Privacy

Home work

pp 141-170 on Privacy.

Find a copy of the latest Pfau Library Newsletter (if possible) and look at the short article on the 2nd page entitled "The Patriot Act and Libraries" by Jill Vassilakos-Long.

Write and hand in notes.

News

US Senators reject California's financial Privacy protections as it re-authorizes the Fair Credit Reporting Act -- Wired News on the WWW.

BBC News Oct 15th 2003 [ 3194438.stm ] (Is it legal for the UK Government to snoop your Internet communications -- UK is under European law not US law?)

Topics



1. Introduction: DoubleClick
2. panopticon::="A gaol where all the inmates are kept under surveillance all the time".
3. Definition and Theory: right to be let alone, information privacy, control theory and restricted access, loss of freedom
4. Personal Information on the Internet
5. Consumer Privacy
   
   1. Privacy Invading technologies.
      
      1. Database phase. government, Institutions, Commercial data.
      2. Network phase: Commerce....
      3. Missing: Identity theft.
         • Protection for payroll and other company data.
         • Notify employees if exposed. Free credit record checks because evidence of risk.
         • I think this is because of the "THE PRIVACY ACT OF 1974" [ privstat.htm ] which does not allow the disclosure of records except with permission and/or for normal purposes.
         • Plus the "Data Protection Act 1998" (See Computer Weekly, October 21, 2003, Pg. 44).
         • For example see The Chronicle of Higher Education, June 6, 2003, Pg. 31: "California Colleges Prepare to Disclose Computer Intrusions".
      4. Missing: The post-9/11 phase. National Security vs privacy.
      
      
   2. Data for sale, email, cookies, web-bugs, click-streams.
   3. CVS vs Consumers
   4. Geocities vs FTC
   5. Mary Merlot's Data
   6. Handout: Stafford Beer's cartoon.
   7. Policy considerations: Notice and Choice, Opt-out vs Opt-in, DMA
   8. Moral Considerations: Technology returns us to the village were there are few secrets, personal security ==> privacy. Is your hard disk private property?
   
   
6. USA Privacy legislation: targeted. 1960s Griswold vs Connecticut, 1970 FCRA (financial data), 1978 "Right to Financial Privacy Act, 1984 Cable Communications Policy Act, 1988 "Video Privacy Protection Act", 1994 "Driver's Privacy Protection Act", 1998 COPPA, 1999 "Financial Service Modernization Act", 2001 HIPAA(Medical data). Reactive and unfocused.
7. European Privacy Legislation:privacy is a human right and so personal data must be protected. Licensed data bases. Can not export data to an country that does not protect. Controls data processing. Business says its expensive.
8. Code/architecture: Intel Pentium III, P3P,
9. PGP and CypherPunks.
10. A Prescription: Informed choice.



Exercises



1. Why is privacy thought to be important?
2. Are the reasons for the importance of privacy increased in cyberspace?
3. What is identity theft? What is stolen? What are the worst possible consequences?
4. Email: Should it be kept private by encryption? One reason for each side!
5. What kinds of data would be valuable for some one else to know about you? List others and what data they can use.
6. What kinds of data someone like you might want to keep private?
7. What data can you find in the County Hall Records building on Hospitality Lane?
8. You discover that the computer you use to handle payroll information has been broken into and some one may have copied a large amount of data: SSN, address, phone numbers, contacts, taxes paid, etc etc. What must you do? Make a list of at least 4 steps to take and the reason for each one.
9. I operate a web site concerned with software development. I want to collect information about the way people use it. Evaluate the technical, ethical, and legal possibilities.
10. You attend a Basketball Ball game at CSUSB and have a lot of fun... the next day you find video footage of your idea of fun is posted on the CSUSB web page. Can you sue? Sketch the arguments on both sides of the case.
11. p177. 1 self-regulation(USA) vs legislation (Euro) of data privacy
12. p177. Cookies.
13. p177. Privacy policies on the web.... see assigned work.



Question

Work for next time

1. Read: pages 170-185: Workplace privacy and case studies.

2. Find these sites and check them out [ http://privacy.net/ ] [ us ] [ privpol.html ]

3. Write and hand in notes on text and what you've seen on the web page above.

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