Will Biometrics Erase Personal Privacy?

Photo from a 2011 Wired magazine article
which claimed the United States kept a biometric file
on 3 million Iraqi citizens.

The first time I encountered biometrics was when I worked in a liquor store. I was required to check in via a fingerprint scanner. It seemed like a lot of fuss over very little. It wasn't as if I were handling the hush-hush formula for a soft drink, or the design of the latest "must-have" gadget.

The scanning episode came to mind as I was reading an article in today's siliconvalley.com about the expansion of biometric use and interest throughout the United States. (It's more than a little ironic that Europeans are more inclined to guard privacy rights than the country whose Constitution enshrines them.) The general sense from the piece is that biometrics have the potential to eliminate anonymity. The notion that this essential, though not always desirable, aspect of the human condition could become extinct is simply incredible. The next, chilling step is wiping out private thoughts.

The enthusiasm for biometrics is a curious development, given that many tech heavyweights are self-proclaimed libertarians. However, while content may yearn to be free, data begs to be controlled. The mug shot photographs, voice prints, eye scans, and other data points that identify one human being as distinct from another may also be translated into bits and bytes. The high priests of tech who want your data do not have any sense of boundaries. For them, data acquisition and management is the current generation's version of the California gold rush. Libertarian sentiments can be -- and will -- conveniently set aside when the mining of personal data becomes sensationally lucrative for its exploiters and providers.