State Surveillance Practices by Edward Snowden - Essay Example

Message from the ***dear client, hello! This is not yet the final paper. I am still writing, editing, and reviewing the final 7 pages. Please, please give me just until Sunday morning to finish everything. Kindly ignore the completed status of your order. Thank you! Privacy is security. It protects our autonomy and power in controlling our personal lives (Moore 184). It is the heart of our freedom and the center of our basic rights (Rotenberg, qtd. in Buchholz and Rosenthal 34). Hence, the intrusion of our privacy infringes our freedom and violates our basic right. Thus, privacy should be respected and protected. Unfortunately however, the digital world that made online social networking possible has essentially reduced the issue of privacy irrelevant and trivial, as online surveillance has become rampant. Edward J. Snowden, a former contractor of the NSA (Devlin 12) proved this to be true. The 50,000 pages NSA classified documents he leaked to the media revealed to the world the magnitude of the US government’s surveillance of U. S. citizens, world leaders, and others over the Internet (“The Surveillance State and Its Discontents,” 64). Snowden’s exposé rekindled issues of privacy which in today’s context of global security has become more complex than ever. Gen. Keith B. Alexander, the director of NSA himself did not deny Snowden’s exposé but rather insisted that online surveillance is a necessary evil to win the war against terrorism, as he saw it the only best way to spy on terrorists (Sanger and Shanker, par. 1). Hence, online surveillance is meant to assure us of our security. But on the contrary, we do not feel secure and at ease knowing that we are being watched even if we are law-abiding citizens. In fact, we are equally terrorized by the mere thought of identity hacking, cyber bullying, cyber stalking, and other cybercrimes that we see happen due to online surveillance. In short, online surveillance creates more fear and insecurity than otherwise, knowing how dangerously intrusive the Internet can be. Although the NSA claims its online surveillance as simple intelligence work against terrorism and other crimes, the very nature of digital technology today proves otherwise. In the Internet, profiling has become easy not only because of the technology, but also because the required information to profile people is free and readily accessible in online social networking sites. “The digital technologies that have revolutionized our daily lives have also created minutely detailed records of those lives” (Richards 1934). These profiles can be used for whatever purpose most useful and most profitable to those who have them (Buchholz and Rosenthal 34). In the end, profiling makes us vulnerable to anything, whether good or bad. Breaching people’s privacy is not a new thing. The difference today is the sophistication and subtleness of violating one’s privacy that even the law meant to protect individual’s privacy is rendered ineffective. Hence, it is more chilling. The resurgence of our assertion for privacy, specifically Internet privacy, does not mean we condone terrorism. Rather, we wanted to draw a clear line between privacy and security interest, as we see how easily online surveillance can be abused not only for cybercrimes but much more frightening for witch hunting. Internet privacy is not a trivial matter but in fact has become more necessary and urgent today as global insecurity reigns; it has become more compelling as the intrusive nature of the Internet (Garfinkel 260) has blurred the line between privacy and security and in defining what is public information and what is private information. Internet Privacy Since its inception, the Internet has become the center of all human communications whether personal, business related, social, or political. Every time we communicate via the Internet, we are storing bits and pieces of information about ourselves and other people that can be easily retrieved and accessed, not by us, because we rarely retrieve information about us. Those interested in doing this are cyber criminals, business companies, service providers, and the state. This information when aggregated and analyzed produces our profile that may be used any way they want without us knowing it. Internet privacy protects us from possible unpleasant third party usage of our personal information and associations. Internet privacy could be understood following the general meaning of privacy – the “right to maintain a certain level of control over the inner spheres of personal information… right to limit public access to the ‘core self’ – personal information that one never discloses – and to information that one discloses only to family and friends” (Moore 182). However, Boyd clarifies that Internet privacy does not refer to the relation of the individual to information. Rather, privacy is the confident feeling that users have control of their social situations and that they have the sufficient agency to assert control. Control, she explains, does not pertain to the control of the technology or the enabling of privacy settings on users’ social network accounts. Rather, control refers to the full understanding of the social situation in which users participate (i.e., the viewers and the nature and reason of viewing, the norms and boundaries of the network). It is only through this control that users can make responsible choices. Hence to have Internet privacy, users must first understand what it is. On the other hand, agency refers to structural factors that help the user assert control. Hence, Internet privacy does not simply refer to restricting the accessibility of information. Instead, it refers to having sufficient agency to feel in control over the