3 ms·

I have a question: Librarians are fiercely protective of reading privacy, and don't want to hand the information on who borrowed which book to the police. Yet t

I have a question: Librarians are fiercely protective of reading privacy, and don't want to hand the information on who borrowed which book to the police. Yet they still record that information. Why? Wouldn't it be better to, for example, require a cash deposit equal to the value of the borrowed books, possibly in the form of some token? And if some books were too expensive, you'd still have the option of presenting some personally-identifiable ID. But the record of what you borrowed would be destroyed after you returned the book.

lwf 5y ago
Most libraries do not record that information once material is returned. See SFPL: > 10. The Library does not maintain a history of what a library user has previously checked out once books and materials have been returned on time4. > 11. When fines accrue on a user's account, the Library does maintain records of items that have been borrowed but returned after the due date, or are still outstanding on the user's record. When overdue materials are returned and all associated fines are paid, the information associated with the library card number is deleted. > 4 Library users may choose to opt in and enable My Check-out History. By doing so library users choose to give explicit consent to the storage of their Check-out History from the opt-in date. Library personnel will not access or release Check-out History unless required by law to do so. Library users may opt out of this service and delete Check-out History at any time. (Noted - November 30, 2011) https://sfpl.org/about/privacy-policy#text-40586 https://sfpl.org/about/privacy-policy#text-40586