The value of privacy

Yesterday, the widespread, furtive, and unwarranted monitoring of telephone conversations and emails by the National Security Agency was revealed in The New York Times. Originally, this authorization was to monitor incoming and outgoing communications between the United States and Afghanistan, but has been broadened since its enactment. Moral outrage has ensued to some extent under the constitutional premise of "privacy", despite the measure's possible effectiveness in providing security.
1. Eavesdropping Effort Began Soon After Sept. 11 Attacks
2. Bush vows to continue domestic eavesdropping
3. Rice defends domestic eavesdropping
4. NSA's surveillance of citizens echoes 1970s controversy
5. Spying on Americans

What is the value of privacy? The fourth amendment states:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Is that privacy? That first portion has always seemed ambiguous to me. "The right.. to be secure in their persons". Secure in what way? Secure in knowing that knowledge about your life and personal business is something that you should have the right to safeguard? To have the right to remain anonymous if one wishes? If that is the case, then privacy is a libery-related value premise and an oblique one at that.

In making axiological judgments between privacy and some other value, privacy, then, holds little weight.. in this case especially, since the value is security. Generally speaking, limited personal transparency has insubstantial negative effects when pitted against the capacity for improved intelligence and national security.

A lack of privacy can potentially result in an oppressive government (which by itself is an extreme case, and only one where the existing institutions lack the checks and balances to stop such a thing from taking place), but a lack of security has consequences such as increased probability for terrorism (i.e. property damage, deaths).

However, would too much transparency ever give way for privacy to take precedence? Where does one draw the line? If everyone had fully transparent lives, e.g. the government could just walk into your home, search your belongings, etc. the amount of security obtained would be remarkable; the main drawback would be disconvenience. However, the two potential largescaled drawbacks would be (1) near inability to engage in civil disobediance or other illegal activities without guaranteed recourse, and (2) the possible Orwellian surge of centralized power and authority that would weaken the ability of the masses to guarantee any of their other liberties (e.g. freedom of speech, right to property without just compensation, etc.).

In my opinion, warrantless phone taps don't push us in the direction of a dystopia, they augment our national defense. I would object if they had purposes other than national defense, in which case the value judgment would be wholly different. But a small amount of transparency is something that one can ethically offer without further consideration.