隐私保护新观点（信息防泄漏的意义）

我们的隐私正面临前所未有的风险，但不幸的是，相关的法律制度却落后于创新的脚步。的确，最近的一部主要隐私法《电子通信隐私法》还是在1986年通过的！虽然因为彼得雷乌斯将军的丑闻事件而触发了对该法律的更新，但这种更新也仅仅是对于例如邮件等电子通信予以更多的保护，仍然无法把我们的隐私与其他很可能违法的行为区别开来，我们的数据信息很可能会被非法搜集并使用。玛莎·布莱克本作为代表本在一篇专栏当中说，一些立法者宁愿不要相关的法律限制，因为这会“威胁互联网的命脉：数据。”听听布莱克本在2010年四月的一场国会听证会的发言：“如果我们效仿欧洲的隐私模式，把信息从信息经济当中抽离出来会发生什么情况呢？……国民经济衰落、创新发展停滞，而你会输给选择到别处工作的创新者们。”

    即便是很多诸如Facebook等公司的行为是合法的，他们的做法还是有令人不满的地方。隐私应该拥有更加深刻的目的，而不应只是像现在这样把它作为换取创新的货币，在很多情况下这似乎也就等同于公司利益。要想保护隐私，我们需要对于隐私的目的以价值进行更为深入的了解。

    这就涉及到乔治城大学法律教授朱莉·科恩的研究领域了。在《哈佛法律评论》期刊上即将发表的一篇论文中，她提出了关于“隐私是为了什么”这一话题的有力论点。她的观点十分新颖，正如科技评论家耶夫根尼·莫洛佐夫微博上说的那样，朱莉·科恩写出了“今年在隐私理论方面最优秀的文章“（他指的是2012年）。

    科恩的观点本质上是对于当今理论家和立法者所持有的主要观进行批判，他们将隐私看作是发展如自由、不可存取性、或控制等原理或价值的工具。在这一框架下，隐私就被降级为我们多种防卫的其中一种，比如防止他人的偷窥，比如防止Facebook最近在未经个人明确授权的情况下，试图提升其面部识别软件以此获取更多用户数据的行为。只要是能通过其他途径来保护的原则，或是当隐私阻碍了其他像创新这样更有利可图的目标时，那么这些原则就显得不那么有用因而也会被漠视。

    科恩并不认为我们应该将隐私视为是一种可有可无的工具。反之，她主张隐私不能狭义地理解为“可以通过演绎逻辑被明确界定的一个固定条件或属性（例如隔离或控制）。隐私其实是一种过程中的……一种自我发展过程中的喘息空间。”

    科恩的意思是，生活和环境总是在变化的，所以隐私不能单纯地用一个具体的事物来定义。隐私应该被理解成是一种重要的缓冲，给我们空间来发展自己的身份而不受监管、评价、和社会文化及价值观念的影响。隐私对于帮助我们处理好这些影响我们人格发展的压力十分关键，同时对于“创造自我（发展）劳与逸的空间“有着重要影响。科恩还认为，这种自我发展使得我们发现我们想要的社会形态以及我们的努力方向，而这两者是决定生活充实与否的关键因素。

    伍德罗·哈特佐格和埃文·塞林格在最近的一篇文章当中对于“模糊“的价值发表了类似观点。当结构限制阻碍了不速之客获取数据的时候，模糊保护就会开始。这些保护会继续阻止公司为了获取经济利益而开发我们的隐私信息。它们会通过促进“人身自由、自我实现、社会化、以及滥用权力的相对自由”来保证民主社会的安全。

    出于这些考虑，真正危险的是像传说中Facebook的地理位置跟踪应用那样的功能吗？你可能觉得自愿交换自己的数据来获得个性化的优惠券或促销活动非常划算，或者通过这种应用像朋友播报自己的位置是个不错的主意。但是想想看——在商店里细细浏览并购买商品——这种安静而独立的时刻恰恰是我们自我定义的重要组成部分。要是这样的时刻让步于无时不在的监视，甚至是发生在我们毫无察觉的情况下，那么我们的行为或是自我认知的方式就会发生改变。

    从这种意义来讲，我们会发展出一种缺乏隐私且出于监视之下的身份；我们必须决定自己是否想生活在一个把任何行为都看作要被分析的数据点并将其视为像货币那样用于交易的社会。我们越是容忍这种长期的跟踪行为，我们就越难改变科技对我们日常生活的侵蚀。

    隐私不仅是我们用来享受的东西。它是我们的一种必需品，它影响着：我们发展成为什么样的人、我们在思维、决定、和行为不受社会任何直接或间接影响的情况下建立怎样的身份以及我们想要生活在什么样的社会里。不管愿不愿意，关于我们一切行为的数据搜集——包括如Facebook以及越来越多其他公司所组织的——都在塑造和生成着我们的行为。我们私底下和监视中会展现出不同的一面。科恩的论证也解释了隐私所带来的喘息空间对于发展完整而充实的人格具有怎样至关重要的意义。

Why Does Privacy Matter?

