Advances in communication have led to a loss of personal privacy

Advances in communication have led to a loss of personal privacy

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Technology has evolved in many forms since the start of human kind in ancient civilizations. The Industrial revolution of the 1900s have introduced humans to new forms of technology such as the telegram, printing press and telephone. However, in today’s modern world advances in communication technology have transformed our world dramatically, making it much smaller. Only a century ago, it would take a person several months to relay a message across the world to a recipient. Nowadays a person can transmit information in seconds to anyone across the world with new technological advance. Like all things in society, advances in communication have their downsides.

First consider a situation in which advance in communication have led to a loss of privacy. Nowadays, the internet has become an omnipresent facility in all corners of the globe. It has become a form of connections with others in ways never imagined before. However some bad apples have used this technology for their own sense of pleasure and gain. For example, in the recent 2009 Rutgers University web-cam case, a college freshman, Dharun Ravi and his friend Molly Wei  used a web cam to record a sexual encounter of his roommate, Tyler Clementi with another man. Tyler Clementi had initially informed his roommate that a friend would stop by and needed some privacy. Despite this request, Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei continued with their intentions of recording the sexual encounter. Both Dharun Ravi and Mol Wei recorded the sexual encounter with a computer web cam and used Twitter to broadcast live the encounter online as well as use comment boxes on web-pages to create gossip of the incident. Mr. Ravi stating “ Look my roommate is making out with some random dude”. Soon after, Mr. Ravi was done recording and commenting on the event that night, Tyler Clementi had realized his privacy was breached by his roommate thus committed suicide off the George Washington Bridge later that day. Thus it is evident that advances in communication have led to a loss of privacy.

Next consider a situation in which advances in communication have not led to a loss of privacy. As mentioned before, advances in communication have made the world a smaller place. With the computer many video sharing websites and chatting software have been coined in the last decade. Firstly, e-mail has transformed communication dramatically over the past 3 decades. In the 1900s it would take several months to send a message in a telegram to another country, but nowdays with e-mail communication is rapid and efficient which occurs in fraction of the time. One of the most notable forms of communication is Skype. Skype is a virtual video calling software that enables people to chat with friends and family from any distance. During the Iraq war of 2003, many soldiers used Skype and their laptops to spend time with their loved ones from a distance. Also, Skype has been very useful in education across college campuses. In rural places such as Maine, distance education has been made possible via Skype. With Skype students are able to have an interactive form of learning with others across the globe in all disciplines of study from humanities to science. Thus it is evident that advances in communication may actually benefit society.

In all advances in communication is a 2 way street. Advances in communication can be used to invade privacy and take advantage of them as in the case of Dharun Ravi in the Rutger’s University webcam spying case resulting in the death of Tyler Clementi. However advances in communication have improved interactions between humans in education and communication with friends and family. Thus it is in the hands of society to stop those who use technology to harm others but also to encourage the use of technology to benefit everyone.