Sochi officials bolster security for the long run

The Sochi Winter Olympics has finally begun to snowball as Norway takes the lead in gold medals after their outstanding performance in the 15 kilometer biathlon. The excitement pulled the viewers’ attention off of something that concerned many before the events started: security.

Earlier in the month, NBC broadcasted several stories of hackers gaining access into people’s phones, even showing their reporter’s phone getting hacked just a few minutes after connecting to wifi in a local coffee shop. Recent news, however, reported that the broadcast was a hoax — the reporter had intentionally visited a malicious website to make a point.

Despite subsequent antagonism towards the staged news coverage, Olympics security should certainly not be taken lightly. The host country has a degree of accountability for keeping thousands of visitors safe from dangers including terrorists, environmental health risks and hackers. Historically, the Olympics has often galvanized host countries to evaluate their security infrastructure and, if necessary, perform a major overhaul to replace outdated technologies with far more capable ones. In fact, in spite of the frenzy surrounding the arduous fight for gold during events, one of the lasting legacies of every Olympics is actually the government’s new surveillance systems.

For example, just before the 2008 Olympics, China bought Western surveillance technologies, including cameras armed with biometric identification software. What sellers may not have realized, however, is that the use of the surveillance equipment after the Olympics had ended. There were some controversial issues surrounding the possible use of these technologies to abuse certain human rights, one of which is obviously privacy.

In the 2012 Olympics, London became the first to blanket itself in CCTV cameras, which was also nicknamed “Ring of Steel” because of its impenetrability to avoid surveillance. There was some controversy surrounding the design of the 2012 Olympic mascot, a cartoon which seemed to feature a camera as its eye. Soon, the surveillance was adapted by the police department to capture criminals via facial recognition software.

The surveillance renovation, which turned out to be a billion dollar project, became one of the largest security overhauls in London’s history. Sochi faces the responsibility of thickening its security to protect itself from terrorist threats and has invested in surveillance blimps, countless cameras and something known as VibraImage, which measures vibrations coming from peoples’ neck and head muscles to detect people who could be feeling mental agitations. Furthermore, registration to the Olympics requires a heavy background check, stripping away much of the privacy that visitors would appreciate.

In light of threats of cyber-terrorism, Russia has also bolstered its surveillance online in 2012. In preparation of the influx of foreign visitors, Kremlin decided to bring all regional databases together into one registry, giving the government the free will to inspect Internet activity in Russia. Every activity on the Internet, even by visitors, can thus be analyzed by the government.

Like the Olympics have done in the past, the Games have given Russia a good reason to significantly change their security infrastructure. But a question remains on how these systems are going to be used after the events are done. Just as in the case for China and London, the risk of reduced privacy for Russian citizens and visitors is questionable.