Privacy Story 2020

By Richard (Age 13.5, Chinese International School)

I reached for the roll of black tape by the side of my desk. It was placed there since the hackers on the internet have discovered a way to access the webcams on computers. The little green light, that was on my computer which signaled that the webcam was on, was blacked out by a small strip of tape. I sighed, leaning back onto a chair, which was probably the only private part of my world growing up. My curtains were closed as usual - the hackers around the world had long since discovered how to hack into government satellites, and although the police and the UN have tried hard, not one hacker has been caught.

I didn't use Facebook anymore, after an incredibly scary episode including me, a hacker from the internet with a picture of me outside my door and a sick smile. I wasn't really missing out on much, anyway. No one used Facebook anymore, except a few "daring rebels" who simply thought using Facebook was like a game. Google had recently tried to put up a "safe" Facebook replacement called GoogleCommunicate, but considering how easily the hackers broke into Google satellites, no one really bothered to try it out. New anti-virus programs had been released with the added function to prevent key-logging (a method by which a hacker records all the keys that you press) and my parents had bought me the program to install on my Mac. It was time for school, and comparing this world to that of eight years ago, it's incredible how things have changed.

I walked out. I waited outside my house, staring at the sky. It was unnerving to know the number of satellites up in space. There were probably two satellites watching your every move. The school bus came, and along with my surrounding environment, consisting of modern grey buildings and tinted windows, the bus had changed. The whole bus was painted a shiny black, and the windows were tinted. Why? I was lucky to go to one of the higher-end schools of this little town and the school was worried about student privacy. Two of this city's most powerful men had sons or daughters in this school. The whole bus being a big piece of shiny black metal on wheels made it harder for satellites to distinguish what was the window and what was just the side of the bus. The school was not so different from before. However, the once open corridors were walled up and the sports field and basketball court each got a roof. It was scary the amount of money that people spent to keep their identities safe from some creepy stalkers.

Photo via Wikimedia Commons

Even as the bus trudged along the road, security cameras swiveled to face the vehicle. The corporate sign "Google" was written in bold blue letters along the side of the camera, and "for your personal safety" was inscribed underneath. I didn't believe it. At first, Google was the hero of the cyber privacy crisis and by 2015 Google even had a military force designated to stop such cyber criminals. However, Google began to realize that these military forces were not producing satisfying results, and although the military scheme was not abandoned, the soldiers were increasingly showing behavior that of a hitman or assassin. Innocent people were killed and the UN forced Google to stop the scheme. Since then, they have been working on safer, newer methods that could be like our original life, such as GoogleCommunicate, but the results haven't turned out too well. Who knows: perhaps by 2060 computers might be banished.

As I slowly doze off to the rhythmic bumps of the wheels, I do not notice a little red light on a satellite, hundred of miles away in space from me, flash. A little red dot. And I do not notice a man, plugged into a huge computer, wires spreading across his desk, connecting antennae boxes, two keyboards, and three screens. He starts to smile.