It is estimated that every person in this country is presently catalogued, indexed, and cross-referenced in an average of 300 computer databases¹.

In the aftermath of reports revealing that government agencies are engaged in the sale of thousands of drivers license photos and other personal information, this number is a little disturbing.

Your name, your address, your income and expenses, your medical history, your assets, your friends and associates, your buying habits, where you've been and what you did there, are all available to the "right people", all at the touch of a button.

A new crime, called "identity theft" is increasingly common. With a little knowledge, a criminal can literally usurp your identity and conduct business, or commit crimes, in your name, leaving you with the bill, or worse.

The idea is now being floated in some government circles to create a massive, centralized computer database consolidating all of your personal information under one common, universal citizen identifier (can you say, "social security number"?)

Some believe that this project is already well under way, with government agencies using various private companies as "fronts" to collect the information, to avoid the likely public outcry.

So-called "V"-chip monitoring technology is already being installed in new televisions, VCR's, and DVD systems.

"Black box" monitoring devices have been quietly installed in many new car models for several years.

Leading technology companies are under heavy pressure and threats of litigation or regulation if they do not make their software and hardware "wiretap friendly", and provide government agencies with back-door access to their encryption technology.

Hundreds of thousands of surveillance cameras have already been installed in busses, trains, and elevators. The movements of many commercial vehicles is closely tracked by satellite.

Hidden cameras and other monitoring devices are routinely installed in cinemas, along roads, in bars, dressing rooms, offices, workplaces, and housing projects.

High-powered satellite spy cameras in orbit can zoom in to read the print on the page of the book you are holding as you sun yourself in the "privacy" of your own back yard.

Daily, we are routinely seduced, and even coerced, into handing over massive amounts of our personal data.

An explosion of laws requires us to disclose personal information to government agencies and private companies, information that is then often used for unrelated purposes, all neatly cross-referenced under the now-nearly-mandatory "social security number".

Penalties for non-compliance range from harassment, to denial of services or employment, to fines and/or imprisonment. Attempts to avoid revealing or to conceal ones identity is often seen as a crime, or evidence of one.

All of this, of course, in the name of law enforcement, drug interdiction, public health, national security, or national revenue.

Fifty years ago, George Orwell's book "1984" painted an unintentionally prophetic picture of a futuristic surveillance society, a vision of unrestrained power in the "public interest".

Orwell, himself a staunch Socialist, meant for his book to be a warning about the dangers that Communism (particularly under Stalin) posed to the Socialist movement. Instead it became a literary icon for advocates of freedom and the libertarian ideal.

"Big Brother" has become a shorthand phrase for the unrestrained power of government, and the intrusion by authority into the private lives of individuals.

In Orwell's fictional Oceania, hundreds of thousands of ever-present two-way "telescreens", equipped with surveillance cameras and microphones, centrally monitored every inch of private and public space, seven days a week, 24 hours a day.

Originating first as useful public-information devices, these monitoring systems eventually became omnipotent tools enforcing the will of the state, policing the morals, behavior, and even the thoughts of every citizen.

It is alarming to see that, in spite of our "tradition" of personal privacy and freedom, and the "protections" supposedly guaranteed to us under our constitutional government, how closely we have come to fulfilling Orwell's vision.

Skeptics argue that such a nightmarish vision could only transpire if every individual, government agency, and corporate body were working together in some vast dictatorial conspiracy that would eclipse the common, inalienable rights of the individual.

It was the passive acceptance of surveillance, and of the authoritarian status quo, that was Orwell's fear. It does not require much imagination today to see the trend.

In a steady drumbeat of publicity, political spin, and legislation, individuals and businesses are routinely advised, warned, and even threatened, that they have a social obligation to support increasingly restrictive and intrusive measures by governments and law enforcement agencies at every level.

Every day, in a thousand different ways, we are already expected to become "partners" in the new surveillance society.

Admittedly, the technology that brings with it both the promise of a better world, and the threat to our liberty, is here to stay.

Exchanging our freedoms, however, for a politician's promise of security, will in the end leave us with neither.

¹ Source: Privacy Internationale - London