The Royal Academy of Engineering in the UK in March 2007 completed a study to identify likely developments in information technology (IT) over the next five to ten years, to consider their impact on the citizen, and to make recommendations to optimize their benefits to society. The report focuses on where the developments in ITW have had a particularly significant impact in everyday lives - the use of IT in surveillance, data-capture, and identify management. "Technologies such as mobile phones, number plate recognition systems, surveillance cameras, and even London Transport's Oyster card can all be used to monitor people's daily movements. Underlying these technologies is the rapidly increasing capacity for data storage, allowing the information collected using these technologies to be stored for indefinite periods," the report concludes.
展开▼
