Essay

Surveillance and privacy on the internet

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Surveillance and privacy on the internet.

The Internet has made life more comfortable for the community, business, and interaction between individuals. The internet serves to connect local and international computers either small, such as mobile phones, or large, such as computers. It has led to the interconnectivity of people and cultures globally through the click of a button on a digital device. The internet as a technological advancement created the issue of surveillance and privacy. Surveillance allows the illegal filing of individuals as well as opening the door to terrorist attacks on an individual's profile. The majority of people encrypt their data with certain platforms, what’s the use of this data, how about those who use this data to monitor the biotechnological information of the owner? This is one major question one should ask themselves. The internet as a transport mechanism and self-expression platform are some of the ways why the internet does not provide privacy bit surveillance.

The internet acts as the transport mechanism for many people today, regardless of distance, people can interact, communicate and transact businesses normally. Jia Tolentino, an author of I in the internet” a book that communicates several advancements and works of the internet, “web 2.0 would be understood as a transport mechanism and not a wall full of texts and graphics” (Tolentino, 6). The web will be ideally dynamic in various ways, it would contain portals and running activities. During these days, whatever one shall be doing will be intertwined with other people’s (Tolentino, 6)

Facebook for instance has failed to protect user’s privacy, Tolentino’s idea of portals and running activities hit the point here. Many people are on Facebook and aren’t secured because of the running activities. Hackers aren’t prevented from invading their data and using it for something malicious. The internet here becomes a transport mechanism for data and user’s profile information (Herman, 1). This leads to an invasion of privacy.

The internet promotes opportunities for self-expression and displaying, leaving a tiny window for privacy and much more opportunities for surveillance. Jia Tolentino, in 2019, pointed out that “The I and the internet” argument tries to find early braces off herself using the internet. She finds fire subpage and essay she knows nothing about. The internet serves as a medium where people can express themselves emotionally and physically. Tolentino for example uses the internet to express her daily escapades.” Myspace allowed people to post photos” (Tolentino, 4). Many people post their daily endeavors on the internet with very little worry about what will become of these things they post. With a vast home of audience and users, the internet becomes a home for the self-expression of many people. (Herman, 4).

Tolentino argued that the pools of data gathered by Myspace when active are today used to criticize big platforms like Facebook and Google (Tolentino,4) The internet through Facebook, Google, Instagram, and Twitter are social platforms for self-expression which doesn’t guarantee any privacy for the user. This has been a limiting factor for many through denial of freedom and privacy (Herman, 6). It’s however not known to many people that their privacy is limited and can be accessed by aggressive individuals.

According to “The technologies that will invade our lives in 2021” by Chen Brian. There are software technologies developed for example the” ultra-wideband” technology. Installing this software on someone’s device could mean some bit of harm to the person. For example, the biotechnological data of the user is encrypted in the system (Brian Chen). The software, therefore, operates on behalf of the user. What do we think about those monitoring the system’s performance? Can’t they spy on users? Ideally, this is what happens. The internet is offering a society where every move of the user is put under surveillance to offer the claimed better services to the user (Brian Chen). This technology is used in detecting authorized personnel into certain premises, this must be based on biometric data analysis. How then is it guaranteed that the user's privacy is guaranteed? Biometric data is the very essential just like any other privacy one would need to keep. The internet keeps it for security purposes, who monitors it? It’s human who we can’t trust at all worth our personal information. At any point in time when we’ll need our privacy the most, they could leak it. This is why the internet offers a risky feat to many of its users who think little about the repercussions of keeping their data with it.

