Legal Reasoning Questions for CLAT | QB Set 95 [Tech Laws]

Passage

Modern governments and private companies collect enormous quantities of personal information. Location records, browsing behaviour, biometric identifiers, financial transactions and communication patterns can all reveal details about a person’s habits, associations and preferences. Supporters of large-scale data collection argue that such information helps governments prevent crime, improve public services and identify security threats. Companies similarly claim that analysing user data allows them to provide more personalised and efficient services.

However, the usefulness of data collection does not by itself justify unlimited surveillance. Privacy is not merely the ability to keep information secret. It also includes informational autonomy—the ability of individuals to exercise meaningful control over how information about them is collected, analysed, shared and retained. A person may willingly disclose a location to a navigation application for directions without thereby agreeing that the same location history may be stored indefinitely or sold to unrelated advertisers.

Some policymakers argue that individuals who have “nothing to hide” should not object to surveillance intended to protect the public. This argument is incomplete. Surveillance can affect behaviour even when no illegal conduct occurs. People who believe that their movements, reading habits or associations are constantly monitored may avoid lawful but controversial activities. Moreover, databases created for one legitimate purpose can later be used for another purpose that was neither anticipated nor authorised when the information was collected.

This does not mean that all surveillance is unacceptable. A government may have legitimate reasons to collect information where there is a genuine security risk. The stronger principle is that surveillance should be necessary for a defined purpose, proportionate to the threat and accompanied by safeguards such as limited retention, independent oversight and restrictions on secondary use.

Critics sometimes respond that strict privacy protections will make effective security impossible. Yet this assumes that privacy and security are competing goals in every situation. Targeted surveillance based on specific risks may protect security while collecting less irrelevant information than indiscriminate monitoring.

Therefore, the real question is not whether information should ever be collected. It is whether the person or institution collecting it can justify the scope, duration and use of that collection. A society that treats every useful piece of information as automatically available for unlimited surveillance risks sacrificing individual autonomy without necessarily becoming safer.

Questions

1. Which of the following most accurately states the author’s main conclusion?

(A) Governments should completely prohibit private companies from collecting personal information.

(B) Surveillance is justified whenever it helps prevent crime or improve public services.

(C) Data collection should be permitted only where its scope, duration and use can be justified through necessity, proportionality and safeguards.

(D) Individuals should refuse to share personal information with digital services whenever possible.

2. The author’s criticism of the “nothing to hide” argument depends most strongly on which of the following claims?

(A) Surveillance can adversely affect lawful behaviour even where no wrongdoing is involved.

(B) Most governments deliberately misuse personal information collected from citizens.

(C) Individuals rarely understand the privacy policies of digital platforms.

(D) Criminals are capable of avoiding nearly every form of surveillance.

3. Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the author’s argument in favour of targeted rather than indiscriminate surveillance?

(A) Many citizens say that they are willing to sacrifice all privacy if national security is threatened.

(B) A government agency finds that targeted monitoring based on identified risk indicators detects serious threats as effectively as mass monitoring while collecting data about far fewer innocent people.

(C) Several technology companies introduce more personalised advertisements using detailed user profiles.

(D) Courts occasionally permit governments to collect information during criminal investigations.

4. A city installs cameras equipped with facial-recognition software at every public intersection. Officials argue that the system is justified because it may help identify offenders. No evidence is provided that ordinary cameras are inadequate, the facial data are retained indefinitely and there is no independent review of how the database is used.

Which of the following is the strongest inference from the passage?

(A) The surveillance is justified because identifying offenders is a legitimate governmental objective.

(B) The surveillance is necessarily unlawful because facial recognition can never be used for public safety.

(C) The surveillance is acceptable if most residents are unaware that facial recognition is being used.

(D) The surveillance raises serious concerns because a legitimate objective alone does not establish necessity, proportionality or adequate safeguards.

5. Which of the following would most weaken the author’s claim that surveillance may discourage lawful but controversial activities?

(A) A carefully controlled study finds no meaningful difference in participation in lawful political or social activities between comparable groups who know they are monitored and those who know they are not monitored.

(B) Some individuals continue to participate in controversial political movements despite knowing that public demonstrations are recorded.

(C) Governments commonly retain CCTV footage for limited periods.

(D) Many people use privacy settings on social media platforms.

6. Which of the following situations is most analogous to the author’s distinction between consenting to one use of personal information and consenting to unrelated secondary uses?

(A) A customer buys a train ticket and later chooses to purchase another ticket from the same company.

