Internet Privacy: A Right or a Privilage?

921 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Privacy right

Internet Privacy: Right or Privilege

Privacy has always been a key personal right for many people. People need that personal space or bubble to themselves that nobody else can penetrate. Especially with the way everything is heading today with the new technologies on the brink nobody has any alone time. It is becoming more and more of a hot topic to people. They want to know that their personal information stays personal, and out of reach of other people. With all the ways that people’s privacy can be breached they have a reason for being a little worried. Out of all these one of the bigger topics is internet privacy. What happens to all their information that is used and posted on the internet? The internet lacks security and legislation when it comes to email providers, search engines, and social networking sites. This has led some people to use private peer-to-peer communication networks such as Freenet and BitTorrent.

First, most people would assume that the emails they send to each other are private and will stay private. Well that may not be completely true. Thanks to out of date privacy laws. The government can about snap their finger and be able to view your electronic messages and private emails.(Frolik) “The Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986,” experts said, “states that the government does not need a warrant to obtain emails and electronic messages that are 180 days old or that have been opened.” The law came out only two years after the year that the book nineteen eighty-four was written. (Orwell) This is too long without a change in the privacy laws. Mike Brickner, director of communications and public policy for the ACLU of Ohio said, “We haven’t had a wide-scale change in our privacy laws since the ...

... middle of paper ...

... very important right of the people. People shouldn’t be watched when they walk around the corner or when they go out in public. They should have the freedom to do whatever they want to an extent. The government should have stricter laws so they cannot just take people’s emails and messages. At the same time though people need to be a lot smarter on social networking sites. Putting all your information up is just asking for it. Maybe legislation does need to step in, and put requirements on these sites. Also, Google Maps should not be able to take street view pictures from their satellites. It violates people’s personal privacy. Hopefully in the future this will be made illegal or at least have tougher restrictions. No matter what happens in the future internet privacy and also just privacy in general will continue to be a hot topic in society for years to come.

Show More
Related

  • Online Privacy: Is It Really Possible?

    1848 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Internet is a vast world of virtual information. Activities like online shopping and social networking sites have put people in the position to ask themselves how private their own information is among the rest of the Internet. Can the average person completely control their privacy or are some parts of their personal information out of their control? To go along with that, is online privacy the complete responsibility of the individual? I have found that online privacy can be difficult to completely control because of the various types of tracking and third party devices. With that said, although these devices can get private information very subtly, being informed of the information gathering methods can help a person make better decisions for their privacy on the Internet. However, complete privacy is unlikely (Mitchell, 2013).

    Read More

  • Dehumanization in 1984 and Today

    676 Words  | 2 Pages

    Government seems to take away more privacy than they say they protect. In 1984 the citizens were constantly being monitored no matter where they were, there was no escape. "It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander when you were in any public place or within range of a telescreen. The smallest thing could give you away" (Orwell 62). Members of the party were constantly being monitored, at even the slight sign of disloyalty they would be apprehended by the Thought Police, striking fear into the people. People had no privacy due to the government and this can now be seen today. Referring to the NSA "The agency has circumvented or cracked much of the encryption, or digital scrambling, that guards global commerce and banking systems, protects sensitive data like trade secrets and medical records, and automatically secures the e-mails, Web searches, Internet chats and phone calls of Americans and others around the world"(Lopez np). Growing use of internet and technology makes it easier for the government to spy on us. Like in 1984 they will soon be able to track our every move. There is no way to completely remove ourselves from technology, there's are steps to take to protect privacy. A solution is to keep more records on paper instead of online. Also, what is posted on social networks should be limited. The less information you give them, the less the government knows.

    Read More

  • Privacy Is Not Privlege

    773 Words  | 2 Pages

    How much privacy do we as the American people truly have? American Privacy is not directly guaranteed in any manner under the United States Constitution; however, by the Fourth Amendment, Americans are protected from illegal search and seizure. So then isn’t it ironic that in today’s modern world, nothing we do that it is in any way connected to the internet is guaranteed to remain discreet? A Google search, an email, a text message, or even a phone call are all at risk of being intercepted, traced, geo located, documented, and stored freely by the government under the guise of “protecting” the American people. Quite simply, the Government in order to protect us and our rights, is willing to make a hypocrite of itself and act as though our right is simply a privilege, and without any form of consent from the people, keep virtual tabs on each and every one of us. In the words of Former Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis “The right to privacy is a person's right to be left alone by the government... the right most valued by civilized men." Privacy isn’t just Privilege, it is nonnegotiable right, and deserves to be treated as such.

