Last Monday we had the privilege of meeting with Simon Davies, visiting fellow in the department of information systems at the London School of Economics, and more relevantly for our interests, the director of Privacy International. Founded in 1990, Privacy International is a London-based global alliance that monitors “surveillance and privacy invasions by governments and corporations.” With more than 250 global affiliates, including the ACLU, P.I. is the world’s largest privacy watchdog.
Upon hearing of our recent visit to the CCTV Center in Newham, Simon snickered a little, and decided to engage in a brief discussion of CCTV, if only to “offload any doubts [we had] that it might actually be an effective technology.” The only type of crime that Simon views as being preventable through CCTV is opportunistic crime; crimes of passion, premeditated violence, and professional burglary are all beyond what CCTV can deter.
Simon considers the relationship between CCTV, economics, and politics to be inseparable. Using the example of the Newham station, he facetiously pointed out that the surveillance control room that we visited had hosted “more journalists than 10 Downing Street” (Tony Blair’s official residence). The free publicity resulting from welcoming visitors allows Newham to promote itself as a safe area for business and residents, and helps the politicians who get their pictures taken there appear to be tech savvy and at the cutting edge of crime-fighting. “There were moments there when there were a queue of media booked up for a month in advance, and running one-hour slots in the control room. This is good for Newham.”
Although CCTV is the most visible form of surveillance in England, P.I.’s everyday dealings encompass methods ranging from RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) chips and security of personal financial information, to online privacy, iris scans and the collection of biometric data. A particular field of concern for P.I., both in the UK and abroad, is government collection of personal data, resulting in the government’s ability to have extremely detailed files on every member of society. As different surveillance technologies are integrated, Simon argued, it will become more and more difficult to live “at the fringes” of society. He pointed to the examples of the film Gattaca, and Orwell’s 1984. In Gattaca, the hero was able to overcome the injustices of a eugenic society by cheating the system and exploiting vulnerabilities resulting from inefficiencies. Simon expressed the fear that if the government’s ability to gather data on its citizens is not curbed, we will end up with a society resembling the world of 1984, where, in the end, there were no inefficiencies. While in Gattaca it was possible to live on the fringes of society, slightly off the map, Big Brother made an unmonitored existence impossible. If a government is able to place cameras in enough places, have comprehensive personal biomedical information, have complete access to our financial data, track us through identity numbers, read and listen to our private communications, know our whereabouts through RFID - the list goes on- living a life that diverges in some way from what is expected or officially permitted would become impossible. Simon readily challenged the argument of “if you have nothing to hide, why oppose surveillance?” After all, these measures are for your safety, aren’t they? He suggested that, at some level, everyone has something to hide, whether it be past relationships, how one acquires music or software, or even some hideous infection.
Simon recognized the huge challenge facing him and his organization. “It’s one of those areas where it seems like we are pissing against the wind. There is no end in sight to the enormity of privacy invasion and the enormity of surveillance.” Despite the gargantuan nature of this undertaking, Simon and his organization persevere, stirring up trouble, even with relatively small resources. Just recently P.I. took on one of the most visited websites, ebay.com, coercing them into allowing users to delete their own accounts, which had previously only been possible through a complicated process of contacting customer service.
The notion of ubiquitous surveillance and monitoring in the near future seems somewhat paranoid. Is it really possibly that governments want to move in that direction? During our visit to the CCTV center in Newham, John asked one of our guides about what would happen if people not wanting to be constantly watched learned to game the system, understanding how the cameras work and avoiding them. Our guide responded by saying that they would just keep placing cameras until it was no longer possible for “criminals” to hide.
Hmmmm…………………………..
-Jeremy Sairsingh
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