When I grew up, we knew that the country to east of the iron curtain had secret agents who spied their own citizens, and we were taught that it was absolutely horrible and terrifying. An integral part of our identity west of the Iron Curtain that we would never behave like this: in the West, we were right to privacy, we had civil liberties which were inviolable. Today, I can not discuss ordinary working the phone with my colleagues. How did it come to this
As the film of adaptation Lord of the Rings opens the voice of Cate Blanchett is heard:. "The world has changed"
When I grew up, we assumed that we could communicate in private. There were countries that were spying on their own citizens, and they were held in contempt. They were the Soviet Union, they were East Germany. KGB and the Stasi were the names of the organizations that we knew spied on shareholders citizens of their country, and a very strong party identity west of the Iron Curtain was that we were not. In the West, freedoms were sacred.
How naive we were. Once it became possible, western governments have done exactly the same thing. How is it that?
According to Edward Snowden, global monitoring machine are not, and never was intended to catch terrorists. It was just a front, a justification, a false front. The real reason was always the geopolitical domination of economic and industrial espionage, diplomatic domination, and the ability to discredit powerful opponents. (No wonder, like drowning in bathtubs is five times more dangerous than terrorism.)
In a cynical way, it feels better to know that my phone is tapped, and that all I say can and will be used against me, now or at anytime in the future. Before, I had a nagging suspicion, often being shot by friends and colleagues as paranoia.
"What makes you think you are important enough to be listened to?" , some people asked, ignoring the geopolitical game I play and the strings I pulled. Some of them make me doubt my own rational analysis
Now, with Snowden, I know my phone is tapped -. Because every phone is tapped. My attention was right all along, and my use - overuse some have said before -. Cryptography had been quite correct to move
Somehow things went terribly wrong, and I'll return to that in the column next week.
Yet the way the world has changed over the last decade is astonishing and devastating at the same time. I can not talk on the phone longer, nothing substantial distance. I can not discuss sensitive matters into my own apartment - and the definition of "sensitive issues" is becoming wider. In other words, I do not want to like this. I want to be able to have a private conversation.
Privacy remains your own responsibility.
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