Big Data is watching you, and you, and you

Fact or fiction? Scene from the 1955 British movie of George Orwell's 1984 resonates today, though many sophisticated systems of government snooping are invisible to the ordinary citizen.


There’s an elephant in your room – and it never, never forgets.

It’s Big Data, and, says Viktor Mayer-Schoenberger, co-author of a book by the same name, it is “A Revolution That Will Transform How We Live, Work and Think.”

From cradle to grave (and even before birth) we’re tracked, trailed, photographed, videoed, scrutinized, biometrized, analysed and….you can see where this is going.
 
Mayer-Shoenberger is a fan of Big D for its ability to put together information that connects patterns we could never understand from smaller bits and bytes. He also has some warnings about what can happen when staggering amounts of personal data are put together to map our lives in a virtual human cybergenome.

Q: Is Big Data just Big Brother writ larger -- an era of total surveillance?

A: There are two important elements. One is the obvious fact that we’re collecting more information than ever before and most of it is in a digital format. That creates a much more comprehensive capability of surveillance.

Q: And the other?

A: It takes the quality of ephemerality out of our communications. We used to depend on things we said or did being plausibly deniable. They would go away. We could say they never happened. Now that’s much more difficult.

Q: What happens in Vegas doesn't stay in Vegas?

A: If you look at Facebook and Twitter, the younger generation uses them as an ephemeral way of communicating. They don’t realize it doesn’t disappear like water cooler gossip. What I say will stay with me and may be used against me in the future.

Q: And the effect on behaviour?

A: What’s happening goes beyond surveillance per se. In the past, watching was done in the same time frame. Now it’s the panopticon. That was a prison in which inmates didn’t know if they were being watched, so they had to assume they were watched all the time. That created compliance without active watching.

Q:  No escape?

A: There’s a “data shadow” following us that transcends time, which is new. And this may freak you out, but in the Big Data age there’s an even bigger problem, our vastly increasing reliance on probability.

It means calculating propensities based on probabilities. We’re using all that data to predict a 90 per cent likelihood that the person standing in front of us is going to commit a crime next week. So punish him now – like Minority Report. Or take him into an interview and persuade him not to do it.

Q: This isn’t science fiction. Ordinary people in Britain have been arrested because surveillance data predicted they might cause trouble during the royal wedding.

A: Right, and in the U.S. there’s “predictive policing” in a number of cities. They use Big Data analysis to determine where and what time crime spikes. But this is deeply troubling because profiling becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

Olivia Ward has covered conflict, politics and human rights from the former Soviet Union to Europe, South Asia and the U.S., winning national and international awards.

Who are the Chechens? Behind the scary headlines

Ruslan Tsarni, uncle of the suspected Boston Marathon bombing suspects, in front of his home in Montgomery Village, Maryland, asked his nephew, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, to turn himself in. (Photo by Allison Shelley/Getty Images)

The Boston marathon suspects “put shame on the entire Chechen ethnicity,” said their shocked uncle Ruslan Tsarni, as a massive manhunt for his surviving nephew continued on Friday.

It’s true that “Chechen” and “terrorist” are all too often linked in the headlines, giving the impression of a people hell bent on destruction. That may be because the vast majority of the small diaspora -- now spread over many continents after fleeing wars, repression and economic collapse -- lives quietly, blends in and attracts no media attention.

Few Canadians have met a Chechen, and those who have may not know it.

Q: Where is Chechnya?

A: It’s a tiny territory in southern Russia, flanked by the spiking Caucasus mountains. On the plains, you could drive from one side to the other in less than two hours.

Q: What’s the population?

A: About 1.2 million.

Q: Who’s in charge?

A: Officially, Russia. But it’s ruled by a regional president, Ramzan Kadyrov, backed by billions of dollars from Moscow to rebuild the decimated republic after two wars. The price: total submission to Moscow and Kadyrov. His brutal rule has sparked rebellions that have spread throughout the Caucasus.

