Consumer Information Privacy

6 Pages 1530 Words

Privacy is a term with many meanings. The simple word 'privacy' has taken on so many different meanings in so many different corners of the law that it has largely ceased to convey any single coherent concept. The functions of a general commitment to the value of privacy as a part of the law are varied, and cannot be reduced to the amount of protection actually given to that value in the legal system … the commitment to privacy is no different than the commitment to other values, such as freedom of expression or liberty [3]. In today's real world, there seems to be confusion in regard to what privacy is and what it is not. At one time, privacy implied that individuals could be secluded, but that has radically changed. Logistical barriers created by geography once protected a person. This too, though, has radically changed. The geographical wall of protection has been removed by the development of technology. The loss of these once formidable barriers has not been accounted for in the scholarship available today. Privacy can no longer be assumed, even in the security of one's own home. Instead, privacy is a condition that is much easier to violate, and thus, is much more difficult to establish and protect. In the online and offline worlds, the value of personal information - especially information about commercial purchases and preferences - has long been recognised. Exchanges and uses of personal information have also long sparked concerns about privacy. Public opinion surveys consistently indicate that overwhelming majorities of the public are concerned that they have lost all control over information about themselves and do not trust organisations to protect the privacy of their information.


Uses of new technologies raise policy issues that are often defined in terms of invasion of privacy (REGAN, 1995). Supporting this argument, one analyst, Patricia Mell, notes that the use of computers to manage information has considerabl...