In today's day and age, to some degree, the general public has consented or accepted the simple fact that not everything they say or do is private. It's an unfortunate truth, but it is one all the same, from social media apps to facial recognition software, there's simply no way of being a ghost in this era while at the same time living a modern life. In the TED talk by Juan Enriquez, he brings up the issue of facial recognition, and immediately it made me think of how not too long ago facial recognition software was more or less something from the world of a sci-fi show. Now we walk around with that very same technology in the palms of our hands and don't even bat an eye.
Fact is when you REALLY stop and think about all the things that could potentially give away private information about us, like our phones, you realize that there are rarely any moments where you are truly private. On top of that is how accessible that information is to anyone that knows what they are doing, for example, as "Gen Z" all I've known is technology, I grew up with it, watched it advance as I grew through the years. I became more competent with it, more knowledgable, more skilled to the point where finding someone online isn't really much of a challenge.
My generation has learned how to maneuver social media and find out nearly any bit of information that we want. And yet, I don't consider myself a hacker, if you were to take 500 "Gen Z" people and ask them if they consider themselves to be a hacker you might get 1 or 2 and that's if you're lucky. That's because the title of "hacker" is in a class entirely of its own in our eyes, and that title is reserved for those with far more skill and understanding than what the majority of us are capable of. For as long as I can remember, hackers have been glorified in pop culture, you always see these cool scenes in movies and tv shows where they break through the firewall in seconds and have hundreds of lines of code streaming past on like 5 different computer screens and growing up seeing that hackers in that light was cool.
In my eyes back then, hackers were the modern-day robin hoods, and that's mainly because that's how they were portrayed by the media, it wasn't until I became older that I fully grasped the power, range, and accessibility that they held at the end of their fingertips. It's kinda scary, and I say that because I know the extent of information that I can gather on someone just by knowing their name, and what I'm capable of finding, it helps put into perspective the capabilities of a hacker. End of the day, coming to grips with that reality is truly frightening.
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