The Security of Privacy

By INT204 -

Post by Amrit Samson Joshua:

Security is not a concept that can be objectively defined. Security means different things to different parts of society, and it's definitely not restricted to just the highest levels of authority, concerning National and International affairs.


But the biggest threat to security, a topic that's been very much debated upon in recent times, is privacy, or the right to privacy rather. Now privacy is a very important element in our lives. It is also a very controversial topic as too much privacy can be treated as suspicious by organisations or the government even, and too little privacy has been misused many times throughout our modern history. 


Recently Apple announced that they will be scanning the images of Apple product users, to check for anything that indicates child abuse. This to Apple and to law enforcement authorities is very beneficial. However, consumers have treated it with much hostility worrying about data privacy, and misuse of their personal images. A middle point in these sorts of situations is near impossible to reach. Incidents like the Cambridge Analytica Scandal of 2016 wherein data of millions of Facebook users were collected and used for political advertising. Far worse occurrences of data breaches are by world governments as part of "Global Surveillance" that they conduct. Edward Snowden who worked at the National Security Agency or the NSA based in the United States exposed the NSA, releasing thousands of classified documents to the press and thus the world. 


Information and Data have become the most valuable resource and the problem here is that people when citizens trust governments or corporations they use products of, with their information, they more often than not, end up regretting as the entity almost always abuses it. The countless incidents lead to the end consumers being paranoid and thus demand total privacy, a demand that those who plot against society, make use of. 


Another notable incident, when the organisation made a call to protect the privacy of the consumer but the consumer misused it was during the San Bernardino shooting. The Federal Bureau of Investigation or FBI wanted Apple to break into an iPhone used by one of the shooters. Apple refused, opting to keep the privacy of its consumers at the centre of everything and the government had to reach out to a third party, a small Australian Hacking Firm.


There really isn't much that either parties can do when there isn't total cooperation on both sides, everyone needs to make efforts, to not misuse the given privacy as the consumer or provided data as the entity. That's when a middle point where both parties can be satisfied, can be identified and reached.


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