Not opaque enough for comfort

TIA (Total Information Awareness) was a "Big Brother" security initiative created around 9/11 that has been killed because the pushback was too strong. Another state-level initiative built on a Seisint technology, called Matrix, has, according to this NYTimes item, "Privacy Fears Erode Support for a Network to Fight Crime," taken a hit as more than a few of the participating states are backing out. It appears to come down to a privacy imposition issues. Read for more details.

What it points out in bold relief, however, is that privacy is truly about opacity not secrecy. The supporters of the initiaitve have gone to great pains to defend the initiative and their work by noting that all the information is available legally somewhere. They only collect and analyse it. And that's the point. Not much about us is really secret. But, by hiding or keeping distance among "private" (and other) information items selectively, and by bundling bits together judiciously, we achieve a comfortable degree of opacity about ourselves that stands in for real secrecy.

Posted by Grayson at March 15, 2004 02:51 PM