Big Data Surveillance and Ethics

This assignment delves into the ethical implications of big data surveillance. It examines concerns regarding citizen privacy, the justification for data collection, and the potential misuse of collected information for harmful purposes like warfare or targeting specific groups. The text emphasizes the need for responsible data handling practices that prioritize protection and prevent exploitation.

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Policy Report
Assessment 4
10-Nov-17
(Student Details: )

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Problem Statement
In the recent years, a noticed growth has been seen in electronic surveillance. A number of
processes have been made automated and a lot of information, particularly big data, is
disseminated through the internet. When it comes to Big Data, it is a key contemporary
surveillance issue and there is a need to protect such data, as at majority instances, the same
relates to sensitive information and also due to the high dependence on such data (Ferguson,
2017).
Evidence
The revelations about the National Security Agency back in 2013 by Edward Snowden, in
addition to the complexities of the internet companies, coupled with the international
controversies have provided an ideal segue to the contemporary problems of Big Data and
surveillance. There has been a change in the attention from being over the C20th information
technology and its networks, to the present Big Data. Through Big Data, some surveillance
trends which are related to networks and information technology are intensified, which results in
fresh yet fluid configurations (Lyon, 2015). This is done in three distinguished manners. The first
one relates to the capacity of Big Data intensifies surveillance through expansion of analytical
tools and interconnected datasets. This is in addition to the present dynamics of risk
management, influence and control increase in the scope and speed by the use of new techniques,
particularly when it comes to predictive analytics (Lyon, 2014).

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Secondly, even though Big Data deems to be about size, there is perceptibility of qualitative
changes. The key trends in this regard relate to the public-private synergies, user involvement
and faith in technology and these are persisting. And lastly, the ethics underpinned in this
process become a key mode of criticism. The viewpoints associated with privacy are breached
when it comes to surveillance as it uses the personal information of the users, which not only is
an ethical breach but also a breach of moral, which has been given a legal structure (Lyon, 2014).
Before an understanding is attained about the revelations of Snowden, certain key matters
associated with Big Data surveillance have to be made clear. This would help in showing the
manner in which the revelations of Snowden showed the dependence on the Big Data techniques,
particularly since these have a huge impact over the very understanding of the present day
surveillance. It cannot be denied that some of the revelations of Snowden involved targeting;
however, the key focus of these remained on the Big Data techniques (Boersma and Fonio,
2017). But what is Big Data? Big Data is the capacity of searching, aggregating and cross-
referencing large data sets (Boyd and Crawford, 2012). There are a variety of practices,
softwares, ideas, techniques and metaphors which are bundled together in two deceivingly
simple sounding words.
The attempt here is to show that surveillance trends are intensified as a result of Big Data,
particularly the ones associated with networks and information technology. Two key questions
have to be answered here. The first one relates to the extent of Snowden disclosures which show
that Big Data practices are very important to surveillance. This is answered from the queries
regarding the practices associated with Big Data with regards to public concern and surveillance
in the matter of activities of NSA which predate Snowden. Snowden just brought out something

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which already existed (Andrejevic and Gates, 2014). Secondly, since Big Data is gaining a lot of
interest, how does it force chances in practices, policies and politics of surveillance?
The revelations of Snowden were not a one off incident but instead were a regular and constant
activity. He began by revealing that the NSA was using order from FISC, i.e., Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Court in order to get the metadata from Verizon, which was a
telecommunications giant, of the millions of phone calls of Americans (Greenwald, 2013). This
was followed by the revelation that NSA was accessing the servers of key sites in a direct
manner. These sites included Facebook, Google, Skype, Yahoo, Microsoft, YouTube and Apple
(Gellman and Poitras, 2013). The revelations of surveillance practices by Snowden revealed that
the governments of different nations were undertaking large scale monitoring of populations and
also showed the manner in which this was being done. In words of Bruce Schneier (2013),
metadata is surveillance. Even though Big Data is deemed as a breach of privacy by some
people, the Snowden leaks cannot be deemed as any more ethical. The publicizing of such
confidential information and Bulk Data was to distort the very purpose of undertaking Big Data
surveillance.
Key Issues
Even though there have been people who oppose Big Data surveillance, the significance of the
same cannot be denied. The problem here is not of the government collecting such data and
using surveillance as a measure to track people. The issue here is of the revelations made through
such releases. The issue here is of effective management of such disclosures in order to take
timely actions to deal with such releases and to protect the information which is collected from
such surveillances from different sources and for different reasons. The reason for undertaking

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Big Data surveillance is not something which has to be justified to the general public as the same
is not undertaken as a means of breach of privacy but as a means of intelligence tactics indulged
in by the government to protect the citizen (Yan, 2017).
Big Data surveillance still raises a lot of concerns from the individuals. There are still a number
of claims made against the government for permitting the data of individuals to be collected and
analysed for the so called purpose of protecting the citizens. The breach of privacy is deemed as
a key reason for the hue cry surrounding Big Data surveillance. Snowden deemed himself as a
whistleblower, as he had raised the misdeeds of the government and the breach of privacy by the
government. But his revelations highlighted a key issue linked with Big Data surveillance. In the
name of whistle blowing, individuals have used the sensitive information and tactics used by
government, which are used to protect the citizens, as a means of being global hero. This makes
it all the more important for the governments to draw out such policies where the information
collected, the manner of its collection and the other aspects associated with Big Data surveillance
are properly protected (Cropf and Bagwell, 2016).
Big Data surveillance is conducted to protect the citizens of the nation, by conducting
surveillance where information is collected in discrete manner and the same is used to draw up
proper strategies to keep the citizens safe from such incidents which harm them. The need for
this is further increased in the present age where the instances of crime are increasing with the
nation. The terrorist groups like the ISIS have moved on to radicalising of the youth against their
very nation, which has resulted in recent attacks in USA, France, UK and other parts of the world
(Williams, 2017). In the sense of protection of the people of the nation and even up to a certain
extent towards social justice, there is a need for Big Data surveillance to be continued in a
manner, where the same is not revealed by “whistleblowers” like Edward Snowden.

