What effect is E-Government having on our privacy?

The birth of the digital era has brought about a number of staggering changes to our society, as you will know if you have had the chance to read my previous blogs. It seems that the storm of the digital area is one that the government has been extremely anxious to get involved with. When you consider how many people across the globe use the internet and various other digital forms, it is clear to see why the government would use the internet to address, contact and research the citizens of their country.

My problem with the whole idea of having an E-government is the lack of privacy that it allows the citizens of a country. With the government obtaining more and more information on its citizens online, the feel of personal privacy is lost. I found an interesting passage on Wikipedia that helps to explain my arguement:

"Increased contact between government and its citizens goes both ways. Once e-government begins to develop and become more sophisticated, citizens will be forced to interact electronically with the government on a larger scale. This could potentially lead to a lack of privacy for civilians as their government obtains more and more information on them. In a worse case scenario, with so much information being passed electronically between government and civilians, a totalitarian-like system could develop. When the government has easy access to countless information on its citizens, personal privacy is lost."

The amount of information governments now posses on their citizens is actually quite scary, from your bank details to your home address. This "hyper-surveillance" as it is known is just another term that really scares me.

Its time to stop and look at how private our lives really are, do we really have real privacy anymore? Or have the lines between privacy and regulation become somewhat distorted?