Privacy In The Film Citizen Four By Glen Greenwald

Privacy has been defined as the ability of a person or group to seclude themselves; this includes information about them as well meaning that they have the right to express themselves selectively. Privacy is what allows people to release stress or express in any way they want because no one is watching them, it gives everyone the feeling that they are free for a moment, free from cultural scrutiny, free from a certain role or simply family or society’s pressure to behave a certain way.

There are several reasons why a person need its privacy, and no reason at all why this privacy should be violated. But this has changed over the years thanks to many terrorist attacks that changed forever the way we live. In a Ted talk, Glen Greenwald stated,
He wanted people to know that all the carriers they used to communicate were sharing personal information, the one they promise to their clients they will keep safe, with the government. “Every dictatorship down through history has always done that. One of the first things they need to do is try to acquire knowledge of their population. And that’s exactly what these programs do. I see this as the most major threat our democracies all around the world” (Binney, 2014). Having access to every piece of information about a person is a huge invasion to its privacy. Some say that they do not care that the government is watching and listening to everything they do or say because they don’t have anything to hide, but this is not true, people still use passwords to access their phones, emails and houses. This means that they are trying to protect something that they believe its important and do not wish to share with anyone else. So if this is the mentality then everyone does care about privacy, even if you have nothing to hide you still don’t want strangers reading your private conversations or looking at your
Journalists are supposed to be the eyes of citizens, find the truth and provide it to the people. But how can they do their job when they are being watched and persecuted 24/7, is crucial for them to use the search engines to find credible resources for their stories but as soon as they type something that can cause controversy they have an officer at their doors. A seven year old was pulled out of class by agents due to a tweet he published in his account, what type of terrorist damage can a kid do to the nation? And still the major terrorist attacks haven’t been prevented, so is it really necessary to use these programs to the extent they are being used? This surveillance has everyone on a leash, not being able to express themselves or look subjects that they find fascinating due to the fear they feel of being finger pointed. Major companies are being forced to hand over personal data from all of their clients to the government, information that is meant to be private and protected. Having your citizens living in fear is not the solution to the terrorism problem, the ones that have bad intentions due know about all of these programs and have found ways to avoid them. That is why the US government could not avoid the attack of Paris 2015, with all the technology they have and spying on all type of communication domestic and international they could no stop this tragedy from happening or any other national shootings that