Living With Big Brother

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Back in the 20th century, citizen worries about privacy were confined mainly to annoying calls from telemarketers and the occasional mysterious click on the phone line.

Big Brother remained in the world of fiction.

But in the 21st century Big Brother is likely to come knocking, and we will probably fall all over ourselves to let him into our homes, offices, classrooms and cars. We will submit to his unblinking gaze in exchange for safety, convenience and a good bargain.

Big Brother is now a travelling digital salesman.

Or so say a growing number of privacy activists and advocates.

Within the coming decade, a slew of ever tinier, ever cheaper, and ever more cunning new wireless devices will hit the market. These gadgets will make daily life easier and safer. But with them will come compromises of our privacy and anonymity.

Here are some of the digital devices that are already available or on their way.

• Global Positioning Satellite systems that identify exactly where you are anywhere on the globe — You will never be lost again. You will never hide again.
• The Wireless Internet — You'll be connected to interactive Internet applications at all hours of the day through personal digital assistants and cell phone Web browsers. They'll bring you weather reports, maps and directions, banking, stock trades and sports scores.
• Personalized advertising — The always on digital flow will also mean you'll be tracked continuously by advertisers and served up a customized barrage of marketing messages based on who you are and where you are.
• Health monitors linked directly to your hospital and HMO — These sensors will instantly summon an ambulance if you have a heart attack. But they'll also allow your HMO to know if you've had too much to drink and suspend your health insurance until you've dried out.

The Nightmare Scenario
Robert Ellis-Smith, a privacy activist who has published a monthly newsletter, The Privacy Journal, since 1974, fears corporations will be able to slip these surveillance tools into our lives by appealing to the acquisitiveness of a consumer society.

“What worries me is that manufacturers will press upon us these gadgets we don't need, but that will allow our every movement to be tracked,” said Ellis-Smith. “In the '80s we were worried about the government, now it's the private sector.”

Ellis-Smith predicts that within five years middle class people in the United States will allow themselves to be implanted with a sub-dermal microchip that contains their driver's license information, medical records and bank account.

“You won't have to fill out forms anymore-just shove your elbow across the reader,” said Ellis-Smith.

Companies promise they won't misuse or abuse such information. Until they're heading toward financial ruin, that is.

Take the case of now defunct Toysmart.com, an Internet start-up backed by the likes of the Walt Disney Company. Toysmart.com recently tried to barter their customer information, including names and addresses of children, when faced with bankruptcy.

The move so enraged U.S. Senators Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Robert Toricelli of New Jersey that they introduced legislation to block companies from trying to sell customer information during bankruptcy proceedings.

Another bill in Congress, the Consumer Internet Privacy Protection Act of 1999, seeks to prohibit computer services from revealing to a third party any personal or identifiable information without the subscriber's informed, written consent. The bill also will grant the Federal Trade Commission the ability to investigate the practices of Internet service companies.

The bill was written in response to criticism of online marketing company DoubleClick's attempt to link its tracking of people's anonymous activity on the Web with databases that could identify the people.

Despite these scattered attempts to shore up government and industry standards, Bob Geller, a privacy consultant in Washington, DC, thinks regulators will need to adopt more universal standards to deal with privacy issues.

Geller said that unlike most other industrial countries, the United States has no uniform code regarding privacy, and existing laws are sector specific.

“The laws (on the books about privacy) are mostly in response to horror stories, so we pass random laws,” said Geller.

As an example, Geller pointed to the “Monica Lewinsky Paradox” — differing restrictions on federal prosecutors ability to get information on Lewinsky's personal spending habits depending on what she purchased.

“If you rent a video at a video store you are protected (from disclosure of the information). But if you buy a book at a bookstore there is no comparable protection,” Geller said.

The Egghead Perspective
Marc Smith, 35, a sociology researcher employed by Microsoft Corp. to study technology's effects on community, doesn't see the issue in the same stark terms.

Author of the recent paper, Some Social Implications of Ubiquitous Wireless Networks, Smith believes wireless technology will become so widespread and so cheap that "one day you'll get the equivalent of a Palm Pilot in your Cheerios box."

Smith, who doesn't own a television because of the negative effect he perceives it has on children, said these new technologies will not be an all or nothing proposition.

“If it were really, really bad, we'd reject it. If it were really, really good, we'd embrace it,” he said.

Smith said that throughout history emerging technology brought with it not only a greater degree of civilization, but also a form of social control.

Lighting, for instance, was quickly developed during the French revolution “not for pedestrian accidents” but to keep undesirables visible, said Smith.

Smith said technology is most potent when it's invisible and society regards it as advancement, not a form of social control. In the case of digital technology, the advancement is ease of obtaining goods and services by cataloging and analyzing your every desire: Big Brother meets the Home Shopping Network.

The Consumer Perspective
Beth and Paul O'Leary, a married couple from San Francisco, aren't worried about the Big Brother implications of the new technology.

Paul, 32, is president of Evolvent Technologies, a wireless application infrastructure services and software company that will help translate Internet technology into wireless technology.

Beth, 30, formerly an accountant and now a mom to 8-month-old Sanchez, is looking forward to the practical applications of wireless technology.

“Basically I think it's a good thing,” Beth O'Leary said. “I don't really believe the Big Brother theories. I think people will control it. There's all sorts of technology now like phone tapping that doesn't happen every day.”

She added that because of technology, she is more likely to stay in frequent touch with her children today than her mom was a generation ago.

“People will talk to each other more,” she said. “I think you already see that with cell phones and email. Communication is in shorter sound bites but is more frequent.”

Beth O'Leary isn't too worried about advertising that tracks her on the wireless Internet either.

“There's going to be all kinds of things you might get beeped about advertising, but hopefully you'll be able to control that,” she said. “But if Banana Republic is my favorite store, I'd like to know when I'm three blocks away and they're having a sale.”

Beth is also looking forward to practical applications such as access to directions, finding a wine recommendation to accompany her restaurant order, or staying in touch with Sanchez.

Paul also likes the practical applications: “Yahoo sends me an alert every time there's a Lakers (basketball) game on.”

He said he understands people's concerns about privacy and advertising, but points out, “You don't have to be on the Web. The Internet is largely free, and you can't have it both ways.”

After 26 years of thinking and writing about privacy, Ellis-Smith has learned that most people are like the O'Learys: more interested in safety and convenience than a nebulous notion of privacy.

According to a Gallup Poll, nearly half of all Internet users suspected their credit card information was at risk and were less likely to give personal or financial information to a Web site. Despite those numbers, Ellis-Smith still finds it hard to interest people in his privacy crusade.

“People give you a blank stare when you talk to them about privacy,” said Ellis-Smith. “You worry about your privacy when you are doing something interesting with your life. Most Americans are not leading risky and adventurous lives.”

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