The Critical Engineering Manifesto

“1. The Critical Engineer considers any technology depended upon to be both a challenge and a threat. The greater the dependence on a technology, the greater the need to study and expose its inner workings, regardless of ownership or legal provision.”

My interpretation of this excerpt from the manifesto pertains to the threat of cyber terrorism. When a piece of technology becomes integrated throughout society, the risk of its exploitation becomes far more consequential. This is because the impact of infiltrating, or manipulating said technology is greater when more people use it in daily life. Therefore, it’s important for people to test the limits of dependent technology (finding bugs, glitches, flaws in security) so that safer, more efficient versions can be developed. Additionally, it’s important to study and expose the inner workings of dependent technology in order to discover new opportunities and benefits for its utilization in society.