Public health measures and the rise of incidental surveillance

Considerations about private informational power and accountability

Datos Bibliográficos

ID21703405
AutoresBart A Kamphorst (0000-0002-7209-2210, Wageningen University & Research, autor de correspondencia), Adam Henschke (0000-0002-2956-0883, University of Twente)
Año2023
Volumen25
Número4
Fecha de publicación2023-12-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaEthics and Information Technology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1388-1957 • E-ISSN: 1572-8439
EditorialSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s10676-023-09732-8
OpenAlexW4388733738
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas56

The public health measures implemented in response to the COVID-19 pandemic have resulted in a substantially increased shared reliance on private infrastructure and digital services in areas such as healthcare, education, retail, and the workplace. This development has (i) granted a number of private actors significant (informational) power, and (ii) given rise to a range of digital surveillance practices incidental to the pandemic itself. In this paper, we reflect on these secondary consequences of the pandemic and observe that, even though collateral data disclosure and additional activity monitoring appears to have been generally socially accepted as inevitable consequences of the pandemic, part and parcel of a larger conglomeration of emergency compromises, these increased surveillance practices were not directly justified by appeals to solidarity and public health in the same way that the instigating public health measures were. Based on this observation, and given the increased reliance on private actors for maintaining the digital space, we argue that governments have a duty to (i) seek and ensure that there are justifications for collateral data disclosure and activity monitoring by private actors in the context of (future) public health emergencies like the COVID-19 pandemic, and (ii) regulate and provide accountability mechanisms for and oversight over these private surveillance practices on par with governmental essential services that engage in surveillance activities

Accountability · Business · Duty · Health care · Pandemic · Political science · Politics · Public health · Public relations · Solidarity · COVID-19 Digital Contact Tracing · Data-Driven Disease Surveillance · Law · Medicine · Nursing · Privacy, Security, and Data Protection