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Consumer Privacy: A free choice approach

The Pacific Research Institute (PRI) is a free-market think tank providing practical solutions for the issues that affect the daily lives of all individuals. Since its founding in 1979, PRI has remained steadfast to the vision of a free and civil society where individuals can achieve their full potential.

And there is available this study "Consumer Privacy A Free Choice Approach" by Sonia Arrison who is the director of the Center for Freedom and Technology (CFT) at the California-based Pacific Research Institute.


Este Estudio está disponible para Consumidores de habla Española, "Privacidad del Consumidor: Un Enfoque de Libre Elección", destaca las tecnologías que pueden utilizar para proteger la privacidad.

CIO Insight

I think it is the first time I visit CIOinsight.com web site, and never it is too late. It is a great magazine, great columns:


The Value of Trust Through Privacy By Edward Cone September 15, 2004

The Value of Trust Through Privacy

Introduction

Privacy And Profits

Performance Indicator

Core Privacy Values

Details Matter

Making Privacy Work


The Ultimate Privacy Argument Against RFID By Evan Schuman, Ziff Davis Internet October 21, 2005


Petition Demands Privacy for Electronic Health Records By M.L. Baker, Ziff Davis Internet October 28, 2005

Lack of privacy affects productivity

The Indian Express publishes this article by Amy Joyce.


Cubicle misery: Lack of privacy affects productivity

Nosy colleagues and irritating chats curb an individual’s efficiency, locked doors can perhaps solve the problem

" Do you remember those days when you could slip into your private office, close the door and make that personal phone call? Or escape from maddening co-workers? Or simply have some quiet time to read that academic paper you needed to check out?

With at least 70 per cent of office workers spending their days in cubicles or open offices without any sort of dividers, very few workplaces have doors and, therefore, privacy anymore. Which means many workers have workplace complaints that involve burnt popcorn, speaker phones and lurkers/starers. Because without the walls workers used to have, we all have to share much more personal aspects of our lives than ever before." .....

Full article at The Indian Express

Video Surveillance

Image by XCaballe from Flickr:http://www.flickr.com/photos/xcaballe/18943611/

Souriez vous êtes filmés" est depuis 1995 un collectif de personnes désireuses de ne pas sombrer dans une société de technologie répressive et de proposer des alternatives militantes festives. L’association s’est donnée comme but le retrait des caméras de vidéo-surveillance, elle entend être un lieu de regroupement humain pour débattre de la société dans laquelle nous souhaitons vivre. Son combat politique et culturel est pluriel, elle oeuvre avec des associations comme AC ou comme le RATP (réseau pour l’abolition des transports payants) http://ratp.samizdat.net/ et organise des actions (masquage de caméras) parfois à l’échelle internationale avec des groupes comme le SCP newyork http://www.notbored.org.

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The Observing Surveillance Project documents the presence of video cameras placed in Washington DC after September 11. The project was undertaken by the staff of the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) in Washington, DC. Many of the images displayed in the exhibit may be viewed online at www.observingsurveillance.org.

EPIC: Spotlight on Surveillance

Image source: http://www.identix.com/

EPIC (Electronic Privacy Information Center) publishes this month, a report about Facial Recognition Systems Have an Ugly Effect on Personal Privacy.

"The federal government is spending an increasing amount of money on surveillance technology and programs at the expense of other projects. EPIC's "Spotlight on Surveillance" project scrutinizes these surveillance programs. For more information, see previous Spotlights on Surveillance.1

This month, Spotlight focuses upon the government’s use of facial recognition systems.2 The Departments of State, Energy, Justice and Defense have spent at least $47 million on such systems.3 In Fiscal Year 2006, the federal government plans to add facial recognition checks to all visa applications, which already include fingerprint biometrics.4 This is despite the Government Accountability Office’s estimate that incorporating biometric systems into visas would cost from $1.3 billion to $2.9 billion for startup, and $700 million to $1.5 billion for annual operating costs.5 Federal funds have been used by cities and states to buy facial recognition devices for motor vehicle and police departments.6 New U.S. passports and national identification cards created under the REAL ID Act of 2005 will both include digital photographs that can be linked to facial recognition systems.7 However, several tests, including those conducted by the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) and the Department of Defense, show that facial recognition systems can be easily befuddled by uncooperative subjects and changes in the environment, such as positioning or lighting.8 Such facial recognition systems create significant privacy risks because the technique is surreptitious, the prospects for extensive profiling are clear, and there are no laws that currently regulate these systems to prevent abuse. "

