Surveillance, Encryption and Citizenship

• In Event: Digital Surveillance and Citizenship

Abstract

In light of the Snowden revelations, this paper examines news discourses about online communication security and surveillance circumvention practices. Specifically it analyses 1,249 news reports about cryptography and encryption in The Guardian and The New York Times, covering a 3-year period from June 2012 to June 2015 (one year before and two years after the Snowden revelations). The paper offers a thematic critique of how encryption is reported - including what triggers such considerations, what is purportedly at stake when it is reported, and who is advantaged by it. In so doing, the paper will argue that the contradictory depiction of communication security serves to restrict uptake of practices that can help citizens challenge excessive privacy intrusion exerted by surveillance agencies and corporations. This has serious implications on civic agency and indeed journalistic freedom since it helps perpetuate the ability of nation states and corporations to conduct indiscriminate mass surveillance.

Author

• Einar Thorsen, Bournemouth University