Surveillance in Various Settings of the Society - Essay Example

Privacy In the contemporary world, there have been various ethical issues related to technological advancements. Most of these issues are centered on the idea of privacy as well as how electronic surveillance relates to the same. Specifically, modern electronic surveillance, which takes place in almost all societal settings, has caused the development of privacy related issues due to the fact that people do not know how much information is stored on them or how the captured information may be used. In most instances, the modern privacy activists maintain that the stored information is mainly used to violate privacy and for the purpose of targeted advertising. Although technological advancements were expected to lead to better life styles for the modern society, it has led to the emergence of various ethical issues related to privacy. When weighing the benefits and the cons resulting from the information age, it is appropriate to conclude that although privacy is an important aspect, it can be broken for various necessities. Although the cameras mounted on all streets may be used to track the movements that people make, which violates privacy directly, they are necessary for security purposes. Law enforcement bodies have been using the information collected by the street surveillance cameras to solve major crimes. This has not only been effective for the law enforcement but has also prevented wastage of time that would have taken place if traditional investigative procedures were used to solve the cases. Previously, it took long for the police and other law enforcements to resolve cases and led to arrest of and perception of wrong individuals. With the current surveillance systems, the law enforcement makes few mistakes with regard to the individuals that they arrest and waste little time through investigations. This is because surveillance information that had been previously captured by cameras could be used to identify a criminal amid a crowd. This has been taken a step ahead to ensure that the police are several steps ahead of the culprits through development and installation if facial recognition software in various investigation centers. Coupled with facial recognition software, application of electronic surveillance in investigative procedures becomes more effective and easier. Here, if the terrorist or a robber is in the crowd, the facial recognition software can be used to pick the right individual. The software uses a large database of imagery information to try to pinpoint a specific individual in relation to some information that has been collected recently. Therefore, the software can undertake real time facial recognition and alert the authorities when a match has been found. The law enforcements can then move in and arrest the individual before they continue causing havoc in the society. This implies that for this purpose, breaking the privacy expectations of the people can help them in establishment of a secure society (Pentland 80-82). Terrorists have also been arrested by the authorities who identified them using surveillance systems. In the modern terrorism age, breaking privacy so as to arrest the terrorists before they cause mass deaths should be supported. When such tragedies occur, the citizens blame the government for not keeping them secure and when the issue of surveillance is raised, they claim that it violates privacy. If the information collected is used for the overall protection of the society, then people should privacy to be broken for this purpose. It also helps if the surveillance is applied since the government does not need to recruit many individuals to undertake investigations into various pending cases. Surveillance systems help the police although they require human assistance so as to produce accurate information regarding various investigations. Such recruitment requires more funding from governmental reserves. If the recruits are not required, then the government is able to save the funds to use in other sectors such as improving healthcare to benefit the overall society. This would be an important development bearing in mind that the funds available for healthcare are not adequate. Therefore, breaking privacy for the long run benefit of improving the funds allocated for developmental purposes is a positive idea that should not be held back for the sake of maintaining privacy. Additionally, if the security agencies have suspicions on an individual, they can track the individual to determine the exact intent that the individual has. To serve this purpose, the electronic surveillance is far reaching with respect to surveilling individuals a person even across continents. This eliminates any erroneous information that the authorities may have and lead to closing of a case since they are able to determine if an individual poses any danger to the public through surveillance. This can also be taken to mean that electronic surveillance can help in providing evidence to the authorities and to make cases against certain individuals. This is because people’s movements provide a lot of information concerning their intent. The idea of privacy can also be ignored if surveillance is applied in the workplace. This is because the privacy concerns originate from a few individuals that are seen as poor performers in the organization. For example, if an employer wants to know what the employees are doing on company network and company time, the only way to accomplish this is through surveillance done through the Internet. If the employees are straight forward, have nothing to hide from the company, and they are doing their duties as expected, there is no cause for alarm because even with the surveillance, the employer would not find something suspicious. This then leads to very low privacy related concerns from the employees. In such an instance, privacy does not matter much because employees are not supposed to do personal work on company time and computers. Such surveillance helps in keeping production high and in reducing time wastage that could take place if the employees were allowed to visit any website during working hours. In such an environment, surveillance is taken as a moral check rather than a privacy violation undertaking. Additionally, in such an aspect, surveillance is effective in deterring workplace bullying and harassment, which mostly emanates from senior employees and directed to the lower ones. This may be done through sending sexually related emails to other employees and may affect their working motivation and even cause a lawsuit from the victim. In the quest to avoid such occurrences in the organization and maintain morale, the organization should be able to establish surveillance and operate it without privacy cries from the employees. The organization can also use the collected information to defend itself in case a lawsuit is filed by an employee citing unfair dismissal. In conclusion, surveillance in various settings of the society has sparked a controversy with the proponents claiming that its benefits outweigh the cons and the opponents holding a different view. Considering the benefits, it would be wise to conclude that privacy concerns can be overruled for the sake of the overall society. This is because surveillance is known to protect individuals against certain occurrence in the society such as terrorism. When the security agencies intend to identify specific individuals amid a crowd, this can be accomplished through facial recognition software hosted by governmental investigative agencies. Additionally, the systems have helped the authorities in identification of criminals, which eliminates time wastage. This also helps them in reducing the funds used in training the officers, as the government does not need many individuals. Such funds are used for other developmental purposes. Suspected individuals can also be surveilled for elimination of suspicions. Therefore, privacy should be broken at certain instances for the sake of the benefits associated with it. Works Cited Pentland, Alex. The Data Driven Society. Scientific American, 309.1 (2013): 78-83. Print. Read More