The Data-Subject and Its Freedom

Abstract

With the emergence and sprawl of the Internet, people are wired in increasing numbers to data online. As the interface between humans and data starts to disappear due to better web integration at the front-end, interstices seem to be cut open in cyberspace by those who have gone too far in their dependence on this data h(e)aven. This paper attempts to look into one of those interstices to read traces of the existential status of the data-subject. The main argument will be that the dilemma of the data-subject, being prone to the spectral attraction of data yet always anxious about its helpless addiction to cyber-space, discloses certain aspects of freedom essential to human existence. Previous studies on existential freedom and civil liberties will be drawn upon to help understand the factical condition of the data-subject in a broader context of human freedom.