A May 6, 2014 essay by Brandon Engel published on Nanotechnology Now poses an interesting question about the use of nanotechnology-enabled security and surveillance measures (Note: Links have been removed),
Security is of prime importance in an increasingly globalized society. It has a role to play in protecting citizens and states from myriad malevolent forces, such as organized crime or terrorist acts, and in responding, as well as preventing, both natural and man-made disasters. Research and development in this field often focuses on certain broad areas, including security of infrastructures and utilities; intelligence surveillance and border security; and stability and safety in cases of crisis. …
Nanotechnology is coming to play an ever greater title:role in these applications. Whether it’s used for detecting potentially harmful materials for homeland security, finding pathogens in water supply systems, or for early warning and detoxification of harmful airborne substances, its usefulness and efficiency are becoming more evident by the day.
He’s quite right about these applications. For example, I’ve just published (May 9, 2014) piece ‘Textiles laced with carbon nanotubes for clothing that protects against poison gas‘.
Engel goes on to describe a dark side to nanotechnology-enabled security,
On the other hand, more and more unsettling scenarios are fathomable with the advent of this new technology, such as covertly infiltrated devices, as small as tiny insects, being used to coordinate and execute a disarming attack on obsolete weapons systems, information apparatuses, or power grids.
Engel is also right about the potential surveillance issues. In a Dec. 18, 2013 posting I featured a special issue of SIGNAL Magazine (which covers the latest trends and techniques in topics that include C4ISR, information security, intelligence, electronics, homeland security, cyber technologies, …) focusing on nanotechnology-enabled security and surveillance,
The Dec. 1, 2013 article by Rita Boland (h/t Dec. 13, 2013 Azonano news item) does a good job of presenting a ‘big picture’ approach including nonmilitary and military nanotechnology applications by interviewing the main players in the US,
Nanotechnology is the new cyber, according to several major leaders in the field. Just as cyber is entrenched across global society now, nano is poised to be the major capabilities enabler of the next decades. Expert members from the National Nanotechnology Initiative representing government and science disciplines say nano has great significance for the military and the general public.
For anyone who may think Engel is exaggerating when he mentions tiny insects being used for surveillance, there’s this May 8, 2014 post (Cyborg Beetles Detect Nerve Gas) by Dexter Johnson on his Nanoclast blog (Note: Dexter is an engineer who describes the technology in a somewhat detailed, technical fashion). I have a less technical description of some then current research in an Aug. 12, 2011 posting featuring some military experiments, for example, a surveillance camera disguised as a hummingbird (I have a brief video of a demonstration) and some research into how smartphones can be used for surveillance.
Engel comes to an interesting conclusion (Note: A link has been removed),
The point is this: whatever conveniences are seemingly afforded by these sort of technological advances, there is persistent ambiguity about the extent to which this technology actually protects or makes us more vulnerable. Striking the right balance between respecting privacy and security is an ever-elusive goal, and at such an early point in the development of nanotech, must be approached on a case by case basis. … [emphasis mine]
I don’t understand what Engel means when he says “case by case.” Are these individual applications that he feels are prone to misuse or specific usages of these applications? In any event, while I appreciate the concerns (I share many of them), I don’t think his proposed approach is practicable and that leads to another question, what can be done? Sadly, I have no answers but I am glad to see the question being asked in the ‘nanotechnology webspace’.
I did some searching for Bandon Engel online and found this January 17, 2014 guest post (about a Dean Koontz book) on The Belle’s Tales blog. He also has a blog of his own, Brandon Engel where he describes himself this way,
Musician, filmmaker, multimedia journalist, puppeteer, and professional blogger based in Chicago.
The man clearly has a wide range of interests and concerns.
As for the question posed in this post’s head, I don’t think there is a simple one-to-one equivalency where one more security procedure results in one more surveillance procedure. However, I do believe there is a relationship between the two and that sometimes increased security is an argument used to support increased surveillance procedures. While Engel doesn’t state that explicitly in his piece, I think it is implied.
One final thought, surveillance is not new and one of the more interesting examples of the ‘art’ is featured in a description of the Parisian constabulary of the 18th century written by Nina Kushner in ,
The Case of the Closely Watched Courtesans
The French police obsessively tracked the kept women of 18th-century Paris. Why? (Slate.com, April 15, 2014)or
Republished as: French police obsessively tracked elite sex workers of 18th-century Paris — and well-to-do men who hired them (National Post, April 16, 2014)
Kushner starts her article by describing contemporary sex workers and a 2014 Urban Institute study and then draws parallels between now and 18th Century Parisian sex workers while detailing advances in surveillance reports,
… One of the very first police forces in the Western world emerged in 18th-century Paris, and one of its vice units asked many of the same questions as the Urban Institute authors: How much do sex workers earn? Why do they turn to sex work in the first place? What are their relationships with their employers?
…
The vice unit, which operated from 1747 to 1771, turned out thousands of hand-written pages detailing what these dames entretenues [kept women] did. …
… They gathered biographical and financial data on the men who hired kept women — princes, peers of the realm, army officers, financiers, and their sons, a veritable “who’s who” of high society, or le monde. Assembling all of this information required cultivating extensive spy networks. Making it intelligible required certain bureaucratic developments: These inspectors perfected the genre of the report and the information management system of the dossier. These forms of “police writing,” as one scholar has described them, had been emerging for a while. But they took a giant leap forward at midcentury, with the work of several Paris police inspectors, including Inspector Jean-Baptiste Meusnier, the officer in charge of this vice unit from its inception until 1759. Meusnier and his successor also had clear literary talent; the reports are extremely well written, replete with irony, clever turns of phrase, and even narrative tension — at times, they read like novels.
If you have the time, Kushner’s well written article offers fascinating insight.