Can we be safe and free? The dilemma terrorism creates - Law & Justice

USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education), Jan, 2003 by Gene Stephens

HOW MUCH FREEDOM are Americans willing to give up in exchange for safety from terrorists? Street criminals? Other lawbreakers? At what point does the loss of privacy and freedom of speech and movement outweigh the perception of added security? Can we have it all--civil liberties and safety?

Public policy is always about trade-offs and compromise. In this case, we cannot truly be free unless we have a reasonable degree of safety, but we cannot truly feel safe unless we are also secure from undue prying into our personal lives. Adding to our real or perceived sense of safety comes at the cost of watching us more closely to protect us from harm.

What Americans need is a comfortable balance between safety and freedom--belief we can say and do whatever and go wherever we want within the limits of the law without repercussions from criminals and terrorists and without repressive restrictions and surveillance by authorities--a difficult task. Having our cake and eating it too requires a precarious balancing act between high-tech and high-touch--development and use of some "gee whiz" gadgetry only to the point we feel relatively safe without feeling abused by the process. Airports already have become testing grounds for this post-Sept. 11 approach. Passengers want safety, but with a minimum of hassle; airlines want passengers at a cost low enough to make a profit; and regulators want to be seen as protecting the public without creating a bureaucratic nightmare.

A major test will occur as the million-dollar-plus "Total Recall"-type X-ray machines are pressed into general service in airports across the nation and later at public gathering places (stadiums, coliseums, fairgrounds) and government complexes (courthouses, administrative buildings, post offices). While these devices can spot any weapons or contraband (from razor blades to plastic bags of cocaine) right down to the bone, they also show the size and shape of body parts for security personnel and possibly others to see and evaluate. Snickers and derisive remarks likely will not be appreciated. When the handheld versions (already in testing) are issued to police at the street level, any and all citizens will be subject to search with these camcorder-size scanners. Absent any recourse to stop (or even know about) such searches, will modesty compel people to wear lead underwear (and will that even divert the electronic device?) or provide a niche market for new "blocking" technology?

The war on terrorism has indeed provided a bonanza for tech developers and suppliers as well as public and private security providers. Federal laboratories have accelerated the pace of research and are turning out new products like the Sandia Decon Foam, which can be used in foam or gas versions to decontaminate many chemical and biological weapons, such as saran and anthrax. The National Institutes of Health, meanwhile, has developed biochips that are programmed to recognize various forms of bacteria and sound the alarm, with the DNA structures of new biological warfare agents being added to the memory as they appear. The military has turned to PackBot technology and has utilized a $40,000 prototype called Fester for radio-controlled reconnaissance in searching the caves of Afghanistan for Al Qaeda. (Fester was employed successfully in searching the debris in the World Trade Center for victims.) Also being used are the Predator, a low-flying drone that fires antitank missiles, and the Global Hawk, an unmanned Air Force surveillance plane that tracks the enemy from 60,000 feet.

To thwart cyber attacks, biometric identification systems--from fingerprints and voice verification to keystroke and DNA analysis--are being perfected so everyone who logs onto the Internet can be identified immediately, ending anonymous surfing in cyberspace. This will become critical as cyber money replaces cash and credit/debit cards in the international economy of the future. This immediate ID on the Net will provide still more stored information on every user--eventually nearly all Americans and almost everyone on Earth.

Other intrusive technology includes facial recognition, universal DNA banks, ubiquitous cameras and computing, and neuromanipulation--all designed to find, observe, and capture a terrorist/criminal. Many communities are installing cameras in public places--often with Federal funding--and soon may go to quasipublic and even private places in the name of public safety. In Los Angeles, motion-sensitive cameras in high-crime areas snap a picture when triggered and play a recorded warning: "We will use this photograph to prosecute you. Leave now." In Wilmington, Del., "jump out" squads of police descend on known drag areas and round up suspected dealers and interrogate them (for up to two hours), and take digital pictures of all others on the street to compile a suspect file. Add facial recognition scanning--as done in Tampa, Fla., and Virginia Beach, Va.--to this, and almost anyone caught on camera can be identified. In England, where facial recognition and ubiquitous cameras have been used for some time, the public has seemingly accepted the loss of privacy, but expressed concern after learning that some public safety officers have been scanning videos of citizens in search of compromising positions (scratching, picking, adjusting, etc.), which they then show for fun and profit.