Q:  Was Chechnya always part of Russia?

A: No, but Russia saw it as a strategic gateway to the Black and Caspian seas. From the early 18th century to 1860 it fought an expansionist war against fierce resistance from Chechen warriors. It staked a claim on Chechnya and neighboring Muslim republics. But the battle was never over.

Q: And earlier?

A: Chechens lived in autonomous clans, or taips. Noone is sure where they originated and they left no written history to explain it. Some trace their ancestry back to the fair-skinned Celts, pointing to the red hair of some families as “pure Chechen.” Others believe they were linked with ancient Armenia or the Fertile Crescent.

Q: What language do they speak?

A: Chechen is part of the Vainakh group of Caucasian languages. Chechens have used Arabic, Latin and Russian alphabets over the centuries.

Q: Are they Muslims?

A: They’re traditionally Sufis, a mystical strain of Islam. After the first Russian-Chechen war of the 1990s, Arab-backed extremists poured in money and weapons to convert them to radical Wahhabism. Kadyrov has tried to revitalize Sufism, but also imposed a stricter attitude to religion, including a ”virtue campaign” for women’s dress.

Q: Why did Chechnya fight two recent wars against Russia?

A: Chechens were subjected to massive, and murderous deportations during World War II, and even when they returned felt like second class citizens. Poverty and unemployment soared in the mountain areas.

When the Soviet Union crumbled, Nationalist Chechen leader Dzhokhar Dudayev seized the chance to declare sovereignty, flaunted his independence and Russia invaded. A Chechen guerrilla leader's incursion into neighboring Daghestan, and accusations of a terrorist bombing, sparked a second war in 1999.  

Q: Are Chechens better off now?

A: Grozny looks like a glossy modern capital. But unemployment is massive and the oil industry hasn’t recovered from the wars. Russia keeps Chechnya on a tight financial leash and Kadyrov is in a power struggle with Moscow for more profits from its oil. Meanwhile ordinary Chechens battle poverty, corruption and repression.

Q: Anything else we should know?

A: Chechens have a famous code of hospitality to strangers. But if you aren’t offered a meal within 45 minutes of visiting a home, you know it’s time to leave.

Olivia Ward covered the first and second Russian-Chechen wars as the Star’s bureau chief for the former Soviet Union. She won a national newspaper award for her  reporting, and a film based on it, A Child’s Century of War, was listed for an Academy Award.

Snooty Newt? Gingrich joins Downton Abbey fan crush

Ready for his closeup: Newt Gingrich speaks at the 2013 Conservative Political Action Conference near Washington DC. (Photo by Pete Marovich/Getty Images)

It comes as no surprise that arch conservative Newt Gingrich would love Downton Abbey, an enthralling Britsoap that revolves around the fate of a ruinously expensive historic pile in the English countryside, its aristocratic owners and struggling staff.

At an early morning news conference earlier this month, the flamboyant former Republican politician and presidential candidate told startled reporters that he was “slightly not awake” because he and third wife Callista were so, well, enthralled by the series that has captivated much of the Western world.

As a historian, Gingrich appreciates Downtown’s “elegant and educational” use of historical background, including, oddly, its portrayal of the breakdown of the old plutocracy and rise of the long-submerged underclass and social protection system that is so much a part of the post World War I era in Britain.

It’s odd because Gingrich’s terms in Congress – including as Republican House Speaker – focused on measures to shrink both the federal government and parts of the social security system that supported welfare mothers and children, while weakening laws to protect consumers from harmful products.

For those hungry for more of Newt’s fan-fessions, there’s Vanity Fair’s Q&A.

The DA character he most identifies with?  (No surprise here) grand seigneur Lord Grantham, who is “constantly worried about the survival of a world he values,” but “reluctantly seeks to adjust to changes.” Appropriate for someone who lost the presidential nomination by a long-shot, and has had to live with a Democratic administration he loathes.

