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US jurisprudence has a primary flaw when comes to privacy: individuals have no rights to most of their own data. Once it is "out there," it's available to be bo
by tbrownaw 13y ago
US jurisprudence has a primary flaw when comes to privacy: individuals have no rights to most of their own data. Once it is "out there," it's available to be bought and sold without much limitation.
Yes, it would be much more convenient if I could forbid people I don't like (or who don't like me) from ever talking about me. Unauthorized gossip should be illegal even if it doesn't qualify as slander or libel. The law should assist me in maintaining a wall between my public image and my not-deliberately-publicized (but still done somewhat in public) actions.
- ds9 13y agoYou rightly point out that the idea advocated by ballard, as stated, doesn't distinguish the probably narrower category that he's concerned about. But I think what he meant was probably business data - which is distinguishable from newsworthy information. Yes, there are problems associated with this distinction, but I think it could be formulated well enough to protect both press freedom and privacy in commercial transactions. That said, I think ballard misidentified the problem in another way. The problem is not that "individuals have no rights to most of their own data" in US law - instead the problem is that individuals can be forced to bargain away all their rights to the info in question as a condition of engaging in any ordinary transaction of everyday life.