Government Surveillance and Crypto-Analysis in the Light of Public Safety and Privacy Concerns in Digital Fortress

Government Surveillance and Crypto-Analysis in the Light of Public Safety and Privacy Concerns in Digital Fortress
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Government Surveillance and Crypto-Analysis in the Light of Public Safety and Privacy Concerns in Digital Fortress
Digital Fortress is an American novel written by Dan Brown. Indeed, it reveals how the National Security Agency (NSA) works by collecting data and analyzing it to protect Americans. The primary themes in Digital Fortress are government surveillance cryptography, and public privacy and safety concerns. In particular, the book shows how the government facilitates data collection to safeguard its citizens’ well-being. However, it appears that there is no boundary when it comes to the information that the state gathers from its citizens. In other words, individuals’ privacy is violated through government surveillance. If the data collected from citizens can get into the public domain, people might not believe it since they are not aware that they are under surveillance. The paper assesses the ethics of government surveillance and crypto-analysis as depicted in Digital Fortress, in light of public safety and privacy concerns.
In particular, Digital Fortress shows that the NSA has a code-breaking supercomputer called TRANSLTR. The primary purpose of TRANSLTR is to break numerous codes to obtain people’s information. At some point, the supercomputer encounters a new code, Digital Fortress, which it cannot decipher. Commander Trevor Strathmore wonders what might be comprised by the code since TRANSLTR is unable to break it. The individual decides to ask for help from Susan Fletcher, who is a renowned cryptographer so that she can crack it (Brown, 1998). Specifically, cryptography entails coding or concealing information such that it can only be decrypted by the receiver. Encrypting data improves information security since even if the decrypted data gets into the wrong hands it is rendered useless. That is why Strathmore is more concerned about cracking the new code that TRANSLTR was unable to decipher. The only thing that Strathmore knows is that the code was written by a former NSA employee, Ensei Tankado. Fletcher takes over the task of figuring out what is Digital Fortress. At that moment, no one knows why Tankado came up with a code that cannot be cracked by TRANSLTR. If the person wanted to protect the government files, he should have created a code that could be decrypted by specific individuals or the supercomputer to pass the message. In that light, Digital Fortress attracts the attention of Strathmore and Fletcher since the NSA must have an appropriate explanation of the code. Since Tankado worked at the NSA, he must have figured out how TRANSLTR worked and was able to write a code that it could not crack.
Not everything that involves national security is communicated to Americans. On that note, it means that some things are done behind closed doors such that no information is leaked to the public. When Tankado worked for the NSA, he was not pleased by realizing that the government intruded on its citizens’ private lives (Brown, 199...