Government’s liberal, unchecked access to personal data frightening, invasive
In 2012, the American government beat out other world superpowers in one category: transparent searches of citizen’s online documents.
Google released the statistics of the information they discharged as well as the amount of requests they received from government officials over the last two years. Over 8,400 requests were sent to Google, who responded to about 90 percent of the requests.
These numbers are almost a 150 percent increase from the same period in 2009. While government security has undoubtedly tightened since then, I can’t help but wonder how many liberties are being taken and how much impertinent information to national safety the government is gleaning.
With advanced features like Google Plus, Google can’t be considered just a search engine anymore. If you have an Android smart phone, you can now choose to link your Google account with it, easily consolidating your emails, former contacts and Internet search history from your computer to your phone. While it is a time saver, the boundary lines between phone and computer can become blurred, allowing more personal information to become available.
Just as the Patriot Act allows regulation of phone and wire transmissions, The Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) regulates the surveillance of all transmissions of electronic data by computer and has been in place since 1986. The advance of technology since 1986 has been mammoth, yet the changes to the act remain minimal.
According to the ECPA, all electronic mail stored on a third party’s server for more than 180 days is considered abandoned and therefore up for grabs. However in a recent article on Wired, Google admits to supplying the government with two thirds of the user data without a probable cause warrant. All that’s required is a subpoena, which in the real world would hold insufficient levity to search someone’s possessions. However, the Justice Department recently argued that emails are considered “abandoned” once they are opened, thereby reducing our privacy even further.
I’m not defending the criminals who do use the Internet to further their criminal acts. I am defending the right to personal privacy that the government often infringes upon. It’s easy to want the government to step in and regulate the possibility of subversion among its people. But in doing so, the government runs the risk of seeing things that aren’t there and abusing its power.
This is one way a government can go from being the democratic voice of the people to a totalitarian instructor of the people. Allowing unnecessary government access to our personal data is akin to allowing them into our homes, like the omniscient TV screens or Thought Police in George Orwell’s 1984.
There needs to be a system of checks and balances on the government’s personal data regulation before the liberties they take infringe upon the liberties of the people.