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The Sammy Screamer is a recently successful device whose cute triangle design would render people to underestimate its effectiveness in keeping people’s items safe. Basically, the device emits a loud noise the instant your item is moved from where it was placed. The idea itself is similar to Lupo (another lost and found device). In a world where there are so many devices meant to prevent theft, one can only wonder whether as a result of the technological advancement, theft has actually increased.
On the whole, the last two decades have seen many technological breakthroughs, one after the other, much of which were driven so strongly due to both the World and Cold Wars. One country competing with another to be the best. But it goes deeper than that. In a physical sense it was meant to be a way to protect the country from enemy invaders. Now, however, there seems to be a shift towards the virtual protection, in other words our intellectual property. This includes private information such as our birthdates, names, school history and even the name for our business.
So, how much of what we put online or even information we willingly give to a company, is safe. A clear example of how our information is not safe is when we simply agree to download something without reading the contract because of the sheer length of it. If we take Apple for instance, when we first download the software that we need, we are presented with a contract that merely needs us to check the accept button and press next to continue. The font used by the company is incredibly formal and frankly quite small; this added to the fact that “waiting” for anything in these days results in millions of people not knowing what they have just agreed to.
Of course when a person’s data is then abused by a company, the common argument would be that they had not read the contract and clause that allowed the company to use it. In respect to the law of contract in England, in the absence of misrepresentation or fraud this argument would not suffice. Caveat Emptor is the latin phrase translated as buyers beware, the implication here is that it is solely up to the individual to take caution in whatever they are agreeing to, that is frequently faced by this generation.
In fact, moving away from the legal arena, the carefulness once found in the earlier part of this technological movement, thanks to internet safety classes that reminded people of ‘stranger danger’ seem to have taken a backseat. Strangely enough, talking to people you don’t know online seems to have grown in popularity again with the creation of Omegle. This website randomly selects two people to chat with each other, or it may be based on the interests they have included. One person dubbed simply as ‘You’ and the other as ‘Stranger.’ There have been problems regarding this website such as some people being far too sexual or may be harassing one another, yet it is still well liked by society.
In conclusion, technology has many benefits as seen through many other articles, blogs and so on. However, it also brings so many risks that are not as profoundly declared to be problems because of the normality found within today’s society. The minute we realise the enormity of the threat such as in the phone hacking scandal, it really emphasises how our lives are not as secure as it once was for no other but technological advancement. Lastly, I’d like to emphasise that I am always happy for any technological improvement done but societies’ view of technology should not be as relaxed as it is now.