Full report at Epic.org

Sony & DRM

Where was Sony's Privacy Officer?
November 21, 2005 By Ray Everett-Church

As this month's controversy over Sony's distribution of music CDs with flawed digital rights management (DRM) software continues to play itself out, the whole mess is already primed to become a classic case study in why corporations need competent Privacy Officers to keep them out of trouble.

According to news reports, about 20 different CD titles issued in recent months by Sony's BMG music distribution group have been outfitted with software called eXtended Copy Protection (XCP). Designed to thwart illegal copying of music files, more than two million CDs containing XCP were shipped, mainly to retailers in the United States.

If you're like tens of millions of music lovers around the world, you often use your computer as your CD player, choosing to manage your music through software like Apple's iTunes or Yahoo's Musicmatch.

Full article at: Earthweb.com

Links:

Texas Versus Sony BMG Security Pronews
Sony BMG sued over CD spyware Hollywood Reporter
Texas sues Sony BMG over CDs
Patch issued for Sony CD uninstaller CNET News.com
Texas sues Sony BMG for spyware violations Reuters
Sony BMG Sued Under Anti-Spyware Laws ABC News

Symposium on Search Engines, Law, and Public Policy

The Information Society Project (ISP) at Yale Law School was created in 1997 to study the implications of the Internet, telecommunications, and the new information technologies on law and society.

At ISP will take place next December 3, 2005 a "Symposium on Search Engines, Law, and Public Policy",

"Search is big business, and search functionality increasingly shapes the information society. Yet how the law treats search is still up for grabs, and with it, the power to dominate the next generation of the online world. How will this potential to wield control affect search engine companies, their advertisers, their users, or the information they index? What will search engines look like in the future, and what is the role of regulators in this emerging market? This symposium will map out the terrain of search engine law & policy.

Regulating Search? is the first academic conference devoted to search engines and the law. The symposium will bring together technologists, policymakers, entrepreneurs, executives, lawyers, computer scientists, and activists to discuss the emerging field of search engine law. It will examine trends in litigation involving search engines, identify the interests that are implicated by the increasing legal control of search, and discuss appropriate public policy responses."

Privacy by Bearing Point

BearingPoint provides strategic consulting, application services, technology solutions and managed services to Global 2000 companies and government organizations.

One of these services is Security Systems Integration, and Privacy Services for Information Resources.

" Today’s market leaders leverage the Internet to increase market share and profitability. Because of the prevalence of online business-to-consumer, businessto- business, and consumer-to-consumer activities, your organization must institutionalize the privacy of electronic business information exchange to protect your most important asset and that of your customers—information.

At BearingPoint, we can help you implement the proper controls to advance your online business model and avoid making costly privacy mistakes. As part of our larger Security solutions suite, our Privacy Services offer an enterprise-wide integration approach that can help your company reduce costs, increase accuracy, enhance customer trust and satisfaction, and gain a competitive advantage through improved customer service and information security."

There is a PDF available "PROTECT VALUABLE DATA RESOURCES FOR COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE".

By the way, BearingPoint has a magazine Business Empowewed, and the last number issue 3, 205 there is a article very interesting about Retailers;

The 21st Century Retailer by Harry King, about the future enterprise and Customer-centric enterprise, customer loyalty and two fantastic quotes:

“A retailer must win the heart of today’s savvy customer by asking, ‘What’s unique about my merchandise and service?’” he says.

“In other words, what will differentiate them in the eyes of their customer? That’s what it’s all about.”

Could be privacy ?