But unlike the financially clueless Lord G, Gingrich has a talent for making money. His companies have reportedly raked in some $55 million over a decade in consulting fees (nothing, he insists, to do with lobbying.)

The character he’d most like to share an eight-hour convertible ride with?  The feisty and candid cook, Mrs. Patmore. But he admits that he’d also like “high tea with the Dowager Countess,” who would be a “far more interesting conversationalist.”

And his “dream cameo” role in Downton? David Lloyd George, Britain’s liberal prime minister from 1916-22, who made housing a social service, doubled pensions introduced national health insurance and rent controls and limited child labor. But wasn’t it Gingrich who suggested in the 2012 primaries that each unionized school janitor should be replaced by the labor of “30-some kids to work for the (same) price?”

In the words of Mrs. Patmore, “he’s got more to say than a parliamentary candidate.” 

A Downton cameo?  Well, maybe a non-speaking part

Olivia Ward has covered conflict, human rights and politics from the former Soviet Union to the Middle East, Europe, South Asia and the U.S. She has watched all three seasons of Downtown Abbey.










 

Q&A with Hamida Ghafour on Syria's rape victims

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nour, a Syrian refugee, says she was raped and tortured in a Damascus prison for 60 days by pro-government guards and soldiers. She is now in Amman, Jordan. (Hamida Ghafour/Toronto Star)

“They had visitors in the prison playing cards and they said in front of us, ‘if you want sex, there are girls here,’ ” Nour says. Two girls died in the cell, she says.

 

Sexual violence against Syrian women brings fear, shame and rejection. Few women and girls are willing to admit they were raped in Syria’s civil war. The Star's Hamida Ghafour recently travelled to Amman, Jordan to speak with some of the war's rape victims. Read her piece here.

Q: How extensive is rape in the Syrian war?

A: The simple answer is we don't know. There are not enough organizations with access to Syria who can document the extent of sexual violence. Certainly, the regime is using rape as a way of torturing prisoners, men and women. The rebels are as well, but again, how much no one knows for sure. 

The nature of the civil war has changed and this may affect the nature of violence being committed against civilians.  

The war has also become more mechanized, with an all out assault against the population using heavy weaponry, so I’m not sure how much opportunity there would be for the regime or even the rebels anymore to commit sexual assaults in the heat of battle. In the early stages of war there was more of this. But now the government is using tanks, cluster bombs and rockets in residential areas. 

One of the things I found startling when interviewing Syrian women in Jordan was how many of them had escaped the war because they were worried their daughters may be raped by soldiers or Free Syrian army fighters. It came up again and again, sometimes unprompted, in my conversations about other aspects of their lives as refugees.

It is hard to say how many of them had children who had suffered sexual violence and were not admitting it, but the fact that it was driving them out of the country is significant. Often I would hear that they left their village or town because they heard that women in the next village had been attacked.

Q: Is anyone trying to start programs to help rape victims? 

A: There have been calls to fund programs, and rightly so. But several factors complicate this. Even if there were extensive counselling and medical services available I'm not sure how many Syrian women would go to them. For one, most Syrians even before the warl had negative experiences with the state and view it with suspicion or fear. In a police state you didn’t go to your government to help you. That fear has stayed with refugees in Jordan and many do not even trust big relief organizations such as the Red Cross or UNICEF. It is particular to Syria -- I heard several times that the Iraqi refugees after the invasion in 2003 were more willing to reach out to groups trying to help. 

The International Rescue Committee has tried to get around this problem by organizing women-only group therapy sessions to encourage women to confide. I spoke to several of them who say it did indeed relieve the stresses and pressures but none has so far come forward to say they were raped.

And culture plays a part too which I wrote about in my story. One of the women, who opened a small shelter hasn’t registered her charity with the Jordanian authorities, which would make it easier to raise money, because of the social stigma around sexual violence. To formally open a rape shelter would open the victims to scorn, at best, or at worse more violence because there is a culture of blaming the victim for the rapes.

Q: What has the reaction been to the story?  

