        Today, nearly every aspect of a person’s life involves the use technology, from the phone that people use to communicate to the alarm clocks that wake you up in the morning. This increasing reliance of technology has allowed it to integrate itself into our way of life and shape how we handle menial tasks to achieve increased efficiency and ease of use. With the increasing reliance on technology comes a larger impact from the loss of such devices and the negative result it would have on our society as a whole. Along with the loss of the technology, there is also the possibility that we may lose one of the most important rights that we currently possess: privacy. This is one of the few parts of the normal person that they keep to themselves, as it is a part of them that makes them feel unique as well as information that could be used against them if fallen into the wrong hands. After the terrorist attack of 9/11, the government enacted laws that greatly invaded on the privacy of the American people and became increasingly controversial as technology became more integrated. In the Obama administration of 2008-2016, various laws and agencies were created in order to weaken the government's power of surveillance as well as what they can do with their collected information. As the new president is taking office, we should not reduce or lose any of the protections the previous administration has set up to protect the privacy of US citizens.

        To better understand what makes up our security, we need to learn about the most important form, cybersecurity and how it allows us to understand what is does for our society. The definition of cybersecurity is described as the measures, practices, and systems that make up the security and protection of online data structures. This helps us understand how the system works and why this important to today’s society. For example, many of the devices that we use from day to day are normally do not use these measures and therefore are unsecured, “most technology is vulnerable and can be hacked. We see examples of this every day: Cars have been hacked, a popular U.S. smart home alarm system was hacked, implantable medical devices like pacemakers have been hacked, plane systems have been hacked, critical infrastructure like a power grid and dam were hacked, smart city and system has been hacked” (Cerrudo). This presents a problem, as many of these devices mentioned have little to no security due to the lack of attention and requirements for these devices to be secured. This opens the door to many breaches of said devices as well as open the door for future attacks and loss of information.

Over the past few years, new laws have been integrated and agencies created to make companies create safer and more secure products through cybersecurity regulation. For example, California passed the California Assembly Bill 1950 in order to accomplish 3 things: “Businesses covered by the laws must notify California residents when the security of their personal information has been compromised and when their information is shared with a third party. In addition, businesses must maintain “reasonable security procedures” to protect personal information” (Milewski) This law was passed in 2005 and has been adopted by nearly every other state by the early 2010s as well as other governmental agencies such as the FTC (Federal Trade Commision) that enforce regulations about the fair treatment of people and business online whether it relate to financial, private, or medical information. Although technology has been readily to most people, new laws and regulations are also created in order to prevent governmental overreach such as in the past.

        While many devices are relatively unsecured, a good example of security and the debate of security and privacy would be the recent dispute between Apple and the FBI. as the event took place after a school shooting and how the information on his phone should be handled. “What's at stake is the point at which digital security ends and national security begins. And it's forcing governments, citizens and tech companies to examine the ‘ins and outs’ of data encryption – what makes the technology effective, and how much control individuals should have over a broad range of personal data held on devices such as phones.” (Hack) This quote brings up the core controversy of the debate, as it boils down to how much privacy citizens should have vs how much control the government should have on the surveillance of its citizens. On one hand, without the knowledge of the phone, law enforcement would be unable to retrieve the information they need to prevent other attacks such as the San Bernardino Shooting, to which this case is connected. On the other hand, the main opposition to the government having access to the phone would be precedent, as if they unlock the phone, what is stopping many other agencies from doing the same until they have access to all phones? This would eventually reach a point to which the privacy of the citizen had been diminished. Along with unlocking the phone, if anyone other than the government were able to get their hands on the key to unlock that phone, they would be able to unlock nearly every other phone with similar software and therefore create an even larger security and privacy problem, as both the phones and their data would be vulnerable. In the result of the case, the FBI dropped the case against Apple and gained access to the phone’s weeks later due to outside help. This exemplifies the risks of decreased security as well as the cost of increased privacy, as in order to keep the phone’s contents private, governmental agencies take significantly longer to access the contents of the phone. On top of the normal devices, the military has the most important role in the cybersecurity. "Cyber threats are not going away. On the contrary, they are proliferating at a dramatic rate, in part because we are making more and more use of information systems.” (Wallace) This states the obvious, as the increasing usage of technology in most aspects attracts the prospect of cyber-attacks due to the benefit of destroying the most prominent part of the country. Along with the US, many countries around the world are using more and more technology as well as incorporating cyberwarfare as the new form of war. This represents the most important reason for military cybersecurity, as there has been a shift of how war is performed. With the rapid shift towards computers and information systems, cyber warfare has become much more impactful rather than the normal man-to-man conflict in the past.   

