Yes, as a matter of fact you are being watched. So what?

As reported in Michael Dresser’s Sun blog, the state has delayed, for another two weeks, ticketing drivers caught going too fast in Maryland construction zones by speed cameras. We’ve reported about how speed cameras have been going up around Baltimore, Baltimore County and elsewhere since a state law took effect Oct. 1.

Speeders in school zones have become fair game, though. If a camera catches you 12 mph above the speed limit, expect a ticket in the mail.

Melody Simmons filed a story for us today about the trend toward increased use of cameras to catch not only fast drivers but anyone deemed to be breaking a law. She quotes Baltimore Police Department spokesman Anthony Guglielmi talking about the city’s plans to add cameras that recognize license plates and people by their facial features.

If this sounds like science fiction, think again: Other cities and countries already use them.

Tampa, Fla., installed facial-recognition cameras and software for the 2001 Super Bowl, but got rid of the system two years later, because it didn’t lead to any arrests. And that fall, after the 9/11 attacks, several U.S. airports installed similar systems.

In Manalapan, a wealthy town on Florida’s Atlantic coast, cameras on poles automatically snap pictures of all drivers, cars and license plates, then check them against a criminal database.

Across the country, the town council of affluent Tiburon, Calif., north of San Francisco, is expected to vote in a few weeks on whether to install cameras to record the license plates of all cars as they enter and leave. As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, the information would be erased from the database every 30 days — or 60 days, if it’s needed for a criminal investigation.

The ACLU, others groups and many individuals oppose such systems. Tiburon’s police department says its officers would check the database only to investigate crimes. No one else would see the data. But instances exist of attorneys getting subpoenas for similar information gathered by cameras installed on state police cars and saved.

An unresolved question: If a public agency gathers the information, then isn’t the information a matter of public record, and therefore available to all? Expect to see a court challenge on this.

Here’s some more science nonfiction: In England, where surveillance is widespread and established, videocameras scold you for littering or other misbehavior when they catch you.

Where some see cameras and their databases as intrusions or even attacks on their right to privacy, those fearing crime and terrorism see a worthwhile trade-off. If you have nothing to hide, why worry, they say.

Baltimore is just one of an increasing number of cities with blue-light camera surveillance. New York and, it turns out, midtown Baltimore, have unmarked street cameras watching you. Nationwide, surveillance systems at ATMs, stores, hotels, gated communities, tollbooths and police cars routinely see us come and go. They’re increasingly linked.

And, according to a view some might call cynical, and others wise, we’re far past the point of losing our privacy: Millions willingly, eagerly spill their lives onto the Internet through webcams, Facebook, LinkedIn, dating sites and blogs.

Perhaps “willingly” is the key word there.