Death of Privacy
By James Donahue
There has been a lot of media attention concerning the way big business interests are tracking everything we do, the places we go and especially the things we buy. It is perhaps troublesome that after we shop for a particular item on the Internet we are inundated with advertising for this particular product. It is almost as if a gene is sitting somewhere over us and recording our every thought and our every move.
What may be scary to us is that in a sense, while it isn’t a gene that records our actions . . . it is our electronic gadgetry. And these things are doing exactly that . . . watching, listening and recording everything we say and do.
We all enjoy visiting the social media Internet websites. The very nature of the Facebook site draws us out of our shell and makes us want to participate by revealing all kinds of personal information. But now we learn that everything we have revealed on Facebook has been recorded. Sites like Facebook and Google Search are collecting all of this personal information. When we use the Google maps to help us in our travels, the fact that we traveled and what we did along the way is carefully recorded.
Guardian writer Alex Preston recently wrote: We “have come to accept that the majority of our social, financial and even sexual interactions take place over the internet and that someone, somewhere, whether state, press or corporation is watching.”
If you examine your desktop computer closely you will discover a tiny camera mounted in the frame. This camera allows us to hold on-line communications while actually looking at each other via the computer screens. It also allows government and private agents to watch us around the clock if they choose.
If you have an Alexa or Google Home device on your desk you can be assured that it is listening to everything we say. The newer televisions are doing the same thing. While we watch the television screen, someone somewhere may be watching us via the same screen.
Electronic devices in our cars record every mile we drive and every problem that develops on the roadways.
If we are walking on public streets and sidewalks there is probably a tiny camera mounted somewhere nearby that is recording our every move.
With over seven billion people now packing this planet, who wants to know all of this personal information? Why would anybody wish to sit in a dark room somewhere and read and listen to all of the boring, mundane events in our lives?
We would think that nobody is tuning in on us personally. But computer systems are tuning in on telephone and computer conversations and actions, searching for anything that might be a criminal act or a terrorist plot. Certain word combinations will trigger attention to that conversation; certain things we shop for or purchase may also catch the attention of authorities.
Crimes committed in public places are likely to be recorded on those hidden cameras.
We all like our privacy and we usually go to great lengths to make sure we have it. But in this fast changing day and age, assuring the privacy we seek is getting more and more difficult. About the only private places we can almost be assured of now is in our bathrooms and bedrooms. And if we bring our portable telephones and televisions into those rooms, even that privacy may be lost.
There is an old saying about these privacy invasions . . . if we aren’t doing anything wrong why should we worry? It may be comforting to think this way but the fact remains . . . who knows if just expressing our thoughts about a news event makes us a target for an FBI investigation? We all have embarrassing events occur in our lives that we do not wish to have our friends learn about. But what do we do when everything that happens to us becomes public record?
Preston reflected on this invasion of privacy. He wrote: “Sitting behind the outrage was a particularly modern form of disquiet – the knowledge that we are being manipulated, surveyed, rendered and that the intelligence behind this is artificial as well as human. Everything we do on the web, from our social media interactions to our shopping on Amazon, to our Netflix selections, is driven by complex mathematical formulae that are invisible and arcane.”
Welcome to the new Orwellian age.
By James Donahue
There has been a lot of media attention concerning the way big business interests are tracking everything we do, the places we go and especially the things we buy. It is perhaps troublesome that after we shop for a particular item on the Internet we are inundated with advertising for this particular product. It is almost as if a gene is sitting somewhere over us and recording our every thought and our every move.
What may be scary to us is that in a sense, while it isn’t a gene that records our actions . . . it is our electronic gadgetry. And these things are doing exactly that . . . watching, listening and recording everything we say and do.
We all enjoy visiting the social media Internet websites. The very nature of the Facebook site draws us out of our shell and makes us want to participate by revealing all kinds of personal information. But now we learn that everything we have revealed on Facebook has been recorded. Sites like Facebook and Google Search are collecting all of this personal information. When we use the Google maps to help us in our travels, the fact that we traveled and what we did along the way is carefully recorded.
Guardian writer Alex Preston recently wrote: We “have come to accept that the majority of our social, financial and even sexual interactions take place over the internet and that someone, somewhere, whether state, press or corporation is watching.”
If you examine your desktop computer closely you will discover a tiny camera mounted in the frame. This camera allows us to hold on-line communications while actually looking at each other via the computer screens. It also allows government and private agents to watch us around the clock if they choose.
If you have an Alexa or Google Home device on your desk you can be assured that it is listening to everything we say. The newer televisions are doing the same thing. While we watch the television screen, someone somewhere may be watching us via the same screen.
Electronic devices in our cars record every mile we drive and every problem that develops on the roadways.
If we are walking on public streets and sidewalks there is probably a tiny camera mounted somewhere nearby that is recording our every move.
With over seven billion people now packing this planet, who wants to know all of this personal information? Why would anybody wish to sit in a dark room somewhere and read and listen to all of the boring, mundane events in our lives?
We would think that nobody is tuning in on us personally. But computer systems are tuning in on telephone and computer conversations and actions, searching for anything that might be a criminal act or a terrorist plot. Certain word combinations will trigger attention to that conversation; certain things we shop for or purchase may also catch the attention of authorities.
Crimes committed in public places are likely to be recorded on those hidden cameras.
We all like our privacy and we usually go to great lengths to make sure we have it. But in this fast changing day and age, assuring the privacy we seek is getting more and more difficult. About the only private places we can almost be assured of now is in our bathrooms and bedrooms. And if we bring our portable telephones and televisions into those rooms, even that privacy may be lost.
There is an old saying about these privacy invasions . . . if we aren’t doing anything wrong why should we worry? It may be comforting to think this way but the fact remains . . . who knows if just expressing our thoughts about a news event makes us a target for an FBI investigation? We all have embarrassing events occur in our lives that we do not wish to have our friends learn about. But what do we do when everything that happens to us becomes public record?
Preston reflected on this invasion of privacy. He wrote: “Sitting behind the outrage was a particularly modern form of disquiet – the knowledge that we are being manipulated, surveyed, rendered and that the intelligence behind this is artificial as well as human. Everything we do on the web, from our social media interactions to our shopping on Amazon, to our Netflix selections, is driven by complex mathematical formulae that are invisible and arcane.”
Welcome to the new Orwellian age.