|
<
< |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="WebPreferences" |
|---|
| >
> |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="FirstPaper" |
|---|
| | | The Administration’s proposal
The Obama Administration recently unveiled The Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights, which outlines a series of goals and policies that aim to build a stronger data privacy framework to protect consumers’ privacy online. Unfortunately, the proposal will likely fail to meaningfully protect consumer privacy, and it may actually make things worse. This essay briefly examines one of the proposal’s critical weaknesses.
Notes
:
:
| |
>
> | Why use footnotes in a
hypertext document? Just link sources to their relevant callout
phrases. | | | Notice and Consent
The first principle outlined in the Privacy Bill of Rights states that individual consumers should have a right to exercise control over what personal data companies collect from them and how they use it. This principle provides that consumers should be given choices about data collection, use, and disclosure that are “appropriate for the scale, scope, and sensitivity of personal data.” In theory, consumers will possess the ability to control what information they share online because companies will be required to explicitly inform consumers of the information to be collected, and to obtain consumers’ consent before collecting it. | | | In the online privacy context, giving consumers a “right to exercise control” will likely do more harm than good. The consequence of a user’s consent is that the user waives his right to challenge the data aggregator’s spying, since the consumer’s consent is affirmatively granting to the data collector a license to spy. The “right to control” will more likely function as a mechanism for immunizing the conduct of data collectors. Thus, although the notice/consent regime effectively balances policy goals in some contexts, it will likely (ironically) lead to greater invasions of privacy in the online context than society might otherwise tolerate. | |
>
> | Through what other
mechanism might this non-tolerance be expressed? What policy better
allows people to choose than a policy of requiring informed consent?
Your remaining objection goes not to the insufficiency of the policy
approach, but rather to the likelihood that people will give consent
too easily, without absorbing the required information. This appears
to call for education, but is not an argument against giving people
choices, or making informed consent a precondition for potentially
risky courses of action. | | | Trey Parker and Matt Stone hit this nail on the head in last year’s HUMANCENTiPAD? episode. In the episode, Kyle is kidnapped by Apple employees, who then use him in an experimental new product that combines the iPhone, iPad, and three human beings. The volunteers all agreed to become Apple’s first “truly-interfaced device”; they will have their lips removed and will become sewn together mouth to anus, so that the bowels from the first volunteer will enter the mouth of Kyle, leading through Kyle’s anus to the mouth of the third volunteer, which then goes to a tablet device. Together, they create a device that is “part human, and part centipede, and part web browser, and part emailing device.” Mr. Jobs repeatedly assures the audience that this is all consensual. The volunteers agreed to all of this when they downloaded the latest iTunes and clicked “Agree” to Apple’s Terms and Conditions.
Problems emerge during the testing stages when the engineers test the device’s reading capabilities. In one scene, a team attempts to rescue the HUMANCENTiPad? by breaking it out of its holding cage and bringing it to an operating room where a doctor says that he can separate the volunteers. The doctor just needs to obtain Kyle’s consent. Kyle, anxious to be freed, immediately agrees without reading the agreement. A buzzer sounds as the operating room splits in half to reveal that it was all a setup to see if Kyle would read the agreement before agreeing. Jobs is furious that the device has again failed to read.
Like Kyle, most people don’t read the lengthy legal agreements before installing iTunes or other soft/hardware. Even if we did, we wouldn’t completely understand what we’re agreeing to, particularly since the agreements typically cover future circumstances that are currently unknown. Further, there’s no room for negotiation; the agreements are presented to users on a take it or leave it basis. So requiring disclosure and user consent won’t actually empower users. Instead, companies will press for more access and will be immunized from user complaints since those users were informed of the policies and freely consented.
Notes
:
:
:
:
| |
>
> | I'm not sure why it took
all these words to state the familiar and almost self-evident
proposition that most people do not read most informed consent
disclosures in any context, and consent too easily to transactions on
adhesionary terms. Like the discovery that people do not cast their
votes on careful political scrutiny of the candidates' positions
relevant to their own political needs, which is not an argument
against elections, this point is not an argument against requiring
both disclosure and consent. How to make disclosures more
informative and consent more reasoned are issues policy-implementers
should be concerned with, but if you have arguments to offer against
the principles on which the policy is being constructed, these aren't
they.
| | | Consumers will probably continue to consent, even in the face of further reaching policies, because of the convenience/utility that many of these products offer. Most people will continue to consent to Facebook spying in exchange for the ability to connect and share information with their friends and family on one convenient platform. At least in some contexts, users might not see any harm in sharing tons of personal data. For example, many users probably consent to sharing their email address book with Facebook because they view this as a harmless and helpful way to more easily find their acquaintances’ accounts.
Solutions | |
<
< | The notice/consent regime cannot be counted on to afford users meaningful choices in the context of online privacy, but perhaps the market will produce viable solutions. A potential remedy to Facebook’s spying might be to create an alternative to the free service with a platform supported by user subscription revenue. This would help relieve part of the need to rely on advertising/spying revenue in order to operate. Additionally, companies dedicated to protecting users’ online privacy have begun to emerge and are gaining popularity in the wake of recent privacy scandals. However, I predict that things will continue to get worse, at least in the near future. Companies will continue to press users for more information and users will continue to consent. We’re still in the early stages of these new forms of spying and most people do not appreciate the harms, but a time will come when the boundary will be pushed too far and a backlash will occur. Most people still don’t realize the extent to which they are being spied on. But as users become more aware of the extent of and implications of spying, they may begin to push back and collectively demand changes.
Notes
:
:
| >
> | The notice/consent regime cannot be counted on to afford users meaningful choices in the context of online privacy, but perhaps the market will produce viable solutions. A potential remedy to Facebook’s spying might be to create an alternative to the free service with a platform supported by user subscription revenue.
Why is this a better
alternative than free as in freedom software that federates the
service of sharing with friends on the Web, and removes the spying
man in the middle altogether?
This would help relieve part of the need to rely on advertising/spying revenue in order to operate. Additionally, companies dedicated to protecting users’ online privacy have begun to emerge and are gaining popularity in the wake of recent privacy scandals. However, I predict that things will continue to get worse, at least in the near future. Companies will continue to press users for more information and users will continue to consent. We’re still in the early stages of these new forms of spying and most people do not appreciate the harms, but a time will come when the boundary will be pushed too far and a backlash will occur. Most people still don’t realize the extent to which they are being spied on. But as users become more aware of the extent of and implications of spying, they may begin to push back and collectively demand changes. | | |
-- LeeSilver - 20 Mar 2012 | |
>
> | The concerns I have
about this draft are explained above. Improvement lies in the
direction of sharper focus: the problem can be stated compactly, and
it's the discussion of the possible policy responses that should be
at the center of the draft. You haven't explained what should
replace the principle of notice and informed consent in preferable
policy, so we are weighing nothing against something. Concerns about
the seriousness with which people give consent is not an argument
against seeking consent, but is an argument for other policy
responses you neither outline nor discuss. Substituting plot summary
of television comedy performances for these forms of analysis doesn't
work very well.
| | |
\ No newline at end of file |
|