Every time that I unlock my phone, I’m being surveilled, not in a spy thriller sense but in a persistent manner that’s almost been normalized. Software is tracking my movements, searches, and how long I give attention to a post. Cameras are installed along streets and inside shopping centers. Data is being gathered even when I’m as careful as possible with my digital footprint. The disturbing part is not that privacy is a future problem; it’s that it’s already gone.
The concept of privacy is no longer real. We continue to discuss it as though it is a thing that we can protect with a switch or a password, but that isn’t true. The systems that we use daily are set up to collect our information.
What needs to change is the amount of power we’ve given up without a challenge. We need far more protection from data gathering, as well as far more accountability on the part of corporations and governments that act as though our private information is theirs to take.
The most significant reason for the end of privacy is the nature of tracking. Smartphones track location, behavior is tracked by application, clicks are tracked on websites, all even when individuals believe tracking is disabled.
What is disturbing is how normalized all this has gotten. We are paying the price for convenience. Want to use a map? Forfeit your location. Want to communicate with your friends? Forfeit your contacts, your messages. The price to keep a level of privacy is onewe’re no longer willing to pay.
The third reason why privacy is no longer a reality is that this level of monitoring can always be justified with “safety.”. The government and institutions believe that people need to be monitored, which may result in a safer society but inevitably makes people more visible and controllable.
The more regular the surveillance, the less alarming it seems. There are cameras, logs, and records everywhere we go, even when we’re unaware of them. In my opinion, a society that monitors everyone, everywhere, all the time is not a free one.
Others have argued that privacy doesn’t matter anymore because we are all posting our lives on the internet. The two are not the same, though. The fact that people are posting things on the internet doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re agreeing to things being taken from them by default.
Others have said, “If you are not violating rights, you do not need to hide.” Privacy is not a matter of concealing one’s guilt but a matter of being able to think, grow, and exist without being scrutinized.
We must stop acting as though the privilege of privacy still exists when, in fact, we are witnessing a loss of that privilege. Politicians need to be limited in how much data they are allowed to collect. Corporations must honor the boundaries that users set for them. And, on a personal level, we need to stop settling for being spied on as a condition of taking part in the life that is now offered to us. This loss of privacy is happening because we are too eager to surrender it.
