Blog Post #5: Privacy Ted Talk

It is alarming to think about how every time an individual posts something online, uses apps, and even browse the web, their data is collected. This not only effects just individuals but also their families, which creates a web of personal information that could be misused. Nowadays individual's personal details, financial information, and even health data can be compromised. Once your information is leaked, its virtually impossible to undo the damages made. How would you feel to find out that the government, and cooperations are keeping tabs on you. How can you even feel safe or comfortable anymore, there are no secrets that can be hidden anymore especially if they are the web. Eventually things you want to be kept hidden will surface. It is notable that telephone companies built surveillance features into their networks initially for the purpose of monitoring it's users. The use of encryption that has become more popular over the past few years has become helpful in keeping texts and phone calls private, and much more difficult to hack into.

                                            

After viewing these videos, I learned a lot of valuable information about how the government tracks you in almost every aspect. One important concept from the video that I learned was that the government can track their citizens through their cars. The video explained that when you drive your car to a location, the government can gain a detailed report about how private citizens interact. Local police departments are able to make assumptions and build cases for individuals. The government uses automatic license plate readers, that capture images of car that convert the license plate into machine readable text to track where individuals go. A large majority of the information that is collected from citizens is kept by police departments, in the case that it is ever needed.