Less privacy, more security? Network Society in the times of PRISM

Today we live in Network Society, the concept that replaced Information Society. University of Lapland Institute for Law and Informatics focuses on researching the complexity and scope of this new Network Society. In order to do that The NETSO Project was established – Network Society as a Paradigm for Legal and Societal Thinking. The NETSO project aims to generate basic knowledge of the theoretical foundations and context of the network society development and to discover the subsequent changes in the legal, communicational and societal aspects of the process.
Nowadays, during the discussion triggered by the situation that very well might be called “mass surveillance crisis” we are in the need of asking, what society thinks about it and do society wants to do anything about it.
Now, as never before, we know we are being spied and that dominant ICT companies are having significant role in it. How Network Society, society trapped in the network, can react to this? How can law react and is it prepared? Or maybe these are just questions without answers?
In this article I would like not only to present some facts concerning network society in the times of mass surveillance and challenges to privacy but also issues very much connected to these, such as the role of dominant ICT companies, or even growing importance of Deep Web, with Dark Web in particular.