WASHINGTON (AP) - A top intelligence official says it is time people in the United States changed their definition of privacy.
Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguards people's private communications and financial information.
Gah! (I -knew- these guys thought 1984 was instructional, rather than cautionary...)
ReplyDelete-- B.Dewhirst
You mean they don't already think that?
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately it is a reality which has hit us faster than we can cope with it - that is, that we have become technologically capable enough that monitoring our every action is a very real possibility. Technology has outpaced our ability to cope with change and now we're (please excuse the obscenity, Mr. MacLeod) fucked.
That's why I am thankful for people like the folk at Truecrypt - who allow consumers to encrypt their files with extremely strong & powerful security - and all the people who've built software and hardware that makes communication more hermetic and difficult to snoop on. There's a new type of Quantum Encryption that'll be nice to see in the public sphere in the next few years, but I feel fairly secure with the precautions I've taken.
I think I'll keep my old school definition of privacy.
ReplyDeleteOn this issue, the furore here over the loss of 25 million records - some including bank account information, shows this definition is already generally accepted.
ReplyDelete