Privacy Issues - Research Paper Example

Running head: PRIVACY ISSUES Privacy Issues Abstract While modern technology has enabled governments and private corporations to engage in activities which people may regard as extremely invasive of their privacy. This article highlights some of the most important ways in which a person’s right of privacy may be threatened through modern technology. Privacy Issues in the Modern Age Recent decades have seen rapid developments in the telecommunication and computing industries, these technological changes precipitate great social changes as well. Technological progress has enabled the creation of huge data warehouse companies who have the ability to collect information on individuals from many different sources; their cellular phone service providers, their local grocery store; their internet service providers, their pharmacists etc. and sell this information to marketers. This allows marketers to construct profiles of millions of individuals giving businesses the ability to tailor the marketing of their products to the likes and dislikes of individual consumers. New technology also helps corporations in carrying out surveillance of their employees and making sure that their employees are not misusing company time and resources. Modern technology helps governments maintain order by keeping those people under surveillance who can pose a threat to the stability of the political and social order. But looking at all this from another perspective, we can say that the advances in technology severely threaten people’s right to privacy. In this essay we shall examine some of the ways in which modern technology endangers an individual’s privacy. Privacy from Businesses Gathering of Personal Information By the late 1980’s it became common for businesses to keeping detailed records about their customers. To many people this record collection is itself a violation of their privacy. People question why businesses are allowed to collect information about them in the first place. In a Nielsen survey, it was revealed that 39.5% of the people strongly agree that some companies know more about them than they want those companies to know (KACHHI & LINK, 2009). There are many reasons why business collect information about their customers. Keeping records allows businesses to customize their marketing campaigns and create the image in the mind of each customer that the business has an individualized special relationship with them. Record keeping also allows business to predict shopping trends and concentrate their marketing efforts for certain types of products to only certain types of people. It also simplifies the transaction process between customers and companies in many instances, leading to more convenience for both the customer and the company, for example personalized mobile portals, which offer menus to customers based on their customized preferences, necessitate that customers disclose their most common activities to the service providers, however people may be willing to accept this trade-off between security and convenience (SMYTH, 2007). Polls have shown that there is a strong level of concern among people regarding the data that is collected about them by private companies. Many people hold that governments should restrict and regulate the practice of data collection by private companies (Dolnicar & Jordaan, 2007). Dissemination and Disclosure of Personal Data It has long been the practice of businesses to sell the personal information of their customers to other businesses for profit. In former times it was only mailing lists containing customer phone numbers and addresses that were sold and bought by businesses for the purpose of direct marketing. Modern technology has enabled the collection and thus the buying and selling of all sorts of information about a person. For example, if a marketer of sugar substitutes may be interested in gaining access to a pharmacist’s records, in order to market the sugar substitutes to diabetic patients. Even if businesses do not willingly sell their data to marketers, it is still possible for malevolent individuals to break into the business’s database and steal the information and thereafter sell it to marketers on the information black market. A vast black market for sensitive information stolen by hackers already exists. Stolen credit card information is the most common product on the information black market (Zetter, 5 More Indicted in Probe of International Carding Ring, 2009). Many governments have introduced laws restricting the type of data private enterprises can gather on their customers, for example Canada’s Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) restricts businesses from collecting, using or disclosing several types of information about their customers (Cady & McGregor, 2002). The Inconvenience of Direct Marketers Direct marketers who obtain an individual’s phone number, home address or email address may make unsolicited phone calls to them at any hour of the day, turn up at their house or inundate their electronic or physical mail box with junk mail. Many people resent this unsolicited marketing and interruption into their lives and demand that the businesses that have their phone numbers and personal information refuse to hand it over to anyone else. Concerns about telemarketers intrusion of people’s privacy has lead to the formation of “Do Not Call Registries”. Several countries , including the United States, Canada, Australia and the UK have implemented “Do Not Call Registries” (Cady & McGregor, 2002). Mobile Advertising Cellular phones have opened up new opportunities to marketers. Cell phones are usually not shared between people, so advertisements sent to the cellular phone of an individual can be tailored precisely to their profiles (CLEFF, 2007). In addition, with the coupling of cellular phones with GPS systems, GPS can be used to track the movements of an individual, for example, sending them advertisements when they come near a particular shopping mall Privacy from Employers Listening in to Phone Calls An employee’s work may involve making telephone calls, in addition many companies allow their employees to spend a reasonable amount of time on personal phone calls. Current laws allow employers to eavesdrop on the professional calls made by their employees, while employees may regard it as an immoral invasion of their privacy. Federal regulations in the United States make it illegal for employers