        With the increased security comes the possibility of abuse by governmental agencies as well as legislation passed. A good example of this would be the passing of the US Provide Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act, or Patriot Act, as the main description of the bill could be described by doing 3 things: “monitor the private telephone conversations of individuals suspected of criminal activity, without probable cause that a crime has been or soon to be committed… overhear private conversations of non-suspects permitted by wiretap authority to foreign intelligence investigations without proper privacy protections… and discourage political dissent by including the activities of unpopular political organizations within the newly created definition of ‘Domestic Terrorism’.” (Rackow) This quote from the article helps describe three of the most important parts of the legislation as well as displaying how these powers could intentionally invade the privacy of citizens. With the first part, the act permits agencies to privately monitor and record the phone calls of any citizen suspected of committing a crime no matter how little evidence the agency possess. The second provision of the act allows the government to wiretap foreign investigations and relates to the first by not disclosing the surveillance, and the third allows the government to deem any unpopular organization as a terrorist to deem them an enemy of the state. The first two acts violate the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, as it gives every citizen “the right of the people to be secure in their persons, papers, houses, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated.” (Rackow, 4) These powers by the act clearly violated the fourth amendment, so why did “two out of three Americans willingly surrender civil liberties”? (Rackow) Fear. This piece of legislation was passed nearly immediately after the terrorist attack of 9/11 and greatly increased the government’s surveillance abilities in order to prevent attacks such as this from happening again. While this legislation had good intention, the amount of power given to many governmental agencies was too much, as nearly every American’s private conversations were being recorded as well as the fact that the government was able to spy on different foreign investigations to gain intelligence. However, six years later, the amount of information that could be recorded due to more sophisticated technology as well as the increase of the population using said technology made many people change their minds about the Act. For example, “Information from the Census Bureau tells us that 15% of homes had a personal computer in 1989; by 2011 that number climbed to 75%. Now we have desktop computers, laptops, smartphones, tablets, Apple watches, GPS-enabled cars, and more coming every day.” (Gebski, 2) This steep increase in technology points towards a more connected world, and the percentage on computers in 2016 is 85%. As more and more people use technology in their daily lives, the more personally attached and dependent they are on said devices. With the increasing amount of technology, the government has many new sources they can gather information from. Depending on the amount of power the governmental agencies have, this information could be used to prevent another terrorist attacks or invade too heavily on the privacy of the citizens.

        What makes the Patriot Act look like child’s play would be how the government collects information and data in the present day and age. The only reason we know of these actions would be the leaks by Edward Snowden in 2013 as well as being updated for 2016. So, what did he leak? In 2013, Snowden leaked government documents on how they conduct surveillance on the public as well as in foreign nations. If we compare what the US Patriot Act enables and what Snowden leaked, the government had the same if not more power than after the enactment of the act as well an increase in technological devices to gather data from. For example, Snowden leaked that nearly every phone provider worked with the NSA by allowing them access to all of their customer’s phone records as well as it not being disclosed by any of the companies. However, in the following years the previous president Barack Obama recently spoke out against these laws as well as the overreach of the governmental power that they possessed. “the risks of government overreach—the possibility that we lose some of our core liberties in pursuit of security—became more pronounced” (Obama) And this is what happened, as after the terrorist attack of 9/11, many people became fearful that a similar attack could happen and relinquished their privacy to protect themselves and their country. On both sides of the argument, this can be seen as a positive and a negative, as the government is able to monitor the public’s information and communication in order to intercept and prevent terrorist attacks while others want the government to stay out of their personal lives. In president Obama’s speech, he mentioned the reasoning behind the intrusions of private conversation, “ We cannot prevent terrorist attacks or cyber-threats without some capability to penetrate digital communications—whether it’s to unravel a terrorist plot; to intercept malware that targets a stock exchange; to make sure air traffic control systems are not compromised; or to ensure that hackers do not empty your bank accounts.”(Obama) And in this sense, this is what the NSA what made to do, as they are able to go through data and help prevent terrorist attacks from even beginning. On top of that, there are many other agencies that keep the surveillance and amount of oversight other agencies are able to have. One of these would be the PCOB, Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, as they are an independent agency within the executive branch of the United States government, and helps advise the President and other senior executive branch officials about concerns such as privacy and threats to civil liberties. To be more precise, they consult with the president and cabinet about the development and implementation of executive branch policies, regulations, and laws related to terrorism. Overall, the implementation of new steps and precautions are put for the government to keep the balance of privacy of the citizens to the amount of data the government can collect for national security.

        No matter how much power the government has, the only way that it can change is if the people of America care enough for it to be changed as well as even be considered a problem. “Most people, despite Edward Snowden’s revelations, are still fairly apathetic about protecting their online privacy. “(Smith) This shows the opinions of many Americans, especially the one whom have not been affected. In a recent poll, fifty two percent of Americans say that they would give up some privacy in exchange for better security. With this split of opinions, many people feel safe and protected under the current government due to the peace around the world as well as an increase of security compared to the previous years. Due to the increase of technology and the amount of people that use it, our government has had to pass new regulations and laws in order to keep businesses and corporations in check to prevent the misuse of citizen surveillance. Along with these safeguards, there have also been rules to create and maintain secure systems as well as require them to take responsibility if they violate those rules. In turn, this creates a more secure and balanced system for corporations and businesses due to the fact that their employees would be secure and protected if anything should happen to the company itself.

In conclusion, multiple events such as the leak of Edward Snowden and the dispute of the privacy of the people vs the security of the country have allowed us to move away from the paranoia from the terrorist attack of 9/11 as well as create safer forms of security to prevent these attacks from happening again. The new administrations and regulations from the Obama Administration provides us with more benefits than harm and should not be altered from their current positions. Along with these changes comes maintaining the balance of security and privacy in order to keep the citizens safe from attacks as well as keeping the freedoms that are ensured with this country.  

 

 
