Friday, July 4, 2014

National Security VS Personal Security

National Security and Personal Security are two differing yet similar security paradigms with different ends and means. The public image of National Security is the Government must protect the privacy, integrity and confidentiality of the National Infrastructure and also those of the people it governs. There are many cases of the Government breaching such trust and faith the people have invested into them to protect the people's liberty, rights, privacy, security and integrity (LRPSI). Governments have also taken measures to intrude into the lives of the people it is suppose to protect by introducing or using multiple robust laws, measures and techniques to ensure that to achieve "National Security", the LRPSI of the people it is suppose to protect are frequently broken and intruded upon. In some uncommon cases, such intrusion of the people'sLRPSI may lead to cases of miscarriage of justice.

Below is a table that will quickly summarize my view of National Security and Personal Security in the current context.

Some may argue that National Security and Personal Security can go hand in hand but the current scenarios and political landscapes around the world implies that many Governments are willing to sacrifice their own people in the supposed name of "National Security" which makes the Governments' infrastructure strong but in turn weakens the LRPSI of the people as a whole.


National SecurityPersonal Security
Robust security on a governmental and national infrastructural levelRobust security on a personal level
Restriction of civilian security technology below it's own surveillance powers.Personal security should be as strong as available
Subversion of LPSRI to achieve population controlExercises full LPSRI rights via means of secure technologies
Maximum surveillance and subversionMaximum counter-surveillance, anonymity and security
Top-down control of infrastructures and technoloogiesIndividual personal control
Derive benefits via surveillanceDerive benefits via LPSRI

The current trend of National Security VS. Personal Security seems to be leaning more towards anti-LPSRI goals. Governments touting that National Security and Patriotism is not a Zero-Sum game is mostly false due to the fact that building a National Security infrastructure requires huge surveillance capabilities and the suppression of secure technologies that prevent surveillance capabilities from working due to the nature of surveillance which requires the possession of large amounts of personal information to be able to effectively execute population profiling, tracking and interdiction of possible threats / "threats".

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