新视野大学英语读写教程听力 第四册 课文 4t04c

[by:和谐英语学习网|http://www.hxen.net|和谐英语||和谐英语学习网]
[00:00.00]喜欢hxen.net，就把hxen.net复制到QQ个人资料中！ Privacy in the Information Age
[00:-1.00]Imagine a small plastic card that holds all manner of information about you
[00:-2.00]on a tiny memory chip (芯片):your date of birth, Social Security Number,
[00:-3.00]credit and medical histories.
[00:-4.00]And suppose the same card lets you drive a car,get medicine,
[00:-5.00]get cash from machines, pay parking tickets, and collect government benefits.
[00:-6.00]One version of this so-called smart card is already in use.
[00:-7.00]Some insurance companies issue medical history cards of customers,
[00:-8.00]who need them to get medicine.
[00:-9.00]This type of technology evolves out of convenience,
[00:10.00]says Evan Hendricks (伊万·亨德里克斯),
[00:11.00]editor of the Privacy Times (《私密时代》) newspaper,
[00:12.00]but "the dark side is that landlords,employers,
[00:13.00]and insurance companies could say we won't do business with you
[00:14.00]unless you show us your card."
[00:15.00]Personal information gets harder to protect
[00:16.00]as more companies and government agencies build
[00:17.00]computerized databases (数据库) that are easily linked.
[00:18.00]"You can go from one database to another
[00:19.00]the way people go from one bar to another,"says Hendricks.
[00:20.00]"The information superhighway will probably be developed by corporations,
[00:21.00]but the government is always willing to associate itself with these things.
[00:22.00]Companies develop databases to better target customers
[00:23.00]and then the government uses these databases for investigating crimes."
[00:24.00]According to writer Simson L.Garfinkel (辛姆森·L. 加芬克尔),
[00:25.00]the database trend started with Ronald Reagan's stories of people on welfare
[00:26.00]cheating the government.
[00:27.00]"It was called Operation Match (匹配行动),"says a privacy expert,
[00:28.00]"and it matched databases of people who owed money to the government
[00:29.00]with other databases of people who received money from the government.
[00:30.00]Operation Match went after government employees who had not paid back student loans
[00:31.00]the government had given them for college,
[00:32.00]and welfare clients with large unreported incomes."
[00:33.00]Saving the public from cheats and criminals
[00:34.00]has been an effective excuse for cutting back everyone's personal privacy.
[00:35.00]The government has been pressing for computer makers
[00:36.00]to include a special chip in their machines
[00:37.00]to allow police agencies to listen to electronic communications.
[00:38.00]The administration claims that failing to do so
[00:39.00]would be begging terrorists and criminals to plot together
[00:40.00]via the information superhighway.
[00:41.00]That may still seem like something from a spy movie;
[00:42.00]more troubling is the growing ease with which everyday information can be accessed.
[00:43.00]Take the computerization of medical records.
[00:44.00]As one writer points out,
[00:45.00] "your video renting habits are better protected by law
[00:46.00]than your medical records."
[00:47.00]That's because there's more money in your medical records.
[00:48.00] A privacy expert says insurance companies generate
[00:49.00]"lists of individuals with certain kinds of medical problems
[00:50.00]and then turn around and sell those lists to medicine companies
[00:51.00]and other businesses."
[00:52.00]Medical records are used to make a whole host of decisions about you
[00:53.00]that aren't related to your health.
[00:54.00]According to a 1991 government report,
[00:55.00]"50 percent of employers regularly use medical record information
[00:56.00]for hiring and promotion purposes.
[00:57.00]Of those who use this information, nearly 20 percent…
[00:58.00]do not inform their employees that their medical records have been used for such purposes."
[00:59.00]One company won't hire smokers,
[-1:00.00]and another fired an employee after finding out he drank heavily at parties.
[-1:-1.00]Employers and landlords often buy this information