Sunday July 31, 2005
The dilemma: tracking terrorists but not tracking us.
The British police zeroed in remarkably quickly on the four men believed responsible for the transit bombings on July 7, thanks to London\’s omnipresent security cameras. One photo actually showed the four entering King\’s Cross station.
London, someone said, has more surveillance cameras than anywhere else on earth. I question the claim (Santiago, Chile, makes a similar claim) but there\’s no doubt that the cameras assisted the investigation.
And that\’s the problem. We all want terrorists stopped. And if surveillance cameras will help do that, we\’re in favour. But we don\’t want our own privacy invaded.
We can\’t have it both ways.
Scott McNealy, CEO of Sun Microsystems, states bluntly, "You already have zero privacy – get over it."
Google now offers satellite imagery of almost any place on the globe. Just type “Maps,” click “Satellite,” enter any address, and zoom in.
Granted, these are still-photos, fixed images. But before long, I\’m sure, you will be able to see an instant video of that address.
With video cameras so small they can be hidden in a hat, with cameras in cell phones, with surveillance cameras in almost all public buildings, you are almost always on display somewhere.
And you thought you had privacy? Forget it!
Privacy legislation
Confidentiality has virtually vanished. By law, doctors must report certain medical conditions. Clergy can be subpoenaed to testify about counselling sessions. Only lawyer/client confidentiality remains protected – hardly surprising, since lawyers write the laws.
Canadian privacy legislation — federal or provincial – is a toothless tiger. Like most reactions against social trends, it attempts to bar the barn door after the horse has fled.
The current push to preserve family values, for example, tacitly admits that those values have been diluted and almost destroyed by divorce, double incomes, and hyper-scheduled calendars. Sexual abstinence died with the birth-control pill; no amount of pro-life lobbying will bring it back. And anyone with a high-school chemistry set can manufacture mind-altering drugs, while legislators continue to fulminate against the drugs of the \’60s.
Privacy legislation came into being only after corporations had already accumulated massive amounts of information about each of us through our use of credit cards and rewards programs.
In his book The End of Privacy, Reg Whittaker, professor of political science at Toronto\’s York University, argues that George Orwell\’s monolithic Big Brother has fragmented into a myriad of corporate Little Brothers who operate with little or no accountability.
Clinging to outmoded practices
Many laws come too late to be unenforceable.
A decade ago, a woman in Montreal fought a copyright battle over a photograph taken of her in a public place. She contended that she, not the photographer, owned the image.
She won. But it was a meaningless victory, almost instantly overtaken by technology.
Today, you may not even know that your picture has been taken. Or, for that matter, that your words or music have been plagiarized. Until they appear on the Internet. By then, no one can reclaim or remove that information.
Information used to be power. Especially if you possessed it, and your opponent didn\’t.
CSIS, the RCMP, and most government departments continue to operate with a closed-door mentality. Canada\’s information commissioner, John Reid, said in his final report to Parliament, “I did not understand the depth of the culture of government secrecy… The watchword is, \’Don\’t tell anything to anybody.\’”
Because to release information is to lose some of the power you once held over others.
Even in the family, secrecy protected abusive, alcoholic, or unfaithful spouses from social censure.
Today\’s near-universal access to information threatens that control. The abuses in Baghdad\’s Abu Ghraib prison emerged only because someone published incriminating photos. Blogs (diaries published electronically) routinely contradict carefully managed press releases.
Simson Garfinkel, author of Database Nation: the Death of Privacy in the 21st3\”> Century, argues that the loss of secrets "forces us to live up to a new standard of accountability."
According to Garfinkel, the new technologies leave us with only two choices: to allow personal data to become public, or to become hermits.
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For a lighter look at ethics, faith, and life, I recommend Ralph Milton\’s weekly e-newsletter Rumors. You can subscribe to it at the Wood Lake Books home page in Ralph Milton\’s Site, or by sending a note directly to [email protected].
It\’s also worth pursuing Richard Fairchild\’s United Online site. Another site worth visiting is David Keating\’s \”SeemslikeGod\” page.
Another author, David Brin, calls this “The Transparent Society.” When individuals and authorities can no longer hide behind a veil of secrecy, they can no longer exploit their advantage to control others.
If information is open to everyone, Brin argues, people will have nothing to fear from the watchers because everyone will be watching everyone else. The cameras can re-assure us that muggers are not hiding around the corner, our children are playing safely in the park, and police will not abuse their power.
So, says Brin, let openness rule. Make bosses as accountable as employees, have government watched by its citizens as much as it watches.
I tend to agree – even though his recommendation resembles the gun lobby\’s argument that if everyone carried weapons, there would be no more crime. Which in turn closely parallels the Cold War\’s thesis of nuclear safety through “mutually assured destruction”…
Fellow writer Deirdre Strachan put the case for transparency this way in her electronic newsletter (http://www.straughan.com/newsletter/index.html if you\’re interested in subscribing): “Anything you do in public, and many occasions you may imagine to be private, could potentially be seen by the entire world. Get used to it, because there\’s not a damn thing you can do to prevent it.
“If the tradeoff is my privacy vs. my right to know what authorities and others in power are doing, I can live with less privacy. Sooner or later, someone will post a picture of me picking my nose on the Internet for all to see. I may be embarrassed, even humiliated, but basically I have nothing to hide.
“Which is, in the end, the real solution — lead a blameless life. Don\’t do anything you\’d be ashamed to have your neighbors know or that you could get trouble for if the law found out.
“Privacy is effectively dead. Long live transparency!”
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Copyright © 2002 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups permitted; all other rights reserved.
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