Information Privacy on the Internet

Search engines, such as Google, keep record of all search queries and personal information regarding the users who made them, and so the government has been demanding the release of this information, so that it can protect national security by keeping track of suspected terrorist-linked individuals and groups. Many of these search engines, including Yahoo, AOL, and MSN have obliged, but Google is taking a stand, stating that by asking this, the government is overstepping its power and infringing upon people's privacy rights.
Privacy over the internet should be respected by the government, but to a certain extent. Granted, the power of the government should not be allowed to become so great as to trample completely on the liberties of the people, but the government has a duty to protect the nation as a whole. In order to achieve this, the government must remain knowledgeable about compromising information, such as security leaks and destructive intentions. This however, seems excruciatingly tedious with respect to maintaining civil liberties. Thus, the government should be able to attain information if and only if said information is vital to the security of the people and the nation. However, as to what is vital would surely be debated by the government and its people, as is the case of the NSA eavesdropping issue and the Google issue. Hence, this would only work if the government had restraint and if corruption was to a minimum. This, however, is not very plausible. Nevertheless, if the government had no knowledge and took no initiative to obtain any information regarding compromising issues, national and civil security would surely be less protected. As discussed prior, the problem is that the government needs to balance the need for the provision for the common defence and for the preservation of civil liberties.
Not only is national security a topic concerning Internet privacy, but also the adherence to laws: if the people are left unchecked, then penchants for crime and unlawfulness will develop.
Hence, the government should be informed of illegal activities on the Internet, such as child pornography, as well as activities that could present great danger, such as active participation in and support of pro-terrorism websites. Yet, this is only an ideal situation, since the government will surely not stop at this, but instead will proceed to obtain any information it desires. Overall, the balance between the people and the government seems to kept due to the perpetual conflict between the governed and the state: the government attempts to gain increasing control over the people, but when this becomes too clear and the people become cautious, they attack the government, forcing it to back down. This constant conflict seems to create equilibrium between the people and their government, in which the government does not become powerful enough to strip the governed of their liberties, but at the same time does not become weak enough to let its control and influence crumble. This can be applied to the issue of Internet privacy, since the people are striving to retain complete privacy of their activities, while the government is aggressive in its attempt to obtain all information that it can.
Thus, Internet privacy should be respected, as long as it does not infringe upon the nation's security and laws, as well as on others' liberties.