The Rockford Files, "The House on Willis Avenue" (1978)
In this prescient episode from season 4 (episode 21) of The Rockford Files titled "The House on Willis Avenue," private investigator Jim Rockford (James Garner) uncovers a domestic government surveillance operation that is collecting intelligence on U.S. citizens. Surveillance data is concentrated in data centers, which are improbably located in suburban homes, and protected by remote surveillance systems and monitored by government agents.
Most remarkably, the episode concludes with with a didactic warning presented as a single text screen attributed to the "U.S. Privacy Protection Commission." The text states that real-world operations resembling those depicted in the preceding episode are being carried out by the government, in violation of citizens' rights to privacy and due process:
Secret information centers, building dossiers on individuals exist today. You have no legal right to know about them, prevent them, or sue for damages. Our liberty may well be the price we pay for perimitting this to continue unchecked.
The text is signed "Member, U.S. Privacy Protection Commission" but the sentiment is clearly meant as a summary of the political implication of the Rockford episode that viewers have just witnessed.
The chairman of the PPC, David Linowes would later (1989) write that, “silently but relentlessly the computer is making it easy for big business and government to erode our right to be let alone.” [Linowes, David F.,Privacy in America: Is Your Private Life in the Public Eye?, University of Illinois Press, Urbana, Illinois (1989)]
Most remarkably, the episode concludes with with a didactic warning presented as a single text screen attributed to the "U.S. Privacy Protection Commission." The text states that real-world operations resembling those depicted in the preceding episode are being carried out by the government, in violation of citizens' rights to privacy and due process:
Secret information centers, building dossiers on individuals exist today. You have no legal right to know about them, prevent them, or sue for damages. Our liberty may well be the price we pay for perimitting this to continue unchecked.
The text is signed "Member, U.S. Privacy Protection Commission" but the sentiment is clearly meant as a summary of the political implication of the Rockford episode that viewers have just witnessed.
The chairman of the PPC, David Linowes would later (1989) write that, “silently but relentlessly the computer is making it easy for big business and government to erode our right to be let alone.” [Linowes, David F.,Privacy in America: Is Your Private Life in the Public Eye?, University of Illinois Press, Urbana, Illinois (1989)]
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