A: A lot of positive response from our readers who say they know more about the war than before but sadly a lot of racist comments and superior judgments from readers and on social media along the lines of ‘all this just proves that Muslim men are like animals, keeping women in burkas and raping them’. 

But a glimpse at the reaction around sexual violence and women on the Internet shows perhaps our western culture hasn’t progressed that much. Just being a woman and writing about these issues invites aggressive insults. Lauren Wolfe who has written extensively about rape in conflict, particularly Syria, told me after her recent Syria report she received a lot of nasty comments calling her a “lying b**** and Zionist filth. 

Mary Beard, professor of classics at Cambridge University wrote recently about the “vile” reaction on the web after she appeared on British television ranging from comments about her pubic hair and being described as a c***.  It is enough to put women off appearing in public life, but that’s another story.

Q: What has happened to Nour? 

A: She is still in Amman, trying to get the right identity papers so she can leave Jordan as a refugee and live in the West somewhere. When she was captured and detained all her identity documents were confiscated so she's finding it hard to prove she is a Syrian citizen.

When I interviewed her she stressed to me several times that she once had a normal life and this has stayed with me. We chatted about her hobby, photography. Her dad owned a car dealership in Damascus. She was a typical, middle class girl.

Her sense of isolation, injustice and anger at what has happened to her are universal themes for us all and touched our readers who have written to me since reading Nour's story about their own personal traumas, very different to Nour, but around being gay and being victimized, or suffering sexual assault. She has touched a lot of people she will never meet simply because she was brave enough to share her life with a total stranger.  

READ MORE: Syrian women who fled war speak of rapes back home

 

Related articles

Q&A: Hamida Ghafour on Lama Al Ghamdi

Syrian women who fled to Jordan tell of horrific rapes back home

A father's plea for his missing son in Syria

Meet Syria's one millionth refugee

'An excuse to leave the most dangerous work to civilian journalists.' Paul Watson on reporting from war zones

Between a rock and a hard place: the choices Syrian refugees have

Q&A: Bill Schiller on what the Steubenville story tells us about America

Steubenville High School football players, Trent Mays (left) and Ma'Lik Richmond sit in juvenile court Thursday. The teens are accused of raping a 16-year-old girl. (Keith Srakocic/Reuters)

“We’re seeing a trend of high-school athletes following the bad behaviour of both their college and professional counterparts," says Kathy Redmond of the Denver-based National Coalition Against Violent Athletes, which aims to end off-field violence through education and counselling. 

 

In Steubenville, Ohio, two teen football players accused of sexually assaulting a 16-year-old girl stand trial this week in a story that has captivated a nation. The Toronto Star's Bill Schiller travelled to Steubenville to investigate this made-for-TV story of sport, booze and alleged sexual assault in small-town America. Bill's piece was published on March 9. Read it here.

Q: What was it that drew you to this story?

A: I am always looking for compelling stories that reveal America, stories that contribute to our knowledge of American anthropology if you will. I’m not looking for stories that speak to the nation’s history – but the beliefs, customs and values that arise out of compelling narratives. What do they tell us about the American moment? Steubenville is, at once, compelling and terrible: two teens, local high school football stars, stand accused of raping a teenage girl during a night of drunken partying in small town America. Without any question it is sensational – and many media have covered it that way, using the theme of ‘the divided town,’ which is legitimate enough. But I was pressed by an editor who wanted to know whether there was any deeper significance beyond the ‘controversy splits town’ story.

Q. And was there?

A: Yes. Data shows that America has a problem. A big problem. A 2011 study shows that one in five American women experience rape or attempted rape during their life time. But even more disturbing, one in five experience these attacks during their college or university years. I was stunned by that number, and then stumbled over the terrible tragedy of Lizzy Seeberg, a 19-year-old freshman who took her own life after she accused a University of Notre Dame football star of sexually assaulting her, only to discover that local authorities didn’t take her seriously.

