Private Internet Spying

572 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: The impact of technology in modern society

" As technology progresses since the time of the application of the Constitution in 1787, the government is naturally going to run into unprecedented circumstances because of the invention of entities that have never existed before. This means that they have no formal decisions to base their actions on. One such unprecedented circumstance is the use of the internet by millions of Americans. Being that all of your internet content is kept track of and saved in a way that an organization with a lot of power (such as the government) could potentially monitor you, it seems inevitable that controversies may arise with respect to internet monitoring. I firmly believe in a hands-off attitude towards internet content and control. It has been understood for a couple …show more content…

I believe that as a citizen of the United States of America, each and every individual should have a right to a private internet access where they can engage in their own business without the government spying on them. One may argue that the internet must be monitored in order to track and control terrorism. The way I see it, those who believe in this argument must also feel that the government should be allowed to spy on us in our daily lives. Communications with someone over the internet should have the same protections as communications with someone in person. You wouldn’t want a federal agent planting a bug and listening in on your conversations in real life, so why would you be okay with them monitoring your conversations on the internet? The freedoms of speech and expression that you enjoy out in the streets of this country should be the same freedoms you enjoy online. If people are constantly being watched, it’s fair to say that this is an infringement upon those liberties, as they will filter what they say and won’t be able to express their thoughts and ideas

Show More
Related

  • Pros And Cons Of The NSA

    1025 Words  | 3 Pages

    ...rk with us. This can have a major impact on the economy, and may eventually lead to a weakened nation overall. However, it can be argued that the United States is not acting hypocritical through mass surveillance over the internet. While there's some overlap of the issues, the existence of surveillance does not cut off the freedom of speech on the Internet."One can recognize... there is a very large difference between censorship and spying... On some level, we know that spying and espionage is going to take place. This still doesn't mean we promote censorship." (Verveer, 2013) Undoubtedly, the censorship by the agency over the internet may make users think twice about what opinions to express, but as long as no major crimes are being planned, then the agency will not really care about what is said online, and internet users are free to say whatever they would like.

    Read More

  • The Pros And Cons Of The NSA

    2057 Words  | 5 Pages

    We all have heard the quote “Life, Liberty, Land, and the Pursuit to Happiness” and that is the promise of a life here in America. As Americans we pride ourselves on these freedoms that allow us to live everyday. We are one of the only countries that have this promise and it is what draws people from all of over the world to come here. Our founding fathers of the United States of America wrote these words, having no idea the impact that they would have for the rest of this countries history. Those words were the foundation for government, and it wasn’t perfect at first but slowly it matured into what we have today, strong and powerful. To other nations America is seen as the World Power, and a somewhat perfect nation to live in. Unfortunately corruption, scandals and controversies have tainted our once golden glow, and other nations are weary of watching their steps. One of the most controversial elements to our government is the NSA. Hidden in the shadows from American and global knowledge is what the NSA is actually doing and watching out for. Only very recently has the NSA been ripped from the shadows and brought to light what exactly is going on inside those walls. They are “spying” on not only America’s personal data, but foreign leaders as well. The NSA says it’s for the safety for everyone against terrorism and attacks. However, it has gone way to far and violates a constitutional right, privacy. The NSA has overstepped their boundaries, and spying doesn’t seem to make a difference in safety.

    Read More

  • The NSA, Privacy and the War or Terrorism

    1550 Words  | 4 Pages

    Edward Snowden is America’s most recent controversial figure. People can’t decide if he is their hero or traitor. Nevertheless, his leaks on the U.S. government surveillance program, PRISM, demand an explanation. Many American citizens have been enraged by the thought of the government tracing their telecommunication systems. According to factbrowser.com 54% of internet users would rather have more online privacy, even at the risk of security (Facts Tagged with Privacy). They say it is an infringement on their privacy rights of the constitution. However, some of them don’t mind; they believe it will help thwart the acts of terrorists. Both sides make a good point, but the inevitable future is one where the government is adapting as technology is changing. In order for us to continue living in the new digital decade, we must accept the government’s ability to surveil us.

    Read More

  • Edward Snowden and Classified Files

    1837 Words  | 4 Pages

    President Obama insisted that the government is not invading privacy but is just looking for potential terrorist activities that can be thwarted by preemptive measures. Even after this statement by the President there are those who speculate that the government is "snooping" into their lives and monitoring their internet activity. Although there is this paranoia that the government is "watching", it may actually make people more aware of what they do on their computers and cause them to practice safer internet browsing techniques.

    Read More

  • US Government Monitoring Its Citizens

    1413 Words  | 3 Pages

    Whether the U.S. government should strongly keep monitoring U.S. citizens or not still is a long and fierce dispute. Recently, the debate became more brutal when technology, an indispensable tool for modern live, has been used by the law enforcement and national security officials to spy into American people’s domestic.