to continue listening in on an employee’s call, once they realize that the call is a personal call and not work related (Privacy Rights Clearinghouse / UCAN, 2010). It is also legal for employees to obtain a list of calls made and received by an employee on a company phone, including company issued cellular phones (Privacy Rights Clearinghouse / UCAN, 2010). Computer Monitoring Current laws allow employers to use monitoring software to obtain a continuous image of an employee’s desktop, employers may also access the hard drives of company computers to gain access to any information the employee may have stored there. Employees may also monitor an employee’s internet use or use keystroke monitoring software to gauge an employee’s performance on the job and the amount of idle time spent by the employee (Privacy Rights Clearinghouse / UCAN, 2010). Email privacy Many people engage in personal correspondence through company email accounts. Surveys have found that most people that the use of company email accounts for personal matters is not unethical even if companies have put out specific guidelines against it. In addition people commonly believe that it is unethical on the part of employers to read their emails (Dillon & Thomas, 2006). In general courts have upheld the rights of employers to read the contents of employee correspondences made using company-owned email accounts, even when the correspondence was non work related but private (Privacy Rights Clearinghouse / UCAN, 2010). Text-Messages There is a considerable difference of opinion among legal experts regarding employer’s right to view text messages on a company provided cell phone. A high profile case regarding on this issue is currently sub-judice in the United States (Fegley, 2010). Video & Audio Surveillance Different localities have different laws regarding an employer’s right to carry out audio or video surveillance on their employees. In a number of cases in the United States, courts have upheld the employees’ rights of privacy when employers were found to be engaging in especially invasive types of surveillance such as having hidden video cameras in toilet and locker room areas. Audio recording may also be subject to a variety of legal rulings, for example, the federal laws in the United States, prohibit recording phone conversations unless at least one party in the conversation has consented to the recording (Privacy Rights Clearinghouse / UCAN, 2010). Disclosure of Private Information to Governments In all countries, the corporations providing information and communication services are be obliged to disclose a customer’s private information to law enforcement agencies upon demand, to one extent or another. In some countries, information divulged by multinational corporations has been used by the government in power to crack down upon political dissenters, for example, in China, a pro-democracy activist was sent to jail based on information disclosed to the Chinese government by the Yahoo! Corporation (Deva, 2008). Corporations consistently flout moral and ethical values in their desire for profit. Multinational corporations may comply with requests for information made by authoritarian governments, even if it is not obligated by the laws of the country or by agreements between the government and the corporation, based on the fear that if they do not comply with the government’s demands, they could lose the opportunity to do business in the country (Deva, 2008). In the United States too, companies providing information and communication services such as Yahoo!, Verizon and Comcast have been disclosing the private information of their customers to law enforcement and spy agencies in return for money. Recently Verizon and Yahoo! filed objections to Freedom of Information Act disclosures of the amounts the United States Government pays to buy from them the private information of their customers (Zetter, Wired.com, 2009). Conclusion In the globalized world of today there needs to be international regulation to ensure that the right of privacy of people is not violated. International treaties should be drawn limiting the types of information a company can gather and disclose. The buying and selling of private information across international boundaries can only be stopped through international regulations. Those corporations which disclose information to oppressive and authoritarian regimes and help them in their crackdown against dissidents should face legal reprisals in the democratic countries. Bibliography Cady, G. H., & McGregor, P. (2002). Protect your digital privacy: survival skills for the information age. Indianapolis, IN: Que Publishing. CLEFF, E. B. (2007). Privacy Issues in Mobile Advertising. INTERNATIONAL REVIEW OF LAW, COMPUTERS & TECHNOLOGY , 21 (03), 225–236. Deva, S. (2008, March). "Yahoo for Good" And The Right to Privacy of Internet Users: A Critique. Journal of Internet Law , 3-10. Dillon, T. W., & Thomas, D. S. (2006). Knowledge of Privacy, Personal Use,and Administrative Oversight of Office Computers and E-mail in the Workplace. Information Technology, Learning, and Performance Journal , 23-34. Dolnicar, S., & Jordaan, Y. (2007). A Market-Oriented Approach to Responsibly Managing Information Privacy Concerns In Direct Marketing. Journal of Advertising , 36 (02), 123–149. Fegley, S. (2010, March 10). Is Texting On An Employer Provided Cell Phone Private? Retrieved June 03, 2010, from fegleylaw.com: http://fegleylaw.com/employment-law/is-texting-on-an-employer-provided-cell-phone-private/ KACHHI, D., & LINK, M. W. (2009, March). Too Much Information: Does the Internet Dig too Deep. Journal of Advertising Research , 74-81. Privacy Rights Clearinghouse / UCAN. (2010, April). Fact Sheet 7: Workplace Privacy and Employee Monitoring. Retrieved June 02, 2010, from Privacy Rights Clearinghouse: http://www.privacyrights.org/fs/fs7-work.htm SMYTH, B. (2007). Adaptive Information Access: Personalization and Privacy. International Journal of Pattern Recognition and Artificial Intelligence , 21 (2), 183–205. Zetter, K. (2009, September 01). 5 More Indicted in Probe of International Carding Ring. Retrieved June 03, 2010, from Wired.com: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/09/westernexpress/ Zetter, K. (2009, December 01). Wired.com. Retrieved June 03, 2010, from Yahoo, Verizon: Our Spy Capabilities Would ‘Shock’, ‘Confuse’ Consumers: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/12/wiretap-prices/ Read More