Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
pros and cons of government surveillance
ethical aspects of electronic surveillance
ethics of surveillance essays
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: pros and cons of government surveillance
Domestic Surveillance
Elizabeth Mahan
SOC 120 Introduction to Ethics & Social Responsibility
Instructor: Cari Lynn Beecham-Bautista
June 29, 2015
DOMESTIC SURVEILLANCE
Introduction
Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary defines domestic as “relating to or made in your own country”. The word surveillance is defined as “the act of carefully watching someone or something, especially in order to prevent or detect a crime”. Therefore, the term Domestic Surveillance in its simplest terms can be defined as the government’s ability to protect its interest by monitoring its residents. In this paper we will review the pros and cons of domestic surveillance as well as review the classical ethical theories. While some may agree with domestic surveillance others believe that it is unconstitutional and the government should not be allowed to use electronics to monitor its residents.
Domestic Surveillance
There have been classical
Giving the examples of theories and perspectives enables a person to reflect and evaluate pros and cons of domestic surveillance or any situation rather it be political or personal. Although reviewing ethical theories gives us a clear reason as to why such a monitoring is done, this does not mean a definitive resolve exists. Therefore, there is the unfortunate fact that with any theory there will have to be a tradeoff between a certain level of privacy and a strong sense of domestic security.
References
Geenwald, G. (2013). NSA collecting phone records of millions of Verizon customers. The Guardian, 4. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary Mosser, K. (2013). Ethics and social responsibility (2nd ed.). San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc.
Review, H. L. (2014). Data Mining, Dog Sniffs, and the Fourth Amendment. Harvard Law Review, 691-712.
Wright, M. (2013). The Lone wold is no mean thing. The
Taylor, James Stacey. "In Praise of Big Brother: Why We Should Learn to Stop Worrying and Love Government Surveillance." Public Affairs Quarterly July 2005: 227-246.
According to a recent article by Scott Shane, “The U.S. is pushing to make sure that cyber programs comply with international law and international standards.” This quote shows that the government wants to make sure that cyber programs protect the citizens to the same degree as other international laws. The government wants cyber programs to have the same standards as international law and international standards to give citizens the sense of security that they are being protected. According to a recent article by David Francis “...Congress retroactively immunized the nation’s telecom giants for their participation in the illegal Bush spying programs, Klein’s claims (by design) were prevented from being adjudicated in court.” This quote means that telecom giants such as Verizon and AT&T participated in Domestic Surveillance in order to help protect citizens. Telecom giants play a role in giving US citizens a sense of security by helping the National Security Agency. Others may believe that the tracking of our phone calls does not give US citizens a sense of security; however, according to a recent article by Marshall Honorof, “Counterterrorism is not the only function of the NSA's widespread surveillance. Although it cannot report exact numbers, Lewis theorizes that the data-mining has allowed the NSA to put a stop to a number of international espionage plots.”
The NSA and U.S. government sifting through our private information is but a small inconvenience that we must sacrifice in order to protect our own freedom and safety. Domestic Surveillance roots back to the 1910’s, where the assassination of President McKinley, created a Bureau of Investigation that would trace the efforts of the Communists attempting an uprising in America. This would be the foundings behind Domestic Surveillance in America, and would continue on after World War II where the government created the NSA and CIA, with the main purposes
Richards, Neil M. "The Dangers Of Surveillance." Harvard Law Review 126.7 (2013): 1934-1965. Academic Search Elite. Web. 8 Feb. 2014.
The government is always watching to ensure safety of their country, including everything and everyone in it. Camera surveillance has become an accepted and almost expected addition to modern safety and crime prevention (“Where” para 1). Many people willingly give authorization to companies like Google and Facebook to make billions selling their personal preferences, interests, and data. Canada participates with the United States and other countries in monitoring national and even global communications (“Where” para 2). Many question the usefulness of this kind of surveillance (Hier, Let, and Walby 1).However, surveillance, used non-discriminatorily, is, arguably, the key technology to preventing terrorist plots (Eijkman 1). Government surveillance is a rising global controversy; and, although minimal coverage could possibly result in safer communities, too much surveillance will result in the violation of citizen’s privacy.