    Read More

  • Online Data Tracking: An Invasion of Privacy?

    1364 Words  | 3 Pages

    The personal connection Americans have with their phones, tablets, and computers; and the rising popularity of online shopping and social websites due to the massive influence the social media has on Americans, it is clear why this generation is called the Information Age, also known as Digital Age. With the Internet being a huge part of our lives, more and more personal data is being made available, because of our ever-increasing dependence and use of the Internet on our phones, tablets, and computers. Some corporations such as Google, Amazon, and Facebook; governments, and other third parties have been tracking our internet use and acquiring data in order to provide personalized services and advertisements for consumers. Many American such as Nicholas Carr who wrote the article “Tracking Is an Assault on Liberty, With Real Dangers,” Anil Dagar who wrote the article “Internet, Economy and Privacy,” and Grace Nasri who wrote the article “Why Consumers are Increasingly Willing to Trade Data for Personalization,” believe that the continuing loss of personal privacy may lead us as a society to devalue the concept of privacy and see privacy as outdated and unimportant. Privacy is dead and corporations, governments, and third parties murdered it for their personal gain not for the interest of the public as they claim. There are more disadvantages than advantages on letting corporations, governments, and third parties track and acquire data to personalized services and advertisements for us.

    Read More

  • The Importance Of Privacy In Today's Society

    1492 Words  | 3 Pages

    Privacy is a human right that must always be maintained. However, with continuously advancing technology, surveillance is only becoming easier. In current society, many are unaware of the power the government has over accessing information. Many also do not think that this is an important issue in today’s world. The well-known novel, 1984, by George Orwell reflects heavily on this issue. It illustrates a world where there is a complete totalitarian government. Similarly, The Truman Show starring Jim Carrey, is about the character Truman Burbank who unknowingly has a television show revolve around his entire life. These two stories demonstrate the extremes surveillance can lead to if not addressed properly. With the revolutionary increase of technology in today’s society, it is undeniable that government surveillance has a ubiquitous presence. These two stories contain haunting messages where they warn of the outcomes that are associated with the abuse of power. There are a

    Read More

  • Our Right to Privacy

    562 Words  | 2 Pages

    Right to privacy is meant to protect us all. Without invading personal lives, the laws are in place. When people are being felt violated that when they know the right to privacy has been invaded as well. This man, Jonathan Franzen has said about his feeling of privacy; “One of my neighbors in the apartment building across the street spends a lot of time at her mirror examining her pores, and I can see her doing it, just as she can undoubtedly see me sometimes. But our respective privacies remain intact as long as neither of us feels seen.” Privacy is not a concern if people feel safe with their surroundings. There are also people feel that their right to privacy is violated for the most random issues. (Right to Privacy)

    Read More

  • The Right to Privacy

    804 Words  | 2 Pages

    Privacy is one of the severe issue in today’s Modern Technology era, tied to human right around the world. Most countries have started thinking differently regarding between the people’s right and national security, and trying to leverage on new technology to detect potential national threats without hurting people’s privacy. However, there's a blurred line between privacy violation and government surveillance. (Sánchez, Levin & Del, 2012) It would be a learning process for governments to seek an optimum balance between retain integrity of privacy right and eliminate national threats in order to make the country better.

    Read More

  • Internet Privacy: Edward Snowden

    1686 Words  | 4 Pages

    The government gives each American citizen a set of unalienable rights that protect them from the government’s power. These rights cannot be broken, yet the government violates the Fourth Amendment daily to find ways to spy on the American public under the guise of protecting against terrorism. In 2007 President Obama said the American administration “acts like violating civil liberties is the way to enhance our securities – it is not.” Americans need to understand that their privacy is worth the fight. The people need to tell their neighbors, their congressmen, and their senators that they will not allow their internet privacy to be violated by needless spying. American citizens deserve the rights given to them and need to fight for the right to keep them by changing privacy laws to include Internet privacy.

    Read More

  • Destruction Of Privacy, By Alan Westin

    2082 Words  | 5 Pages

    Lastly, if we give people the ability to protect their privacy, then they need to be educated on the subject. If we have laws and regulations put into place to protect everyone’s privacy, that isn’t going to make a difference if they don’t realize that when they allow apps to track their location, then their privacy laws all go out the window. When people are posting all sorts of personal information online for everyone to see, then they need to realize that they themselves are the culprit of their privacy being destroyed. We must start teaching everyone about the New World, cyber-space, and the suggested precautions that they should be carrying out to help protect themselves and their privacy within this New World.

