Why Privacy Matters

Watch Why Privacy Matters Ted Talk https://www.ted.com/talks/glenn_greenwald_why_privacy_matters

In the Glenn Greenwald video, he comments on the surveillance state as follows:

Here is how Orwell's narrator, Winston Smith, described the surveillance system that they faced: "There was, of course, no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given momentYou had to live, did live, from habit that became instinct, in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard and except in darkness every movement scrutinized.

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What all of these seemingly disparate works recognize, the conclusion that they all reach, is that a society in which people can be monitored at all times is a society that breeds conformity and obedience and submission

Conversely, even more importantly, it is a realm of privacy, the ability to go somewhere where we can think and reason and interact and speak without the judgmental eyes of others being cast upon us, in which creativity and exploration and dissent exclusively reside, and that is the reason why, when we allow a society to exist in which we're subject to constant monitoring, we allow the essence of human freedom to be severely crippled.

Please watch the Glenn Greenwald video and explain what you believe he meant when he made the foregoing statement. What is the argument he is making? Are you worried that the government may be collecting information about you? If not, please explain why you feel that way and how you might refute Greenwalds argument.

Also, there is a growing amount of information that employers are collecting about their employees. Do you know if your employer is collecting information about you? Do you know what information that your employer is collecting about you?

If, as a condition of employment, your employer requires that you provide it with access to all online profiles and internet activity and you sign the agreement (because after all you need the job), should courts enforce such a waiver? Why or why not? If your employer is monitoring your online activities, does that give rise to any privacy concerns?

Relatedly, are you concerned about the extent to which companies like Google and Amazon are collecting information about you? Are you concerned that information brokers are doing so and using that information to build profiles about you to sell to third parties? If you are concerned, what is the nature of your concern? If you are not, please explain why these activities do not trouble you.

Who are you most concerned about collecting information about you: government, your employer, or advertisers? Why?

If you could write any law to protect individual privacy in the age of the internet and facial recognition technology, what would it be? How would it read?

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