Privacy: Law, Custom, and Technology

[Bill Frantz <frantz@netcom.com>]

As far as I can tell, law, custom, and technology are the three ways we
have to protect our privacy.  Cypherpunks are well aware of the
technological options, so I won't discuss them further except to note that
they probably are not, by themselves, enough.

Law has also been discussed, including the European privacy laws and
similar laws which have been proposed for the US.  One good thing about the
European mindset on privacy is that it seems to include resistance to legal
suppression of privacy technology.

The last is custom.  This approach appears in cypherpunk discussions as an
emphasis on contractual relations between people and the organizations
receiving data.  It is this area I would like to discuss.


What makes a good privacy contract?  What should you expect when you buy
something?  What is the standard contract?  What exceptions must be clearly
noted?  How does society decide these cultural issues?

I strongly believe in standard contracts because they greatly reduce
transaction costs.  Where the parties need different terms, they can
negotiate exceptions.  However, we do not have standard privacy contracts
which match our new communication and database technologies.  We don't even
have a good public debate on the issues involved.

Unfortunately, it seems that the only way to raise these issues to the
radar scope of the news media/public is to have some congresscritter
propose a law.  Even more unfortunately, said law usually preempts people's
right to contract with each other, rather than just setting a framework for
the contract negotiations.  There must be a better way.


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