Big Brother is watching us all

As the 29th Olympic Games kicks into full stride, the gaze of the world is firmly on Beijing but by far the most vigilant observer will be the unblinking host writes the Nelson Mail in an editorial.

 The huge foreign media contingent, armed with cameras, recorders and perhaps even a few reporters' notebooks, pales alongside the hundreds of thousands of closed circuit television cameras trained on the streets, squares, parks and other public places where tourists and athletes will gather. Big Brother will definitely be watching everyone and everything, everywhere.

Beijing was already among the world's most watched cities: apparently, authorities have added 300,000 new CCTV cameras especially for the games, along with other features such as anti-aircraft missiles beside the main Olympic stadium. Though even the flinty-eyed People's Armed Police officers have been trained to smile at least for the next fortnight or so woe betide the unfortunate tourist who meanders into a sensitive area, initiates an impromptu human rights protest or, having partaken in a little too much Chinese hospitality, finds himself caught short while walking back to the hotel and hops behind a statue to relieve the pressure.

The increasing use of video monitoring for security or more sinister reasons is not simply the domain of single-party police states, of course. Britain reputedly has four million CCTVs, constantly on the lookout for littering, the theft of opposition leaders' pushbikes or other equally heinous activities. Closer to home, the police and the Nelson City Council have been using them for years as a means to keep an eye on troublespots, such as the main carparks after dark. The ubiquitous little lenses are also trained on places of interest in Richmond, and even High St Motueka has a half-dozen or so of them, silently monitoring our every move as life increasingly mirrors the art of George Orwell's dystopian 1984.

It is not only the authorities taking to security cameras with growing enthusiasm. Nelson business owner Russell Scott was so peeved by the number of people using his shop's entrance as a toilet that he sent overnight snaps of a young girl, captured in flagrante delicto, to the Nelson Mail which, after giving due weight to issues such as taste and privacy, opted to publish it. A Waikato University student made headlines this week after blowing the whistle on a Hamilton bar, which placed CCTV cameras in its toilets ostensibly for security reasons. Another loo-view stink came last month in Rotorua, where Starbucks staff discovered a camera, hidden by a member of the public, in a cubicle in the unisex toilets.

The latter case in particular illustrates the potential for abuse as surveillance equipment becomes more sophisticated, miniaturised, accessible and ever cheaper. Use a public changing room at the beach or a swimming pool, for example, and you just might wind up featuring on the likes of YouTube, or worse. Simply scratch one's nose, yawn or raise subtly on one cheek in supposed privacy and risk your very humanness being exposed to the world. And let's not forget National Party get-togethers, which might need to employ Maxwell Smart's cone of silence to ensure sensitive matters can be discussed in private. Though limited use of CCTV for legitimate security reasons can, on the face of it, be justified shopkeepers should not have to put up with phantom piddlers, burglars or worse it is hard to avoid feeling that society is on a slippery, and increasingly public, slope. In the 21st century, 1984 draws ever closer.