Persuasive Essay On Government Surveillance

According to “A Surveillance Society” By William E. Thompson there are camera everywhere, watching everything you do at all times. Cameras are found everywhere and are used by everyone, including the governments of the world who use it the most to track its citizens and potential threats to the safety of their nation. People are more willing to be watched in order to feel safer everywhere they go such as the supermarket to your own workplace. Governments can now look into your email, travel records, credit history and your personal life without your knowledge of them ever doing so, even your neighbors can now easily buy tools to spy on others or to protect themselves from danger; Things such as security cameras

However, despite its unpopularity amongst many citizens, government surveillance still has many benefits to the society. In this essay we will discuss the advantages of government surveillance and espionage in detail. The following essay will discuss how government surveillance will counter terrorism and reduce crime rate which will lead to greater diplomacy, freedom, and increased sense of safety. In addition, the essay will discuss how government surveillance can help improve public health care system in Canada by allowing greater access to scientific data that may not be easily accessed. Last but not least, the essay will discuss how government surveillance may also be advantageous to Canadian economy by helping domestic businesses prosper and grow by increasing the efficiency of their business model.

Did you know that 58% of employers have fired workers for Internet and email misuse? And 48% justify employee video monitoring as an effort to “counter theft and violence?” According to the “2007 Electronic Monitoring & Surveillance Survey” of which 304 U.S. companies participated in, computer-monitoring results have led to the highest cause of employee termination. These companies used several tactics to eavesdrop on employees while claiming to be managing productivity or for security purposes. Some argue that surveillance is absolutely necessary to help protect and grow a business; others argue that employee and customer rights come first. However, companies that use such tactics often violate the privacy of individuals, exploit their private information and even punish those that do not conform to their standards.

Privacy and safety of citizens is common in today's society, as well as the government looking over their shoulder at all times. As an example, George Orwell wrote a book called, "1984" which in it gave an outlook of society being taken over by a party. Government surveillance is different from protecting and bringing safety to the citizens, it violates their freedom, privacy, and human rights.

The government looks at our emails, text messages, listens to our phone calls and other similar communication devices. “The U.S. has led a worldwide effort to limit individual privacy and enhance the capability of its police and intelligence services to eavesdrop on personal conversations. The campaign has had two legal strategies. The first made it mandatory for all digital telephone switches, cellular and satellite phones and all developing communication technologies to build in surveillance capabilities; the second sought to limit the dissemination of software that provides encryption, a technique which allows people to scramble their communications and files to prevent others from reading them” (Solove). How much of this did you know about? Almost all of our current devices already have technology that makes it an easy access for the government to know about all of your conversations.

Surveillance is not a new thing. In fact, espionage, tracking, and sleuthing were part of society ever since 5000 B.C. But in the rise of the modern era, the idea of surveillance in the public eye serves as a controversial topic of discussion. People everywhere complain about the existence of security cameras, government tracking, and the right to privacy. Such problems, however, are not due to the sudden discovery of surveillance, but the modern abuse of it. Seeing the disastrous effects of over surveillance from George Orwell’s 1984, the public rightfully fears societal deterioration through modern surveillance abuse portrayed in Matthew Hutson’s “Even Bugs Will Be Bugged” and the effects of such in Jennifer Golbeck’s “All Eyes On You”. The abuse of surveillance induces the fear of discovery through the invasion of privacy, and ensures the omnipresence of one’s past that haunt future endeavors, to ultimately obstruct human development and the progress of society overall.

Government surveillance is beneficial in moderation, but can quite easily become excessive. A well-known example of this is the controversy regarding the NSA monitoring U.S. citizens discreetly on American soil. This unwarranted watch crosses the fine line between monitoring criminal suspects for security, and blatant overreach of authority in spying common citizens. The personal infringement of information has been commonly associated with the NSA’s PRISM, but their MUSCULAR program is much more disconcerting. According to Harry Bruinius in “Why Tech Giants Are Now Uniting Against U.S. Surveillance”:

Imagine a world where your every move was being monitored. A dark world where it is no secret who you are, where you have been and who you associate with; now include who you love, who you pray to and what you just ate for dinner. The word privacy doesn’t exist in such world and it is such world that we are heading to.“Big Brother is watching you!” This quote by George Orwell couldn’t have been truer. Every aspect of our lives is being sorted through as Big Data this very moment. Government surveillance has prevailed by the name of security. But, is government surveillance of internet digital communications like social networks, cell phone calls, text messages, and emails really a public service of security? Or

