Week 14 Privacy

Id like to start this blog post with a Vsauce video I watched on "How People Disappear" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPBJgpK0Ulc. He begins the episode with a story about an angry dad storming into target because his high school daughter was receiving coupons in the mail for things like diapers and baby cribs. Turns out, targets purchase algorithm has been tracking his daughter's most recent purchases which co-aligned with a woman who is pregnant. In fact, his daughter was in fact pregnant and was due that coming August. It is creepy knowing that the world around us has a much more closer eye on us than we anticipate. Christopher Soghoian talks about how Apple has taken steps towards encryption technology so we can be more and more safe against foreign agencies with ill intention blob:https://embed.ted.com/e286b8ff-cf91-4b63-a6a6-046d9248831b. It has become the norm for tech companies to include default encryption ware within their products. Well not only does this encryption conceal our information to those with ill intent, but it hides information from our Government. He makes a point that there are bad people in this world, and that these bad people are using the same cell phones and computers everyone else is using. But he proposes a question: should we encourage "Big Brother" for the sake of our own safety, or do we do we take the democratic approach and create space from the government and escape with our own privacy at the cost of endangerment. In an ideal world or community, we would chose the latter safer option to opt out of endangerment. But realistically speaking, we are better off encrypted. Information is king: although it can be useful, it can also be just as harmful to us and others simply through wiretapping. My personal stance is that I want my privacy.