Thoughtful Thursday: A ban on Whatsapp?

I'm ashamed to admit it, but often I find out the latest news and scandals from my social media feeds. This week was no exception, and to my horror I was browsing my Facebook news feed yesterday lunchtime, and came across an article that someone had 'shared' suggesting that David Cameron is proposing a ban on smart phone apps such as Whatsapp, Imessage, Snapchat and Facetime. Sorry, what?

 

Our PM is proposing a ban on these apps in the wake of the shootings in Paris. These apps use 'encrypted' data so that they cannot be read. He claims that it is important that there is no means of communication which the security services cannot read, should they 'need to.'

 

Putting my regular use and enjoyment of these apps aside, I have only one question. When did it become acceptable for our government to start controlling (and restricting) us on the form in which we communicate with one another on a daily basis? Last time I looked, we weren't under a quasi-North Korean dictatorship, and I don't know when our lovely PM and government decided it might be acceptable to act as though we were. Apparently, David said he felt 'comfortable' about these proposals in a 'modern liberal democracy.' Really David?

 

Have we really got to a stage where there should be no form of communication between common people which can be kept private from the government? I can't see how the benefits of allowing the government to keep tabs on our every movement and message really outweighs the extreme violation of our human right to privacy that this necessarily entails. The only argument the government has ever advanced in response is 'well if you haven't got anything to hide, then what's your problem?' Well Mr Cameron, it's not about having something to 'hide' from the government. It's about my fundamental human right to be able to keep some of my private life, private. If we were to follow your line of argument through, we may as well all just be government-created and controlled clones.

 

In my mind this is just another example of the government slowly controlling and violating its own peoples' freedoms and powers. First was the suggestion of compulsory ID cards in circa 2008 (which I also vehemently disagree with, FYI) and now this. Am I really not allowed to send a stupid Snapchat to my best friend, or an iMessage to my boyfriend, without knowing that at any point someone else could also be looking at it? What’s next; installing CCTV in my home and taking my DNA samples?

 

I can't imagine that these proposals are going to be met too kindly by the British general public, and quite rightly so. It's about time this government realises that the fight on terrorism/crime/other human obscenities should not and cannot be solved by restricting and violating the rest of the general public's right to a private life. And don't even get me started on those who are the victims of crime and deserve to be able to keep their identity hidden...