Introduction

Computers scare people. There are many levels of this fear. Technophobia is a common phenomenon, exemplified by the stereotypical example of the senior citizen who refuses to use a word processor and does his/her typing on a manual typewriter instead. Technophobia can be categorized very generally: It affects the old more than the young, females over males, minorities over whites, and the poor over the rich.

The roots of technophobia are myriad. In many cases, it is simply e fear of the unknown. Many people (especially those of those groups ntioned above) simply have not had enough exposure to computers and formation technology to understand them. In addition to that, when mputers were first introduced, they were difficult to use, prompting many users to give up after trying. Another root aspect, the one that I will concentrate on here, concerns the fear of the development of an "electronic Big Brother." In 1988, it was estimated that the average citizen had files present in eighteen different government databases.[1] In addition to that, almost all private firms compile their own databases:

Every time you make a phone call or rent a video, pay for
something by check or credit card, fly in a plane or go to the doctor, a
notation is made in a computer. Get a driver's license, register to vote,
apply for a marriage license--that information is also in a computer. As
all this information gets compiled, a picture is being painted, an
electronic portrait of your personal life and habits.[2]

People fear the creation of an all-encompassing database, one that includes such information as taxes, credit rating, driving record, criminal record, and every other type of personal data available under one easy heading. To some extent the fears of this happening are palpable: in 1989 civil libertarians defeated a Federal Bureau of Investigation proposal to "link its criminal data banks with computerized records at airline reservation systems, car rental companies, and phone companies." [3]

The language of this article contains the giveaway as to what people are truly afraid of. They are not necessarily afraid of computer technology, but of the possible Orwellian implications of some applications of this technology. Simply put, people want their privacy to be sacrosanct. They do not want to have their personal lives on file. This becomes more and more difficult to prevent as the world known as cyberspace increases its user base. As the Internet and commercial online services link to each other and grow in size, and credit card companies, banks, and marketing firms link to the Internet, more and more information becomes "on file" somewhere. The fear is not of the mere existence it . People don't want the IRS scrutinizing all of their financial records, looking for tax inconsistencies. At the same time, they don't want a teenage hacker destroying their credit record, using their phone card, and changing their criminal records around.