Hi, and Merry Christmas. I’m honored to have the chance to speak with you and your familythis year.
Recently, we learned that our governments, working in concert, have created a system ofworldwide mass surveillance, watching everything we do.
Great Britain’s George Orwell warned us of the danger of this kind of information. The typesof collection in the book—microphones and video cameras, TVs that watch us—are nothingcompared to what we have available today. We have sensors in our pockets that track useverywhere we go.
Think about what this means for the privacy of the average person. A child born today willgrow up with no conception of privacy at all. They’ll never know what it means to have aprivate moment to themselves—an unrecorded, unanalyzed thought. And that’s a problem,because privacy matters. Privacy is what allows us to determine who we are and who we wantto be.
The conversation occurring today will determine the amount of trust we can place both inthe technology that surrounds us and the government that regulates it. Together, we can find abetter balance, end mass surveillance and remind the government that if it really wants toknow how we feel, asking is always cheaper than spying.
For everyone out there listening, thank you, and Merry Christmas.