My first reaction on reading the news was: "It is bizarre that 4 people, whose average age is greater than 65 years, can pass landmark judgments without demonstrating that they fully understand the power of the technology that is a cellphone"! And nobody can do anything about their opinion!
Firsty let's get the lingo right...
A "Cell phone" is NOT just a phone today.
- It is a computer.
- It is a repository of private documents.
- It is the family photo album.
- It is where 80% of all your private conversations happen and are stored.
- It is an instrument for activists in a democracy, planning and expressing their dissent.
- It also is a window into private conversations that your co-workers, professional networks, friends, lovers and relatives have with you -- or with others!
- It is also a library of books that you choose to read.
- It is also your collection of movies and videos you watch.
- It is a geographical history of your physical movement, places you have been to, businesses you have visited.
I don't feel safe knowing that my political intentions, ambitions and dissenting views (like this one) can be made visible to any policeman without a warrant? Specially at a time when Americans and Canadians are horrified by police brutality and high-handedness, as evidenced by the widespread protests in the cases of Michael Brown and Eric Garner!
Ridiculous Conditions don't make citizens feel safer!
Of course the judiciary in their finely age wisdom didn't just give police access to your lives willy nilly without any checks and balances? Here are a few checks:
- The arrest has to be lawful. (And who gets to decide that on the spot? Let me see, my name is Officer Snoopyreach and I am scratching my head thinking whether this arrest I am making is lawful or not so I am not sure if I want to go through your phone to see if I can find a reason to claim it is lawful?!)
- The search of the phone must be made promptly. (Great, so now the first thing a cop MUST do is search through my phone immediately on arresting me because as time goes by, they would not be able to find that precious incriminating evidence that my Facebook and email would provide?)
- The police don't have a license to just "rummage around the device at will". (But how are you policing that? What is to prevent a cop who has forced open his way into a cell phone to not click on that tempting "Private Docs" app?).
- Police must take detailed notes of what private information they looked at and for how long. (Great! I can imagine a cop taking copious notes like "Errr, went through John's porn collection and stared at the image of a dominatrix whipping a judge for 30 seconds before I orgasmed").
While I watch in amusement people freak out every time Facebook and Instagram update their privacy terms, Clueless Canadians will not utter a peep that any copy on the street can arrest them and search through their most private data and life events without a warrant!
Laws like these are ridiculous not just because they encourage police high-handedness and make activists, demonstrators and dissenters feel unsafe -- they also take away the moral legitimacy for the Canadian government to speak out against censorship, privacy intrusions and snooping by countries like Iran and Israel).
D'oh Canada! Our privacy stands unguarded and open to thee!
