The Bruce Report

It’s 9:00 a.m. and, with a hot cup of Joe in hand, I check my messages.

“Hello, Alec. We couldn’t help noticing you spent precisely 42 minutes longer than is customary for you in the washroom this morning. Based on your water consumption, we surmise that you chose to have a bath. Did you know that showers are far more energy wise? Just a friendly reminder from your public works department. Have a nice day!”

Good point. I make a mental note to be more environmentally sensitive in my daily ablutions. What’s next for me in the email queue?

“Dear Mr. Bruce, it has come to our attention that your weekly television viewing has tapered off over the past two months. Is there anything wrong? As your neighbourly cable operator, we are committed to providing you with only the best in entertainment and information. Please let us know if there’s any way we can serve you better.”

I think about it, and wonder how much a subscription to HBO Canada would set me back. I love that Bill Maher character. I continue clicking through the inbox.

“We don’t mean to alarm you, but we noticed you pulled no power from the provincial electricity grid in March. This strongly suggests you were absent from your house for a protracted period of time. As your home insurer, we wish to point out that your agreement with us will be nullified should we discover that you routinely leave your residence unoccupied for more than three days at a stretch.”

Wow, this is getting creepy. I can’t take a bath, turn on the tube, or leave my digs without being tracked. I take a slurp from the mug and up pops another missive.

“So, how’s the coffee?”

Okay, none of this has actually happened, but if some experts are correct our brilliant innovations in the field of information and digital communications could one day leave us bereft of even the smallest morsel of privacy.

A story in the Toronto Star the other day tells the tale of Big Brother’s steady encroachment: “The time you jump into the shower in the morning, the time you finally flick off that TV at night – even the time you set your home security alarm. Ontario’s privacy czar wants to keep the information secret. Personal privacy must remain paramount as the ‘smart grid’ electricity system is built around the province, said Ann Cavoukian, Ontario’s information and privacy commissioner.”

As the dear woman proclaimed, “Imagine the enormous interest in this information – not only by marketers and companies but unauthorized third parties like the bad guys, thieves who’ll know when you are not at home. . .Think about every single appliance in your house reporting, in real time, your energy use. What will develop over time is a library of personal information relating to a profile of your energy use: When you eat, when you sleep and wake.”

And here I thought Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and the like were the poison-tipped points on the spears of progress. To learn that my alarm clock could be used against me gives a whole new and chilling meaning to the phrase, “home invasion”.

The problem, of course, is there’s not much anybody can do about these emerging trespasses and transgressions. They are manifestations of a cultural shift in attitudes about the proper limits of privacy in a global, interconnected economy. The more successfully we transform personal information into streams of electrons, the more accessible that information becomes to “the bad guys”. Just ask any one of the millions of victims of identity theft, now epidemic around the world.

Still, we can take reasonable precautions to protect what’s left of our inner lives. Short of holing up in a windowless, electronics-free panic room somewhere in the backwoods, keep personal information. . .well, personal. Avoid excessive use of the Internet. Stop downloading useless tripe. Read a book once in a while.

And when you come across one of those new-fangled, full-body airport scanners, consider that in this day and age, hitchhiking might just be the safest way to travel after all.

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.