发布时间：2013-02-27

文章出自：Atlantic

原文链接： 点击查看

Our privacy is now at risk in unprecedented ways, but, sadly, the legal system is lagging behind the pace of innovation. Indeed, the last major privacy law, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, was passed in 1986! While an update to the law-- spurred on by the General Petraeus scandal -- is in the works, it only aims to add some more protection to electronic communication like emails. This still does not shield our privacy from other, possibly nefarious, ways that our data can be collected and put to use. Some legislators would much rather not have legal restrictions that could, as Rep. Marsha Blackburn stated in an op-ed, "threaten the lifeblood of the Internet: data." Consider Rep. Blackburn's remarks during an April 2010 Congressional hearing: "[A]nd what happens when you follow the European privacy model and take information out of the information economy? ... Revenues fall, innovation stalls and you lose out to innovators who choose to work elsewhere."

Even though the practices of many companies such as Facebook are legal, there is something disconcerting about them. Privacy should have a deeper purpose than the one ascribed to it by those who treat it as a currency to be traded for innovation, which in many circumstances seems to actually mean corporate interests. To protect our privacy, we need a better understanding of its purpose and why it is valuable.

That's where Georgetown University law professor Julie E. Cohen comes in. In a forthcoming article for the Harvard Law Review, she lays out a strong argument that addresses the titular concern " What Privacy Is For." Her approach is fresh, and as technology critic Evgeny Morozov rightly tweeted, she wrote "the best paper on privacy theory you'll get to read this year." (He was referring to 2012.)

At bottom, Cohen's argument criticizes the dominant position held by theorists and legislators who treat privacy as just an instrument used to advance some other principle or value, such as liberty, inaccessibility, or control. Framed this way, privacy is relegated to one of many defenses we have from things like another person's prying eyes, or Facebook's recent attempts to ramp up its use of facial-recognition software and collect further data about us without our explicit consent. As long as the principle in question can be protected through some other method, or if privacy gets in the way of a different desirable goal like innovation, it is no longer useful and can be disregarded.

Cohen doesn't think we should treat privacy as a dispensable instrument. To the contrary, she argues privacy is irreducible to a "fixed condition or attribute (such as seclusion or control) whose boundaries can be crisply delineated by the application of deductive logic. Privacy is shorthand for breathing room to engage in the process of self-development."

What Cohen means is that since life and contexts are always changing, privacy cannot be reductively conceived as one specific type of thing. It is better understood as an important buffer that gives us space to develop an identity that is somewhat separate from the surveillance, judgment, and values of our society and culture. Privacy is crucial for helping us manage all of these pressures -- pressures that shape the type of person we are -- and for "creating spaces for play and the work of self-[development]." Cohen argues that this self-development allows us to discover what type of society we want and what we should do to get there, both factors that are key to living a fulfilled life.

Woodrow Hartzog and Evan Selinger make similar arguments in a recent article on the value of "obscurity." When structural constraints prevent unwanted parties from getting to your data, obscurity protections are in play. These protections go beyond preventing companies from exploiting our information for their financial gain. They safeguard democratic societies by furthering "autonomy, self-fulfillment, socialization, and relative freedom from the abuse of power."

In light of these considerations, what's really at stake in a feature like Facebook's rumored location-tracking app? You might think it is a good idea to willfully hand over your data in exchange for personalized coupons or promotions, or to broadcast your location to friends. But consumption -- perusing a store and buying stuff -- and quiet, alone time are both important parts of how we define ourselves. If how we do that becomes subject to ever-present monitoring it can, if even unconsciously, change our behaviors and self-perception.

In this sense, we will be developing an identity that is absent of privacy and subject to surveillance; we must decide if we really want to live in a society that treats every action as a data point to be analyzed and traded like currency. The more we allow for constant tracking, the more difficult it becomes to change the way that technologies are used to encroach on our lives.

Privacy is not just something we enjoy. It is something that is necessary for us to: develop who we are; form an identity that is not dictated by the social conditions that directly or indirectly influence our thinking, decisions, and behaviors; and decide what type of society we want to live in. Whether we like it or not constant data collection about everything we do -- like the kind conducted by Facebook and an increasing number of other companies -- shapes and produces our actions. We are different people when under surveillance than we are when enjoying some privacy. And Cohen's argument illuminates how the breathing room provided by privacy is essential to being a complete, fulfilled person.