    Read More

  • Privacy: Security, Confidentiality, or Convenience?

    3152 Words  | 7 Pages

    The evolution of the Internet started from the department of defense's project, and rapidly distributed to world wide. With the rise of the Internet age comes with the benefits and the concerns. Because of the easeness to communicate information and displaying data, the first amendment needs to be applied to this communication channel. How are we using and communicating information without offending and harm others? Since the evolution of the Internet, there has been acts from Congress to regulate the use the Internet such as the Communications Decency Act in 1996 and the Child Online Protection Act in 1998. These acts aim to forbid Internet users from displaying offensive speech to users or exposing children of indecent materials. The Internet raises other issues that people might have. The biggest and most debatable topic is the privacy issue. Is the Internet a safe place to protect personal information such as financial information, medical data, etc…? Some people who are computer literate or at least with some experience in software and technology would not trust to release the information on the web or at random sites . As a matter of fact, any unknown or small vendor on the web would have difficulty getting many customers to do business online. Big vendors such as Amazon would want to secure their network infrastructure to protect the users information, so that their server would not be hacked. However, even this style of protecting personal information is not enough. The users demand further protection such as ensuring their information is not being sold to other vendors for misuse, or spam the users mailbox with soliticing.

    Read More

  • Privacy Essay

    1284 Words  | 3 Pages

    As society has progressed, there have been many new innovative and unbelievable developments in almost all aspects of life that have ultimately created an impact. More specifically, advancements in technology have rather had a much larger and intense impact on society as it continues to grow. Technology has allowed for many great and useful applications that has made life much easier and convenient. However, many aspects of technology have given a rise to a number of social and ethical issues, causing numerous debates and concerns. One of the more prominent concerns deals with the issue of privacy rights.

    Read More

  • Privacy Rights

    626 Words  | 2 Pages

    The privacy of the individual is the most important right. Without privacy, the democratic system that we know would not exist. Privacy is one of the fundamental values on which our country was founded. There are exceptions to privacy rights that are created by the need for defense and security.

    Read More

  • Is Personal Privacy Dead?

    1024 Words  | 3 Pages

    ...onal privacy dead?” brings up many other questions along with it. But there is no doubt that the government is doing all of what they are doing for safety reasons. They claim to want to make the United States as safe as possible, and this has proved to ring true in many situations. But now the inevitable new question becomes: How far is too far? Is safety more important than privacy? To know these answers, one must ask themselves and know their own opinion on the situation. But whatever their answers may be, and despite the multiple other questions that are brought up along with the topic of personal privacy, there is still one thing that is known for sure: personal privacy is dead. And unless the use of technology becomes less critical to the United States, personal privacy will always be dead. The bigger the role technology has; the less personal privacy there is.

    Read More

  • Surveillance and Privacy Issues

    1006 Words  | 3 Pages

    Perhaps the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, said it best when he claimed that privacy is no longer a “social norm.” Virtually everyone has a smart phone and everyone has social media. We continue to disclose private information willingly and the private information we’re not disclosing willingly is being extracted from our accounts anyway. Technology certainly makes these things possible. However, there is an urgent need to make laws and regulations to protect against the stuff we’re not personally disclosing. It’s unsettling to think we are living in 1984 in the 21st century.

    Read More

  • Monitoring Social Networking Sites

    1147 Words  | 3 Pages

    There are many people who disagree with social networking sites being controlled by the government. They believe this because the public considers it an invasion of privacy. Freedom has been an issue for centuries. Is it right for the government to know all of our private information? As technology has developed and become essential to our society, many government commissioners dread social media and its authority and power in our society – but does this give them the authority to monitor online content? This means that the government would have access to personal and confidential information that the public display on the internet. Tom Baker, a liberal democratic MP, stated that social networking sites have replied that social networking sites consist of hypersensitive exclusive details about its users and Mr. Baker troubled that the data could possibly be exposed from all government-controlled database. Another newspaper, The Independent, cited him stating related strategy to keep phone and email files threatened to be the "most expensive snooper's charter in history". "It is deeply worrying that they now intend to monitor social networking sites which contain very sensitive data like sexual orientation, religious beliefs and political views," Mr. Bake...

    Read More

More about Internet Privacy: A Right or a Privilage?

Open Document