Is everything we write, send, and view on our devices really private? As people use their phones and computers to communicate via texting, emails, and calls, they expect this data to reach only the person they are communicating it to, without it being intercepted, and bulk stored for possible later review by a rather controversial surveillance organization - the NSA. The NSA stores information about everything an individual views that is connected to the Internet and can keep that information for decades for possible later review. “Americans place a high value on privacy. It is generally accepted that a certain core of one's individual and family affairs should be protected against interference, or even investigation, by outside forces—including …show more content…
In the constitution, the fourth amendment states that people’s rights to privacy in person, homes, and papers is not to be violated and that nothing is to be searched or seized without a warrant issued by a judge. Articles 12 and 18 in the UDHR clearly prohibit arbitrary interference with an individual's privacy, family, or home; and protect the right to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion, respectively. Considering these documents, the high value of privacy is clear. Although, in the information age, privacy violations in the U.S. are very common as the NSA is able to get in reach of personal data through warrantless surveillance, overlooking the aforementioned documents. In order to avoid further violations of privacy and intellectual freedom, which are human rights, a balance must be made between privacy and national security by requiring law transparency, warrants for data collection under the PRISM program, and modification of existing laws and policies like the USA Freedom Act, and the third-party …show more content…
The NSA and major ISP’s argue that people should not have any expectation of privacy as soon as they start using Internet services, but people do not have a choice because the Internet is so incorporated into daily lives of many people, that it can be considered an extension of the mind. Neil Richards, a professor of law and an international expert on privacy and freedom of expression explains in his book, Intellectual Privacy: Rethinking Civil Liberties in the Digital Age, “Intellectual privacy is the much-needed protection for learning, reading and communicating that helps us make up our minds about the world on our own terms… Without intellectual privacy, when people are watching us when we read and communicate, our thoughts and beliefs get driven to the boring, the bland and the mainstream” (Schoenherr). People may feel unsafe to express their existing ideas and opinions as well as new ones because they never know if someone is watching them. Privacy and intellectual freedom are human rights; this surveillance-induced sense of nakedness may diminish intellectual freedom, and severely impact the essence of new ideas. In extreme cases, it may cause discrimination and selective enforcement for expressing “heretic” ideas that are not seen as norm by the society, thus stalling social change