Article 19
of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that “Everyone has the
right to freedom of opinion and expression; the right includes freedom to hold
opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and
ideas through any media regardless of frontiers”. This is the right which we
are entitled to but are we?
The United States of America:
The National security agency
(NSA) of USA has the authorization to conduct domestic wireless taps. Under the
PRISM project, the US government also has authorization to access information
from internet giants like Google, Apple, Face book etc. The government of US
admits that it has been collecting mass data of all US citizens under the
regulations of the Patriot Act. Also, it has been analyzing communications of
foreigners talking to people inside the United States. The US government has
provided itself with access to all the personal information of its citizens
behind the facade of fight against terrorism for we can see that the US
government has been intercepting and analyzing a lot of information without
probable cause.
Europe:
Regulation of Investigatory
Powers Act 2000 regulated the ways in which public bodies carry out covert
surveillance. This act allows pubic bodies to photograph, bug, and watch and
follow people. But most importantly it allows them to record, read and listen
to contents of emails and telephone calls made by its citizens. The "snooper's
charter" is a nick name that has been associated with this act
pertaining to the fear of its misuse. This fear was brought to life when on
June 2008; the 121 councils of Europe revealed that they had used the
legislation during a 12-month period to monitor behaviour by examining the
private communications of residents. [i]
British counter partner of
the NSA known as the Government Communication Headquarters (GCHQ) is also
spying on its own people, gathering personal information from their emails and
telephone calls behind the garb of fight against terrorism. The biggest fear of
the exploitation of the World Wide Web, as Sir Malcolm Rifkind beautifully put
it, is not how much data they could theoretically collect, but what they then
gain access to.[ii]
India:
On October
20th 2012, Ravi Srinivasan from Pondicherry tweeted in reference to
Kartick Chidambaram, son of Union Finance Minister of India, P. Chidambaram
stating “got reports that kartick Chidambaram has amassed more wealth than
vadra”.On the morning of 30th October he was arrested under section
66A of the Information Technology Act 2008. Not only this, on 18 November 2012
a 21 year old girl was arrested for a Facebook post stating, “People like
Thackeray are born and die daily and one should not observe a bandh for it”.
There are many instances where the vague words of section 66A have resulted in
the arrest of people just stating their opinion…
Are these
instances not within the rights provided to the citizens under Article 19 of
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights? Then how has section 66A of the IT
Act been successful in taking those rights away from the citizens time and
again? Section 66A of the IT Act states sending information by a computer
or communication device which is “grossly offensive”, “menacing”, and “false”
or causes annoyance, inconvenience, danger or obstruction as a punishable
crime. But who is to be the judge of that? Who is supposed to hold enough power
to decide whether words of individual are offensive, menacing and false for the
information offensive to one may not be offensive to the other. Inconsiderate
of these factors, people of political importance have time and again been able
to manipulate the words of section 66A in their own favour. And thus we may say
that the ultimate judge is the government.
Such cases
have always raised the question whether the World Wide Web really is a free
space. The NSA, the GCHQ, the IT Act etc are all competitors in the race to
rule the web. So who really sits behind the screen is the government, carefully
going through our personal emails, videos and much more. Is this the state of
individual privacy in the world today that the citizens cannot send a message
without thinking what its implications might be in the political sphere? What
started off as the fight against terrorism has today turned into a fight to
rule the web. Yes, the ultimate aim of all cyber surveillance was to create a
safer world and prevent terrorist attacks but cyber surveillance in the 21st
century focuses more on the fight for power and ownership. Alas the individual
privacy of every human being you’ve met is a myth, the government owns privacy…
[1] the 121 councils of Europe
revealed that they had used the legislation during a 12-month period to monitor
behaviour by examining the private communications of residents - http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/libertycentral/2009/jan/14/regulation-investigatory-powers-act
[2] is not how much data could
they theoretically collect, but what they then gain access to- http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23012910
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