All right, let's get to audience questions for the week.
First one, Hey, David is a right to privacy, still a realistic expectation in 2019 given
the technology that is now ubiquitous.
So sometimes with these [inaudible]
easier to start with the simplest form of the answer, like the most basic logistical
answer and then talk about the implications.
So in a literal sense, in public there's no realistic expectation of privacy.
There are cameras everywhere.
Uh, there are all sorts of different surveillance methods that are going on via satellite.
If a government really wants to follow you around, they can do it when you're out in
public.
So in public there is not, in a practical sense an expectation of privacy, but that
definition of privacy has changed over time.
And I'll get to that in private people.
Can decide whether to record and there are laws that govern this.
If businesses want to have surveillance cameras inside their business, most of the time it's
legal in bathrooms and locker rooms.
It's not an, it should continue to be illegal.
I believe that it should be disclosed if there is surveillance.
I'm trying to think in Vegas casinos where there are cameras everywhere.
I don't know that I see signs that say that you are under surveillance at all times other
than in the bathroom and presumably it presumably in your hotel room.
I think that that should be there.
It may not even really be um, the law, but it is that businesses right to do it and then
it's up to you to decide whether you want to be a patron of a business that is a recording,
video surveillance, et cetera.
The problem really goes back to what do we mean by privacy when we talk about data collection,
is that a violation of privacy that was not in considered by older definitions of what
it means to have a right to privacy.
Because what you have to understand is that a hundred years ago we could say if you're
in public, you don't have a right to privacy.
And in 2019 we say if you're in public, you don't have a right to privacy.
But what that meant a hundred years ago is very different from what it means today.
Today you, uh, have the ability to track someone almost 24, seven between their phone using
the GPS on their phone and all sorts of public and private cameras that exist out on the
streets of our cities, in businesses, et cetera.
A hundred years ago.
Even though the presumption of the right to privacy might've been no different than it
is today from a legal perspective, in order to track someone in the way that you can track
them down merely technologically, you needed a team to actually track that person 24, seven
and so even if the law has not changed, and even if we can say, even though by the way
the Patriot act and other types of surveillance have modified the law around other types of
surveillance, including phone records and others.
But that's a little bit different than what we're talking about here.
Uh, the ability, the practical ability to do this type of surveillance has changed drastically.
Never having a right to privacy in public, uh, ignores that today.
It means something very, very different to be walking around in public than it did a
hundred years ago.
So should our definition of privacy evolve even with the same data, often there's a question
of who gets to see it, right?
I mean in, in principle, think about something like medical records and the privacy that
is presumed to go along with those.
I might be okay with those records being used in some sort of aggregate and non-US way to
research illness, but that doesn't necessarily mean that I want my insurer to have access
to those records or that I want those to have my name attached to them in a way that is
not private.
Uh, so clearly in public, there is no right to privacy in the sense that many of us imagine.
But I still believe that we should have a reasonable right to anonymity if we want it.
And that's where the technological surveillance starts to become a question Mark.
Realistically.
The other thing we have to consider about this is that as these new technologies have
been developed, public opinion has also shifted and will likely continue to shift.
If you ask a 20 year old today and a four year 40 year old and a 60 year old and an
80 year old, when it comes to something as seemingly straightforward as right to privacy
in public, when you're just out in public, you will have drastically different answers
from what is reasonable from each of those groups.
And I can't imagine that that's going to stay the same over time as these new technological
means become more of an everyday part of our lives.
When I write an email, when I think about it, I tell myself I have to be under the,
the sort of, uh, operating under the belief that this is not necessarily private, but
I'm not actually thinking of that.
Every time I write an email, younger generations may be actually thinking about it that way
or they may not because they don't care.
And, uh, that is part of the shift in public opinion around this that we've seen.
Let me know what you think.
Uh, when it comes to a right to privacy, what is reasonable to expect and what is not.