Surveillance Technology Needs More Oversight and Corporate Responsibility, Experts Say
La Rue said corporate responsibility is also important when it comes to surveillance. The U.S. and Europe lead the world in technology and their monitoring creates a bad example, said La Rue. “Corporations have no problem selling their surveillance to foreign governments. We need export licenses to generate some image of control,” he said. Rebecca MacKinnon, New America senior research fellow, identified this trend as the “surveillance industrial complex,” where companies are “developing technologies for government and selling them around the world.” LaRue and MacKinnon said companies do have human rights responsibilities related to the freedom of expression and privacy. “When companies acquiesce to government demands, they are doing everything they can to mitigate harm,” she said.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Export Compliance Daily combines U.S. export control news, foreign border import regulation and policy developments into a single daily information service that reliably informs its trade professional readers about important current issues affecting their operations.
The interests of national security and children are the two areas where surveillance concerns are legitimate, said La Rue. “We need transparency, where monitoring can be done legally and properly in certain situations,” he said. He identified the Boston bombings in April as one of those situations. Cynthia Wong, Human Rights Watch senior researcher, also emphasized transparency. “We need to have transparency and disclosure to have an actual debate,” she said. In terms of leaks, La Rue said there needs to be a balance between the harm and the benefit of the leak. “If we lose privacy, we also lose freedom of expression. They are tied together.”
If surveillance is not curtailed, it will weaken the democratic system, said La Rue. Due process is needed with judicial and legislative oversight, he said. “A checks and balances system needs to be applied to communications,” said La Rue. He identified the challenges of new technology. “Freedom and speed are the standard and benefits to the world, but it can be hard to keep up,” he said. He also emphasized the need for accessibility. “It is clear that the Internet only benefits if everyone has access to it through content and connectivity.”