[ad_1]
We have all seen a steady increase in living standards and life expectancy over the past century. And for those of us who were fortunate enough to have lived in the Western world, we have enjoyed peace and security for as long as most of us can remember.
But if the current pandemic has shown us anything, it is that things can change dramatically and very quickly. In just two weeks, the United States has lost half of the jobs created in the past decade; it is no wonder that Nouriel Roubini compares the impact of Covid-19 with that of an asteroid hitting planet Earth.
As the staggering economic impact of the pandemic becomes clearer, the case of a prolonged blockade becomes increasingly difficult to solve. With each day spent under lockdown, you see more businesses affected and put a bit of a recovery appearance out of reach.
While surprising in scale, government support packages and central bank stimulus can only go so far. There is now a real risk of mass unemployment, the implications of which are profound, not only for the economy but also for society.
We are now faced with what has been described as a “coronavirus trilemma”. We can end the blockage and risk triggering a second wave of infections more damaging than the initial outbreak. Alternatively, we can keep the lock on until a vaccine is ready, but this would likely cause unimaginable harm to business and society.
The third option is to relax some of the restrictions while ensuring that those who have or may have the virus remain isolated, requiring some form of behavioral surveillance and conditioning. The tools range from the least invasive and apparently useful (such as alerting citizens when they are close to infected people) to the frankly Orwellian ones (in mid-March, the Israeli government announced plans to access the data on the phones of the people to track their movement and contact with others).
Even if they wanted to, it would be extremely difficult for politicians to opt for the first option. Therefore, we are likely to have to choose between an economic catastrophe and an erosion of civil liberties. We can try to gradually reduce some of the restrictions (this has already started in Austria). But without mass testing, contact tracing, and forced isolation, we are likely to find ourselves locked up again facing the same trilemma.
While some fiercely oppose any threat to our privacy, Facebook’s relentless popularity, even after the Cambridge Analytica scandal, suggests that most people are happy to give up some of their data in order to access something they consider beneficial. .
Surely, if offered to choose between financial hardship and a temporary invasion of privacy and civil liberties, many people would opt for the latter.
Of course, concerns about the creep of surveillance are justified. If, by sacrificing our privacy, we could stop the spread of the virus and overcome the pandemic, we would soon ask ourselves if similar surveillance technology could help us solve other social problems. Perhaps we could eliminate tax evasion, tackle high crime rates, or help healthcare providers treat other diseases and save more lives?
To avoid a permanent invasion of privacy, we could have expiration dates built-in and blocked in the software, effectively setting it to self-destruct after a certain period of time.
If Brexit were an act of extreme economic self-harm, then opting for a prolonged lockout would be to reach a knife. If there was ever a reason to deploy the full strength of the software, then surely this is the reason.
Mark Tluszcz is CEO of Mangrove Capital Partners and President of Wix.com.
