While the exact foundation for a “right to privacy” in America is somewhat constitutionally dubious – there is no such explicit right, as it has been “inferred” from the “penumbra” of various Bill-of-Rights amendments – it is quite clear that Americans highly value their privacy. This is in stark contrast to the UK, where recent advances in license-plate recognition allow an extensive Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) network to keep tabs on all vehicles moving in and out of cities. With the exception, perhaps, of a few Brittons distractedly over-boiling their tea on the day of the announcement, this vehicle data-basing failed to cause even a modest stir.
In America, where even a national identification card proposal has met with strong opposition, it comes as somewhat of a curiosity that Mayor Bloomberg of New York City intends to construct a version of London’s “Ring of Steel” CCTV network. The city has thus far raised $25 million dollars of an expected $90 million necessary to fill Lower Manhattan with cameras. According to NYC Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, the system has four components: license plate readers, surveillance cameras, a coordination center and roadblocks that can swing into action when needed.
What is not being widely reported in the media is the huge, precedent-setting implications of New York’s plan. According to CNN, officials in Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago and many other cities are anxiously eying the program. The potential for a very dramatic change in the nature of America’s police surveillance is, then, quite high.
Currently, there are approximately 30 million cameras in operation around America. However, most of these are in private locations, and are not centralized or networked. It is also generally understood that these cameras are used for information after a crime has been committed – a glance back into the past – rather than being actively monitored. This is in contrast to Britain, where operators are able to use camera speakers to communicate with those who are being watched, chastising them for public behavior that is considered inappropriate or dangerous. It is with this in mind that we must begin to consider the implications of an American Ring of Steel. The first step is to approach the question with an honest understanding of what we are trying to accomplish with CCTV. Are we fighting crime, or attempting to deter it? Is our objective to reduce petty theft, or to stop terrorism? According to Kelly, the primary purpose of the system is deterrence and investigation.
But will the system be effective for this purpose? In another CNN interview, Steven Swain from the London Metropolitan Police states, “I don’t know of a single incident where CCTV has actually been used to spot, apprehend or detain offenders in the act.” If the act in question is a suicide attack, the criminal in question is clearly not going to be concerned about cameras. Thus, the system may provide some deterrence against small crimes, but not against large-scale attacks. Indeed, no peer-reviewed study to date has proved that cameras deter crime; in many cases, apparent crime reduction is simply the result of criminal activity moving to areas without cameras.
Given the dubious value of CCTV, claims about the impact that the systems have on civil liberties must be taken all the more seriously. On the surface, monitoring speaks to a lack of trust, warranted or not, by the government toward its people. On a deeper level, it creates a culture predisposed against notions of individual strength and self-reliance. Think to your family upbringing: one does not come into his own when his elders are constantly watching over him, looking out for him, and telling him what is best. “Big Brother,” as civil libertarians often call government surveillance programs, may provide protection in the short run, but, to the extent that individuals come to trust this system, they necessarily become dependent upon it. Fundamentally, being monitored takes away the freedom to be alone, and to develop an autonomous identity. If the best ideas, innovations, and quality of life come when individuals have the ability to act as they wish – as the founding fathers believed – then the existence of a vast camera network is more than slightly troubling.
As governments hasten to embrace digital technology, there is a natural tendency to consolidate information into more efficient databases. At the point where Manhattan begins using its camera system to control vehicle entry by scanning license plates, travel habits and work patterns are only the slightest notch forward. We must, therefore, question what is collected, as obscurity becomes a less relevant factor in regards to information privacy. At the point where the databases are created, questions of equitability come into play: who belongs in the database, and for how long? Are my city-driving habits tracked if I am a convicted sex-offender? . . . a drug dealer? . . . a drug user? Some proposals in Britain call for recording every member of society, for the sake of equity. Indeed, as information gathering becomes more efficient and diffuse, ubiquity would seem to be the natural end. However, and not even considering the massive cost of such a proposal, is this the sort of equity that we would want? The precedent set by Manhattan may very well be determinative.
