Futuríveis
segunda-feira, novembro 06, 2006
Surveillance Societies
Britain's privacy watchdog sounded the alarm over growing state and commercial intrusion into people's lives as a report on Thursday ranked the country alongside Russia and China as "endemic surveillance societies".
Richard Thomas, the UK's independent information commissioner, said clear lines needed to be drawn about the extent to which government agencies and businesses could hoard information on people's movements and buying habits.
"Two years ago I warned that we were in danger of sleepwalking into a surveillance society. Today I fear that we are in fact waking up to a surveillance society that is already all around us," Thomas said.
Civil liberties group Privacy International, in a survey of 37 countries, named Britain alongside Russia, China, Malaysia and Singapore as countries practising "endemic" surveillance against the individual.
Only slightly better were the United States, Thailand and the Philippines, described as "extensive" surveillance societies".
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Thomas said that while some forms of surveillance could help combat crime and terrorism, others risked undermining trust and fostering a climate of suspicion. He voiced concern about commercial as well as government intrusion.
"Every time we use a mobile phone, use our credit cards, go online to search on the Internet, go electronic shopping, drive our cars, more and more information is being collected," he told the BBC. "Humans must dictate our future, not machines."
A report for a London conference hosted by Thomas predicted surveillance would be ramped up even more in the next 10 years.
Among its forecasts: satellite navigation devices in cars would help police to monitor speed and track selected vehicles; employees would be screened for future health problems and their impact on productivity; monitoring of people's movements would intensify, with the use of unmanned aircraft and street-level security cameras with facial recognition technology.
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