PRIVACY INTERNATIONAL MEDIA RELEASE
ON GEORGE ORWELL'S HUNDREDTH BIRTHDAY,
PRIVACY ADVOCATES SOUND A SOLEMN WARNING OF
UBIQUITOUS SURVEILLANCE AND MASS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE
Human rights watchdogs will launch the 1st international "Big
Brother Awards" at London birthday event25th July 2003 For
immediate releaseThe Director of the human rights watchdog Privacy
International today warned that current efforts world-wide to
eliminate privacy will result in the growth of violence and civil
disobedience.
His warning was issued on the hundredth birthday (June 25th) of
the influential author George Orwell.
Mr Davies provided a solemn warning about the future prospects
for privacy. "Privacy is being systematically engineered
into extinction. Each day sees a new onslaught on this precious
and delicate right". "Surveillance has become an epidemic.
Led by the US and the UK, countries are encouraged and coerced
into adopting a vast range of repressive measures designed to
maximise all levels of surveillance."
Simon Davies warned that the right to privacy was under such sustained
threat that at some point in the near future "the right may
collapse under the sheer weight of pressure from government measures"
He signalled "within a short time anxious citizens will be
reluctantly forced to take action through campaigns of civil disobedience,
sabotage or subversion".
"In the past year alone there has been a substantial growth
in the number of on-line resources dedicated to the sabotage of
surveillance technology". "I don't like the idea of
such a confrontation between citizens, technology and authorities,
but I can well imagine that it is inevitable. The history of embattled
movements to protect rights is peppered with physical and behavioural
confrontation. A "call to arms" will be a tactic of
last resort, but there are already millions of angry and concerned
citizens who would respond to such a call"
To recognise the occasion of Orwell's centenary, an invited gathering
of civil rights advocates from throughout the world will meet
in London, Wednesday, to celebrate the man who gave the world
a terrifying insight into the future possibility of a "Big
Brother" society.
Orwell is now the Patron Saint of the privacy movement. His momentous
book "Nineteen Eighty Four" has been transformed in
the space of fifty years from a fanciful work of fiction into
a frighteningly realistic blueprint for the future of societies
throughout the world.
The London birthday event, organised by Privacy International,
will be staged this evening at an undisclosed pub in central London.
The pub was Orwell's favourite drinking establishment, where he
regularly drank a mixture of Guiness and beer ("Black and
Tan") and "smoked far too much for his own good".
During the event Privacy International will unveil plans for the
first global Big Brother Awards. The BBA's were established by
PI in 1998, and are now an annual event in fifteen countries.
This will be the first attempt to create an award that recognises
the threat to privacy and rights posed by international organisations.
The global award will be judged by a panel of sixty experts from
thirty countries. The event will be staged later in 2003.
In the past year alone governments throughout the world have harmoniously
created hundreds of initiatives hostile to privacy and rights.
These include:
- The development of national and global systems of "biometric"
projects (fingerprints and iris scans) designed to strengthen
border controls.
- The creation of a new generation of powerful identity cards
- The expansion of DNA databases
- Linkage of information systems between government and corporate
organisations
- Requirements placed on communications providers to store
data on the activities of their customers
- A massive growth in the use of electronic visual surveillance
- The creation of dozens of national "Homeland Security"
departments and divisions
- An extraordinary extension of government powers to monitor
the activities of citizens
- The development of global information sharing agreements
between nations
- The dilution of traditional rights through the "revision"
of national and international laws and agreements
- Privacy International (PI) is a human rights group formed in
1990 as a watchdog on surveillance by governments and corporations.
PI is based in London, and has an office in Washington, D.C. Together
with members in 40 countries, PI has conducted campaigns throughout
the world on issues ranging from wiretapping and national security
activities, to ID cards, video surveillance, data matching, police
information systems, and medical privacy, and works with a wide
range of parliamentary and inter-governmental organisations such
as the European Parliament, the House of Lords and UNESCO. It's
web site is www.privacyinternational.org
- The Big Brother Awards www.bigbrotherawards.org
are held each year in the UK, the US, the Netherlands, France,
Germany, Switzerland, Hungary, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Bulgaria
Finland and Spain, with Japan and Australia holding their first
awards ceremony this year.
- Simon Davies can be reached at simon@privacy.org and on
07958 466 552
(+44) 7958 466 552 from outside the UK.
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