Furthermore, we have plenty of self-proclaimed defenders of our "right to privacy." These well-intentioned people span the political and social spectrum from the ACLU to folks on remote Montana ranches. In cyberspace, our privacy rights are championed by organizations like the Electronic Frontier Foundation whose co-founder, Mitch Kapor, wrote an introduction to Andre Bacard's Computer Privacy Handbook (which is available from ICSA's catalog department). People who write about privacy, like Bacard and Kapor, clearly do so with conviction and noble intentions. Speaking personally, I tend to agree with a lot of what they say. However, if we are to participate constructively in the ongoing debate about computer ethics, a debate which has become increasingly public and widespread in the last few years, we need to make sure that all of our terms are defined and all of our assumptions are explicit. Lately, I have been trying to define privacy and examine the assumptions people make about this concept.
Suppose we start with a simple, practical definition of privacy, such as "denying other people access to certain information about ourselves." Now let's question this. Specifically, why would I want to keep certain information from other people? I was surprised that the first two answers I came up with were both based on fear. The first fear is that those "other people" will abuse "certain information." For example, I might fear that information I give the IRS about how much money I make will find its way to a former spouse who is suing me for alimony (this is purely hypothetical). Alternatively, I might fear people knowing my home address in case I am stalked by a crazed fan (I am not belittling this particular fear when I say it is not a problem typically encountered by authors of computer text books).
The second fear is that "other people" will misunderstand "certain information." For example, if my neighbors find out that I walk around my house without any clothes on, they might misunderstand and decide that I am a licentious and wicked person (depending upon their beliefs they might jump to the same conclusion if they find out I have a former spouse). A prospective employer who finds out that a job applicant once served time for stealing might not understand that the applicant is now a much reformed and very trustworthy person. An insurance company that finds out you have a particular physical condition might not understand that they still have an obligation to pay for your treatment, and so on.
What do we see in these explanations of why we need privacy, apart from a lot of fear, much of which may well, at this point in time, be justified? I see a worrying lack of trust and understanding. We don't have much trust in our government and apparently we don't see much shared understanding within our society. We can all point to examples of information abuse as well as tragic misunderstanding. Many of us can think of people who did not realize their full potential because they lived in fear that "embarrassing" information about them might become public (we often use "embarrassing" when we talk about something that other people may not understand).
In my opinion, the lack of trust and understanding revealed by this alternative perspective on privacy is a serious political and social problem. It is hard for government to serve the people if the people distrust the government. It is hard for neighbors to live in peace if they don't understand each other. Is the answer to these problems to deny the government any knowledge of our existence, to completely eliminate social intercourse with people who think differently from us, lest it lead to misunderstanding? Hopefully, the right answer is no.
I believe that in the ongoing debate about information technology and the desire for privacy, we must be careful not to elevate privacy to an absolute, an unquestioned virtue. However, this requires a balanced approach. Hopefully, we want to work towards a government that we can trust and a society that is inclusive, one in which we make room for differences of opinion and agree to live-and-let-live. How can we properly defend an individual's right to freedom from undue government intrusion into their affairs without also recognizing the potential for privacy to become a cloak under which secrecy and sedition may fester? As we decide the legitimate uses of private information and which people should have the use of that information, how do we also recognize that privacy may become a convenient excuse to avoid moral constraints and accountability?
In the end, it is all a question of privacy.
The ideas expressed here are the author's alone. If you have any thoughts or comments on them, feel free to write scobb@icsa.net.
Retirado do site: http://www.icsa.net/library/research/h.shtml em jul/99