The passing of the USA Freedom Act does not guarantee that the average citizen will enjoy any more free than they have in the past. Sure the NSA and other organization may rely on other means to access the data that is being collected. However, it would be naive to believe that the government would give up a collection method without having another in there wheelhouse. We store tons of data online it would be easier to rely on tools that gather information from the internet than obtain it through the court systems.
Poor knowledge of civil liberties has not been a factor in the infringement of American’s civil liberties. It is the complacency with the policies that has contributed to the infringement of civil liberties. We as the people believe that these policies do not affect us, to the extent that they do. However, the amount of data we are freely willing to give is astounding. On social media alone we tag ourselves in pictures that hold GPS data of locations and times. We give away our birthdays on social media. We have come to terms with the fact that we are being tracked and assuming I’m not doing anything wrong why should I care.
Now comes the fun part should the NSA continue its monitoring program? After all this is an ethics class. Is it ethically right to monitor the data of all citizens? I would venture to say without a reason to suspect that someone is going to commit an act of terrorism then no. Also if we where to look at the travel patterns of terrorist organizations, terrorists are usually trained in foreign countries usually in the middle east. If certain criteria are met then I believe that monitoring should continue. If we are so willing to give out our information online that we should we care that it is gathered at all. If we didn’t want it out there maybe we should put it out there.
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