We are living through a privacy tipping point. \u00a0Technology is dramatically changing what is possible in terms of surveillance, monitoring, persistence, analysis. \u00a0We are cracking open the lid of Pandora\u2019s Box. We still don\u2019t really know what\u2019s in the box. \u00a0Maybe the benefits of the disappearance of privacy will outweigh the negative outcomes. \u00a0Is it possible that the quantified self will be worth trading for the all-seeing eye of the corporation or state? We don\u2019t understand the full story yet.<\/p>\n
One thing that IS clear is that this is an important time to stop and think. \u00a0Before we give away privacy in ways that may (already) be very difficult to undo, we ought to slow down and consider the implications. \u00a0That\u2019s what brings me to write about this. \u00a0I am not an expert on privacy but I believe it to be important enough of an issue that it will require all of us to come up with an approach to privacy that realises the benefits of technology without undermining our rights and our autonomy.<\/p>\n
We know that both corporations and governments are actively collecting data about us. We are not happy about the\u00a0covert collection of data about us by governments<\/a>\u00a0but ironically we queue up to\u00a0give away our privacy to corporations<\/a>\u00a0in exchange for services. \u00a0We know that proliferation of technology is making it harder to be anonymous. \u00a0In particular, the smarter our mobile phones get, the more data they leak to governments and corporations alike.<\/p>\n We\u2019ve known for some time that it doesn\u2019t take many pieces of data to uniquely identify someone. \u00a0More than twenty years ago, researcher Latanya Sweeney showed that with just three pieces of data (date of birth, gender, and postal code) she could\u00a0identify 87% of the US population<\/a>. \u00a0 In 2006, researchers\u00a0Arvind Narayanan and Vitaly Shmatikov shocked Netflix byde-anonymising a massive dataset<\/a>\u00a0of recommendations that Netflix had released after stripping it of what they thought was all\u00a0personally identifiable information or PII<\/a>\u00a0as it is known in the data industry.<\/p>\n That is disturbing enough on its own but it has actually gotten worse since then. \u00a0Last year researchers from MIT were able to uniquely identify individuals from cell phone recordsusing just four data points<\/a>\u00a0that indicated location and time. \u00a0In fact, location data turns out to be incredibly informative. \u00a0In a competition called the\u00a0Nokia Mobile Challenge<\/a>, researchers were able to\u00a0estimate the user\u2019s gender, marital status, occupation and age based on location information alone. \u00a0Researchers on location tracking\u00a0point out that the accumulation of data is significant<\/a>. \u00a0What is anonymous is small amounts becomes PII in large amounts.<\/p>\n Some Massively Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are now\u00a0collecting keystroke information on students<\/a>\u00a0which they use to uniquely identify students. \u00a0The goal of eliminating fraudulent behaviour in MOOCs is laudable but the collection of this data raises privacy issues. \u00a0How would you know\u00a0for certain when this data is or is not being collected from you? \u00a0What if this data found its way into the hands of other less scrupulous organisations who might conceivably use it to find you anywhere on the Internet?<\/p>\n So we live in an era where it is becoming increasingly challenging to protect one\u2019s privacy. \u00a0In fact, I am told that de-anonymisation researchers have recently reached the point where some are choosing not to publish some of their research results because they might be used to further undermine privacy.<\/p>\n One popular reaction to the problem of the erosion of personal privacy is to attempt toreclaim privacy through personal data control<\/a>\u00a0where we are able to establish and exert our own individual preferences in order set our own boundaries for privacy. \u00a0The notion of privacy being an individual transaction where we are each allowed to choose whether to share or not to share PII sounds like a great improvement on what we have now where we have very little individual control. \u00a0Laura James of the Open Knowledge Foundation\u00a0makes the case in a blog post<\/a>\u00a0that the right to choose should be an essential element of \u201cmy data\u201d. \u00a0She says, \u201cif it\u2019s my data, just about me, I should be able to choose to access it, reuse it, share it and open it if I wish.\u201d<\/p>\n Until recently I would have said that this was hard to argue with but what I have learned recently has made me realise that privacy cannot be so easily reduced to individual transactions. \u00a0In his excellent lecture series,\u00a0Snowden and The Future<\/a>, Eben Moglen makes the case (in Part 3<\/a>) against privacy as a transactional issue. \u00a0He points out that \u201cIf your family contains somebody who receives mail at Gmail, then Google gets a copy of all correspondence in your family.\u201d \u00a0Your personal decision has privacy implications for everyone you know.<\/p>\n Perhaps even more worryingly, researcher Scott Peppet argues that\u00a0decisions to reveal personal information publicly have implications for those who choose not to<\/a>. \u00a0He suggests that\u00a0people with \u201cvaluable credentials, clean medical records, and impressive credit scores will want to disclose those traits to receive preferential economic treatment.\u201d \u00a0Pressure is then put on those with only marginally less valuable credentials to share in order to benefit. \u00a0Peppet argues\u00a0that others could find they also need disclose PII in order to avoid negative inferences that may be drawn through staying silent.<\/p>\n So apparently we need a new way of looking at privacy issues. \u00a0Researchers Paola Tubaro and\u00a0Antonio A. Casilli have explored a multi-dimensional agency-based model. \u00a0In\u00a0their research<\/a>, they found that a tendency to share more online was accompanied by a counter-tendency among people to protect themselves online. \u00a0This plays out in complex ways in which we all influence each other through our privacy (or lack of privacy) practices.<\/p>\n Eben Moglen has suggested that, from a legal perspective, privacy is much more like an environmental issue than a transactional issue. \u00a0He points out that \u201cenvironmental law is not law about consent. It\u2019s law about the adoption of rules of liability reflecting socially determined outcomes: levels of safety, security, and welfare.\u201d \u00a0Perhaps this is a better way of looking at privacy. \u00a0I wonder what the privacy equivalent of a fine for littering is?<\/p>\n As I was reflecting on this I wonder if we might look at privacy from a health perspective and consider certain privacy practices as \u201cvaccines\u201d against the more egregious invasions of personal privacy. \u00a0The notion that privacy is a social thing seems almost oxymoronic at first glance but the closer you look, the more evident is that privacy is something that we collectively engage in but benefit from individually.<\/p>\n I am still digesting these ideas and reading more. \u00a0I hope to see something from YOU too. \u00a0Privacy is something too important to be left up to technological determinism or to twenty-something billionaires. \u00a0We all need to read, think, and ENGAGE.<\/p>\n I am grateful to\u00a0@barefoot_techie<\/a>\u00a0for links to many thought-provoking articles and for the opportunity recently to listen to privacy researcher\u00a0Kate Crawford<\/a>. \u00a0Privacy image courtesy ofg4II4is<\/a><\/p>\n Source: Many Possibilities by Steve Song<\/strong><\/a><\/em><\/p>\n SA Spy Files link deepens to the tune of R3.6m<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n South Africa\u2019s link to The Spy Files<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\nMy Data<\/h3>\n
New Metaphors<\/h3>\n
More on spying and information privacy in SA<\/h3>\n