After uncovering yet another troubling aspect of the current health care proposal, IPI recently wrote, “Because HR 3200 (the House of Representatives health care reform legislation) contains the most egregious violations of Americans’ privacy imaginable. Indeed, one way to characterize HR 3200 is as ‘The End of Privacy.’”
HR 3200 would protect your privacy right up to the point that it runs into the most disgruntled, curious or careless government employee.
Bad enough. But wow, did we miss the big story…
As it turns out, privacy is under attack from many new “programs,” creating a virtual pattern of turning a person’s private life into a public exposition.
- About a month ago, the White House asked that citizens report on those who may be sending “fishy” emails, or spreading what one might perceive as “misinformation” about health insurance reform, thus creating a list of citizens that the White House intends to keep.
- Less than a month ago the administration proposed rolling back a ban on tracking, or persistent, cookies placed on your computer by government web sites. Persistent cookies are used to collect identifying information about the user, such as Web surfing behavior or user preferences. It can tell whomever placed it there what you are doing online. That’s more information that the government then must keep for, um, who knows what purpose . . .
- In the last couple weeks, certain members of Congress, such as Gene Green of Texas or Jim Moran of Virginia, began requiring a person to show ID before they are allowed to ask questions at townhall meetings.
- And last week, a new draft of legislation to provide the president with the power to seize “emergency” control of the Internet came out. While it’s a rewrite of earlier, heavily criticized proposal, it still allows the federal government to exercise control over private Internet networks without providing anything but vague outlines of what a “cybersecurity emergency” might be. Undefined blanket authority consolidated in one branch of government at best does great damage to liberty.
So what is going on?
Americans are willing to meet their obligations to government. They are willing to file their taxes, be counted for the census, and renew their driver’s licenses. But otherwise, Americans want to be left alone by their government, and certainly don’t want to feel like our government’s “always watching me.”
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Today's TechByte was written by Bartlett D. Cleland, director of IPI Center for Technology Freedom.