Deconstructing the Relationship Between Privacy and Security

From a government or law-enforcement perspective, one common model of privacy and security postulates that security and privacy are opposite ends of a single continuum. While this model has appealing properties, it is overly simplistic. The relationship between privacy and security is not a binary operation in which one can be traded for the other until a balance is found. One fallacy common in privacy and security discourse is that trade-offs are effective or even necessary. Consider the remarks of New York Police Department Commissioner Ray Kelly shortly after the Boston Marathon bombing, “I’m a major proponent of cameras. I think the privacy issue has really been taken off the table”