I was in high school when I first read George Orwell’s novel 1984, a depiction of the totalitarian society that he suspected would dominate the world’s future. Written in 1948, the book describes a government dedicated to the proposition that, in order to protect the homeland (a nation called “Oceania”), all citizens should be subjected to electronic surveillance and tracking every moment of every day.
Giant video screens fill the cities with images of the nation’s leader, known as “Big Brother,” who is reminding the citizenry “Big Bother is watching you.” The book’s main character, a government employee named Winston Smith, works for the Ministry of Truth. Smith’s job is to change history by editing, censoring and re-writing newspaper articles that are then re-printed with government-approved content.
Fast-forward to the year 2008. While Orwell’s predictions have not yet been completely fulfilled, some recent stories reminded me that Big Brother has not given up or gone away, and is still ruthlessly pursuing a total surveillance society. Case in point: cell phone tracking.
Wireless Enhanced 911 is a marvelous technology that allows emergency responders such as police, fire, and ambulance personnel to pinpoint the exact location of cell phones that have been used to make emergency 911 calls. This allows a rapid and precise response by those tasked with guarding public safety.
According to a story by the Washington Post, this marvelous technology has also been routinely used by government snoops to track the movements and locations of citizens without demonstrating “that there is probable cause to believe that a crime is taking place or that the inquiry will yield evidence of a crime. Privacy advocates fear such a practice may expose average Americans to a new level of government scrutiny of their daily lives.”
Another innocent sounding technology ripe for Big Brother-type exploitation is Verizon’s new “Chaperone” service. According to the Verizon website, “Chaperone is designed to help you communicate with your children and can be used as a tool to help put your mind at ease by knowing their location at a given time. You can also use Chaperone with Child Zone, which is an additional feature that lets you set up a perimeter that alerts you if your child enters or leaves a specific location.” The Post story quoted Kevin Bankston of the privacy advocacy group Electronic Frontier Foundation as saying, “Most people don’t realize it, but they’re carrying a tracking device in their pocket. Cell phones can reveal very precise information about your location, and yet legal protections are very much up in the air.”
Adding to the long list of Orwellian technologies is the state of Missouri, whose Department of Transportation (MoDOT) is barreling ahead with a program to covertly monitor and track every cell phone on 5,500 miles of interstate and state highways. The program allows its users to see in real time, not only the location of individual cell phones, but the speed at which the phones are traveling. Transportation officials claim that the technology will only be used to monitor traffic congestion and plan future highway improvements, but Missouri State Rep. Brad Robinson is not convinced. The Park Hills Daily Journal quoted Robinson as saying, “Look out, Big Brother is traveling with you down the highway in the form of MoDOT.”