Privacy and Government

Privacy and government was a heavily featured theme in this film, as the primary conflict was military problems between the United States and Russia. 

Privacy in 1964

While this movie did predate a majority of themes mentioned in the textbook, the film has multiple instances of privacy and government surveillance. Firstly, both Russia and the U.S. are monitoring their airspaces via radar, which is how the U.S. detected the unidentified aircraft at the beginning of the film and how both nations kept track of the fighter planes. Secondly, Russia's pursuit of privacy, namely their signal jammers, prevented the U.S. from contacting the pilots in time to call off the mission.

Loss of Privacy

With the rise of computer technology and the passing of the Patriot's Act post 9/11, issues with privacy only grew. What started with private and government wiretapping became tracking of location and metadata. Hidden cameras and microphones moved to smart devices that could be taping without one's knowledge. As technology has improved, it has gotten better at tracking peoples' information. As such, completely maintaining one's privacy in this digital age is incredibly difficult, if not outright impossible.