According to John W. Whitehead, “The fact that the government can now, at any time, access entire phone conversations, e-mail exchanges, and other communications from months or years past should frighten every American.” (Whitehead). The NSA
In early June 2013, Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old former defense contractor who had access to NSA database while working for an intelligence consulting company, leaked classified documents reports that the National Security Agency (NSA) is recording phone calls of millions of Americans along with gathering private data and spying foreign Internet activity. The Washington Post later broke the news disclosed PRISM, a program can collect data on Internet users. The leaked documents publicly stated a vast objection. Many people were shocked by the scale of the programs, even elected representatives were unaware of the surveillance range. A nationwide debate over privacy rights have been sparked. Although supporters claim that the NSA only does its best to protect the United States from terrorists as well as respecting Americans' rights and privacy, many civil rights advocates feel that the government failed to be clear about the limit of the surveillance programs, threatening Americans' civil...
Andrew Guthrie Ferguson thinks that people should be able to choose what areas they want to be secure from “physical and sense-enhancing invasion.” Another scholar, Joel Reidenbuerg, believes that current views of privacy do not fit well with the current technology, instead surveillance is dependent on “the nature of the acts being surveilled.” One more scholar, Chris Slobogin, believes that “the justification for a search should be roughly proportional to the intrusiveness of the search” (Hartzog, 2015). Point is, legal issues surrounding government surveillance is a complex topic without a perfect all-encompassing solution; each situation is different and should be treated
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.
The deontological ethical system, ethical formalism, articulates that what is considered moral is the motive or intent of the actor and not the consequence of the action (Pollock, 2012 pg 26). Philosopher Immanuel Kant states that the only thing that is good is good will, if a person does an act from good will; it can be considered moral action even if it results in bad consequences. Kant states that you should treat people as ends in themselves and not as only means to an end. In order to examine if governmental monitoring is ethical from a Kantian perspective, an examination of the why government is monitoring its citizens must be discussed.
Barry, Vincent, Olen, Jeffrey, & Van Camp, Julie C. Applying Ethics: A Text with Readings, Tenth Edition. Boston: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2011.
Citizens feeling protected in their own nation is a crucial factor for the development and advancement of that nation. The United States’ government has been able to provide this service for a small tax and for the most part it is money well spent. Due to events leading up to the terrifying attacks on September 11, 2001 and following these attacks, the Unites States’ government has begun enacting certain laws and regulations that ensure the safety of its citizens. From the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978 to the most recent National Security Agency scandal, the government has attempted and for the most part succeeded in keeping domestic safety under control. Making sure that the balance between obtaining enough intelligence to protect the safety of the nation and the preservation of basic human rights is not extremely skewed, Congress has set forth requisites in FISA which aim to balance the conflicting goals of privacy and security; but the timeline preceding this act has been anything but honorable for the United States government.
Ultimately, however, surveillance is only a tool that can be used both ethically and unethically. Employee monitoring, consumer data collection, and government surveillance provides great benefits, including improving company efficiency, providing commercial and health values, and protecting the nation from threats. However, when considering the extent to which surveillance can be done, the rights of the people affected must be taken into account. Finding the right balance between these two views is the key to maximizing the benefits of everyone involved.
There are an estimated 30 million surveillance cameras in the United States, proving to be a normal feature in American lives (Vlahos). This is no surprise because in the past several years, events such as the 9/11 attack and the availability of cheaper cameras have accelerated this trend. But conflicts have come with this and have ignited, concerning the safety of the people versus the violation of privacy that surveillance has. Although camera surveillance systems are intended to provide safety to the public, the violation of privacy outweighs this, especially in a democratic country like America.
There has always been surveillance of the general public conducted by the United States government, the usual justifications being upholding the security of the nation , weeding out those who intend to bring harm to the nation, and more. But the methods for acquiring such information on citizens of the united states were not very sophisticated many years ago so the impact of government surveillance was not as great. As a result of many technological advancements today the methods for acquiring personal information - phone metadata, internet history and more - have become much simpler and sophisticated. Many times, the information acquired from different individuals is done so without their consent or knowledge. The current surveillance of people