Internet Monitoring — Are we really safe?
There is an increasing concern among internet users, who are now more exposed than ever, as to whether their private data is really as they say; secure. This concern over privacy of data is not only confined to an individual’s Facebook page but also to large organisations such as the olympics.
Its imperative that governments and organisations to try and stop having a complete grip over everything going on in the world, thinking they are illuminati.
Time has proven that even huge giants such as Apple are prone to cyber attacks and the Korean Olympics is an example of the devastation compromising a connected network can bring upon common people. The debate over the need for an existence which monitors internet activity and have a net of surveillance over us, to protect us, has always existed. The possible havoc this power could wreck if it ended up in the wrong hands is huge.
We are now more connected than ever and the prime concern in this debate had always been privacy.
As of 2009, 12 divisions of power in India such as the RAW, the Narcotics and Tobacco division, etc, have been authorised to be able to ‘snoop’ into netizen’s computers and retrieving data such as passwords, emails, phone numbers in the possible scenario of terrorism, cyber attacks or a compromise in national security.
This paved way to a string of conspiracy theories and misuse of authority when government officials’ phones have been proven to be tapped during the succeeding elections.
Edward Joseph Snowden is an American whistleblower who copied and leaked highly classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA) in 2013 when he was a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) employee and subcontractor.
Famously known as the Snowden Wikileaks, these were a series of primarily four documents posted on Wikileaks proving that the NSA was conducting a secret surveillance programs encompassing multiple countries in the name of national security called PRISM.
These leaks provoked a strong response from both the government and the public, both contrasting to each other. A wave of question rose out of this, with the media having a lot of hustle to make money out of; Do the people have something to hide? Is the government no more as innocent as it seems?
These are just examples of the strong objections and backfires received when internet monitoring was taken into consideration.
Surveillance both in real life such as street cameras and on the internet have been proven to be ineffective if not encouraging when fighting against crime.
The infamy gained when pulling it off right under our noses instead promoted crime.
A recent poll suggested that majority of the netizens object to having an authoritarian system governing their private data for the cause of national safety. Nevertheless, cyber crime has always been a thing of the present and is bound to be even more pronounced in the future as we strive for a globally connected network. This debate is often ironical and is endless. But one thing has been made clear by the people — we don’t want anybody to be snoopin’ around in our PCs anytime soon. Respect privacy.
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