Further, I learned that it isn’t just a problem confined to college. President Barack Obama’s Education Secretary, Arne Duncan, felt the problem of sexual assault in American high schools was serious enough to raise it in a speech in April 2011. He noted that there are 4,800 sexual assaults, rapes or attempted rapes there every year. He also noted that rape and attempted rape are “notoriously under reported,” the inference being that the real numbers are obviously far higher. And he’s right: a national study shows that 80 per cent of female rape victims don’t even report their victimization to the police.

Q: And why don’t victims report?

A: The reasons are complex, but one reason that’s key is that many fear the authorities won’t take them seriously. They’ve suffered enough – they don’t want to be dragged through yet another humiliating experience

Q: Given the complexity of this story and the fact that you couldn’t actually speak to the alleged victim or the accused, what tools did you use in your reporting?

A: Obviously I needed to know as much as I could about what happened that night, and key to answering that question was getting a hold of a 300-page transcript of the pre-trial hearing that took place in October. That hearing – in keeping with America’s open justice system – was public, and three key witnesses came forward and told the court precisely what they saw. And what they saw, according to testimony, was shocking.

Q: You and others have noted the significant role played by social media in this story. Just how big was it?

A: It was massive. To begin, it literally unfolded on the Internet in real time – or close to real time. The football players and their friends brazenly posted photos, tweets and even a video-commentary as the night went on. And that proved crucial in the police investigation, because the victim and her family gathered them all up and handed them over to the police within 48 hours. The police had all of that – including the notorious Michael Nodianos video-commentary – straight out of the gate. I think a lot of people were under the impression that bloggers had actually obtained “evidence” from the Internet that the police never had. And that led to accusations that the police were either incompetent or engaged in a cover-up. But the transcripts of the pre-trial hearing make it clear: the lead detective in the case stated that when the victim’s parents came through the door on Aug. 14, they brought a flash drive. The police were given at least one photo, copies of an array of disgusting tweets that had been posted, and the notorious Nodianos video. The police reviewed that video “many times” and it “helped and guided us,” the detective said. Still, the positive power of the Internet was also on display. Bloggers like Alexandria Goddard raised broad awareness of the case and I think it’s safe to say that this kind of publicity put pressure on Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine to assign more personnel and resources to the case. She made a difference.

Q: Can any good come out of this?

A: You have to hope that the magnitude of coverage allocated to this story will inspire governments – both state and federal – school and college authorities, coaches and athletes, and everyone who cares about the issue of rape in America, to confront it in a serious way. Regardless of the outcome of this trial, the data shows rape and ‘rape culture’ in America is a grave problem. It has to be addressed.

Bill Schiller has held bureau postings for the Toronto Star in Johannesburg, Berlin, London and Beijing. He is a NNA and Amnesty International Award winner, and a Harvard Nieman Fellow from the class of '06. Follow him on Twitter @wschiller

Q&A: Tanya Talaga on can Britain be saved?

A man photographs a burnt out police car after riots on Tottenham High Road on Aug. 7, 2011 in London. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

“People are happy when there are riots because at the time, at that exact point, they are having their own way. They are voicing their feelings to the establishment. They are taking it to the streets,” Clasford Stirling.

Britain is poorer now than it was five years ago, as measured by gross domestic product, the total amount of goods and services a country produces each year. The Star's Tanya Talaga recently went to Britain to survey the impact the austerity cuts are having on its people.

Read Tanya's report here: Can Britain be saved? Country feeling pain of PM David Cameron’s austerity cuts

Q:  You visited Broadwater Farm Estate, a social housing project in Tottenham, north London. What was it like being in Broadwater?

A: I took the Underground to Broadwater Farm one evening after interviewing British Labour MP David Lammy at Westminster. I had tried to head up to Tottenham earlier that day, but my cab driver took me in the wrong direction and I missed my set-up interviews, so I had to try again at night.

The Farm is a massive, social housing project, home to 4,000 people living in low-rise and tower apartments built nearly 45 years ago. The place is like a labrynith, built on a maze of streets and it is confusing to outsiders.