    Read More

  • NSA Wiretapping

    1154 Words  | 3 Pages

    The NSA has been secretly ordered to eavesdrop by the Bush administration after the 9/11 terrorist attack. The base of where the NSA has been operating their wiretapping agenda is in Bluff Dale, Utah the building sprawls 1,500,000 square feet and possess the capacity to hold as much as five zeta bytes of data it has cost almost $2,000,000,000. The act of spying over the USA citizens even though they are suspicious is a threat to the people’s privacy and the privacy of other countries’ members are being infringed on by the NSA by the act of wiretapping. The action of wiretapping violates laws for privacy, like the Bill of Right’s Amendment Four which says “Every subject has a right to be secure from all unreasonable searches, and seizures of his person, his houses, his papers, and all his possessions”. The wiretapping controversy has caused the panic and hysteria of the citizens of the USA and USA’s allies. This panic and hysteria has troubled the government by resulting to mistrust and concern against them by both groups. The panic effect of the NSA wiretapping has caused many people such as journalist to have their freedom of speech to be restricted in fear of the NSA to stamp them as terrorist and according to the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights that is an infringement of the people’s right of freedom of expression consists of the rights to freedom of speech, press, assembly and to petition the government for a redress of grievances, and the implied rights of association and belief.

    Read More

  • Patriot Act Essay

    843 Words  | 2 Pages

    Essentially for the past 12 years the NSA has been monitoring the cyber world and telephone activity of American citizens, as well as foreign nationals in secrecy. The NSA has been receiving digital information from several major internet and cable providers including Verizon, AT&T and Sprint. They have kept records of phone conversations of millions of Americans and internet search histories as well as all data text messages. Many of the American citizens being monitored have not been convicted of any crimes and have caused no suspicion of illicit activity. Despite the circumstances these private citizens are being unlawfully monitored by the U.S government without consent.The issue at hand is whether the new powers granted by the Patriot Act to permit the NSA to spy on its citizens are absolutely necessary to protect our national security, or if the NSA utilizing the terro...

    Read More

  • NSA: They're Watching

    584 Words  | 2 Pages

    As of June 30, 2012, there are more than two million Internet users around the world (“World Internet Users Statistics Usage and World Population Stats”). The National Security Agency (NSA) has been tracking U.S. citizens since 2005 ("EFF NSA Spying | Electronic Frontier Foundation"). They are supposedly to only track suspects and dangerous people, but instead have dug deep into the life of the innocent. Although their intentions may be morally correct, the NSA is jeopardizing the private information from the Internet and because of that must be outlawed to protect the people of the United States.

    Read More

  • Patriot Act Research Paper

    1494 Words  | 3 Pages

    If citizens knew about how much they were monitored every day they would be a lot more withdrawn when expressing their ideas on the internet even though the First Amendment says that they can express whatever they feel everyone will still be cautious about what things they let people see just due to the fact that they’re intimidated. If Americans think that them giving up their own rights as citizens in order to obtain a more secure lifestyle then they’re wrong. Just by letting the government bully us around like this it is actually degrading our morals and what democracy means to us. The last reason I oppose the Patriot Act is because it takes what our founding fathers laid out for us to do as a country and it stomps on it. It tramples over everything we’ve fought for since the American Revolution and a simple Act should not be the demise of The United States of America. If the government could come up with a solution that would protect us from foreign threats but also still value our unalienable rights that would completely clean up the mess we made when we passed this bill. As American citizens we should not trade our ability to achieve life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for a hoax and illusion of us being protected by a group of men listening to our

    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

  • Surveillance and Privacy Issues

    1006 Words  | 3 Pages

    However, government agencies, especially in America, continue to lobby for increased surveillance capabilities, particularly as technologies change and move in the direction of social media. Communications surveillance has extended to Internet and digital communications. law enforcement agencies, like the NSA, have required internet providers and telecommunications companies to monitor users’ traffic. Many of these activities are performed under ambiguous legal basis and remain unknown to the general public, although the media’s recent preoccupation with these surveillance and privacy issues is a setting a trending agenda.

    Read More

  • Privacy on the Internet

    2274 Words  | 5 Pages

    In this new era of the Internet, most people use the Internet to acquire information of one kind or other. But what these people are not aware of is that the Internet is collecting information about them. Every time we get onto the Internet there might be a compromise of privacy of our personal information. The information flows both ways. With every clock of the mouse on a hyperlink, or an addition to the mailing list, someone out there might be gathering information about us. This raises the seriousness of privacy of our information on the Internet.

    Read More

  • Threat to Internet Privacy

    2650 Words  | 6 Pages

    At what level is Internet surveillance by the United States government acceptable to society, considering a balance between security and privacy, what are the short and long term implications, and how does it affect the rest of the world.

    Read More

  • Lack of Internet Security and Privacy

    909 Words  | 2 Pages

    A major reason the U.S. needs to increase restrictions on the type and amount of data collected on individuals from the internet is due to the fact that the United States government can track communications and browsing histories of private citizens without warrant or cause. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, ...

    Read More

  • Internet Security and Confidentiality

    2107 Words  | 5 Pages

    My aims are to require my evidence that will show me to understand of broad range of my learning outcomes in my project brief.

    Read More

More about Private Internet Spying

Open Document