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Matrix revisited
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With rapid advances in science, you and I have less privacy, thanks to racked up security
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UPPING THE ANTE The world is getting increasingly suspicious and is keeping tabs on all and sundry Photo: D. Gopalakrishnan
Remember the forgettable movie Insaan, where Rahul Dev is the bad guy with a finger on the cellphone bomb? Imagine the improbable thing happening in real life, where the police can not only disarm the trigger, they can also unmask the terrorist.
This cracking of the matrix is possible thanks to a rising wave of security consciousness and the easy availability of gizmos. Part of it is catalysed by the infotech revolution that is bringing in more greenbacks, raising the stakes for those riding the boom. And post-IISc. strike in the city, mandarins in metros are taking no chances and are racking up the security to a level never seen before.
Currently there are about half-dozen cameras tracking the activity of citizens of Hyderabad round the clock. Standing under the dome camera is Ravi Reddy, a businessman from Vishakhapatnam, waiting for his cab. Does he know that his movements are being tracked and is he happy about it? "I don't know," he says looking up to the dome shaped thing which has Camera-4 written on it: "But I guess it will only make this railway station safe, and if passengers lose something they can easily recover, I think," he says.
Inside the railway station, beside the counter for platform tickets, K. Jhansi sits on a console with joystick and a bunch of remotes. Sitting there, she tracks the movement of passengers and goods. As she tracks the movements of people, all she has to do is pick up the phone and call her senior officers if she finds anything fishy. There is a recording of 10 days on the four-terabyte memory digital video recorder.
But the security is also becoming intrusive: enter a multiplex in Koramangala and your bag will be rifled through if you want to have two hours of movie madness.
In at least one big metro hotel, the management has thrown away the door key and added biometric iris scan feature so that only the occupants can enter their rooms.
"The terror threat has added a new dimension to security. We are only following orders, plus, most of our customers are okay with this kind of security," said an employee of a hotel, which has created a maze roadblock to its security paraphernalia.
Infotech MNCs have taken the fear factor to a different level by erasing the names of the companies from cabs transporting employees, even employee IDs don't have reference to the companies they are working for.
Is anyone losing sleep or are we sleeping better for it?
SERISH NANISETTI
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