Blog Post #8

Privacy 

I’ve always known to be safe on the internet, but I had never even thought of the things brought to my attention in the provided TED Talks. As a child, I was constantly made aware by my parents and my school that the internet is a scary place, and I’ve always known that. But in today’s day and age, it’s even scarier. From police license plate scanners to revenge porn to our phones being created for surveillance, I am astonished. It's unsettling to think that someone could have been listening in on almost everything I have ever spoken about on the phone, and I’d had no clue. Or all my emails since I was in middle school, which was over a decade ago, could basically tell someone on the outside everything from what I want to do to my friends, to my education, my interests, my loans, etc. That is petrifying to me. 

Watching Catherine Crump’s talk about how the police track you makes me want to go to my local police station to see what they have. Considering that they have information on everyone, criminal record/criminal activity or not. I understand wanting to keep people safe and using high-tech surveillance equipment, but at what point is it too much? Obviously, I want the correct departments to find those breaking the law, but what about those not and their privacy? Then, Christopher Soghoain talked about how our phones were created for surveillance and how our government could be listening all the way to another country's government to hackers and even other criminals. I think the one part of his talk that gave me the most relief was about iPhones. It took a weight off my shoulders hearing about how hard it is to wiretap things like iMessage, meaning you’re sending a message to another iPhone, and even Apple itself is unable to see those messages. Continuing that FaceTime and FaceTime audio are the same way because it is two iPhones for Apple products communicating. Even with something like this that gives me hope in privacy, countless issues remain. These issues can range from how we are able to protect ourselves, let alone our friends and our family.

And what if the police wrongfully accused you? Or they mistake you for someone else? I had multiple emails and different accounts on social media without my name, but I bet money that, in some way, those accounts can connect back to me in ways I have never even thought of. Even with these accounts, I have my own personal accounts that I do share my life with via social media. My parents, on the other hand, are completely different. They have absolutely no forms of social media, only the typical emails for themselves and for work, and then there are phone numbers, and that’s about it. In today’s day and age, it’s very hard to stay away from social media and different things like that, so I really envy that my parents can do that, and I would imagine that their digital footprint is significantly smaller than mine. 

The government has all this information on us. In reality, I feel as if it’s a good thing. But if this information did fall into the wrong hands, it could be bad. I believe that if this is what the government needs in order to catch some criminals and figure out what types of crimes are being planned and executed without them knowing, then it’s something that’s needed. It just needs parameters and how far they should be allowed to go; therefore, innocents do not get caught in the crossfire.