Privacy vs Progress: Can they co-exist in the information age?

I came of age in the cable TV era. It brought us niche networks catering to our interests – science fiction, sports, news, movies – and this was a revelation. Add in VCRs and our world of entertainment had changed forever.Only our cable companies and video rental stores knew our viewing habits, according to what package we subscribed to or videos we borrowed. And if you didn't like the looks of the clerk at the rental store, you could always go to a different one or come back later.Our credit card companies knew quite a bit about us – where we shopped and when, what we bought and how much. But we could always pay with cash.Paying tolls was always a pain in the butt, though, scrounging for change, or making sure you had enough tokens. I hated it when I missed the basket. Then E-Z Pass came along and it was a fabulous time-saver. The tiny sensor in it pinged the toll booth and you didn't even have to stop when going through.Were we approaching a future where we could pay via a retina scanner or thumbprint? How cool would that be? For sci-fi geeks like me, it seemed a dream was coming true.We forgot, however, about the future predicted by writers such as Philip K. Dick and George Orwell. A future with no privacy, where even thoughts could be our undoing.Sure, the tech was amazing and cool. I don't know a single person who saw Minority Report who didn't come out of it wanting the glass wall computer that Tom Cruise was use. A swipe here, a flick of the wrist there, and you could control what you were studying or reading or viewing.Then we got those computers - the iPods and iPhones and iPads and started swiping away. (I'm sure Apple is working on one just like in the movie). We started buying music by the song instead of album, apps that catered to our every interest. Do you even realize how much Apple (or Google, just through Google Play) knows about you and your likes and dislikes and interests?We happily took to Friendster, MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare – to each and every new social platform. Abandoning our privacy for a free way to talk to other people. Suck on that, Ma Bell!So we became the product. All that data made us a very valuable product. This accelerated the erosion of our privacy. Now we're overlaying that data with information from our Fitbits, Misfit Shines, and Fuelbands, and further speeding up that erosion.But we want to connect all our data, right? We want to track our fitness. We want to keep track of everywhere we’ve been and when and with whom. We just don’t want marketers or "the government" to have it.But think on this Symantec took a $70 Raspberry Pi and was able to snag all sorts of data being broadcast by fitness wearables in public. What they did wasn't high-tech. They did it to show it could be done, so people and the wearables companies would be aware of the problem. But you can almost guarantee that someone else is out there doing it right now with less benign intentions.And who wants a Glassholes next to us in the bathroom? But Glass isn’t the only wearable camera and may well be one of the more noticeable wearable cameras. Who knows how much of our lives is being caught on camera right now?Lest you think I believe it's all doom and gloom and the world is going to hell in a handbasket, let me share with you a sports bra. This wearable has had a 90% accuracy rate of detecting early stage breast cancer. That reminds us of an optimistic, relatively utopian Star Trek future.But if someone hacks the tech that powers that bra, we could find ourselves in Gattaca, where our genetics dictate our future. A world where what our genes say about us rules our lives, and we don't the ability to change that path.Let's face it: no matter what security measures are put in place, we are approaching a future where any information will be available to the highest bidder. And there's more information available about us than ever before.The gulf between haves and have-nots will widen, where those with money will literally be able to buy more time, and those without will not.The real question is: Can we have the progress we say we want and retain a measure of privacy? I’d like to think the answer is yes. But I don’t know. Hopefully, there are minds greater than mine working on this problem.Tell me what you think. What future will be ours? One of optimism and hope, or a dark dystopian world where privacy is but a distant memory?This blog post is based on a presentation I was asked to deliver at Ignite NYC's 16th event, "Sensors, Devices, and Wearables: Humans Interconnected."  Privacy photo by Alan Cleaver via Flickr Creative CommonsProgress photo by David Ingram via Flickr Creative Commons