Lammy gave me a specific set of instructions on how to get to Broadwater once in Tottenham – which subway exits to take and what mini-cab stand to use as some cabbies don’t know their way around the Farm, or, refused to go after dark. The cab driver who picked me up told me that in his last four years of driving, I was the first “white” woman he had taken to the Farm in the evening.

I was struck by that comment and found it hard to believe. This is inner-city London. Could the divide between the haves and the have-nots be that bad?

The Farm was the flashpoint of two of the worst riots in London’s recent history. Perhaps that is why there is a perception that this isn’t a safe place to be. But the community has worked hard to turn around the Farm’s reputation and reduce crime in wake of the 2011 riots, triggered after the shooting death of Mark Duggan.

Q: How would you describe the residents of Broadwater?

A: Inside the Farm’s community centre, I was welcomed with open arms by soccer coach Clasford Stirling, who appreciated I took the time to visit and check the place out rather than doing a phone interview.

Inside the gym, groups of 9 and 10-year-olds were busy running drills. Families waited on the sidelines and it felt like I was back in Toronto, watching my own kids at soccer practice. The place was packed with parents sitting on the sidelines.

It struck me as a community like any other, full of parents struggling to meet demands of the day, juggling kids, homework and everything else. The Farm reminded me of social housing projects here in Toronto, just on a far larger scale.

 

Q: Can Britain be saved? How?

 A: Britain is trying to manoeuvre itself out of nearly three straight recessions, triggered after the 2008 global financial collapse. Like many western powers, I think they have found themselves falling behind due to a lack of investments in possible growth sectors of the economy coupled with being burdened by high social services costs.

In order for the economy to turn around, I think they need to get aggressive on job creation and infrastructure spending and ease off on drastically reducing transfer payments to local council governments. Spending on building roads, bridges and other public works helped to insulate the Canadian economy from some of the fallout after 2008. So did a strong hand from the Bank of Canada with policies of low interest rates.

Will incoming Bank of England Governor Mark Carney make a difference? He could be a help, but it is going to take a concerted effort by both Westminster and Carney to turn the ship around.

Q: What do you see happening in the future?

 

A: If the British government does not ease up on a series of deep funding cuts to local governments combined with measures that tax the poor – such as the bedroom tax for those living in social housing – there is a real recipe for unrest in the coming months.

Youth unemployment looms large in some areas, for instance in Tottenham it is 55 per cent. In Liverpool it is more than 25 per cent in some neighbourhoods.

Local governments are being forced to shut down youth sports programs, women’s shelters, libraries and other community services.

When that happens, there's more harm than good results.

Tanya Talaga is the Star’s Global Economics reporter. Follow her on Twitter @tanyatalaga

 

Q&A: Hamida Ghafour on Europe's secret tax havens

A masked demonstrator leaves a Starbucks coffee shop in central London in this December 2012 file photo. Big companies in Britain now pay less tax than they did 12 years ago despite a big jump in profitability, a Reuters analysis of official data shows. (Luke MacGregor/Reuters)

“Tax is the foundation of good government and a key to the wealth and poverty of nations, yet it is under attack,” John Christensen, an economist and director with the Tax Justice Network, a London-based activist group.

The world's wealthiest citizens and multinationals are dodging hefty tax bills by moving their money to offshore havens, critics charge. The Star's Hamida Ghafour recently travelled to Europe to report on the social impact.

Read Hamida's report here: How the rich avoid paying their tax bill

Q: In your piece, you write “economists and businessmen say the root of the crisis is that the world’s wealthiest citizens and corporations refuse to pay their share of taxes by moving enormous sums to tax havens where there is little or no income tax.” Will this ever change?

A: The problem is we’re talking about huge amounts of money, hundreds of millions of dollars in profits and revenues.  Every multinational worth its salt moves their money to offshore havens to minimize their tax bills.  So there is a lot at stake. It is hard to see what motivation there is to change unless governments push through new laws. There is increasing pressure from the public in places like Britain and France because people are suffering from cuts to public welfare programs while the one per cent is perceived as greedy.