RFID & Privacy: OECD Forum, Paris, 5 Oct 2005

Last October, OECD, hold a forum on RFID & Privacy, presentations are available;

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) Applications and Public Policy Considerations, OECD Foresight Forum, Paris, 5 Oct 2005

AGENDA

1. WELCOMING REMARKS AND INTRODUCTION BY THE CHAIR [9:30 – 9:40]
Hugo Parr, Director General, Ministry of Modernisation, Norway, and Chair of OECD Committee for Information, Computer and Communications Policy - Presentation

2. DESCRIPTION OF RFID TECHNOLOGY AND ITS POTENTIAL [9:40 TO 11:00]
Introductory remarks and session moderator: Jonathan Collins, European Editor for RFID Journal

2.1. Panorama of RFID current applications and potential economic benefits [9:40 – 10:10]
Dan Caprio, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy and Chief Privacy Officer, U.S. Department of Commerce - Presentation
Naji Najjar, Director of Wireless Broadband & Sensing Solutions, IBM Southwest Europe - Presentation

2.2. Future applications, ubiquity of RFID and potential economic and social benefits [10:10 – 11:00]
Taiichi Inoue, Senior Consultant - Head of IT for Society Consulting Group, Nomura Research Institute, Ltd. - Presentation
Indro Mukerjee, Executive vice president, Automotive & Identification business unit, Philips Semiconductors - Presentation
Elliot Maxwell, Fellow of the Communications Program at Johns Hopkins University - Presentation

3. COSTS/BENEFITS IN DIFFERENT TYPES OF APPLICATIONS [11:30 – 12:30]
Introductory remarks and session moderator: Richard Rees, President, Scanology Group, and Chair British Standards Institution Technical Committee “Automatic Identification Techniques” - Presentation

3.1. Smart tags along the supply chain [11:30-12:00]
Claudia Loebbecke, Professor, University of Cologne - Presentation
Masakazu Fujita, Research Director, Next Generation Electronic Commerce Council of Japan (ECOM) - Presentation - Appendix

3.2. Smart tags at the item-level and smart cards in service applications [12:00 – 12:30]
Elie Simon, Chief Executive Officer, TAGSYS SA - Presentation
Mark MacCarthy, Senior Vice President for Public Policy, VISA USA - Presentation
RFID DEMONSTRATIONS IN ROOM 1 [13:15 – 14:15]
IBM Demonstration: RFID in supply-chain management applications
Philips and VISA demonstration: payment applications with contactless pay cards and RFID-enabled mobile phone - Presentation

4. CRITICAL ISSUES FOR POLICY MAKERS [14:15 – 17:00]

4.1. Infrastructure/standards panel discussion [14:15 – 15:30]
Introductory remarks and session moderator: Dave Wollman, Scientific Advisor and RFID Coordinator, National Institute of Standards and Technology (USA)
Henri Barthel, Technical Director EPCglobal, GS1 - Presentation
Simson Garfinkel, Postdoctoral Fellow, Center for Research on Computation at Society at Harvard University - Presentation
Kyo-il Chung, Director, ETRI (Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute, Korea) - Presentation
Bernard Benhamou, Senior Lecturer, Political Science Institute, Paris - Speech

4.2. Privacy panel discussion [15:45 – 17:00]
Introductory remarks and session moderator: Joseph Alhadeff, Vice President for Global Public Policy and Chief Privacy Officer, Oracle Corporation
Marc Rotenberg, Executive Director, Electronic Privacy Information Center - Presentation
Florent Frederix, Scientific Officer for RFID, European Commission Infosoc D-G - Presentation
Stephania Congia, International Department of the Italian Data Protection Commission - Presentation
Jeroen Terstegge, Corporate Privacy Officer, Philips, and Member of the EICTA (Chair) and ICC Privacy and RFID Working Groups - Presentation

5. ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION [17:00 – 18:00]
Chaired by Hugo Parr, Director General, Ministry of Modernisation, Norway, and Chair of OECD Committee for Information, Computer and Communications Policy

5.1 Summary of important elements from the Forum [17:00 – 17:20]
Peter Ferguson, Director, Electronic Commerce Branch, Industry Canada
Richard Foggie, Assistant Director, Electronics and IT Services, DTI
Tony Taylor, European director, EPCGlobal Inc.
Jeremy Ward, Director of Service Development, Symantec EMEA

5.3 Open discussion of important elements from the Forum [17:20 – 17:50]5.4 Overall summary and next steps [17:50 – 18:00 ]

5.4 Overall summary by Hugo Parr, Director General, Ministry of Modernisation, Norway, and Chair of OECD Committee for Information, Computer and Communications Policy
Potential future work by the OECD: next steps

Eurobarometers on privacy

Picture from: RTD Info magazine Nov 2005
RTF Info is a magazine by European Commission on European Research.

