ARTICLE SUMMARY
Summary:
Privacy is not dead. Privacy rules are increasingly critical to protecting individual autonomy and political freedom, and to consumer protection.
POLICY RELEVANCE
Policy Relevance:
Privacy rules should apply to the private sector. Information may be private even if it has been shared with third parties.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Key Takeaways:
- Privacy rules concern the flow of information about human lives, beliefs, hopes, and actions; privacy is not dead, nor should it be.
- Privacy should not be absolute; privacy is not an intrinsic good, valuable in itself, but is an instrumental good, valuable insofar as it promotes our values and wellbeing.
- The idea that once information is shared with a third party it can no longer be private is overly simplistic; shared data (including the metadata generated by electronic communications) can remain confidential, as do medical records.
- Privacy is not fundamentally about the “creepiness” of some types of surveillance, as our feeling that some surveillance is “creepy” is subjective; rather, privacy is about power, and power may be exerted over individuals whether they feel something is creepy or not.
- Privacy promotes three important values:
- Our identity and autonomy, including formation of our political and religious beliefs.
- Democratic freedom, especially political freedom from the power of the state.
- Protection from discrimination and from manipulation by commercial interests.
- Our identity and autonomy, including formation of our political and religious beliefs.
- Privacy should be recognized as a fundamental right and protected against intrusions by the government or by the private sector; the failure of the United States Congress in 1974 to ensure that privacy rules apply to the private sector was a grievous error.
- Policymakers and courts should ensure that the Fourth Amendment continues to protect privacy as technology changes; outdated wiretapping laws should be revised.
- States should be permitted to experiment with strong privacy protections, as California has done.
- Privacy rules should not assume that all individuals enjoy autonomy and are able to exercise choice; rules should protect the most vulnerable.
- Human information and the ability to control it are increasingly important; privacy has become critical to determining how we will live our lives.