With the advancement of surveillance technology, many citizens feel that their privacy rights have been violated due to homeland security and the threat of terrorism. Throughout history our government has implemented domestic and international surveillance as a way to safeguard our society from other countries. Now the question that seems to arise within our society is if the government is infringing on our civil liberties? Or is this indeed protecting our nation from imminent danger?
The balance between national security and the rights of American citizens was forged in 1791 with The Fourth Amendment. This was implemented to enforce the notion that “each man’s home is his castle” and to protect “the people” from warrantless searches and seizures
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The domestic use of drones by the government has increased over the years. Unfortunately drone surveillance use remain unregulated due to slim privacy and civil liberty restrictions at federal level. With the advancement of surveillance technologies, drones will be used to track our every move violating our privacy. New drone systems such as the ARGUS-IS (Autonomous Real-time Ground Ubiquitous Surveillance Imaging System) are being equipped with five-megapixel smartphone camera sensors. Yiannis Antoniades, an engineer who developed ARGUS-IS, stated “You can see individuals crossing the street. You can see individuals walking in parking lots. There is actually enough resolution to be able to see the people waving their arms, or walking around, [or to see] what kind of clothes they wear.” With this and even more increasing technologies the most intimate details of our live may be potentially revealed without our approval. This could really threaten our nation’s privacy and actually violates part of our First Amendment rights which “prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion and abridging the freedom of speech”. Everything we do will be constantly observed by the Government and due to few federally regulated laws they are “free to roam about the
The Fourth Amendment makes people in American feel safe and secure. David Sirota author of “Does the government actually understand the 4th Amendment?” says,"a few years after it aired the director of national Intelligence admitted illegal surveillance was still taking place"(understand). " the Government’s unverified assertion that it has halted “systemic” illegal/unconstitutional surveillance by the National Security Administration." says David Sirota author of “Does the government actually understand the 4th Amendment?”(Understand). Sirota also states "The NSA is admitting that even with an outdated 1997 supreme court ruling it knows it cannot post mass collect metadata with no warrants whatsoever.
For another example, the natural right to be free from unreasonable government intrusion in one’s home was safeguarded by the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirements. ("Bill of Rights,"
Information about the Fourth Amendment The Fourth Amendment originally enforced the nation that,”each man’s home is his castle”, secure for unreasonable searches and seizures of property by the government. It protects against arbitrary arrests, and is the basis of the of the law regarding search warrants, stop-and-frisk, safety inspections, wiretaps, and other form of surveillance, as well as being central of many other criminal law. The right of the people to be secure in in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizure, shall issue, but upon probable causes, supported by oath or affirmation, searched, and the persons or thing to be seizure.
For example a drone is ideal for SWAT operations, crowd control, criminal missing person, forensics crime scene, gangs, narcotics, search and rescue, vehicle crashes and corrections (prisons). However, using drones for the constant surveillance of someone at their personal property is illegal unless the law enforcement agency obtains a warrant. There are many cases that have been thrown out due to be in violation of the fourth amendment. In the case Kyllo v. the United States (2001)” Suspicious marijuana was being grown in petitioner Kyllo’s home in a triplex, agents used a thermal imaging device to scan the triplex to determine if the amount of heat emanating from it was consistent with the high-intensity lamps typically used for indoor marijuana growth.
Some people may think that the 14th amendment does a poor job of protecting people’s rights. In document five it explains how on September 11, 2001,with the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, it has caused video surveillance in the United States to increase. For example the U.S has programs that use facial recognition that help match photographs of criminals faces to the criminal. Another program that we use helps prevent suicide bombers from attacking. Some people may think that prevention of terrible events reoccuring or occurring is a good thing, but using security systems everywhere may be a violation of their rights and privacy.
To begin, we need to understand the fourth amendment. The fourth amendment was created to prevent the government from breaching into our homes and convicting us of crimes based on evidence they discover within our homes. It was vital to state unreasonable searches in the constitution, and an unreasonable search is a search done without
In the article,”Drones and GIS: A Look at the Legal and Ethical Issues”by Caitlin Dempsey, describes the negative characteristics of drones. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has set several laws on these hazardous toys. For instance, the FAA made restrictions on how high a drone can fly, where it can fly, and keeping all drones under control. Privacy is the main problem in the moral use of drones.
Civil liberties are rights guaranteed to citizens in the Constitution that the government cannot interfere with, however, in the name of national security, they do. The government sometimes finds it necessary for Americans to give up some of their basic rights to keep the nation protected, but many people find this unnecessary. A law-abiding citizen’s extremely personal information should not be essential to finding terroristic threats within this society. Under no circumstances should an American citizen’s civil liberties be violated in a time of war or crisis, because those are assured rights that are most valuable to their freedom during national conflicts.
The United States spends more on its defense than any other country in the world, in a democratic state whose constitution Alexander Hamilton helped to inspire. It’s questionable as to what lengths a democratic system should go to keep its citizens safe as ultimately security cannot be unconditionally guaranteed. Having a debate between liberty and security is by no means a new one, its influence on political thought can be profoundly polarizing, as the extremes of both liberty and security can be witnessed around the world and throughout history. The principles that must be prioritized within a democracy while still affording safety, revolves around the ability of citizens to exercise their political liberties.
For the past couple years there has been many injustice cases involving poor accusations of innocent victims. These poor accusations of innocent victims include shootings of innocent African Americans. One way to avoid these problems is the use of body cams. These tiny cameras have saved a Police Officer 's job, justified an innocent victim, and even has saved a person 's life. Recently Police Departments have been using these such body cameras and have seen significant results.
It is very important to use surveillance, but if you use it unjustly it can give more power to public order than individual rights. It causes a similar problem as the ones mentioned before, that it can prove challenging to identify if you had a good reason to use surveillance. You might not always know if you have a good enough reason to use surveillance, but you should exercise your best judgement to decide whether or not to use
Drones: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly This research paper will look at the issue behind drones, or UAV’s unmanned autonomous vehicles. There are many good, viable cases and quality reason as to how, and where drones can be used for the benefit of society. There are also many reasons and applications for drones that can bring about ethical questions and legalities that are being looked at by many Western nations today. This paper will focus on what is good, what is bad, and what could be an ugly use of drones through governmental deployment on a militarily basis. Drones can have a wide variety of applicable uses that have great benefits to them for our society.
When certain principles apply to warfare, most moralists argue that the means to do so is foolish due to the disruptive nature of war. But in other terms some argue that without put thought into taking our enemies lives, we cause them to become pest that could be completely destroyed without noble consideration (Dalziel). The aerial vehicles known as drones tend to strike fear into the hearts of some people. Although drones have become very successful in their mission to put a stop to the violence that has consumed the Middle East. People are now starting to fear that the success of this aerial vehicle would lead to a demand for it in the United States.
Technology is growing at a fast pace and every day we see a new product or service that is available. Many times it is hard to even keep up with the latest phone, computer, game console, or software. There are so many different gadgets to choose from and even the internet is on information overload. As a result, we can no longer truly expect to have privacy.
“Visible: the inmate will constantly have before his eyes the tall outline of the central tower from which he is spied upon. Unverifiable: the inmate must never know whether he is being looked at at any moment; but he must be sure that he may always be so” (Foucault 201). Surveillance is inevitable, all over the world humans are constantly being watched over like hawks in the daytime. No matter where you go or who you talk to you are never, truly, alone.