Last number, november 2005, is dedicated to two surveys: Europeans, Science and Technology and Social values, Science and Technology .

One of these questions was privacy:

" Privacy and freedom of expression

Protecting information about our private life from misuse and exploitation - Protecting freedom of speech and information. A very large majority of Europeans are concerned about the need for this dual protection. Almost 70% regard it as “very important” and over a quarter as “fairly important”.

The protection of private life, in particular with the increasing traffic in virtual information, is thus a matter of concern to citizens, reflecting their interest in a subject that is laid down in Article 8 of the Charter of European Fundamental Rights. The application of this right constitutes a very clear challenge in a society where information obtained by those engaged in electronic commerce, insurance, health care and many other private spheres of activity is stored in databanks. Not only are these insufficiently protected against possible piracy but their very use by the operators in question can raise ethical questions due to the growing intrusion into an individual’s private life.

The Czechs (81%), the Greeks (78%) and the British (77%) prioritise the importance of protecting personal data – as do the Icelandics (83%) and the Norwegians (81%) outside the EU. A similar unanimity is found for freedom of speech and information, also laid down in the Charter of European Fundamental Rights: 95% of Europeans attach importance to this (including the 68% who regard it as “very important”). A similar degree of unanimity is found throughout the various socio-cultural strata. However, in the ‘new’ EU states there is a tendency maybe to view the importance of the application of these rights in more relative terms. "

Sperm-donor, DNA & Privacy

Image Source : http://www.wisniewskis.de

Last week, New Scientist, published this article “Anonymous sperm donor traced on internet”, how a 15-year-old boy who was conceived using donor sperm discovered his genetic father.

“The teenager tracked down his father from his Y chromosome. The Y is passed from father to son virtually unchanged, like a surname. The Y is passed from father to son virtually unchanged, like a surname. So the pattern of gene variants it carries can help identify which paternal line an individual has descended from and can also be linked to a man's surname.The boy paid FamilyTreeDNA.com $289 for the service”

“Using another online service, Omnitrace.com, he purchased the names of everyone that had been born in the same place on the same day.”

Trusted Pear

Primum Group Technologies (PGT) announced plans to present its new privacy and anonymity technology in Albany,New York during the week-long National Small Business Innovation Research(SBIR)/Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Conference from 14-18November. PGT are developers of a new web-based technology -- "TrustedPear(TM)" -- so named because it provides trusted exchange between pairs ofexchange partners.

HBR articles about privacy

Harvard Business Review published last december an article about Privacy & Technology by Roberta A. Fusaro, for read this article, you must pay it online or go to a library and read the Harvard Business Review number Dec 2004.

"Tracking technologies--in products and services like TiVo and electronic toll collection--make people's lives a lot more convenient. But the public is understandably concerned about the privacy issues such technologies raise. No one is more aware of those issues than Dante Sorella, CEO of Raydar Electronics, which develops and sells radio frequency identification (RFID) tags and readers"

But I have found this article in spanish for free: www.infobaeprofesional.com

Privacidad y tecnología. Como Gran Hermano

"Ante una oferta para utilizar etiquetas de identificación en un bien de consumo, un ejecutivo se pregunta: ¿se ofrece un servicio valioso al cliente o se invade su vida? Las tecnologías de seguimiento como la RFID han hecho más transparentes que nunca las vidas de las personas"

3M: Electronic Vehicle Registration

Image source 3M

Electronic Vehicle Registration (EVR) is a product by 3M that uses Radio Frequency Identification technology to electronically identify vehicles and validate the identity, status, and authenticity of vehicle data. This enables government agencies to automatically detect and screen vehicles for compliance with federal, state, and municipal vehicle regulations.

