Hello Gentle Reader,
The statement: “if you’ve got nothing to hide, why do you need privacy?” betrays a superficial and narrow-minded perspective. The perspective of nothing to hide perpetuates the notion that privacy functions as a cloak to conceal and hide illegal activities from scrutiny or legal prosecution; or views privacy as a transactional commodity, which is forfeited to either maintain or facilitate security, both personally and nationally. The statement is so well worn and employed, it is even the catchphrase of the mass surveillance program utilized in London: “if you’ve got nothing to hide, you’ve got nothing to fear.” The nothing to hide statement betrays a lacking understanding regarding privacy. This otherwise well-intentioned ignorance will always be at risk of being exploited by both governments and businesses, on the grounds that they have nothing to hide.
Privacy is a plural concept and in part due to this mercurial nature evades pigeonholing and neat and tidy summarization. Perhaps due to the absence of a straightforward definition that allows for the nothing to hide sentiment to continually exist and perpetuate itself in contemporary thought and opinion. Perpetrators of the nothing to hide perspective view privacy as synonymous with secrecy, which places privacy in an otherwise negative context whereby privacy is the application of duplicity and deceit. The cloak and daggers of noir alleys, shady deals, and morally reprehensible characters. In turn others argue that privacy is an otherwise moot point in a technologically dependent world where data and information—personal and otherwise—is the fuel and currency consumed by technological corporations to sustain economic development and growth. Then there are the those who subscribe to the prescription that security and safety inherently requires a decrease in liberty, whereby the citizens voluntarily relinquish liberties and freedom in order to maintain a lawful society. This inevitably and almost always includes the erosion of privacy rights, on both a basic and fundamental level. Defenders of this perspective maintain, however, that this is the cost to keep the trains running on time. Some go as far as to reassure that such measures are always temporary; when in fact such measures are never temporary in nature.
These emblazoned statements which advocate for the minor sacrifice of privacy in order to encourage the maintenance of sustainable economic development and growth; or the surrender of privacy rights to ensure national security and order; fail to mention what the absence of privacy looks like. One of the most conventionally utilized metaphors to describe what the absence of privacy looks like is the Orwellian concept of ‘Big Brother,'. In his novel “1984,” George Orwell depicts a dystopian world of mass surveillance that controls the populace through social inhibition. Without privacy, individuals in George Orwell’s “1984,” are stripped of their agency and freedom of thought, as it does not conform with the sponsored or endorsed ideals of the state. To see this practice placed out of the imaginary realm of fiction and into the palpable and tangible world, one only needs to look at the current ideological campaign of prosecution taking place in China against the Uighur minority. By deploying sophisticated technocratic systems of surveillance established totalitarian regimes such as China, have been able to increase efficiencies and modernize their chokehold over their populace. This is evidently clear in how the Chinese state has employed advancements in surveillance technology to disregard the privacy of the citizenry and prosecute them in a campaign of “ideological transformation.” This program has specifically targeted members of the Uighur minority in Xinjian, China. By utilizing the Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP), the Chinese government employees’ sophisticated algorithms to arbitrarily determine if an individual is suspicious of ideological impertinence by collecting information from their social media activities, internet search habits, facial recognition surveillance, check-point data collections, as well as sourcing health information.
The technologically facilitated persecution of the Uighur minority in China has become a real-world dystopian example of what the absence of privacy looks like, by exemplifying both the surveillance conducted by the state, but also the industrial efficiency of the electronic bureaucracy’s ability to facilitate refined information processing practices, which become Kafkaesque in its execution. In “Nothing to Hide: The False Tradeoff Between Privacy and Security,” Daniel J Solove, presents two literary metaphors to describe a world neglected of proper privacy protection. The first is the aforementioned Orwellian state of continued surveillance. The second is the labyrinth bureaucratic world of information processing exemplified in Franz Kafka’s novel: “The Trial." In Kafka’s novel: “The Trial,” the absurd plight of an unnamed man is examined: from his arrest, where he is never told on what charge or what crime he is accused of committing; later he discovers the government has collected and processed volumes of information concerning him, and yet he unable to access the information, to review, correct, or contest the contents of the records. Though these two literary references are referenced and metaphorical examples of what the careless disregard for one’s privacy looks like; the reality of the Uighur’s is anything but a metaphorical or literary. Instead, the explicit persecution of the Uighur is a textbook application of both Orwellian surveillance and the authoritarian bureaucracy envisioned by Franz Kafka. By employing sophisticated surveillance and data acquisition, the Chinese government removes any notion of privacy of the Uighurs. Afterwards, they further reduce them to a state of abject powerlessness, by alienating the persecuted from any participation or involvement in how their information is processed, let alone reviewing it. This inevitably leaves the Uighurs vulnerable to the predilections of the government, who have unapologetically chosen to persecute them for ideological reform by using technocratic processes leaving a chilling reminder that these same tactics can be employed elsewhere.
