Privacy Online & Off

 

Juan Enriquez compared our online presence to a digital tattoo.

Watching Juan Enriquez and Catherine Crump's TED Talks opened my eyes to how much of our personal data is constantly tracked and stored without our knowledge. 

I notice these privacy issues mostly through the ads I get on social media and the emails that show up in my inbox. Sometimes it feels like Instagram and YouTube know exactly what I've been looking at, even when I haven't searched for something recently.

Because of that, I try to be careful about my online privacy.

I use Safari as my main browser because I like its privacy features. I only use Chrome for certain things because I have an ad blocker on it, which makes the experience a little better. I also separate my email accounts depending on what they're used for. My iCloud email is for important and professional things, so I rarely get random emails there.

I have one Gmail account for things like YouTube, Canva, and other everyday websites. Then I have another Gmail account that is basically a burner account for random websites that require an email address. 

I honestly don't know if these privacy issues have affected me directly. What they have done is make me think more carefully about the information I share online and who has access to it.

My friends and family are probably affected in many of the same ways. Most people use social media, online shopping sites, and apps every day without really knowing how much information is being collected about them.

The scary part is that every click, search, and interaction becomes another data point. Over time, companies can build detailed profiles that reveal a lot about who we are and what we're interested in.

I think this is a difficult issue because there are legitimate reasons for the government to collect certain information. Data can help law enforcement investigate crimes and potentially prevent future ones.

At the same time, there has to be a limit.

Technology today allows governments and law enforcement agencies to collect much more information than they could in the past. Tools like cell tower dumps and automatic license plate readers can track where people have been and where they go. 

That raises concerns about privacy and civil liberties.

One thing that really bothers me is the idea that information can be collected and stored indefinitely just because it might be useful someday. Most people would never know where to look to find out what information has been collected about them. 

I think the government should be much more transparent about what data is being collected, how long it is stored, and who can access it. There should also be clear rules and stronger oversight to prevent surveillance tools from being abused. Public safety is important, but privacy matters too.

It is almost impossible to avoid data collection completely, but people can still take steps to protect themselves. One of the biggest things is simply sharing less information online. The less data that exists about you, the less there is for companies and organizations to collect.

People can also delete their browsing history and cookies on a regular basis. Using privacy-focused browsers, ad blockers, and strong privacy settings can make a difference as well.

It is also important to be careful with links and websites that seem untrustworthy. Clicking on the wrong link can expose personal information without you even realizing it. I think using separate email accounts for different purposes helps too. That is one of the reasons I keep my professional, personal, and burner accounts separate.

At the end of the day, awareness and sharing less information is probably the best defense.

The more people understand how their information is collected, analyzed, and shared, the better decisions they can make about protecting their privacy.

AI Disclosure: Copilot was used to help organize and structure my raw notes and thoughts into this final piece. All core ideas, perspectives, and final edits are entirely my own.

The Invention of Email: A Communication Revolution (EOTO)

Billions of email accounts exist worldwide, and hundreds of billions of emails
fly across the globe every single day.

It is hard to imagine modern life without email. Every day, billions of messages are sent worldwide, connecting businesses, schools, governments, and individuals in seconds. While email is now a routine part of everyday communication, its creation marked one of the most important technological breakthroughs of the twentieth century.

Ray Tomlinson

Ray Tomlinson, a computer engineer at Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN), a research company involved in developing ARPANET, the precursor to today's Internet, is generally credited with inventing email. According to the Internet Hall of Fame, Tomlinson developed the first system that allowed electronic messages to be sent between different computers connected through a network.

Before email, users could leave messages for one another only if they shared the same computer. This limitation made communication difficult as computer networks began to grow. Tomlinson recognized the need for a better way to exchange information between machines and modified existing software to create a networked messaging system.

One of his most lasting contributions was the introduction of the @ symbol in email addresses. The symbol separated the user's name from the destination computer and provided a simple way to route messages. More than fifty years later, that format remains the global standard for email addresses. As explained by Britannica, the development of email became a key step in the evolution of modern digital communication.

What began as a practical solution to a technical problem soon transformed the way people communicate.

