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Surveillance and privacy
Ethical aspects of electronic surveillance
Surveillance technology essay
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The three most thought about aspects of a surveillance society, would be; from one side it protects and monitors, but on the other hand in order to achieve its protection functions, certain boundaries of privacy are crossed. Some would argue that it is governments demand for more power over people, a disciplinary technique; the fact that people are more likely to behave if they had known they had been under a certain amount of supervision. But not all of the time can this be beneficial to them; questions are asked of whether the success of it, rationalize for existence radical surveillance technologies. As much as it acts as a nation protector, and crime preventer, it is also, on a massive scale, a privacy invader. In this essay I will examine some of these aspects and theories that justify their disadvantages from their advantages.
The purpose of surveillance as Lyon explained, is: “the focused, systematic and routine attention to personal details for purposes of influence, management, protection to direction” (2007: p.14) this describes a more of national secure safety matter, then what he had supposed in his 1998 description of “watching others’ activities as a means of monitoring and supervising them” this here, describes a more a simple service, people are being watched purely for the purpose of monitoring and supervising, such as a prison watcher or an exam monitor. However in since the happening of September, 11 of 2001, surveillance on individual has became more of a formal national security issue. Moving away from the notion of specific should be targeted, to a notion of everyone is suspected and therefore targeted. Post nine eleven, “war against terrorism” has become a major excuse or reason for national security to k...
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...ivilians fears over the paranoia of under consent surveillance and feel that their freedom is under consent restriction.
Works Cited
Foucault, M. (1979) Discipline and Punish. London: Penguin.
Dreyfus, H and Rabinow, P. (1982) Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Lyon, D. (1988) The Information Society: Issues and Illusions. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Lyon, D. (2003) Surveillance after September 11. Cambridge: Polity
Orwell, G. (1948) Nineteen Eighty Four. New York: New American Library
Links:
BBC. (2005) “Shot man not connected to bombing” July 23. Available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4711021.stm
“Cookies” http://epic.org/privacy/internet/cookies/
BBC. (2005) “Full text of Tony Blair's speech” September 27. Available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4287370.stm
What is the historic context of surveillance, whose current form is electronic? We now know that the N.S.A. has no fewer than 46 surveillance programs (three in conjunction with the UK’s GCHQ) as described by surveillance reporter Julia Angwin (2014). For example:
Richards, Neil M. "The Dangers Of Surveillance." Harvard Law Review 126.7 (2013): 1934-1965. Academic Search Elite. Web. 8 Feb. 2014.
The feeling that someone is always watching, develops the inevitable, uncomfortable feeling that is displeasing to the mind. For years, the National Security Agency (NSA) has been monitoring people for what they call, “the greater good of the people” (Cole, February 2014). A program designed to protect the nation while it protects the walls within as it singles people out, sometimes by accident. Whether you are a normal citizen or a possible terrorist, the NSA can monitor you in a variation of ways. The privacy of technology has sparked debates across the world as to if the NSA is violating personal rights to privacy by collecting personal data such as, phone calls and text messages without reason or authorization (Wicker, 2011). Technology plays a key role in society’s day to day life. In life, humans expect privacy, even with their technology. In recent news, Edward Snowden leaked huge pieces from the NSA to the public, igniting these new controversies. Now, reforms are being pressed against the government’s throat as citizens fight for their rights. However, American citizens are slammed with the counterargument of the innocent forte the NSA tries to pass off in claims of good doing, such as how the NSA prevents terrorism. In fear of privacy violations, limitations should be put on the NSA to better protect the privacy of our honest citizens.
(Flynn 1996, 28) One important aspect of his analysis that distinguishes him from the predecessors is about power. According to Foucault, power is not one-centered, and one-sided which refers to a top to bottom imposition caused by political hierarchy. On the contrary, power is diffusive, which is assumed to be operate in micro-physics, should not be taken as a pejorative sense; contrarily it is a positive one as ‘every exercise of power is accompanied by or gives rise to resistance opens a space for possibility and freedom in any content’. (Flynn 1996, 35) Moreover, Foucault does not describe the power relation as one between the oppressor or the oppressed, rather he says that these power relations are interchangeable in different discourses. These power relations are infinite; therefore we cannot claim that there is an absolute oppressor or an absolute oppressed in these power relations.
Penenberg closes his essay by mentioning that the surveillance is not only used to watch the citizens but also for citizens to keep an eye on the government. Through his organization, relevant information, and professional tone, Penenberg creates an effective
Problems with Foucault: Historical accuracy (empiricism vs. Structuralism)-- Thought and discourse as reality? Can we derive intentions from the consequences of behavior? Is a society without social control possible?
Mass surveillance is a word that has been thrown around every so often in the last few decades, especially ever since George Orwell’s book Nineteen Eighty-Four. Although this book was released over 60 years ago, some aspects of the book are seeming to become true in the United States, and other parts of the world today. The idea of mass surveillance isn’t so taboo anymore, as there are several programs ran by sovereign countries around the world which monitor their domestic citizens, as well as citizens and leaders of other foreign countries. With all of our technological communication advances since 1949, this age of information is only going to get more severe, and more tracking and monitoring will be done. The biggest offender of doing this is the NSA, shortened for National Security Agency. The NSA is an organization that was made by the US Government to monitor intelligence, and collect, translate and decode information. What’s important about the NSA, is that this most recent summer, a program named PRISM was revealed by a whistleblower, and in summary, PRISM monitors everything it can, including our own citizens in the United States. This “scandal” had a lot of air time for many months, and is still in the news today. The revelation of what the NSA is doing behind our backs is what made the basis of this essay, and made me think of how similar this entire situation is to Nineteen Eighty-Four.