Despite the tangible example set out of what the disregard and absence of privacy looks like when reviewed in the context of the persecution of the Uighur; the perspective of the nothing to hide argument persists. Or in the words of one technological activist: “the right to be free from unwanted intrusion – no longer exists in an absolute sense,” because such parameters cannot be facilitated in a networked world when data is produced and collected without scrutiny. Furthermore, the activist argues that large technology companies are the greatest asset to not just achieving economic and innovative prosperity, but also thwarting hackers (cybercrime), state surveillance and acts of terrorism. Instituting regulations or dismantling big technology companies limits their ability to defend against such attacks, as well as stalls economic growth. Yet, in order to achieve this potential for protective action against cybercrime or terrorism attacks, or sustain long term economic growth, large technology companies require in turn the unregulated agency to feed on the personal information and data being produced by their consumers, as its their bread and butter, which inevitably means privacy as a virtue must be disregarded in the digital frontier to maintain prosperity, and encourage protective action to thwart both cybercrime and terrorist activities. This perspective advocates for citizens (or in this case consumers) to relinquish their privacy in favour of private corporations utilizing their data to either maintain or increase profits, and in turn providing a runoff to develop economic growth. The activist maintains their position by arguing that governments and public officials are technologically illiterate and incapable of properly safeguarding privacy interests, without irreparably damaging economic initiatives; therefore, private organizations are more responsible in the utilization of the information they have collected. On the contrary, however, Apple’s CEO Tim Cook warrants a cautionary position regarding how personal information is utilized to maintain economic or commerce activities. In a speech, Cook warned that the information of both consumers and citizens are being used against them. Cook further explained that the information being utilized is in essence surveillance, where the algorithms employed by the organizations: “can serve up increasingly extreme content, pounding our harmless preferences into hardened convictions,”. This raises the question of whether or not consumers privacy is being disregarded for the sole purpose of sustaining economic prosperity; or are organizations granted unencumbered access to proficiently manipulate consumers and citizens based off their data, and by extension influence political sentiments or social attitudes.
Surveillance is surveillance regardless of the type of organization conducting it, be it government or corporation. The motivations may be different, from the Chinese government’s use of surveillance to persecute the alleged ideological impertinence of the Uighur; to a corporation’s ability to craft a digital persona of a consumer to market and cater products and services to them, based off their digital habits. Yet, both organizations hesitate, or are completely opposed to the notion of privacy, arguing with the usual conviction: “if you’ve got nothing to hide, why do you need privacy?” The reasons for why individuals, citizens, and consumers require or chose to safeguard their privacy should ironically be considered a private predilection; just as it is their prerogative to relinquish it on the misguided notion that privacy hinders economic growth or obstructs national security measures.
Regardless of the rational used to convince individuals to relinquish their privacy, the attempt at a defensible argument: “if you’ve got nothing to hide, why do you need privacy?” becomes a moot point. There are locks on house doors to keep the home secure, but also to facilitate privacy. Curtains are employed to cover windows and shield the interior from the sun and keep out the heat, but also maintains the privacy of the occupants. Privacy is not the same as hiding. Privacy is a multidimensional concept that provides separation of public and personal boundaries; as well as being a virtue that has developed alongside the progress of society and technology. Due to privacy’s multidimensional nature, it cannot be easily discarded as irrelevant or incompatible in a technologically dependent world. Rather this strengthens the resolve to protect it and promote it. Palpable contemporary examples of what the disregard of privacy looks like leaves citizens to be surveyed by their governments, who utilize sophisticated technocratic systems to root out and quash dissidence and political discourse to maintain absolute authority and positional power. Without privacy safeguards technology driven businesses cannot be held accountable to the intangible services or products they provide; and as concerning wield the ability to influence political matters through the manipulation and exploitation of data.
In reviewing privacy as a multifaced perspective or juvenile virtue, for those who credulously maintain the argument and false sense of moral withstanding prudence: “if you’ve got nothing to hide, why do you need privacy?” it is best be reminded of the sobering remarks of the Soviet/Russian dissident writer, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: “Everyone is guilty of something or has something to conceal. All one has to do is look hard enough to find what it is.” At which point each of us double checks the locks on our doors and pulls the curtains shut. The world might be right outside, but that does not mean it needs to peer in.
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
M. Mary
For Further Reading
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/23/opinion/privacy-tech-companies.html
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