Privacy Law Links

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Privacy Law Links

Privacy Law Academic Papers

• "Examined Lives: Informational Privacy and the Subject as Object" (2000) is a scholarly article by Julie E. Cohen published in the Stanford Law Review (52 Stan. L. Rev. 1373-1438). The article explores the concept of informational privacy and its impact on individuals as objects.

  Official Abstract:

  In the United States, proposals for informational privacy have proved enormously controversial. On a political level, such proposals threaten powerful data processing interests. On a theoretical level, data processors and other data privacy opponents argue that imposing restrictions on the collection, use, and exchange of personal data would ignore established understandings of property, limit individual freedom of choice, violate principles of rational information use, and infringe data processors' freedom of speech. In this article, Professor Julie Cohen explores these theoretical challenges to informational privacy protection. She concludes that categorical arguments from property, choice, truth, and speech lack weight, and mask fundamentally political choices about the allocation of power over information, cost, and opportunity. Each debate, although couched in a rhetoric of individual liberty, effectively reduces individuals to objects of choices and trades made by others. Professor Cohen argues, instead, that the debate about data privacy protection should be grounded in an appreciation of the conditions necessary for individuals to develop and exercise autonomy in fact, and that meaningful autonomy requires a degree of freedom from monitoring, scrutiny, and categorization by others. The article concludes by calling for the design of both legal and technological tools for strong data privacy protection.

  Overview:

  The article argues that proposals for informational privacy protection have been controversial in the United States due to their potential threat to powerful data processing interests. Data processors and other data privacy opponents argue that imposing restrictions on the collection, use, and exchange of personal data would ignore established understandings of property, limit individual freedom of choice, violate principles of rational information use, and infringe data processors' freedom of speech.

  The author proposes an alternative framework for addressing informational privacy that focuses on the subject as an object and recognizes the importance of individual autonomy and dignity. This framework seeks to give individuals more control over their personal information by creating protected zones of personal autonomy where individuals can exercise greater control over their personal information.

  The article concludes with some observations about the complementary roles of law and technology in constructing an autonomy-centered regime of informational privacy protection. The author argues that relying solely on property right laws to address informational privacy is not sufficient, and a more comprehensive approach is needed that takes into account the social and political implications of data collection, use, and exchange.

  Overall, this article provides a thought-provoking analysis of the challenges associated with protecting informational privacy in today's digital age. It offers a new perspective on how we can balance individual autonomy with the need for effective data protection policies.

  Personal Commentary:

  This is one of the first legal review articles that I've found (1999 drafts, 2000 final) that talk about the inadequency of property and contract law for privacy.