Email solved a challenge that had existed for centuries: delivering written messages quickly across long distances. Traditional mail could take days or even weeks to arrive, while telephone calls required both parties to be available at the same time. Email introduced nearly instantaneous communication while also creating a written record that could be saved, shared, and referenced later.

The impact was enormous.

As computer networks expanded during the 1980s and 1990s, email became an essential tool for businesses, universities, and government agencies. According to Smithsonian Magazine, email quickly evolved from a tool used by researchers into a communication system relied upon by millions of people. Employees could coordinate projects, researchers could share discoveries, and students could communicate with instructors more easily than ever before.

Email also changed social communication. Families and friends could stay connected regardless of distance, making global communication more accessible and affordable. The technology helped lay the groundwork for many of the digital communication tools that followed, including online messaging platforms and social media.

Despite its many benefits, email has also created challenges. The ease of sending messages led to problems such as spam, phishing scams, and information overload. Many people now receive so many emails each day that managing their inboxes can become a task in itself. These unintended consequences demonstrate that even revolutionary technologies can create new problems while solving old ones.

Even so, the overall impact of email has been overwhelmingly positive.

The invention transformed communication from a process measured in days to one measured in seconds. It connected people across continents, improved the efficiency of organizations, and helped build the digital world we rely on today. More than half a century after Ray Tomlinson sent the first networked message, email remains one of the most influential communication technologies ever created.

The invention of email did more than create a faster way to send messages.

It helped shape the connected world we live in today. 

AI DISCLOSURE: This post was a collaboration using Microsoft Copilot. I asked Copilot to find research on the history of "Emails" along with the impact it has on communication. I then prompted it to take this research and turn it into a blog post, using prompts such as "write the blog post in academic style, but instead in professional writing."  I asked Copilot to help shape the text into a blog format, and I added links to related resources, along with appropriate images and captions.

Eight Values of Free Expression

Checks on Governmental Power and Protecting Dissent are the most important values. 

Checks on Governmental Power:

I feel that Checks on Governmental Power are the most important. I think that the government should be watched, and it must be held accountable for its actions because if we, as a people, are not allowed to criticize the government and protest, the structure of a functioning democracy is gone. 

When things go wrong, or might need improving, like adding amendments and constitutional standards, the government won't listen if we're not allowed to protest and hold them accountable. 

One of the most important things about a democratic government is to follow the wishes of its people, and that won't get done if the government is not held to standards or watched. If no one were allowed to criticize the government, we would no longer be a free country, and meaningful societal change would not get done. 

I think the women's suffrage movement, the civil rights movement, and the 13th Amendment are examples of this. These movements and changes show why people being able to come together and express their opinions can be important for society. That's why, for me, it's the most important value of free expression.

Things like Checks on governmental power allow for protected dissent because they allow free expression and let people come together to disagree with the government. 

It matters to me as a college student and citizen because getting together in a protest or expressing opinions on social media about the government's power is an important right because it can lead to societal change. 

I am a part of HPU Vision, the weekly news show on campus. Although I don't think we should criticize the government's actions because we don't want to take sides and make people unhappy, we could, in theory, expose government wrongdoing as a journalistic show. This is another way that the press can act as a check on government power.

An AP article I found about press freedom also connects to this idea. The article shows a 2026 Pew Research Center survey that found that three-quarters of Americans consider press freedom highly important to the well-being of society. This shows why a free press is still important today: it allows people to question and report on the government.

Protect Dissent:

The other value that I think is important is protecting dissent. This basically means citizens can criticize and disagree with the government even when their opinions aren't popular. It's also the most personal for me because I see it around me in action, whether it's on social media or discussing it with friends and family. People criticize the government all the time. 

Because social media gives regular people a way to publicly criticize what the government decides, it can help protect dissent by giving people a voice outside of regular news organizations. People should be allowed to say, “I don't agree with this law” or “The government is doing something wrong.” That's how I see it in action the most nowadays. Social media right now is one of the easiest ways to express an opinion and protest what the government does.

Bringing the two ideas together:

I believe these two free expression values are pillars of American society. Checks on government power matter because the press can criticize and expose government wrongdoing, and protecting dissent matters because it lets citizens criticize and disagree with the government. Both can lead to meaningful societal change.