Is privacy a basic right?
Posted 5 September, 2007 in Philosophy
I’m still trying to work out if privacy is a basic right, like personal liberty or property rights. What gets referred to as a violation of privacy is often really just a database of information that is obtained legally, say, a database of products you’ve purchased from a particular store so you can be targeted for advertising. If you’ve purchased a series of products from a store then most people would expect that the store would keep a record of those purchases, at least for warranty purposes. What if they used that information to mail you specific advertising? What if they didn’t even contact you personally but used that information to determine an area where a bunch of people lived who were interested in a certain product, so the store put up a billboard in that area? Is any of that a violation of privacy?
It raises all sorts of questions. Another example: it’s not illegal to park your car on the street. What if you parked your car on the street and recorded the time another person left for work every morning? Let’s just say you kept a record but didn’t use this information for anything. Is that a violation of privacy?
Then there’s the flip side, which is illustrated very well in this short clip: http://aclu.org/pizza/images/screen.swf
What are the underlying first principles at play here?
2 comments to “Is privacy a basic right?”
Joel Baltaks, February 19th, 2008 at 10:56 am:
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An excellent resource on this is security guru Bruce Schneier. I’d recommend this article first, which pretty much tackles the right to privacy head on: http://www.schneier.com/essay-114.html
There are also other articles on his blog.
http://www.schneier.com/blog/
http://www.schneier.com/essays.htmlMy opinion is that yes, privacy is necessary for us to maintain our sanity and live happy lives. This doesn’t mean that everything we do should be a secret though - it’s important to determine the right level of privacy. And private from whom? - a government observer, or our family? Privacy is a very complex issue, and I think it’s never really needed to be explored before because never in the history of mankind has technology allowed its erosion, as is the case now and in the forseeable future. In the past, as long as you were out of sight and earshot, you could be pretty sure you weren’t being observed. No cameras, microphones, etc.
Michael Sutcliffe, February 20th, 2008 at 10:00 pm:
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This is interesting Joel. I’ll have a good look at it.
Since writing this article I have come to the conclusion that privacy is a right, and that it is normal to want a level of privacy, and that wanting to live as a private person doesn’t mean you have bad secrets.