IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - September 2016 - 20

University of Arizona, College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Mar. 2016.
[8] R. Stallman, "Why free software is more
important now than ever before," Wired, Sept.
2013.
[9] S. Zuboff, "The secrets of surveillance capitalism," Frankfurter Allgemeine, Feuilleton,
Mar. 2016.
[10]"," E. Kain, "T"he NSA reportedly has total
access to the Apple iPhone," Forbes, Dec. 2013.
[11] J. Zdziarski, "Identifying back doors, attack
points, and surveillance mechanisms in iOS devices," presented at HOPE/X Conf., July 2014.

[17] S. Turkle, Alone Together: Why We Expect
More from Technology and Less from Each
Other. Basic, 2012.
[18] K. Malancharuvil, "ICANN 55, Marrakech:
Witnessing a Historic Event, Community
Empowered Work Continues," CircleID Internet Infrastructures, Mar. 2016.
[19] CANN55. "Marrackech, GAC Communiqué,"
Mar. 2016.
[20] R. Carroll, "Welcome to Utah, the NSA's
desert home for eavesdropping on America,"
Guardian, June 2013.

[12] K. Finley, "Apple's noble stand against the
FBI is also great business," Wired, Feb. 2016.
[13] P. Malone, "Apple's claim a marketing opportunity over iPhone encryption case with FBI," The
Age, Mar. 2016.
[14] R. MacKinnon, Consent of the Networked: The Worldwide Struggle for Internet Freedom. Basic, 2012.
[15] R. Hotten, "Volkswagen: The scandal
explained," BBC News, Dec. 2015.
[16] J. M. Gitlin, "Mitsubishi outdoes VW, admits
25 years of falsified economy tests," Ars Technica, Apr. 2016.

Commentary (continued from page 16)
health with devastating consequences. The knowledge that we might
also be under constant scrutiny can
also put limits and margins on our
natural biological impulses to act
spontaneously and to give free reign
to our imaginations, and also to say
and to express what we truly believe.
This sort of self-censorship has, for
example, been openly discussed by
many prominent writers and academics. There is the fear of punishment or being ostracized from
our communities. We are more and
more living and existing in a theater,
surrounded by cameras - surveillance cameras - and we are each
compelled to play a part, any part,
anything but to be ourselves.
Ultimately, if we exclude the
legitimate uses of surveillance
whether to do with national security
or crime for instance, surveillance
is strongly impelled for control by a
powerful elite, and in the monetizing of people to gaze into their lives,
to literally get into their heads. It is
driven to advertise to us, to sell us
redundant products that come with
lots of promises that we may continually fill the information silos to
the highest bidder. Not only is this a
question of human rights, but also
one of identity. To be stripped of

privacy has terrible ontological and
metaphysical implications.
Finally, ethics (rules or standards
of behavior) are not irrelevant when
it comes to the technologies we
introduce into our lives. The ethics we promote that determine our
responses and acts are vital. Technology has to be scrutinized by ethical concerns, for technology is not
neutral, it is imbued with the spirit
and intentions of its builders. And
even if you were to disagree with this
connection, technology does create
a technological elite with superior
access to these new technologies,
widening the gap between the haves
and have nots. Is this not an ethical
question of the irregular placement
and uses of power? If we continue
on this track, the abuse and misuse
of surveillance, a vital component of
the new technologies, will help greatly to realize the worst of what we find
in our dystopian literature, which
has been increasingly cited in such
meetings as ours in recent years.

loss of our human rights and our dignity, and we too are being reduced
to the same "level" as the machine.
Sadly, the Internet of Things and
People mantra denigrates "People"
to "Things"; the "Subjects" are on an
equal playing field with "Objects."
And that is just not right. Humans
are not things. They are unique individuals with spirits and the ability to
think creatively. We are not 1s and
0s and never will be.

Author Information
MG Michael is an honorary associate
professor in the School of Computing
and Information Technology at the
University of Wollongong, Australia.

References
[1] Internet Governance, Security, Privacy and
the Ethical Dimension of ICTs in 2030, https://
www.itu.int/net4/wsis/forum/2016/Agenda/
Session/150, 2-6 May 2016, Geneva, Switzerland.
[2] Business Wire. IEEE to Join Stakeholders
at the World Summit on Information Society
(WSIS) Forum 2016 in Geneva, Switzerland,
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ieee-joinstakeholders-world-summit-130100980.html,
April 30, 2016.
[3] WSIS Forum: Outcome Document, World Summit on the Information Society, https://www.itu.
int/net4/wsis/forum/2016/ Content/documents/
outcomes/WSISForum2016%E2%80%94Forum
Track-Outcomes.pdf, ITU, 2-6 May 2016, Geneva,
Switzerland, pp. 351-353.

***
In actual fact, our freedoms are
being impinged. We are losing our
ability to make decisions for ourselves, to make a choice based on
our preferences, not imposed by
computer systems. It is akin to a
IEEE Technology and Society Magazine

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - September 2016