Global Surveillance
Surveillance is the monitoring of behaviour, activities, or other changing information. It is usually the watching of people for the purpose of influencing, managing, directing or protecting them. Although it seems like there is no privacy anymore; through Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, or even just walking down the street, you’re always being watched.
The rise of social media coincides with shifting norms about what constitutes an acceptable form of private information in contemporary societies (Baruh, L and Soysal, L 2010). People can easily look up your name on Facebook or Instagram for example and stalk your entire profile. It is a fact that it can take no time at all to track someone down online and stalk their whereabouts. Precise details of our personal lives are collected, stored, retrieved and processed every day within huge computer databases belonging to big corporations and government departments. There are many masses of information that have gone unheard of; just like keeping a secret, not everyone has to know. As a society however, we could be termed the ‘surveillance society’.
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But is this a bad thing? Take the case of Jill Meagher as an example; a woman who was raped and murdered in the streets of Melbourne. Jill Meagher’s murder case created a nationwide upset that resulted in state and national action to enhance CCTV security in all communities. Security videos did however play an important role in the initial pleas for help to find Jill in the days following her disappearance. Once an arrest was made detectives trolled through hours of footage from cameras across Melbourne; piecing together her final hours and the movements of Adrian Bailey (murderer). This case proved how beneficial surveillance cameras are at assisting these types of situations. Even just store CCTV camera can make the difference between solving a case or not.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owwPKNhnFrQ
Although some might think that surveillance can lead to individual empowerment, where some of the ‘wrong’ people can control or orchestrate a negative action on society. There is the ability to balance surveillance and privacy so that everyone wins. Mass public surveillance should be accessible to security services in order to protect the public from harm. CCTV can be most beneficial when used in conjunction with other crime reduction measures and when tailored to the local setting (Armitage. R, 2002). We should not let it overpower our lives; however we should master the use of surveillance and use it to our benefits both locally and globally. Although many people see surveillance as an invasion of privacy, we need to understand that privacy and surveillance are juxtaposing, as one can exit in the realm of the other. We need national surveillance to protect our development as a society both locally and globally. There should be embrace of surveillance rather than outrage as it is a worldwide phenomenon that at times yes, may feel invasive, but in the long run, it may prove to be the defining savior for societal mishap.
