High-Tech Tools Are Only As Good As The Users
Technology Op-Ed
6.5.2001
Politics Online, June 5, 2001
There’s been much rumbling about e-government in the last couple of years, and recently Senators Joseph Lieberman and Conrad Burns introduced legislation to bolster the idea. But notwithstanding the giddy evangelists of automated government services, it’s time for America to think about the possible risks. Renewing driver licenses online, thereby avoiding the dreaded DMV, is one of the many helpful aspects. Government sites also facilitate research on Social Security and other public-interest topics. But e-government initiatives are not all good, and as with any new initiative, policymakers should be careful to implement only aspects of new technology that show clear benefits. Technology is a tool, neither good nor bad in itself. How technology is used will be the measure of success for any e-government program. For instance, if e-government becomes an excuse to expand government rather than shrink it, as appears to be the case in the Lieberman-Burns proposal, the promised efficiencies from e-government will evaporate. There are a number of individuals arguing that government should “innovate, not just automate,” but this catchy slogan could lead down a dangerous path. Innovation sounds like a wonderful idea - until it leads to privacy violations, security problems, and other ills. That is, legislators need to consider very carefully whether government departments should be cross-referencing data and compiling detailed databases on citizens without their consent. In the private sector, individuals can refuse to give their data to businesses or hide it using encryption technologies, but with government we are forced to hand it over. This makes the creation of mass government databases on individuals a violation of privacy, particularly when governments have a history of abusing data (a la J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI) and don’t have a fantastic history of guarding our data either. New government dossiers would certainly become a hacker’s dream and the average citizen’s nightmare. Besides these privacy and security concerns, there’s also the nature of politics standing in the way of what many hope will be a new age for democracy. Pundits argue that new technologies will open up government and make it more responsive. But that will only happen to the extent that politicians and their staff are willing to make it happen--technology alone will not make politicians more forthright or communicative. No one would argue that government should lag behind the technological curve. But the use of high technology does not translate to good policy in every case. If they are to improve the quality of life and government, high-tech possibilities must be tempered with careful evaluation.
Sonia Arrison is director of the Center for Freedom and Technology at the California-based Pacific Research Institute. She can be reached via email at sarrison@pacificresearch.org.
|
