(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
But Orwell's novel is totally outdated, for the horror scenario he presented just before the communist hunt of the 50 century was pure science fiction. Today it is reality. Of course, western states have not become totalitarian surveillance regimes, but technology is there. The opportunity exists.
George Apenes, director of the Data Inspectorate, has said that the biggest challenge that threatens us is that Little Brother sees us. A myriad of small and large electronic tracks stored in databases, which the individual has little control over. We know that private surveillance in Norway is out of control and that in recent years the police have been given several authorizations to operate, inter alia, telephone interception.
Now come a new directive, from the heart of Europe, which sends us another step on the road to the surveillance community. In a new directive, the EU requires Norway to store telecommunication data in from 6 to 24 months. The blogger Vox Populi puts it well:
“Imagine that there is an official at your mailbox every day. He registers all your mail. Who is the sender, when it is sent, where it comes from and how large it is. All information recorded is stored in a database and stored for a period of 6-24 months. Did you think it was ok? You had probably been pissed off and asked the person to disappear to a significantly warmer area.
But when the government gnomes do the same with your email and in addition store all the information about who you are calling, how long the call lasted, where your mobile phones were when you called and where the recipient of the call was. And do the same with all your SMSs and MMSs. ”
Data Protection Director Georg Apenes, soon to be the last barrier in privacy in this country, writes it such:
“All privacy authorities within the EEA have long pointed out that the Storage Directive is in front of the conflict with Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights on the right to a respected private sphere. When it is nevertheless introduced into national law, it is because the politicians believe that the consideration of law and order must take precedence over the consideration of the – eventually obviously quite old-fashioned – bourgeois ideals of freedom. "
This is the small steps policy towards a society where privacy is slowly but surely weathering. For each step, politicians can point to good intentions – limit crime, collect data for research, fight terrorism – but together this becomes a massive attack on the right to privacy, my right to control what information about me is recorded. No one claims that such a register will necessarily be misused, but the danger is certainly present. That the EU and Norwegian politicians assure us that the registers will only be used to prosecute people who have committed serious crimes is a small consolation. As Georg Apenes writes, it is like "preserving haystacks in case it turns out that there is a needle in one of them".
For almost ten years, the Young Conservatives have warned against a development towards a surveillance society. Conservative national meetings have each time chosen to push the boundaries even further. Maybe it's time for them to wake up…
You can sign an appeal against directives here .