One of the biggest questions being asked today is if our own government is spying on us using these new technologies. There has been though that the government has been doing so for the past decades but few years the topic has been really brought to light with all of the terrible things going on throughout the world and in our own country. One of the most popular acquisitions that the government is taking is the idea that they are engaging in economic espionage. The NSA has been accused of this and through the past year have denied the acquisitions. Though this is not invading directly on the privacy of the public people what this is saying is that there is the potential for the government to access our personal privacy in many different ways. If they are able to gain access to probably some of the most private information on other countries economics that are more than likely protected with much higher security than that of our own personal email accounts than what can they really see about us.

The population of our country is huge and a very large amount of them have come in contact with cameras meaning that the government is watching them. This help prevent people from doing terrible thing for instance hurting others and ruining lives. Which is where technology comes into view. Sheldon Richmond states, “But if their purpose is to protect us, why worry?

The cause of terrorist attacks like 9/11 tragedy the government has ramped ups the security and surveillance of the activist, journalist and dissidents. It is no secret that the government are able to have assess of people phone call records and text messages but for that reason that, activists avoid using telephones, instead they use tools like Skype. Which they think they are immune to interception but they are wrong. Over the last years there has been an industry of companies who provide surveillance technology to the government, technology that allows the government to hack into computers. Rather that intercepting the commutations as they go over the wire, instead the government now hacks into your computer, enable your webcam and your microphone and able to steal and look through documents from your computer. In the article “ Quasi- Constitutional Protection and Government Surveillance” by Emily Berman argues “ The government may collect and analyze unprecedented amounts of information about U.S persons’ communications, but without concomitant safeguards against infringing on individual privacy” (781). According to this, it indicates that all the access the government is able to see and how it is invading American’s privacy.

The right to privacy was not established as a constitutional doctrine until after the result of the Supreme Court ruling in the 1965 case of Griswold vs. Connecticut. The court decision was based on the interpretation of several amendments within the Bill of Rights. Although the Bill of Rights does not explicitly state anything about the right to privacy, a combination of its sections was used as the framework for establishing the right (“Griswold v. Connecticut (1965),” 2007).

This gives organizations information that the user may not aware is being recorded and shared. Without knowing it, we are leaving “ electronic fingerprints” with every mouse click, every phone call, is recorded and used for analysis purposes, which tend to be justified through the idea that it is used to help protect civilians from terrorist or other threats. Though surveillance is used to protect society, it can go as far as to even control and monitor society. In countries like China, the government uses surveillance to censor what is available to the public, and therefore allows the leaders of the country to maintain a tighter grip on society.

Today, individuals are sacrificing privacy in order to feel safe. These sacrifices have made a significant impact on the current meaning of privacy, but may have greater consequences in the future. According to Debbie Kasper in her journal, “The Evolution (Or Devolution) of Privacy,” privacy is a struggling dilemma in America. Kasper asks, “If it is gone, when did it disappear, and why?”(Kasper 69). Our past generation has experienced the baby boom, and the world today is witnessing a technological boom. Technology is growing at an exponential rate, thus making information easier to access and share than ever before. The rapid diminishing of privacy is leaving Americans desperate for change.

In general, employers are allowed to install video cameras within an organization, which may include direct surveillance of employees. First of all, this can be done without significant legal concern, at least when placed in areas open to view. Both public and private employees may seek to assert an expectation of privacy, though constitutional protections apply to public, but not private employees. The reasonable expectation of privacy is determined on a case-by-case basis considering specific policies, practices, and other circumstances. Also, employers are not allowed to conduct surveillance of employees who are engaged in protected concerted activities, including those of union organizers. In this case, the liability for invasion of privacy would lie with the school principal rather than the school district. The plaintiff's claim was supported by the Fourth Amendment in that sufficient evidence was provided to prove that the employees have an expectation of privacy in their locker room and office, and from the students and other staff members to change clothing or complete office work without interruptions. It is recommended that if your organization uses video monitoring, to inform employees that they are subject to monitoring and surveillance, even though such notice may not be legally required. All things considered, employers and others are prohibited from intentionally intercepting wire, oral, or electronic communications, which can be in the form of electronic,