• Automatically detects and screens vehicles for compliance with federal, state, and municipal vehicle regulations
• Automated enforcement actions and violation processing for non-compliant vehicles
• Increases effectiveness and efficiency of current government processes

There are videos in English, Spanish and Portuguese availables.

And this Brochure.

Ambient Agoras

Despite it is over Ambient Agoras it was a European Project Developed between 2001 – 2003.

" This Project amazing project, aims at providing situated services, place-relevant information, and feeling of the place (‘genius loci’) to users, so that they feel at home in the office.
In our approach, we are combining two perspectives that can be taken towards the issue of how the computer will disappear. We propose that disappearance can happen in two ways: via the “physical disappearance” by becoming very small due to miniaturization; via the “mental disappearance” of devices by becoming "invisible" because they are integrated/embedded in the physical environment (e.g., walls, doors, tables) around us. "

Privacy Issues

"The “Disappearing Computer (DC)” approach raises some fear among users because of the increased possibilities of being observed and of loosing control over private information, due to hidden functionality based on embedded invisible devices. This fear is certainly not entirely irrational, and the potential of DC indeed enables invasive capture of private data. On the other hand, as DC is devoted to collaborating with the user and supporting him, it needs to know things about the user. How can this be achieved without the user being put in embarrassing situations where personal data are disclosed to the wrong person, or used by others against his will? As privacy is a cultural notion, it may vary in time and space. The limit between privacy and isolation is not easy to define; as the right to be left alone competes with the right to be informed. To cover all these issues, we will provide a general framework for privacy design."

Download the European Disappearing Computer Privacy Design Guidelines (Version 1, November 2003, pdf-file, 190KB)

Facing the privacy issues: Privacy Guidelines for DC (organized by Saadi Lahlou, Laboratory of Design for Cognition, EDF R&D, Paris, François Jegou, Dalt Brussels & Politecnico di Milano Marc Langheinrich, ETH Zürich) (Download the "Open Day"-Schedule, pdf-file)

Project Partners:

The Integrated Publication and Information Systems Institute (IPSI) of the German Fraunhofer Gesellschaft (FhG) in Darmstadt, serves as the scientific and technical as well as the administrative coordinator of the project. It has expertise in developing innovative concepts and software prototypes in the fields of human-computer interaction, CSCW, and hypermedia environments. The research division AMBIENTE - »Workspaces of the Future« will contribute based on its earlier work in the areas of meeting rooms, Roomware®, and Cooperative Buildings.

EDF (Electricité de France) , the French electrical power utility, is the user organisation in the consortium. The Laboratory of Design for Cognition (LDC), located near Paris, of its R&D division develops and evaluates a wide range of office environments. In the project, it contributes innovative observation and evaluation methods as well as participative design techniques. Their K1-Building will provide a versatile testbed for the project.

Wilkhahn, located in Bad Münder (Germany), develops design-oriented, high quality products and interior concepts for applications in high quality segments, e.g., creating innovative office environments. Together with its design company "wiege" (Wilkhahn Entwicklungs GmbH), they provide the expertise for designing and building the planned artefacts. They will make use of their specific experience gained in the design of the second generation of Roomware® components developed in cooperation with IPSI as part of the Future Office Dynamics Consortium.

More about Ambient Intelligence:

OCW AmI Course: MAS. 963 and MAS.961
AMIGO Project (Ambient Intelligence for the Networked Home Environment)

Patient Privacy Rights

Image Source Patient Privacy Rights' Website
Article from EPIC NEWS

On October 26th, EPIC joined with Patient Privacy Rights in an effort to establish stronger protections in the United States for patients' medical information.

"2005 is the year that the American public learned that massive security breaches of personal information have made identity theft the number one crime in America. We must not allow the most sensitive personal records that exist, our medical records, to go online without adequate privacy safeguards," said EPIC Executive Director Marc Rotenberg.

