Civil liberties or public health, or civil liberties and public health? Using surveillance technologies to tackle the spread of COVID-19

Abstract

To help tackle the spread of COVID-19 a range of surveillance technologies–smartphone apps, facial recognition and thermal cameras, biometric wearables, smart helmets, drones, and predictive analytics–have been rapidly developed and deployed. Used for contact tracing, quarantine enforcement, travel permission, social distancing/movement monitoring, and symptom tracking, their rushed rollout has been justified by the argument that they are vital to suppressing the virus, and civil liberties have to be sacrificed for public health. I challenge these contentions, questioning the technical and practical efficacy of surveillance technologies, and examining their implications for civil liberties, governmentality, surveillance capitalism, and public health.