Internet and Mobile Phones - Essay Example

Internet and Mobile Phones Introduction Anderson & Rainie (2008) state that information and communication technology has numerous benefits in its application within various sectors of the economy. It is in this regard that the contemporary business environments have embraced the application of technology to tool to facilitate realization of their aims and objectives. Billions of people around the globe presently use internet and mobile phones, which has become a significant component of their everyday lives. The use of search engine help many people and organizations to navigate via a plethora of images, video clips, pages, and numerous audio recording available on the global Web has become instrumental over the past two decades. Likewise, cell phones use is ubiquitous with roughly 6.8 billion subscriptions around the globe (Anderson &Rainie, 2008). In fact, mobile phones play a significant role in the modern telecommunications. In number countries, approximately more than half of the populace embraces mobiles and the market is growing considerably. This paper seeks to explore the forms of surveillance facilitated by mobile phones and the Internet and discuss issues of control over personal information and privacy in these contexts. Internet Standards and Surveillance Issues The internet and mobile phone standards organizations majorly consist of a group of engineers, researchers, users, and interested people who have joined hands with objective of developing standards and protocols to facilitate smooth functioning of the Internet (Andrejevic, 2006). Besides the private sector playing various roles, there is also involvement of some government entities.Cell phones are an inexorably critical instrument for passing message from one place to another. In the United States, roughly over 302 million individuals are cellular telephone subscribers. The internet and cell phones are becoming to get more computerized. With the arrival of the iphone and other “advanced mobile phones,” cellular telephones are becoming devices that are used to access and administer data through desktop and PCs. A research conducted by Pew Internet anticipated that the vast majority on the planet will access Internet through cell phones by 2020. New interpersonal interaction administrations for cellular telephones have been produced which will likely allow individuals to make, create, and reinforce social ties(Andrejevic, 2006). Much like social networks on the Internet, cell phones give clients an alternate stage to interact with a number of people. Interpersonal interaction services for cell phones regularly depend on clients imparting their area and other individual data with companions and different clients using these services. Hence inquiries emerge regarding the manner in which these mobile users manage expectations, standards, and understand issues of privacy and surveillance when diffusing personal information on the Internet (Anderson, &Rainie, 2008). This is a survey on people’s perception on privacy and private information in the use of new technology. Privacy and Surveillance Focusing on the nature of online interpersonal interaction and related Web 2.0 administrations and applications, a customary and rather contrary origination of surveillance appear. Reconnaissance is connected with privacy intrusion, snooping, or spying and it is a pervasive view that everything identified with it ought to be avoided. This is in accordance to well-knownframeworks, for example, Panopticon and Big Brother(Andrejevic, 2006). The increased advancement in data engineering recognizes numerous issues with respect to security and surveillance. Privacy and surveillance are regularly considered as counterpoints when examining issues of individual data and the advanced technology. Security has been characterized as the capacity to control what data around oneself is or should be accessible to others. At the point when one cannot control what data around oneself others receiver or get to know, one may be interested in surveillance by others. Anderson, &Rainie (2008) consider surveillance as “any gathering or handling of individual information, whether identifiable or not, for the reasons of dealing with those whose information have been assembled”. Innate to the meaning of surveillance is the impact it has over others. The secret power behind surveillance is that individuals whose discrete information are gathered or observed may not know when or in the event that they are being consistently viewed. As Couldry& McCarthy(2004) contends, the information community believes that reconnaissance is part and parcel of the most important issues in the society. Computing and information technology encourage the accumulation of individual data. Data engineering databases take into account the incorporation and layering of various types of data from distinctive sources. The most critical part of this point is that it permits the individuals who control the databases (in most cases, the government and corporate entities) to know more about others. This coupling of data highpoints behavioral and cognitive propensities that people sometimes fail to put into consideration. It is noteworthy information collected from the Internet can likewise be commoditized and possibly utilized for despotic exercises. Forms of Surveillance Whitaker (1999) indicates that there major forms of surveillance besides the contemporary idea of surveillance, which is characterized by its non-transparency. The first one is the voluntary panopticon, which refers to the act of voluntarily submitting information to the surveillance. It can also be termed as participatory panopticon. It is different from the well-known traditional older systems of surveillance (Couldry& McCarthy, 2004). This form of surveillance is essential since people partake voluntarily in the process of monitoring their personal conduct. It is based on consumer society where data engineering is based on decentered surveillance. The second form of surveillance is the lateral surveillance, which is usually asymmetrical monitoring of persons through others. With the new technology, people have become capable of disseminating information that was initially in the hands of the government and corporate entities (Whitaker, 1999). Citizens use this form to monitor other people’s behaviors via non-reciprocal systems of watching. The last form of surveillance is the self-surveillance that refers to people’s recording via the Internet and advice others to do the same. Technologies such as camera phones and video cameras enable people to capture their aspects that they later replay. Through technology and the Internet, such recorded information or captured images can be uploaded online, and this acts as a self-surveillance(Whitaker, 1999). Finally, it is noteworthy that safety and reconnaissance have long been concerns of researchers of intuitive media. Past studies have investigated privacy issues when using mobile phones and the Internet. These studies propose that the utilization of most of the technologically advanced systems creates security issues to most individuals because many people barely have control over their individual information. Many forums have created by various stakeholders raising questions on the issue of Internet governance and the people behind its control(Whitaker, 1999). These various issues have come into play because of the interests the state actors hold and due to unsatisfactory on the way the Internet is being governed. Proposals have been made to bring change on the existing governance systems or surveillance issues so as to be universally controlled by an international body. However these proposals have faced tough challenges and seem not applicable because of the architectural nature of the Internet. Therefore, various treaties have been signed by stakeholders agreeing on the governance of Internet policy issues. Since individuals have no control over their data that is being collected, the recommendation is that further research should be done to deepen understanding of the Internet and how the mobile phones assist in dissemination of information. This will help develop some possible measures for governing or control the Internet use (Whitaker, 1999). Conclusion It is evident that the emergent media spaces created through the mobile and internet are not merely meant for communication, synchronization, and interaction, but also monitored spaces. Continuous use of technology to meet people, whether through social networks that shares true locations, users tell friends their location and are potentially conveying a lot of information to people. This means that mobile and internet spaces are likewise spaces for production. However, it is noteworthy that mobile and Internet also allow for the monitoring of behavior in ways that were previously unavailable. In fact, as many individuals spend their time using these spend more time using these two contemporary ICTs services, they should understand that some of their private information goes to commercial scrutiny. Above all, these new interactive technologies are central tools for exploring how information is collected and used. The purpose of privacy and supervision within the process is integral, as elaborated in the above discussion. References Anderson, J. Q., &Rainie, L. (2008).The future of the Internet III. Washington, DC: Pew Internet & American Life Project. Andrejevic, M. (2006). The discipline of watching: Detection, risk, and lateral surveillance. Critical Studies in Media Communication, 23, 391 – 407. Couldry, N., & McCarthy, A. (Eds.). (2004). Media Space: Place, scale and culture in a media age. London: Routledge. Whitaker, R. (1999). The end of privacy: How total surveillance is becoming a reality. New York: New Press. Read More