No human wants his or her personal information leaked to third parties or unauthorized parties, it’s, however, traumatizing that with the advancing technology, the majority of internet accessing individuals give almost all their crucial information in a bid to enjoy the provisions that come with the technology. Much negativity also comes with this, serial killing, spying, and even hacking of personal software entities are just but the few misfortunes that come along this path. The internet truly doesn’t guarantee as much security to personal data as it’s perceived. In the 20th century, data protection regimes had become a way of processing personal information and verify it. Currently, in the 21st century, an uprising in data protection has risen too far. Big companies like crypto currency and even Android need to keep away malice from their escapades. In the article “Surveillance and Capitalism is an assault of human autonomy” by Zuboff Shoshanna. The author argued that surveillance and capitalism explain how the growing technology and enthusiasm to transact through the internet has led to little privacy. She expounds on how this has only increased monitoring of people’s endeavors. (Shoshanna). This has called for IP address monitoring and which can easily locate the devices people use. This is spying. On most occasions, this happens through an internet connection.

An increment in the mode of surveillance has increased the concern of many people. In the 21st century, business platforms are required to keep and provide customer data as one of the assets of the company. According to “Surveillance and Capitalism is an assault of human autonomy” by Zuboff Shoshann. The author argued that the personal data of the business firm or company is also considered an asset and needs to be provided (Shoshanna). Big tech companies like Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google are therefore not able to prevent any surveillance on the information or data we keep with them. However much they promise to keep it private and confidential, there is a body somewhere monitoring it and can access it anytime they want.

Majorly, the rise or advancement in technology will always be a subject of no objection. It’s however worrying that the aspect of agreement to privacy control and concealment isn’t put into consideration. Society is escalating to a phase where everything happens through the internet, buying food, machinery, studying, and even doing business. Sincerely, this calls for more accuracy in keeping personal data as well as verifying it. Surveillance must be there to protect the general majority from harm or malware intrusion. This also prevents any terrorist activities through the internet. For this to happen, our privacy must be accessed by the overseeing bodies. It’s factual that as long as people operate and transact through the internet, they cannot limit their privacy to themselves. In the article. “The Cambridge Analytical files” by Graham, Harrison. tried to explain that no data is kept out of reach. In as much as it’s kept out of unauthorized hands, some bodies always access and monitor them. The internet cannot keep personal data from authorized security bodies of the world, many people have been identified and their full personal information is displayed to the public through access to their biometric data. Well, it’s the internet technology that one can use to scan or retrieve even data provided during the processing of identity cards. There are ways of linking the information one provides on social media to those stored in government encryption. Someone could easily hack through the internet and retrieve such vital information. Through linking and detaching, someone could easily come up with full personal information without the owner’s consent (Graham-Harrison). The internet can’t, therefore, keep us safe from everyone, there must be people who can get into the in-depth knowledge about many of the internet users without them knowing.

People today can scroll through their phones, they can post and delete photos and files on the internet. The internet has made it easy to communicate either directly or indirectly, it’s however ideal to consider that it raises surveillance and privacy from media sites especially after the web 2.0 technology. The internet as a transport mechanism sends and receives globally. The internet acts as portals that allow people to see and hear what the other person is saying. Today whatever thing one does on one part of the continent can be seen and heard on another side. It’s apparent that many people use the internet and go as far as encrypting their data with certain platforms. Upon registration or the encryption process, the user is often informed that these data shouldn’t be disclosed to anyone. It’s however notable that some of it is disclosed or accessed by unauthorized people without the user's consent. The internet itself spies on its users without their consent, it’s therefore clear that the internet deprives users of their privacy and offer more surveillance.

Works cited

Brian Chen “ The technologies that will invade our lives in 2021” New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/06/technology/personaltech/tech-2021-augmented-reality-chatbots-wifi.html Jan 6, 2021.

Graham-Harrison and Cardwallar, “ The Cambridge Analytica files.” https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/cambridge-analytica-facebook-influence-us-election

John, Herman “What happens when Facebook goes the way of Myspace” published 2018. Nytimes.com 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12magazine-what-happens-when-facebook-goes-the-way-of-my-space-html.Accessed 29 jan2021

March 2018.

Shoshanna Zuboff, “Surveillance and Capitalism is an assault of human autonomy”. October 2019. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/04/shoshana-zuboff-surveillance-capitalism-assault-human-automomy-digital-privacy

Tolentino Jia, The I and the internet” Trick mirror reflection of self-Delusion Random house 2019 pp3-33.