Where Has Our Privacy Gone ?

Yesterday CNS News reported:

Bypassing Congress, the Obama administration has issued a proposed administrative rule, which if adopted, would mandate the installation of “black boxes” in all automobiles and light trucks beginning in 2014.

The U.S. Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) proposed the regulation on Dec. 7, which it said “would capture valuable safety-related data in the seconds before and during a motor vehicle crash.”

I can understand the value of the event data recorders (EDRs) in case of an accident, but what about the other things they record? According to Horace Cooper of the National Center for Public Policy Analysis,  “EDRs not only provide details necessary for accident investigation, they can also track travel records, passenger usage, cell phone use and other private data — who you visit, what you weigh, how often you call your mother and more is captured by these devices.” Logically, with an EDR, you could determine which people are associating with each other, where they are meeting, and begin to control personal and political activity among Americans. I think this is a really bad idea.

Enhanced by Zemanta