With deep felt sorrow we announce the death of privacy. It leaves to mourn its irreplaceable loss…”
Up till now, I have never seen or read such an obituary in any of our papers. Nor was any State funeral announced anywhere in the world. This was hardly to be expected, since states, the world over, are an accomplice in its murder. The other main assailant was the corporate world of big business actively abetted by Jo(sephin)e Public.
Am I being too pessimistic? I don’t think so, but let’s compromise for the sake of keeping the peace on a nice, sunny Sunday. I will settle, for the sake of consensus, that she (or is it a ‘he’ or, to be perfectly politically correct, some other gender?) is on the throes of death.
Before delving into the shock treatment given last year by Edward Snowden in his desperate attempt to save privacy, let us look at a recent local manifestation of the deadly malaise.
A local newspaper carried a story that may not have been noticed by many readers of this column. The Birżebbuġa council placed a camera in the public toilet of their town.
According to the report, the camera, positioned in the male section, was strategically pointed towards the urinals.
The council’s justification for this voyeuristic experiment was that they wanted to catch someone who was vandalising urinals!
They caught him but at the expense of the privacy of all the men who needed the service of this – at times – most useful appliance.
This invasion of privacy, quite naturally, pales into insignificance when compared to what was revealed by Snowden.
The relatively young American computer professional bravely and generously, put his neck on the block by revealing to the world the gargantuan attempts of the US government to spy on whoever it wanted to spy on.
Hundreds of millions in the United States and the world over were being spied on. This included heads of governments who were buddies with the US.
On the first anniversary of the Snowden exposés, the telecoms giant Vodafone released a detailed report of the amount of ‘investigations’ it was asked to make. The relative large number of requests from Malta gives the impression the Maltese are one of the most spied-on people in Europe.
This revelation led to a debate about phone tapping and data mining in Malta. The police can do it after getting clearance from a member of the judiciary.
On the other hand, our security services can spy on anyone if Home Affairs Minister Manuel Mallia gives them permission.
I have no reason to believe that Mallia is not executing his duties with great scrupulosity and exactness and in no way do I want to hint otherwise.
But there are two issues. So many years after enacting that law, is it not time to revisit it and possibly amend it to take this power away from the hand of just one minister?
Besides, many are concerned it is Mallia, the same minister who had half a million euros stashed under the proverbial mattress and who, to boot, gave a weak explanation of how these got there, is the person legally empowered to take such an important decision.
The minister who can authorise the surveillance of each one of us is now refusing to let the Ombudsman (a constitutional official approved by two thirds of Parliament) survey a number of files that can prove (or disprove) that injustices had been committed.
Many of the incursions on privacy by the powers that be (State or commercial) are framed within the offering of this Hobson’s choice: we lose some privacy but in the end, we are told, we gain our peace made in the certitude that Big Brother is out there trying to catch all the bad guys.
Since we are good guys, we are told, we should not worry.
Many gulp down this mode of reasoning hook, line and sinker stating that government surveillance does not concern them or that they didn’t mind people knowing what they were doing because they had nothing to hide.
In a 2009 interview, Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, said: “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.”
Is it really so?
Four years before Schmidt had the temerity to make that statement, he had blacklisted CNET, an American media website that publishes news and blogs on electronic technology, for invading his privacy!
To make a point about privacy concerns, CNET had published an article wherein it listed where Schmidt lives, his salary, his political contributions and his hobbies. And from where did it obtain all this ‘private’ information? It just went through the arduous task of making a 30-minute Google search.
It is not the technology we should be worried about but the way we use it or abuse it
Before saying that government surveillance is no concern of yours or that you have nothing to hide, consider the following. Would you be ready to make public all your e-mail and social media passwords?
Any sensible person would answer in the negative because privacy is embedded in our very humanity.
Those who value their privacy should be worried that states and big business are encroaching on this right every day.
But perhaps one of the biggest dangers to privacy is the wrong use made by the ‘common’ users of digital technology.
Many users endanger privacy as they are not conscious enough of two things.
All their internet activity is monitored and stored by states and private companies and, secondly, that the internet is always watching and that it never forgets.
Perhaps it is about time that internet use, like cigarette use, comes with a disclaimer: ‘This can be dangerous to your privacy. Use attentively.’
Big Brother can only be effective if there are many Little Brothers who are not conscious of the danger and consequently behave as if they don’t care. It is not the technology we should be worried about but the way we use it or abuse it.
It is only if we stand up for our rights that we can say together with Snowden that we all want to avoid living in a world where everything we say, everything we do, everyone we talk to, every expression of creativity or love or friendship is recorded.
joseph.borg@um.edu.mt