Henrik Skaug Saetra - Big Datas Threat to Liberty: Surveillance, Nudging, and the Curation of Information

Big Datas Threat to Liberty

Surveillance, Nudging, and the Curation of Information

HENRIK SKAUG STRA

Faculty of Computer Sciences, Engineering and Economics, stfold University College, Halden, stfold, Norway

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Foreword

A few months ago, I purchased an Amazon Echo. If you are not familiar with it, the Echo is a smart speaker with an integrated cloud-based AI program called Alexa. The device now sits on my kitchen counter, silently blinking in blue, waiting patiently for my commands. Alexa, whats the weather like today?, Alexa, give me my news update, please!, Alexa, remind me to call my mother at 3pm!.

This was not an impulse buy; I purchased it for a reason. Like Henrik Skaug Stra, I am a philosopher and ethicist of technology. My general feeling is that if I am going to write about technology, it is incumbent on me to actually use it and be familiar with its features. But, given my day job, I am aware of the risks that such devices pose. They are, after all, surveillance machines. You welcome them into your home and then they track your voice commands, learn your preferences, and feed Amazons databases with information they can use to hone their products and services. That said, Alexa has a number of conveniences that I like. It is great for setting reminders and keeping track of your calendar. Its AI is also reasonably impressive, capable of answering factual questions and performing complex calculations. My inner child rejoices every time I ask it to do something. I feel as if I have stepped onto a science fiction movie set, speaking to a computer as if it were a normal and mundane part of my life (which, in a sense, it now is).

Recently, however, I have noticed a change in my behavior around Alexa. I am always conscious that it might be listening. I tell my wife to watch what she says in its vicinity. Although Alexa is only supposed to pay attention when you use its wake word (Alexa in this instance), a quick review of the voice history suggests that it can make mistakes. It sometimes listens and records information before deleting it as irrelevant. I still like the movie and book recommendations that Alexa gives me, but, despite the inconveniences this causes, I now tend to switch it off whenever I am not actively using it.

Heres the question: Does a technology like Alexa undermine my liberty? In a sense, it feels like it does. If I invited another person into my home, to observe my every move, I would undoubtedly act differently as a result. I would be more guarded in what I say; more cautious in what I do. I would start putting on a show rather than being my true self. That sounds like the opposite of being free. On the other hand, Alexa does allow me to outsource some of my cognitive burden. I do not have to keep track of dates and appointments anymore. Alexa will remind me of these when needed. This frees me up to think about other things that are more important to me. Similarly, Alexa gives me more choices than I had before when it comes to music, radio, and other forms of information. More choices and more time sound like a good thing when it comes to protecting liberty. It seems like there are arguments to be made on both sides. The technology both undermines and promotes my liberty.

Or does it? If you, like me, are confused about this issue, then you will be glad that you picked up this book. In Big Datas Threat to Liberty , Henrik Skaug Stra expertly guides the reader through the thicket of concepts and issues that lie at the heart of my confusion about Alexa. Liberty, it turns out, is a complex idea. People often claim that technology undermines or promotes liberty, but they often do not clarify what they mean by this. It is assumed that we know what liberty is. But liberty has many faces. There is negative liberty (freedom from interference and domination) and positive liberty (the power to be who you want to be). There are also perfectionist and non-perfectionist forms of both, as well as legitimate and illegitimate forms of interference with liberty. How are we to make sense of this complexity?

Stra has the answers. In a crystal clear exposition of big data and the threat to liberty, Stra encourages us to avoid the danger of talking past each other. He clarifies what is meant by liberty and what is meant by big data and then, in a series of rigorously formulated propositions and arguments, he identifies three core threats that big data poses to liberty: the surveillance threat, the nudging/shoving threat, and the information curation threat. Building on this, he then explains how these threats are linked to power relations in society and why it is important for us to care about them.

The book he has produced speaks for itself. I cannot do a better job summarizing its key claims than he has already done (indeed, one of the virtues of the book is its regular summaries of key arguments). I would, however, like to comment on two features of the text that I think are worth highlighting at the outset.