surveillance and society 

About: surveillance and society is an academic journal published by Surveillance Studies Network. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Politics & Context (language use). It has an ISSN identifier of 1477-7487. It is also open access. Over the lifetime, 737 publications have been published receiving 15590 citations. The journal is also known as: Surveillance and society (Online).

Datafication, dataism and dataveillance: Big Data between scientific paradigm and ideology

Abstract: Metadata and data have become a regular currency for citizens to pay for their communication services and security—a trade-off that has nestled into the comfort zone of most people. This article deconstructs the ideological grounds of datafication. Datafication is rooted in problematic ontological and epistemological claims. As part of a larger social media logic, it shows characteristics of a widespread secular belief. Dataism, as this conviction is called, is so successful because masses of people — naively or unwittingly — trust their personal information to corporate platforms. The notion of trust becomes more problematic because people’s faith is extended to other public institutions (e.g. academic research and law enforcement) that handle their (meta)data. The interlocking of government, business, and academia in the adaptation of this ideology makes us want to look more critically at the entire ecosystem of connective media.

Sousveillance: Inventing and Using Wearable Computing Devices for Data Collection in Surveillance Environments.

Abstract: This paper describes using wearable computing devices to perform "sousveillance" (inverse surveillance) as a counter to organizational surveillance. A variety of wearable computing devices generated different kinds of responses, and allowed for the collection of data in different situations. Visible sousveillance often evoked counter-performances by front-line surveillance workers. The juxtaposition of sousveillance with surveillance generates new kinds of information in a social surveillance situation.

The Work of Watching One Another: Lateral Surveillance, Risk, and Governance

Abstract: This article explores a range of technologies for 'lateral surveillance' or peer monitoring arguing that in a climate of perceived risk and savvy skepticism individuals are increasingly adopting practices associated with marketing and law enforcement to gain information about friends, family members, and prospective love interests. The article argues that the adoption of such technologies corresponds with an ideology of 'responsibilization' associated with the risk society: that consumers need training in the consumption of services and the development of expertise to monitor one another. Rather than displacing 'top-down' forms of monitoring, such practices emulate and amplify them, fostering the internalization of government strategies and their deployment in the private sphere. In an age in which everyone is to be considered potentially suspect, all are simultaneously urged to become spies.

The Public Domain: Surveillance in Everyday Life

Abstract: People create profiles on social network sites and Twitter accounts against the background of an audience . This paper argues that closely examining content created by others and looking at one’s own content through other people’s eyes, a common part of social media use, should be framed as social surveillance. While social surveillance is distinguished from traditional surveillance along three axes (power, hierarchy, and reciprocity), its effects and behavior modification is common to traditional surveillance. Drawing on ethnographic studies of United States populations, I look at social surveillance, how it is practiced, and its impact on people who engage in it. I use Foucault’s concept of capillaries of power to demonstrate that social surveillance assumes the power differentials evident in everyday interactions rather than the hierarchical power relationships assumed in much of the surveillance literature. Social media involves a collapse of social contexts and social roles, complicating boundary work but facilitating social surveillance. Individuals strategically reveal, disclose and conceal personal information to create connections with others and tend social boundaries. These processes are normal parts of day-to-day life in communities that are highly connected through social media.

Picturing Algorithmic Surveillance: The Politics of Facial Recognition Systems

Abstract: This paper opens up for scrutiny the politics of algorithmic surveillance through an examination of Facial Recognition Systems (FRSs) in video surveillance, showing that seemingly mundane design decisions may have important political consequences that ought to be subject to scrutiny. It first focuses on the politics of technology and algorithmic surveillance systems in particular: considering the broad politics of technology; the nature of algorithmic surveillance and biometrics, claiming that software algorithms are a particularly important domain of techno-politics; and finally considering both the growth of algorithmic biometric surveillance and the potential problems with such systems. Secondly, it gives an account of FRS's, the algorithms upon which they are based, and the biases embedded therein. In the third part, the ways in which these biases may manifest itself in real world implementation of FRS's are outlined. Finally, some policy suggestions for the future development of FRS's are made; it is noted that the most common critiques of such systems are based on notions of privacy which seem increasingly at odds with the world of automated systems.