(B) A student lends a classmate a textbook and later asks the classmate to return it.

(C) A patient gives a hospital medical information for treatment, and the hospital later provides the information to a marketing company without seeking separate permission.

(D) A driver voluntarily follows traffic rules and is later fined for violating a different traffic rule.

Answer Key

1. (C)
2. (A)
3. (B)
4. (D)
5. (A)
6. (C)

Detailed Explanations

Question 1 — Correct Answer: (C)

Step 1: Identify the issue discussed throughout the passage. The passage does not argue against all surveillance. Instead, it considers when collection of personal information is justified.

Step 2: Locate the author’s governing principle. The passage states that surveillance should be necessary for a defined purpose, proportionate to the threat and accompanied by safeguards.

Step 3: Connect this principle with the final paragraph, which states that the central question is whether the scope, duration and use of information collection can be justified.

Therefore, (C) correctly captures the author’s overall conclusion.

Why the others are wrong:
(A) is too absolute because the author does not advocate a complete prohibition.
(B) ignores the requirement of necessity and proportionality.
(D) concerns individual behaviour rather than the author’s broader argument about legitimate data collection.

Question 2 — Correct Answer: (A)

The “nothing to hide” argument assumes that surveillance should concern only people engaged in wrongdoing.

Step 1: The author challenges this assumption by pointing out that surveillance can influence people who are behaving lawfully.

Step 2: Individuals may avoid controversial reading, associations or activities simply because they know they are being monitored.

Step 3: Therefore, privacy matters even where a person has committed no offence and has nothing unlawful to conceal.

Hence, (A) is the assumption underlying the author’s criticism.

(B) is unnecessarily strong because the argument does not depend on governments deliberately misusing data.
(C) may sometimes be true but is not central to the “nothing to hide” argument.
(D) concerns the effectiveness of surveillance against criminals rather than its effects on innocent individuals.

Question 3 — Correct Answer: (B)

The author’s claim is that targeted surveillance may protect security while unnecessarily collecting less information.

Step 1: A strengthening statement should provide evidence that targeted surveillance can achieve security objectives without mass monitoring.

Step 2: Option (B) directly provides such evidence: targeted monitoring detects threats just as effectively while collecting information from fewer innocent people.

Step 3: This undermines the idea that broad surveillance is always necessary for effective security.

Therefore, (B) strongly reinforces the author’s reasoning.

(A) reports public willingness but does not establish whether mass surveillance is necessary.
(C) concerns commercial advertising.
(D) merely confirms that some surveillance may be legally permitted.

Question 4 — Correct Answer: (D)

The passage accepts that crime prevention can be a legitimate objective, but legitimacy of purpose is only the beginning of the analysis.

Step 1: The city has a legitimate goal: identifying offenders.

Step 2: However, there is no evidence that facial recognition across every intersection is necessary.

Step 3: Indefinite data retention raises proportionality concerns.

Step 4: The absence of independent oversight also conflicts with the safeguards specifically recommended in the passage.

Therefore, (D) follows most strongly.

(A) incorrectly treats legitimate purpose as sufficient justification.
(B) is too absolute because the passage does not prohibit all facial-recognition surveillance.
(C) is inconsistent with informational autonomy because lack of awareness does not make surveillance more legitimate.

Question 5 — Correct Answer: (A)

The relevant claim is that awareness of surveillance may cause people to avoid lawful but controversial conduct.

Step 1: To weaken this claim, evidence should show that surveillance does not significantly change such behaviour.

Step 2: Option (A) provides controlled comparative evidence showing no meaningful behavioural difference between monitored and unmonitored groups.

Step 3: This directly challenges the proposed chilling effect.

Therefore, (A) is the strongest weakening statement.

(B) shows only that some people continue participating; it does not show that surveillance has no broader deterrent effect.
(C) concerns data retention rather than behaviour.
(D) concerns social-media privacy tools and does not test the author’s claim.

Question 6 — Correct Answer: (C)

The passage distinguishes between agreeing to provide information for one specific purpose and agreeing to its later use for an unrelated purpose.

Step 1: A user may give location information to receive navigation directions.

Step 2: That does not automatically amount to consent for sale of the location history to advertisers.

Step 3: Option (C) has the same logical structure. A patient provides medical information for treatment, but the hospital then uses it for an unrelated marketing purpose without separate permission.

Thus, (C) is the closest analogy.

(A) involves two voluntary transactions with the same company.
(B) concerns possession and return of property, not secondary use of information.
(D) involves separate legal obligations rather than consent to data use.