If given a choice between losing your wallet or losing your cell phone, which would you choose? When was the last time you went a day without checking, using, or looking at your phone? Who would you give full access to beyond your spouse? Or, not even your spouse?

Could you put your phone in the hotel safe and explore a new city without it? Did that thought just make you anxious? (It’s called travelling. Think back, we’ve all done it.)

Remember the early days of cell phones? If you forgot your phone at home you could still function. Now, forgetting your phone is like leaving a lifeline behind. I have senior friends who would balk if their adult children asked them to wear an alert button but they won’t use the stairs to their basement without their phone in hand.

There is an insidious threat to this mass love affair/dependence we have with our phones and it’s not about the time wasted or the volume of personal information contained therein. We already know about the slyness of corporate advertising. Without specific privacy settings activated, the phone is listening to our conversations, watching what sites we visit and noting our casual online window shopping. We’re targeted for our next most likely purchase. Some people just don’t care that this is going on. The marketing spy does not know who the browser is specifically. So why worry?

It is one thing for corporations to use cellphone data for marketing purposes but imagine that same level of surveillance employed on a political level. What if because of innocent scrolling for information on say, Russian history, your news sites and feeds were bombarded with pro-Putin articles? Or what if someone could be negatively affected for having interests that were opposed to the current political power? You can see where I’m going with this. The technology is already here. 

There is no solution. We’re not giving up our cellphones anytime soon. There is only vigilance. And who should be in charge of that?

While googling for research on this post, I was more than a little creeped out. There exists a vast array of ‘spyware’ technology and apps that enable the user to see who and what others are messaging on their phone. Think about the implications of that for a moment.

There is much fodder here for fiction. In real life, I’m sure this kind of phone surveillance and response already exists and is employed somewhere in the world. Double check your privacy settings.

Next week, I’ll aim for a lighter topic…

Keep your joy.

Anne Milne is an every Sunday blogger, unless it’s a holiday weekend. Or summertime. Facebook or email.