Smile! You’re on Camera.
By No, you’re not on candid camera, but you are on camera in the U.S. virtually all the time. According to a new study from Privacy International, a UK-based group, and the U.S.-based Electronic Privacy Information Center, the U.S. and the U.K., along with Russia and China, have “endemic” surveillance throughout the country. The study surveyed surveillance techniques including workplace monitoring, visual surveillance, communications interception, and border and trans-border issues (among others).
It shouldn’t surprise us that we are constantly monitored. Between the PATRIOT Act’s intrusions into our data, heightened security measures at airports, and security cameras at every store, subway, and street, there’s more and more surveillance each day.
Of course security is important. But at what cost to our civil liberties and our ability to live our lives with a modicum of privacy? Seems like many other industrialized countries that also cope with the threat of terrorism are doing a much better job finding that balance.