Happy New Year – 2013 might have been a disappointing year for tech, but for many it was a weird, wild roller coaster ride. Hopefully that ride is going to result in some very interesting destinations in 2014.
It’s tempting to make predictions about 2014 and wise heads prefer not to – what I’d refer to is a failed prediction from 2011, that that year would be remembered as the year of the security breach.
That was wrong. 2012 was worse and 2013 continued the trend of ever increasing corporate glitches and finished the year with two massive security breaches at Target and Snapchat. 2014 promises to be a year when the stakes become higher.
And then there were Edward Snowden’s revelations. Everyone who’s worked in or reported on the tech sector knew security agencies had the ability to snoop on the data of anyone they thought might be of interest, but few of us thought they would have engaged on such massive sweeps of the planet’s personal and business data.
Snowden’s leaks and the fallout from them have a long way to play out and the big story is going to be how the US justice system reacts to the creation of a surveillance state.
In countries like Australia that lack the US’ constitutional protections, fighting the constant spying of government agencies is probably a lost cause unless an economic collapse sees the authorities running out of money to operate their comprehensive monitoring programs.
What we can be certain of in light of ongoing privacy breaches by governments and businesses that the technology world is going to obsessed about security. That’s probably going to be the big, ongoing story for 2014, even if the mainstream media outlets focus on big TVs and the latest smartphone.
So Happy New Year and play nice on the internet. The Feds are watching.