spread and interpretation of information. Boyd also emphasizes that breach of Internet privacy is not only harmful to an individual but can actually be more harmful to the networked public. As such, she recommends that policy makers and privacy advocates should address issues of privacy beyond the individual approach to a collective approach. Key to this is the full understanding of “what happens as the data flows across networks and as the data is networked together.” (2, 5) In short, Internet privacy is not an individual matter but a collective matter because online communication is a networked communication. Your online participation does not simply reveal about you, but even the people that are connected to you. Internet privacy is not simply enabling online social networks their privacy settings or restricting access to information. Rather, it is having the full understanding on the flow of the data that go through various networks and that are networked together. Why is this so, lies on the fact that traditional communication settings greatly differ from that of the Internet. For example, unlike the Internet, which is “a store-and-forward technology… a personal face- to- face communication is fleeting. A phone call is most likely to be confined to dyad that conducts it. A social party on held private property is presumably self-contained.” (Walther 3-4) Online Surveillance Surveillance comes from the Latin verb ‘vigilare’ and the French term ‘surveiller’ which means to watch over (Petersen 4). There are different ways in conducting surveillance. In the past, surveillance is popularly depicted by George Orwell’s ‘Big Brother’ and Jeremy Bentham’s ‘Panopticon’. It involves a few, primarily the authority watching over the many. It uses surveillance equipment such as electronic bugs and camera. (Albrechtslund, sec. 4) As such, surveillance can be easily traced and countered. But the development of digital technology has radically changed the very nature of surveillance. No longer is surveillance physical and personal, because information is virtually stored and networked through the Internet. As such, it is almost untraceable unless there is a breach in the system. Furthermore, surveillance has become participatory and interconnected. Information is freely provided, stored and made easily accessible through social networking sites and e-mail communications. People may not even realize that through the Internet they, themselves are freely subjecting their selves and even their families and friends to surveillance, not until the like of Snowden leaked information. Moreover, surveillance is no longer exclusive to the state. Anyone with the required technological expertise can now watch anyone online, because the Internet is largely unregulated. In short, online surveillance is almost inescapable because once you communicate online your data and prints are automatically captured. However, Albrechtslund argues that online surveillance is not necessarily harmful as traditionally understood. He contends that online surveillance has a social aspect which can be understood as a form of participatory surveillance. Here, the elements of mutuality, empowerment, and sharing are present. This, he furthers, creates positive social relations between and among people from different parts of the globe. Thus, he recommends that the concept of surveillance should be redefined. (sec. 4-5) As to how it should be redefined Albrechtslund did not proceed any further. But following his thoughts, it seems that he would like to define surveillance to be not necessarily intrusive or invasive. In short, he is implying that online surveillance does not necessarily threaten Internet privacy. Though he recognizes the dangers of online surveillance, the best thing to do to avoid this is to take precautionary measures. And what is the best precautionary measure against abuse on online surveillance? It is no other than Internet privacy. To Lyon’s definition, surveillance refers to “any collection and processing of personal data, whether identifiable of not, for the purposes of influencing or managing those whose data have been garnered” (2). For Lyon therefore, what makes online surveillance dangerous and a threat to privacy is not the absence of mutuality, but rather the cunning use of manipulation, as what Snowden revealed about the NSA’s online surveillance, to reorder society. This to my belief is what makes surveillance dangerous. This is what makes surveillance an activity that should be highly regulated. Perhaps if surveillance did not involve manipulation, it may not be as contentious as it is today. Conclusion Privacy has become more complex and contentious with the emergence of the Internet. The emergence of the Internet has drastically changed people’s concept and way of communicating from the traditional oral face to face communication to virtual communication. Communications have become more internationally interconnected and unregulated. Interactions have become non-physical and non-personal. People suddenly live in a single world, knowing in a single mouse click what happens on the other side of the globe and being able in a single mouse click to be part of that other side of the globe. Thus, it made people’s communication and interaction more convenient, in-time, inexpensive, and far-reaching. But given its intrusive nature, the Internet has made online surveillance highly effective, inescapable and almost untraceable, making Internet users vulnerable to prying and communications, interactions and transactions on the Internet equally susceptible to abuse. The best way for users to be protected from this danger of online surveillance while they enjoy the social aspects of the Internet is to assert Internet privacy as defined by Boyd. Read More