Privacy 1

Definitions of Privacy The right to be let alone – Harvard Law Review article by Brandeis and Chase in Abigail v. Franklin Mills Chief Judge Alton B Parker and his interesting reversal of opinion The right to control information about yourself Who owns information about you? How do they get it?

Abigail’s Image

Definitions of Privacy “The claim of individuals, groups or institutions to determine for themselves when, how, and to what extent information about them is communicated to others.” Weston “The extent to which we are known to others, the extent to which others have physical access to us, and the extent to which we are the subject of others’ attention” Gavison

Right to privacy Is there a right to privacy? US Bill of Rights Declaration of Human Rights California State Constitution

The Players Government Business Technology Norms

Fair Information Practices An organization: –Must be accountable for all PII in its possession –Must identify the purposes for collecting PII –Must have the knowledge and consent of the person before collecting PII –Must not permit forward transfer of of PII without the person’s permission –Should retain the PII only for as long as necessary –Allow persons to access their PII with the opportunity to amend it –Must ensure the security of the PII in its possession –Provide a means of recourse if any of the previous are violated

The Census and Mission Creep Original census was simply a head count Scope expanded to include a variety of demographic information Today the role of the census includes determining eligibility for various federal programs

A National Identifier The Social Security Number –Problems as an identifier –Scope creep re. The SSN Other identification schemes – national ID cards Driver’s License

Other Identification Issues Homeland Security – Arrival Departure Information System (ADIS), US Visitor and Immigrant Status Technology (US – VISIT) VeriChip™ – Applied Digital Technology RFID scheme

Fair Credit Reporting Act How it came to be The credit reporting industry Errors in credit reporting and the presumption of guilt

Identity Theft How prevalent is identity theft? What factors make it an attractive crime? – Sutton’s Law What are the effects? –On the individual –On society

Absolute Identification Fingerprints DNA –Identifies bodies, not people The UPS signature problem The more trust we place in identification systems, the more rewarding fraud becomes Identification systems and the presumption of guilt

The Potential of e-Commerce Up to now, e-commerce revenues have not lived up to predictions. The dilemma for business –Exploit Personally Identifiable Information? –Be a strong supporter of consumer privacy? Who owns the customer’s information?

Cost of Privacy Studies aimed at showing that the cost of privacy is prohibitive, e.g. commissioned studies sponsored by the DMA (see paper by Robert Gellman at Costs of failing to protect privacy Are there benefits of protecting privacy?

What are the costs of failing to protect privacy? Privacy Chernobyls –Eli Lilly –DoubleClick –San Diego State University Effects of negative publicity –Lost sales –Decline in stock price

Cost/Benefit of Privacy Cyber Dialogue survey October 2001 –27% abandoned an order online –21% switched an online order to an offline order –7% online and 5% offline switched to another store –Expanding to the entire population, these defections were estimated to have had a cost of $6.2B for the year

Trust Consumers do not fully trust business and government on privacy – Harris Interactive Poll April/May 2001 Privacy policies are growing more common, but not necessarily more understandable

Loyalty and Retention Customer loyalty results in higher retention rates By increasing customer retention 5%, a company will increase its profits from 25% to 95% (Reichheld, HBR)

Cost/Benefit of Privacy (2) Forrester Report – October 2001 –37% would buy more online if they were not worried about privacy issues –34% do not buy online due to privacy issues –50% of online buyers extremely concerned about privacy, 34% somewhat concerned –Only 6% thought benefits from sharing personal information outweighed privacy concerns –Bottom line – Potential loss of $15B or 27% of projected e-commerce revenues for the year

Steps Consumers Take to Protect Privacy Read privacy policy Many don’t understand ‘cookies’ 24% of Internet users surveyed falsified information to protect privacy (Pew Internet & American Life Project, August 2000) 86% favor opt-in (Pew Internet & American Life Project, August 2000) Consumers most likely to take steps to protect their privacy are those of greatest interest to marketers (IBM Multi-national consumer privacy survey 1999)

Privacy and B2B B2B predicted revenues and reality – analogy to B2C Privacy expectations shaped by B2C experiences Trust and B2B

The Public and Privacy (Weston) Privacy unconcerned – 12% Privacy pragmatics – 63% Privacy fundamentalists – 25%