Bodoky, Tamas

Policy Documentation Center

The day after tomorrow 
 
 
 
It has become clear by today that out of the two “sacred” objectives concerning 
digitalized, electronic information, that is personal data protection and publicity of 
data of public interest, the former one will merely be a vain hope, a momentary 
illusion. The latter one still can be achieved but many will not welcome it. 
 
In my opinion, business interests gaining faster and faster global influence that make 
consumer society run and political considerations since the terror attacks in America 
don’t allow privacy protection but quite the contrary, since both business and politics 
are concerned in the possible most thorough screening, monitoring of citizens and 
collecting information about them.  
 
If private persons want to get a job, loan or visa, or avail themselves of the obvious 
advantages of information society in any other ways they are forced to accept that 
their human rights and rights to self-determination concerning their personal 
information are curtailed or even ignored. In a digitalised world, each action leaves a 
trace on a server and the big brothers – the state, employers and banks, because of 
different considerations – are more and more curious to study, collect and organise 
these traces and base decisions on them that influence a person’s life.  
 
In the material world, satellites, street monitoring video cameras and biometric 
identification systems monitor all our steps. Our credit card information piling up in 
the information space reveal more than any CV, but also our telephone calls can be 
tapped and electronic mails can be checked if required. We shouldn’t have illusions: 
the ban of combining databases has become a dead letter, and the more and more 
advanced data-mining programs can transform the scattered digital traces into 
valuable information or personal profile.  
 
Private persons become perfectly transparent in the information society and there is 
no place to hide, unless they want to leave civilisation and live a nomadic life like 
some Luddite philosophers did. The only thing we can trust is that the increasingly 
perfect system will operate democratically, taking into account the interests of the 
whole society and will not turn against us in the form of a possible dictatorship. 
 
Unfortunately, concerning the publicity of data of public interest, there aren’t so 
strong concerns but just the opposite, several adverse interests impede the 
enforcement of the principle drawn up to ensure the transparency of the government 
and public institutes. Accordingly, making public data public is quite sluggish, 
especially in Hungary where strong private interests collaborate to conceal data of 
public interest.  
 
However, the example of states pioneering in freeing information shows that it is both 
desirable and possible to make data of public interest electronically available for 
everyone, and though it may cost a lot it is worth it. In Hungary, however, even 
representatives of the press are rejected to receive information that all citizens have 
the right to know, and various political forces try to intimidate Internet 
communication that has become a spontaneous forum to reveal data of public interest 
by censoring and controlling contents. 
 
On the one hand, the citizens of the evolving information society must be aware that 
more and more personal data of theirs are recorded and stored and affect their 
opportunities, and on the other hand, they also must spy and use their civil guts to 
enforce the publicity of data of public interest because equal or unequal access to 
information isn’t only a matter of principle but it will fundamentally determine what 
society we will live in the day after tomorrow.  
 


The day after tomorrow

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