Congress is rushing to pass legislation to establish a national Health Information Network without patient privacy protections. Yet recent surveys show that Americans consider the privacy of medical records to be a major concern. A Harris poll this past February found that 69 percent of adults do not believe strong enough data security will be installed in the system. An earlier Gallup survey found that 78 percent of the American public feel it is very important that their medical records be kept confidential. And the Markle Foundation found that more than three out of four respondents (79%) supported the right for a patient to control who can access his health information.

"No one should be able to see or use your medical records without your permission," said Dr. Deborah Peel, founder and chairman of the Patient Privacy Rights Foundation. "Americans must have confidence in the privacy and security of their online medical records."

As part of the effort to protect patients' privacy rights, the two groups are circulating an online petition calling for strong medical privacy safeguards.

The petition states simply:

-- I want to decide who can see and use my medical records

-- I do not want my medical records or those of my family's to be seen or used by my employer

-- I should never be forced to give up my right to privacy in order to get medical treatment.

Patient Privacy Rights is an Austin, Texas-based national consumer organization devoted to medical privacy.

"I Want My Medical Privacy!" petition:
http://www.patientprivacyrights.org/petition

Patient Privacy Rights site:
http://patientprivacyrights.org

FIDIS (Future of Identity in the Information Society)

FIDIS (Future of Identity in the Information Society) is a NoE (Network of Excellence) supported by the European Union under the 6th Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development within the Information Society Technologies (IST) priority in the Action Line: “Towards a global dependability and security framework”.

FIDIS work is structured into 7 research activities:

1. “Identity of Identity”
2. Profiling
3. Interoperability of IDs and ID management systems
4. Forensic Implications
5. De-Identification
6. HighTech ID
7. Mobility and Identity

The FIDIS consortium consists of the following partners:

1. Goethe University Frankfurt
Germany
2. Joint Research Centre (JRC)
Spain
3. Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Belgium
4. Unabhängiges Landeszentrum für Datenschutz
Germany
5. Institut Europeen D’Administration Des Affaires (INSEAD)
France
6. University of Reading
United Kingdom
7. Katholieke Universiteit Leuven
Belgium
8. Tilburg University
Netherlands
9. Karlstads University
Sweden
10. Technische Universität Berlin
Germany
11. Technische Universität Dresden
Germany
12. Albert-Ludwig-University Freiburg
Germany
13. Masarykova universita v Brne
Czech Republic
14. VaF Bratislava
Slovakia
15. London School of Economics and Political Science
United Kingdom
16. Budapest University of Technology and Economics (ISTRI)
Hungary
17. IBM Research GmbH
Switzerland
18. Institut de recherche criminelle de la Gendarmerie Nationale
France
19. Netherlands Forensic Institute
Netherlands
20. Virtual Identity and Privacy Research Center
Switzerland
21. Europäisches Microsoft Innovations Center GmbH
Germany
22. Institute of Communication and Computer Systems (ICCS)
Greece
23. AXSionics AG
Switzerland
24. SIRRIX AG Security Technologies
Germany

Google, ads and privacy

Last sunday, The New York Times publised this article Google Wants to Dominate Madison Avenue, Too by SAUL HANSELL

"Google already sells its text ads for many other sites on the Internet (including nytimes.com), and is also moving tentatively to sell the picture-based interactive advertising preferred by marketers who want to promote brands rather than immediately sell products. Now it is preparing to extend its technology to nearly every other medium, most significantly television. It is looking toward a world of digital cable boxes and Internet-delivered television that will allow it to show commercials tailored for each viewer, as it does now for each Web page it displays."

And this blog by Jack Schofield from Guardian Unlimited, Google, advertising, and the future of privacy

" The scary bit is that Google can target ads better if it knows more about you. And if it knows everything you have ever seached for on Google, knows who your friends are (Orkut), has read all your email (Gmail) and instant messages and listened to your phone calls (Google Talk) then it may well know far about you than your parents, your spouse or your boss."
....
"Of course, Google doesn't tie all your personal information together in a Big Brother-style database, yet. But if Google doesn't, then Yahoo or Microsoft MSN or some new service almost certainly will. At the moment, Google says it only uses location information (ZIP codes)"