Week Five - Defining Privacy, does it still exist?

This week in class, we begun the class by being asked by Peter (our tutor/ lecturer) to think about and write down how we view and define privacy. 


After some after sitting in my chair looking around the room watching the majority of the class fursiously write their own definitions I came up with this;

  " Privacy can be defined as the space in which one can control who can and cannot access ones personal space/ sphere. The private sphere is a/the sphere of a person in which information is kept private, confidential and in total control of the individual whom it belongs to".

It was a definition which I found rather difficult to define off the top of my head as there as many defining points that could have, and can be explored, discussed and put into the definition of privacy. I found the class to be, as all of them are, rather insightful and thought of privacy in a different way.

Take a moment to think about what you define privacy as? In a day and age, where there is so much technology accessible we do not analyse what we consider, private information, we are putting out into the public sphere. Take Facebook for example, we (society) are so concerned with public image and acceptance from others, we do not consciously realise we are opening our lives to those we do not even know.

Facebook asks for your Name, E-mail address, Interests, Gender, Relationship status, Religion etc. Whilst it is an option to publicly post such data (from anecdotal evidence) the majority of people still post their real Names, Interests, Gender, Political views, Political views, Relationship Status and Religion. Whilst such information may not seem harmful or important by posting such private data, we are essentially freely handing over information we usually only tell those close to us or institutions with some authority who require such personal information.