1984, a novel by George Orwell, represents a dystopian society in which the people of Oceania are surveilled by the government almost all the time and have no freedoms. Today, citizens of the United States and other countries are watched in a similar way. Though different technological and personal ways of keeping watch on society than 1984, today’s government is also able to monitor most aspects of the people’s life. 1984 might be a dystopian society, but today’s condition seems to be moving towards that controlling state, where the citizens are surveilled by the government at all times.
Privacy is one of the severe issue in today’s Modern Technology era, tied to human right around the world. Most countries have started thinking differently regarding between the people’s right and national security, and trying to leverage on new technology to detect potential national threats without hurting people’s privacy. However, there's a blurred line between privacy violation and government surveillance. (Sánchez, Levin & Del, 2012) It would be a learning process for governments to seek an optimum balance between retain integrity of privacy right and eliminate national threats in order to make the country better.
Most people concerned about the privacy implications of government surveillance aren’t arguing for no[sic] surveillance and absolute privacy. They’d be fine giving up some privacy as long as appropriate controls, limitations, oversight and accountability mechanisms were in place. ”(“5 Myths about Privacy”). The fight for privacy rights is by no means a recent conflict.
The world erupted in outrage following revelations by Edward Snowden regarding the extent of surveillance perform by the National Security Agency. Privacy becomes one of the hottest topic of 2013 and was chosen by the world’s most popular online dictionary, Dictionary.com, as the Word of the Year. However, the government is not the only one that conduct data gathering and surveillance. Employers often monitor their employees, and businesses collect data on theirs customer. The morality of these practices is a topic that generates heated debate.
Privacy is not just a fundamental right, it is also important to maintain a truly democratic society where all citizens are able to exist with relative comfort. Therefore, “[Monitoring citizens without their knowledge] is a major threat to democracies all around the world.” (William Binney.) This is a logical opinion because without freedom of expression and privacy, every dictatorship in history has implemented some form of surveillance upon its citizens as a method of control.
The concept of surveillance is a phenomena addressed by a wide range of disciplines- including sociology, psychology, law, criminology and politics (Crampton and Elden, 2007), and has been defined as the systematic investigation or monitoring of the actions or communications of one or more persons (Clarke, 2000). Its purposes vary according to the subject in question, although most ordinary language users argue that its primary purpose is to gather data and information about individual’s actions and daily activities in society (Rose, 1999). While others have argued that there is a second intention which is to deter a whole population from undertaking illegal actions (Clarke, 2000). The process of monitoring includes observations from a distance via technological devices such as CCTV, or interception of electronically transmitted information (reference). On average it is suggested that there are approximately 5.9 million CCTV cameras operating in Britain (Barrett, 2013), which work out at one for every 11 people in the UK. There has been a wide range of debates and publications on Surveillance & Society, the most important of which are the work of Michel Foucault (1977), Jeremy Bentham, Giddens (1985), followed by the work of Gary Marx (1998), and of course more recent work afforded by Deleze, (1990) Lyon (2001, 2007) and many more. For the purpose of this essay, the work of Foucault (1977) is discussed at length in order to examine whether his work is applicable to contemporary society. Therefore, this essay will begin by drawing on Foucault’s work on Discipline and Punish (1977), and outlines the concept of panopticon which he elaborate...
In the modern day era, we find in society a ubiquitous usage of technology that seems to be never ending and forever growing. Included with this notion, the broad subject of surveillance is of course included. Contemporary surveillance, or more specifically technological surveillance, has been described as ambiguous; meaning that it is often misunderstood or open to different interpretations. The representation of surveillance within popular culture has played an impacting role on how we as a society perceive it and this raises certain questions that may reflect back on to society. The 1998 film Enemy Of The State directed by Tony Scott, Starring Will Smith, Gene Hackman and Jon Voight is considered to be a ‘spy-thriller’ blockbuster. Its central themes explore a range of surveillance techniques and equipment and also provides some insights, no matter how realistic or unrealistic they may be, into the real life security organisation; The National Security Agency (NSA). Using this film as an example and analysing how these themes are represented will hopefully allow us to key these ideas back to modern surveillance theories and practices.
The past decade has seen a proliferation of law enforcement security cameras in public areas, with central London having more cameras than any other city. In cities like New York, Los Angeles, and central London, cameras can be found at almost every intersection. Terrorist attacks have been a major basis for this significant increase in law enforcement security cameras; however, privacy advocates, along with many of the public, feel that it’s an invasion of privacy. People are concerned that all this video surveillance, which is continuously expanding, has created a “Big Brother” society, where people are constantly watched. This creates paranoia and unease for people that just want to go about living there private lives, without feeling that their every move is being watched. The increased presence of surveillance cameras is almost compared to George Orwell’s novel from 1984, where he imagined a future in which people would be monitored and controlled by the government. One question that needs to be asked is: does the benefits of law enforcement security cameras outweigh the negative sides to it? Although the invasion of privacy is a serious argument against law enforcement cameras; nevertheless, it should be seen as a valuable tool to help fight crime. As long as surveillance cameras are in public places and not in people's homes, privacy advocates should not be concerned.