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Such incidents also increase the chances of the revealed information to be used by wrong outfits,
thus putting the human rights of the people of a nation at threat. Agreed that the citizens have a
right to be their privacy but this right is any day bigger than the right to live. And if this requires
the use of Big Data surveillance, there is a need for the governments to indulge in it and also
protect the information collected from such surveillances. At the same time, there is a need to
pay heed to the genuine concerns raised by private sector groups that the use of Big Data
surveillance needs to be undertaken only for the purposes of upholding human rights, social
justice and safety of the citizens. There is a need to thus ensure that the Big Data surveillance is
not used as a quest for control, which can easily take place in the present time, particularly due to
the sensitive international relations across the globe.
Recommendations
The previous conducted discussion highlighted how Big Data surveillance has gained a lot of
importance in the recent time period. However, the public revelation of the modes and
information collected from Big Data surveillance has led to different issues being presented.
Included in these were the breach of privacy, attaining equilibrium between security and quest
for contract, and the need to protect the citizens. On the basis of the different issues discussed
here, some recommendations have been drawn which can help in dealing with the issues raised
above.
i. There is a need to clearly demarcate to the citizens between what would be deemed as a
rightful whistle blowing and a dissemination of confidential governmental information.
This does not mean that whistle blowing has to be ended or that the same has to be
punished. Instead, there is a need to bring out a forum where such issues can be raised in

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a confidential manner. And these forums can be linked to the courts, where they can
decide in a fair manner if the particular information needs to be protected in terms of
being sensitive towards protection of the citizens, or whether the same highlights the
atrocities of the government and the misuse of power by office holders.
ii. There is a need to drawn out such policy which could regulate and protect information
collected from Big Data surveillance, in addition to drawing out the manner in which Big
Data surveillance can be conducted. This would help in drawing out a line being crucial
data collection and the breach of privacy.
iii. There is also a need to invite views of the different private sector groups and even from
the citizens with regards to their concerns surrounding privacy. Following this, a policy
has to be chalked out which gives legal backing to Big Data surveillance, while at the
same time, protecting the privacy of the citizens. This would help in stating what an
acceptable surveillance is and what is not.
iv. As Big Data surveillance largely remains an automated process, there is a need to bring
human element into it. This would help in ensuring that the boundaries of privacy are not
crossed and at the same time the threat is not disguised as a need of privacy. So, both
human and automation elements have to be combined in a manner to create algorithms
and datasets to make the best use of this technique.
v. A key step which needs to be taken in this regard relates to the misuse of the collected
information. There is a need to ensure that when a citizen’s privacy is breached, it is done
for justified reasons. Thus, there is a need to make certain that the collected information
is safe.

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vi. Another point which stems from the previous point is the information collected should be
used for protection purposes, instead of using it as a means of waging war against an
enemy or a not so friendly nation.

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References
Andrejevic, M., and Gates, K. (2014) Big Data surveillance: Introduction. Surveillance &
Society, 12(2), pp. 185–196.
Boersma, K., and Fonio, C. (2017) Big Data, Surveillance and Crisis Management. Oxon:
Routledge.
Boyd, D., and Crawford, K. (2012) Critical questions for Big Data: Provocations for a cultural,
technological and scholarly phenomenon. Information, Communication and Society, 15(5), pp.
662–679.
Cropf, R.A., and Bagwell, T.C. (2017) Ethical Issues and Citizen Rights in the Era of Digital
Government Surveillance. Hershey, PA: IGI Global.
Ferguson, A.G. (2017) The Rise of Big Data Policing: Surveillance, Race, and the Future of Law
Enforcement. New York: New York University.
Gellman, B., and Poitras, L. (2013) US, British intelligence mining data from nine US internet
companies in broad secret program. [Online] The Washington Post. Available from:
www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/usintelligence-mining-data-from-nine-us-internet-
companies-in-broad-secret-program/2013/06/06/3a0c0da8-cebf- 11e2-8845-
d970ccb04497_story.html [Accessed on 10/11/17]
Greenwald G (2013) NSA collecting phone records of millions of Verizon customers daily.
[Online] The Guardian. Available from: www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/06/ nsa-phone-
records-verizon-court-order/ [Accessed on 10/11/17]

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Lyon, D. (2014) Surveillance, Snowden, and Big Data: Capacities, consequences, critique. Big
Data & Society, 1(2), pp. 1-13.
Lyon, D. (2015) Surveillance After Snowden. West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons.
Schneier, B. (2013) Senator Feinstein Admits the NSA Taps the Internet Backbone. [Online]
Schneier. Available from: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/09/ [Accessed on
10/11/17]
Williams, J. (2017) White American men are a bigger domestic terrorist threat than Muslim
foreigners. [Online] Vox. Available from: https://www.vox.com/world/2017/10/2/16396612/las-
vegas-mass-shooting-terrorism-islam [Accessed on 10/11/17]
Ya, W.Q. (2017) Introduction to Intelligent Surveillance: Surveillance Data Capture,
Transmission, and Analytics. 2nd ed. New York: Springer.