978-1285197159 Chapter 4 In addition, the global marketplace and intensified

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Chapter 4

Privacy

At a Glance

Instructor’s Manual Table of Contents

Overview

Objectives

Teaching Tips

Quick Quizzes

Discussion Questions

Additional Projects

Additional Resources

Key Terms

Lecture Notes

Overview

This chapter helps students understand the right to privacy, and presents an overview of

developments in information technology that could impact this right. The chapter also addresses

a number of ethical issues related to gathering data about people.

Objectives

As students read this chapter, they should consider the following questions:

What is the right of privacy, and what is the basis for protecting personal privacy under the

law?

What are some of the laws that provide protection for the privacy of personal data, and

what are some of the associated ethical issues?

What are the various strategies for consumer profiling, and what are the associated ethical

issues?

Why and how are employers increasingly using workplace monitoring?

What are the capabilities of advanced surveillance technologies, and what ethical issues do

they raise?

Teaching Tips

Vignette—What Is the National Security Agency (NSA) Up to?

I. Privacy Protection and the Law

1. Begin the discussion by explaining that information about people is gathered, stored,

analyzed, and reported because organizations can use it to make better decisions. Some of

these decisions, including whether or not to hire a job candidate, approve a loan, or offer a

scholarship, can profoundly affect people’s lives. In addition, the global marketplace and

intensified competition have increased the importance of knowing consumers’ purchasing

habits and financial condition.

Teaching

Tip

Take time to discuss reasons why the legal system has evolved to protect the

privacy rights of citizens from government monitoring, but has not acted to

protect the privacy of citizens from monitoring by private industry.

A. Information Privacy

1. Explain that a broad definition of the right to privacy is “the right to be left alone—the

most comprehensive of rights, and the right most valued by a free people.”

2. Explain that information privacy is the combination of communications privacy (the

ability to communicate with others without those communications being monitored by

other persons or organizations) and data privacy (the ability to limit access to one’s

personal data by other individuals and organizations in order to exercise a substantial

degree of control over that data and its use).

B. Privacy Laws, Applications, and Court Rulings

1. Use this section to outline a number of legislative acts that affect a person’s privacy. Note

that most of these actions address invasion of privacy by the government.

Financial Data

1. To access many of the financial products and services, individuals must use a personal

logon name, password, account number, or PIN. The inadvertent loss or disclosure of

Teaching

Tip

Discuss the fairness and accuracy of credit reports, and the effectiveness of the

Fair Credit Reporting Act to protect consumers’ credit scores.

3. The Right to Financial Privacy Act (1978) protects the records of financial

institution customers from unauthorized scrutiny by the federal government. Explain

4. Point out that the Right to Financial Privacy Act only governs disclosures to the

federal government; it does not cover disclosures to private businesses or state and

local governments.

5. The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA), also known as the Financial Services

Modernization Act of 1999, was a bank deregulation law that repealed a

Depression-era law known as Glass-Steagall.

6. Explain that Glass–Steagall prohibited any one institution from offering investment,

commercial banking, and insurance services; individual companies were only allowed

to offer one of those types of financial service products. GLBA enabled such entities to

merge.

7. Discuss the following three rules, included in GLBA, that affect personal privacy:

Financial Privacy Rule—introduce the terms opt in and opt out.

9. Note that the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act was passed in 2003 as an

amendment to the Fair Credit Reporting Act, and it allows consumers to request and

obtain a free credit report once each year from each of the three primary consumer

credit reporting companies (Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion).

Health Information

1. The use of electronic medical records and the subsequent interlinking and transferring

of this electronic information among different organizations has become widespread.

Individuals are rightly concerned about the erosion of privacy of data concerning their

health. Note that the primary law addressing these issues is the Health Insurance

Portability and Accountability Act.

2. Explain that the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA)

was designed to improve the portability and continuity of health insurance coverage;

to reduce fraud, waste, and abuse in health insurance and healthcare delivery; and to

simplify the administration of health insurance.

5. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, passed in 2009, is a wide-ranging act

that authorized $787 billion in spending and tax cuts over a 10-year period. Explain that

Title XIII, Subtitle D of this act—also known as the Health Information Technology for

Economic and Clinical Health Act, or HITECH—included strong privacy provisions for

electronic health records, including banning the sale of health information, promoting the

use of audit trails and encryption, and providing rights of access for patients.

Children’s Personal Data

1. Explain that till date, only a few laws have been implemented to protect children

online, and most of these have been ruled unconstitutional under the First Amendment

and its protection of freedom of expression.

2. The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is a federal law that

assigns certain rights to parents regarding their children’s educational records. Explain

that these rights transfer to the student once the student reaches the age of 18 or if he

or she attends a school beyond the high school level.

Electronic Surveillance

1. Use this section to discuss the laws that address government surveillance, including

various forms of electronic surveillance.

2. Explain that the Communications Act of 1934 established the Federal

Communications Commission and gave it responsibility for regulating all

non-federal-government use of radio and television broadcasting and all interstate

telecommunications as well as all international communications that originate or

terminate in the United States.

4. Note that foreign intelligence is information relating to the capabilities, intentions, or

activities of foreign governments or agents of foreign governments or foreign

organizations. Point out that the act also created the Foreign Intelligence

Surveillance Act (FISA) court, which meets in secret to hear applications for orders

approving electronic surveillance anywhere within the United States.

5. Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act, also known as the

Wiretap Act, regulates the interception of wire (telephone) and oral communications.

Note that it allows state and federal law enforcement officials to use wiretapping and

electronic eavesdropping, but only under strict limitations.

6. Explain that the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) protects

communications while in transfer from sender to receiver; protects communications

held in electronic storage; and prohibits devices from recording dialing, routing,

addressing, and signaling information without a search warrant.

(1994) amended both the Wiretap Act and ECPA; it required the telecommunications

industry to build tools into its products that federal investigators could use to

eavesdrop on conversations and intercept electronic communications.

10. Add that CALEA covered emerging technologies such as wireless modems,

radio-based electronic mail and cellular data networks.

11. Explain that the USA PATRIOT Act gave sweeping new powers both to domestic law

enforcement and U.S. international intelligence agencies, including increasing the

ability of law enforcement agencies to search telephone, email, medical, financial, and

other records.

12. Point out that the USA PATRIOT Act also eased restrictions on foreign intelligence

gathering in the United States.

13. Use Table 4-1 to discuss the key provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act as they affect

the privacy of individuals.

Fair Information Practices

1. Explain that fair information practices is a term for a set of guidelines that govern

the collection and use of personal data. Note that the overall goal of such guidelines is

to stop the unlawful storage of personal data, eliminate the storage of inaccurate

personal data, and prevent the abuse or unauthorized disclosure of such data.

2. Point out that for some organizations and countries, a key issue is the flow of personal

data across national boundaries (transborder data flow).

3. Introduce the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and

5. Briefly discuss the following European data privacy directives:

Notice

Choice

Use

Security

Correction

Access to Government Records

1. The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), passed in 1966 and amended in 1974,

grants citizens the right to access certain information and records of federal, state, and

local governments upon request.

2. Explain that FOIA is a powerful tool that enables journalists and the public to acquire

information that the government is reluctant to release.

3. Point out that there are two basic requirements for filing a FOIA request: (1) the

request must not require wide-ranging, unreasonable, or burdensome searches for

records, and (2) the request must be made according to agency procedural regulations

published in the Federal Register.

Teaching

Tip

Discuss reasons why industry would reject such reforms, and the risk to

proprietary data they pose.

5. The Privacy Act of 1974 establishes a code of fair information practices that sets rules

for the collection, maintenance, use, and dissemination of personal data that is kept in

systems of records by federal agencies. It also prohibits U.S. government agencies

from concealing the existence of any personal data record-keeping system.