> Moreover, it's highly unlikely that anyone's full-time job consists solely of watching the one camera that happens to point towards you.
That was my point of view a decade ago when video surveillance came to my city. I saw that mostly as backup if something bad occurred, since nobody could process that much data.
Then came stories about TrapWire. Whether they are true or not, one thing is certain : it is possible to automatically process those data, and therefore at some point, we will do it. That's too much valuable for anyone with the mean to do it to simply discard it as unethical. There will always be any kind of "greater good" argument (war against terrorism, order, police efficiency over cost of patrols, you name it).
We can't simply say : we won't use those technologies. It won't happen. As individuals, we probably will even encourage it, carrying tracing devices like mobile phone or google glasses everywhere. Because, those devices offer so much to our day to day life. Who wouldn't say mobile 3g phones with google maps changed their life ?
Yet, when you activate google account report and has an android device with geolocation features opted in, google tell you precisely where you went past month, lists your friends addresses (without mentioning they're friend home, just "you went there repeatedly"), tell you how much time you spent at home, and how much time you spent at work. And that's perfectly natural to them : you said you were ok to send data about your location.
If we just let things go, we will have to accept privacy is a deprecated concept in a few decades, and enjoy the almost omniscience. I can't see privacy being a first class human right without any strong political will. But right now, even if we speak of it from time to time, most people don't care about privacy that much.
That was my point of view a decade ago when video surveillance came to my city. I saw that mostly as backup if something bad occurred, since nobody could process that much data.
Then came stories about TrapWire. Whether they are true or not, one thing is certain : it is possible to automatically process those data, and therefore at some point, we will do it. That's too much valuable for anyone with the mean to do it to simply discard it as unethical. There will always be any kind of "greater good" argument (war against terrorism, order, police efficiency over cost of patrols, you name it).
We can't simply say : we won't use those technologies. It won't happen. As individuals, we probably will even encourage it, carrying tracing devices like mobile phone or google glasses everywhere. Because, those devices offer so much to our day to day life. Who wouldn't say mobile 3g phones with google maps changed their life ?
Yet, when you activate google account report and has an android device with geolocation features opted in, google tell you precisely where you went past month, lists your friends addresses (without mentioning they're friend home, just "you went there repeatedly"), tell you how much time you spent at home, and how much time you spent at work. And that's perfectly natural to them : you said you were ok to send data about your location.
If we just let things go, we will have to accept privacy is a deprecated concept in a few decades, and enjoy the almost omniscience. I can't see privacy being a first class human right without any strong political will. But right now, even if we speak of it from time to time, most people don't care about privacy that much.