Remember Google chairman Eric Schmidt’s comment that he was “proud” of his company’s tax practices? The question is whether that political pressure will mean a change in the laws.

Q: Many people see “tax” as a bad word. Why is tax so crucial to good governance?

A: I became interested in this issue after living in the United Arab Emirates where there is no income tax. The rulers don’t need it – they are sitting on enormous amounts of cash because of oil. Abu Dhabi for example has a sovereign wealth fund worth an incredible $627 billion.
The rulers can build schools, offer universal health care, even give free houses to their citizens without giving them the vote which would mean they have a say in how they are governed. Emirati citizens are generally happy with this paternalistic arrangement. I mean, the government will fund their entire university education, even if they want to study overseas.

But in Europe tax helps bind the social contract between citizens and their governments. In other words, people pay income taxes and vote for the government that decides how that money will be spent. But in Greece that agreement is breaking down. The Greek government does not have funds to pay for schoolbooks, for example, because it does not have enough revenues from taxes to pay for them and citizens are protesting in the streets because the perception is the government is not living up to its end of the bargain. The whole social contract in Europe is fraying.

Q: James Henry, former chief economist at consultancy firm McKinsey, says “approximately $12 trillion of unreported, private financial wealth from the developed world is held in about 80 tax havens” How can so much money be hidden without anyone noticing?

A: The problem is tax rules were written in the 1920s and these guidelines outdated. There are loopholes and gaps which the super rich and multinationals can exploit to their advantage. If you want to hide $30 million from the taxman you need a pretty good accountant to do this for you without anyone noticing. There has been an attempt to create a ‘blacklist’ of tax havens and impose sanctions against those countries which have them but it has gone nowhere – partly because the countries that would be punished are powerful such as Switzerland and America and have baulked at the suggestion of sanctions.

Q: As you mention in your piece, people tend to associate tax havens as “sunny islands such as the Bahamas, where yachts moor in crystal-blue harbours”.  Is this a fair description?

A: The cliché is that tax havens are sunny places for shady people.
It is also an outdated description. Many are in places like The Netherlands, Liberia, or Ireland or the United States so some prefer to call them ‘secrecy jurisdictions’. The state of Delaware, for example, is one of the biggest offshore havens in the world – it has 900,000 companies registered but there is hardly any information on who they are, what they do, who owns them and where the money comes from.

Q: What details surprised you about tax havens?

A: The mind-boggling numbers involved. James Henry from McKinsey told me that $12 billion of unreported wealth from Europe, America and Canada is being held in offshore havens. But when you take into account the Middle East, Asia and Africa the figure is closer to $32 billion. It has huge implications for development and aid. If the wealthy elite of those developing countries kept the money in their nations the revenue from interest that is taxed would help pay for a lot of wells, clinics and vaccination programs.

Q: Is the EU headed for a collapse?

A: No, I don’t think so. The European Union is still very wealthy and politically stable. There is inertia, for sure, as not many politicians seem to know how to cope with this problem. I am certain we will hear a lot about this issue in the coming year. Every week you hear about another company accused of dodging tax, Google, Starbucks, Barclays bank, the list goes on.


Q: What is the advantage to a country in having a tax haven if they don't get much money from the companies who register businesses there?

A: They hardly get any benefit from it. Places like the Cayman Islands, or Jersey in the UK suffer from what tax experts call the “financial curse.” A small minority of people, lawyers and accountants, benefit because they can make a lot of money. One economist told me they can also lobby the government on behalf of their clients to prevent anyone from getting access to information about their bank accounts. Having a tax haven in your midst also crowds out other economic sectors which makes the place increasingly dependent on tax haven activity in the same way that oil and gas economies end up being dependent on a very narrow sector. Saudi Arabia is the classic example of that.

