk to, what they read, what they search on line, how many people do they see at one particular time, and so on? The notion of governing science and technology has already been stated herein, but what to do will have to involve the integrated parties, i.e., ISP’s and their already identified role of addressing the unwanted SPAM epidemic. Yet, when it comes to pinpointing what to do, there will always be some who would argue that certain identified measures to address technology intrusive potential would be too burdensome. Of course, such views selfishly ignore, that incurring the suggested burden provides a general protective piece of mind to society. A piece of mind that today seems dwindling.

[1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-plan-to-make-permanent-health-tracking-on-smartphones-stirs-concern-11590422497 – China’s Plan to Make Permanent Health Tracking on Smartphones Stirs Concern, Liza Lin, May 25, 2020.

[2] https://www.wired.com/story/inside-the-nsas-secret-tool-for-mapping-your-social-network/ – BACKCHANNEL, Inside the NSA’s Secret Tool for Mapping Your Social Network, Barton Gellman 05.24.2020