Is Democracy at Risk from Digital Surveillance?

Carissa outlines global democratic decline and argues digital surveillance accelerates erosion of democratic institutions.

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Episode notes

AI ethics sounds reassuring. Carissa Véliz (Oxford professor, author of Privacy Is Power) says it's a contradiction: you can't build ethical systems on surveillance.

The result isn't accountability. It's rule by opaque models you can't inspect or appeal. That's not ethics. That's Kafkaesque.

Three hard truths Véliz lays out:

1. Privacy is both a right and a duty. It protects lawyers, journalists, citizens who need to act without intimidation. Remove it and democracy loses its working parts.

2. Privacy is collective. Your choices affect everyone else. When you give up your data, you expose your contacts, your patterns, your network.

3. Governments and Big Tech co-produce surveillance now. Data moves both directions. History shows companies can rival states in coercive power (see: East India Company).

What can be inferred from "just" location data: where you live, work, worship, who you meet, whether you visit a psychologist, whether you're buying drugs, whether you're having an affair. Everything.

Trading sovereignty for convenience breeds dependence. You think services are free. They're not—you're paying with control.

Practical steps that actually work:

- Signal instead of WhatsApp

- Proton instead of Gmail

- DuckDuckGo instead of Google

- Proton VPN, Proton Drive

Why small changes matter: When 5-10% of people shift behavior, companies notice. Privacy becomes a competitive advantage. Standards rise.

Surveillance isn't the future. It's the business model. And it works because we accept it.

Not on our watch.

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Guest: Carissa Véliz, Associate Professor Oxford | Author "Privacy Is Power"

Topics: Privacy, surveillance, democracy, AI ethics, data collection, Big Tech, government surveillance