Blog Post 5

John Raymond

            As the internet continues to grow, both in breadth and detail, it seems that more, not less, of our private information will be farmed by companies, if not the government.  Although the surveillance programs carried out by the NSA are surely debatable, the fact of the matter is that those programs do operate within the confines of the law and are overseen by lawmakers.  Companies like Google, Facebook and the like, have been proven to have operated illegally in collecting user data.  With the more pervasive use of social media and online services, data collection by the companies providing those services is a more imminent breach of privacy than the data collection conducted by the NSA.

            The Huffington Post article describes how Google collected personally data illegally through the Wi-Fi networks of users, and even after they were caught, found ways around their court orders to continue monitoring internet use.  Internet based services are becoming more and more engrained into everyday life.  For instance, if using the money-transfer service Venmo to move more than $300, you have to either connect your Facebook account, or enter information including your birthday and the last four digits of your Social Security Number.  That is just one example of how online profiles are becoming a recognized piece of your online identity.  Unlike the NSA, who collects data to analyze national security threats (and maybe enhance US economic prosperity/dominance according to Greenwald’s book), companies like Google collect data to enhance their profits.  It seems a hypocritical to champion privacy, but also illegally collect the data of your users and then block legal actions to reveal what exactly was collected.

            Greenwald points out that many proponents of NSA data collection demonstrate the same hypocrisy.  However, the debate should not really be over what the NSA is doing, but what they are allowed to do.  As shocking as the data collection revelation is, it was not illegal, the laws the policies operate under (the Patriot Act, at least in part) are not secret.  The collection of metadata definitely merits debate, and I think Greenwald makes a very telling point when describing how protestors demanded Dianne Feinstein post her metadata for the public to see, if such information is not a breach of privacy.  The good news is, the NSA operates under a democratic government in which most legal proceedings are of public record, whether people or the media choose to pay attention to those records is another matter.  Currently, we live in an era where the United States exists in relative social calm compared to the Civil Rights movement of the 1960’s.  Periods like those, with strong social and political dissent, will be the true test of surveillance programs and law enforcement.  That is when the definitions of “terrorist” or “security threat” can be bent to silence dissenters.  If the NSA are the “watchers”, then who is watching the watchers of the watchers?  The NSA has enough oversight that as an entity on a large scale, it won’t be able to act illegally, but what is preventing those who oversee the NSA from using it to act questionably?  It seems the best solution is for the public to inform themselves as much as possible, so they can make educated decisions on these policies, and which representatives support their views.  Ultimately, there will never be complete transparency regarding government actions, but that does not make the drive for more transparency wrong.