FOX has an interesting story on their website discussing websites that have taken transparency disclosures and used them to essentially reveal private information, in ways that could end up being potentially harmful. For example, California recently passed the controversial Proposition 8, banning gay marriage in the state; there is now a site that mashes information about donations people made supporting Prop 8 with Google Maps to show who, living where, donated how much.
In Tennessee, meanwhile, there are sites showing every person who has a license to carry a concealed weapon, which has a pair of dangers - either harassment of those who choose to carry by anti-gun activists, or an easy mapping of people or areas where people typically do not have protection in their home by thieves, rapists, or the like.
Transparency exists to prevent people from wielding too much discretionary power, to avoid abuses, to make sure things are done properly. What is ironic is that it is now being used by people to do the exact opposite: To threaten, to intimidate, to scare people away from doing things or supporting issues they find important.
The answer is going to end up being laws which restrict the mining of private data or increased abuses by those who wield information such as the ones listed above improperly. It reminds me of this excellent piece (which I'll hopefully discuss more another time) noting how modern law makes us not free, but powerless. As rights trump responsibility, law has been forced to take an increasingly active (and irreversible) role in life - and this is not a tribute to our system, but a blow to our freedom and any reasonable way of life.
though not entirely related this reminds me of something that has been bothering me the past few years.
ReplyDeleteIf the right to bear arms, as a means to ensure our freedom is part of our constitution. Then why are groups such as Gangs in Urban areas, or Cults in the midwest (who wield guns and form militias for the expressed intent of having protection from government and others) viewed by society as the only people who should not be allowed to own guns?
Everything seems to be justifiable if the powers that be allow us to maintain a freedom of mobility and a freedom of resources.
The big plus of transparency is that we become able to watch the watchers. The two examples you gave, while troubling, are atypical cases where transparency involves giving out the data of private citizens rather than public servants. There are certainly tradeoffs involved there. (Allowing citizens to donate anonymously opens the door to bribery. It seems to me that there would be ways to do gun registration without making names and addresses available. I don't see much upside to transparency there.)
ReplyDeleteThe big win in tranparency, as I said, is when we get to watch the watchers. Taped confessions and vehicle stops, how much in donations received by politicians from which industries and interest groups, openness in how bids are decided, etc.
Privacy is on its way to extinction as an inevitable result of technology, in my opinion. I can find your identity/location via your IP, camp outside your house sniffing your WiFi traffic, pointing sophisticated snooping technology at your windows (which vibrate according to noises inside), use satellite imagery, including infrared, to see who's home and where they are at all times, your cell phone is constantly trackable, etc. Cameras will soon be everywhere recording everything. Etc.
Not to mention fingerprints and DNA, etc. Hell, everytime you pee outside your house it's theoretically possible to find out about some disesases and medications (legal or not.)
ReplyDeleteDaganev - I'm not sure I follow what you're asking/saying. I don't know that the problem is gangs carrying concealed, legally registered weapons, or cults doing the same.
ReplyDeleteJA - I'm not saying there's no need for transparency; I usually am arguing for it. I'm more saddened that there are people who abuse transparency, which will result in either its disappearance when it's needed or continued abuse where courts back the need for the transparency. (Well, if it's legal, that means I can do it!) More importantly, in the end, people will find ways around it - establish foundations that are not transparent which then donate the money on their behalf, etc.
And yes, technology has erased privacy to a large extent. Of course, this need not be the case, if people used their sense of responsibility a little more; the old quote about "not everything that is thought... not everything that is written should be published" would be well applied to video and the like. Common sense and responsibility are sorely lacking in today's times; while perhaps it's not much more true than it was in the past, the advent of technology has made the impact of irresponsibility that much greater.
Common sense and responsibility are sorely lacking in today's times; while perhaps it's not much more true than it was in the past, the advent of technology has made the impact of irresponsibility that much greater.
ReplyDeleteI agree. I think the difference between you and me, policy-wise, is that I always assume that this is the case. Yeah, it'd be great if everybody was responsible and smart and educated, but they're not.
We can't expect someone with an IQ of less than a hundred (that's half the country) to necessarily comprehend complicated mortgage schemes, for example, especially if corporations are knowingly misguiding such people. And we can't trust corporations to police themselves because, well, they generally don't.
"Daganev - I'm not sure I follow what you're asking/saying. I don't know that the problem is gangs carrying concealed, legally registered weapons, or cults doing the same.
ReplyDelete"
I'm talking socially, not legally.
As in, people will argue that only gang members or cultists ever want to own the guns, and we need guns to protect ourselves from such people.
Or, when the news will point out the stash of weapons some people store as societal "proof" of thier "badness".
You would never find a mainstream politician arguing that we need to protect the rights of gangs and anti-government groups to be formed and carry weapons. (I don't think even the NRA could be found saying such things)