Privacy can be defined as the ability of an individual to seclude themselves, or information about themselves in order to express themselves selectively. In today’s world, technology plays a huge role, allowing personal information to be exposed to almost everyone who can access the internet.

How much privacy do we actually have? Each and every day, more and more people willingly put our information out for everyone to see; how much privacy should we actually have?

“I think people should be careful about what they post,” senior Julia Gielniak said. “We need to be careful about what everyone can see.”

Recently, the United States FBI and Apple got into quite the dual. The FBI was seeking access to the phone of a man responsible for a 14-person shooting in San Bernardino last December.

The FBI was seeking Apple to unlock the shooter’s phone by disabling the setting that locks the phone after so many invalid password attempts. Apple denied this request for the reason that if they gave the government this capability for one phone, they would be able to unlock millions of phones.

“I wouldn’t want the government to have access to my phone,” senior Olivia Windorf said. “I think people deserve to have a certain amount of privacy.”

At this point, the case was taken to court and is recognized as one of the most significant court cases involving encryption and data privacy between the government and a technology company. The FBI later stated that Apple is blocking them from stopping terrorist attacks, but Apple replied that privacy is key to protect customers from hackers.

Some issues in today’s world are pretty easy to pick a side, but not so much with this case. If the case is broken down, it really comes down to one thing: protection. Would you rather protect yourself and your private information, or protect groups of people, including yourself, that are at risk of terrorist attacks?

“I would want to protect groups of people from terrorists,” senior Drew Wager said. “There’s really nothing to hide on my phone in the first place.”

The only real reason that someone would feel concerned about the government or others having access to their phone is if they have something to hide. But, it is always nice to not feel like someone is monitoring all of your stuff all the time.

Personal privacy is a very big concern and it is important in keeping a certain level of respect for the people. Giving the government slight access to your phone could save our country and others from a terrorist attack. Hopefully in the near future, an agreement can be made that benefits both the people’s personal privacy and public safety.