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We're living in a surveillance
society
The
Marlborough Express
Thursday April 12, 2007
We can't say we weren't warned. In his dark novel, 1984, George
Orwell predicted a nightmare society, where cameras and computers
spy on citizens' every move, writes The Marlborough Express in an
editorial.
Now comes a newspaper report from Britain where it says there are
32 closed circuit television (CCTV) cameras within 200m of Orwell's
former home in Islington North London.
Britain has become the extreme case of the surveillance society,
with latest studies showing the country has an estimated 4.2 million
CCTV cameras - one for every 14 people in the country.
And New Zealand's privacy commissioner, Marie Shroff, has added
her warning to the growth of the surveillance society, saying what
has happened in the United Kingdom is likely to happen in this country
in the future.
One of the most disturbing aspects of the decline in our privacy
is the way it has sneaked up on us.
In the absence of a bill of rights, the Government has been able
to slip through a raft of legislation which makes its job easier
in many cases, but which also impinges on the rights of citizens.
While no one would disagree that it is important to minimise the
incidence of welfare fraud, the implications of the swapping of
confidential information between Government departments, one of
the tools used in addressing welfare fraud, has impacts on all citizens.
There is now a myriad of clauses in legislation allowing data swapping
and few people are aware of many of them.
Easy access to personal records such as birth certificates has
made identity fraud much easier than it should be, although legislation
is before Parliament to tighten the rules around this particular
problem.
The private sector has also gleefully embraced the information
revolution, with, as one newspaper put it recently, information
databases (being) compiled, bought and sold by private companies,
political parties and Government departments.
There have been battles recently over employers' rights to spy
on workers in the workplace and barely a day goes by when there
is not a story about some use or misuse of the internet at work.
Also many people willingly agree to have their activities monitored
in exchange for the apparent benefits of loyalty and credit cards
which allow the issuer to monitor and in many cases use the information
for commercial purposes.
Cell phones and email provide another way to track people's activities
and organisations in most cases have enough computing power these
days to store, retrieve and search this information almost indefinitely.
The increasing use of databases and technology provides many benefits
for our society. The problem lies in people not being aware of the
privacy pitfalls attached to these benefits.
Surveys show increasing concerns about privacy. It is important
that people follow up on these concerns and be aware of what information
is gathered about them, what it is used for and what rights they
have over the content and use of that information.
INFOWARS:
BECAUSE THERE'S A WAR ON FOR YOUR MIND
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