READ MORE: Corporate profit shifting erodes the developed world’s tax base: report

Hamida Ghafour is a foreign affairs reporter at The Star. She has lived and worked in the Middle East and Asia for more than 10 years and is the author of a book on Afghanistan. Follow her on Twitter @HamidaGhafour

Q&A: Raveena Aulakh on Bangladesh's climate change

Two major cyclones, Sidr and Aila, within 18 months, have wrecked havoc on Bangladesh's coastal area. An island off the Bay of Bengal. Elders say they see the coastline changing slowly and subtly. (Raveena Aulakh/Toronto Star)

“Climate change has wrecked everything,” Shamisur Gazi, 86.

Rising sea levels could flood 17 per cent of Bangladesh and create between 20 million and 30 million refugees, experts say.  The Star's environment reporter Raveena Aulakh recently travelled to the country to look at how climate change is affecting one of the world’s most densely populated countries and its people.

Read Raveena's report here: Bangladesh faces mass migration, loss of land from climate change

Q: In the piece, you write "Bangladeshis, like others in developing countries, are least responsible for climate change but among the worst affected by it."  Do you believe that Bangladeshis feel they have no control over how this will play out?

A: This tiny country is not going down without a fight. The government is allocating money for cyclone shelters and to devise storm early-warning systems. Its scientists have developed salt and drought-resistant rice strains. Its farmers are constructing houses on plinths to withstand floods; tanks to harvest salt-free rainwater. Others are fattening crabs and growing chillies to make up for the lost rice crops.

Bangladesh is contributing a fraction of the global greenhouse gas emissions but it’s trying to bring that further down, too. It’s a testament to the country’s commitment to fight climate change.

Q: Do you feel North Americans and Europeans truly grasp the severity of this problem and how climate change in Bangladesh will affect their own lives in North America and Europe?

A: Not really. Because it’s happening far away on different continents, it’s hard for people in the western world to understand the implications or what it could mean for them. Food prices will shoot up as large swathes of land are rendered useless because of climate change. That will cause conflict but migration will likely be the biggest reason: experts have said repeatedly climate change refugees could lead to the next big conflict in the world as they search for food, water and safety. Where will those people go? How will countries in Europe and North America keep that many people out?


Q: How would you describe rural Bangladeshis? Are they a resilient people?

A: They are. As I wrote in the story, cyclones and severe storms are not uncommon to Bangladesh. Most of the land is barely above sea level so storms sweep across the country without obstacles and tidal surges batter the coast. People lose everything. In the past, Bangladeshis in the coastal area would have built new huts, bought more livestock, stockpiled food and carried on with their lives. It’s harder for them now because they know things are changing and will likely never be the same again.
 

Q: What will happen to Bangladesh in the future?

A: It is hard to say. Climate change signs are all there: sea-levels are rising, cyclones are more frequent, monsoons not as potent. And people are already leaving the coastal areas. Bangladesh will not disappear like the Maldives will in 100 years or so but the country will have to take extraordinary steps to adapt to what definitely will be a new way of life.

Q: People from rural communities are heading to the capital, Dhaka, for work. How would you describe Dhaka?

A:Dhaka is a sea of people, a cacophony of noise. There are water bodies everywhere — ponds, streams and the city sits on the banks of Buriganga river. Traffic, at best, is chaotic. Cars, buses, trucks and rickshaws wrestle for space on the streets every hour of the day. Most streets are encroached by vendors selling vegetables, fruits or peanuts as they spill on to the roads.

There is construction where you look: bridges are being built, shiny towers are going up, homes are being constructed. Even as construction carries on, slums continue to proliferate. At least 40 per cent of the 17 million population of the country lives in little hovels in slums.

But for all the poverty, Bangladeshis still welcome people into their homes.

Raveena Aulakh is the Toronto Star's environment reports. She is intrigued by climate change and its impact, now and long-term. Her last World Weekly feature looked at Follow her on Twitter @raveenaaulakh