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Privacynotes Digest Protecting Privacy is Good for Business
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Published by: Mike Banks Valentine Privacynotes privacy@privacynotes.com
www.privacynotes.com
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October 3, 2002 Issue # 028
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.....IN THIS DIGEST.....
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"Privacy in Public" ~ Mike Banks Valentine
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"The Latest in Privacy Issues"
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==> TOPIC: PRIVACY IN PUBLIC
Do Americans have a right of privacy while in public places?
Last week an Indiana woman was arrested for beating her child
in view of a surveillance camera in a public parking lot. [See
linked news story in the privacy news section below.]
This event raised concerns of privacy advocates about the ever
present electronic eyes trained on us from every angle in public
spaces. Business owners place cameras with the intention of diverting
crime by monitoring their property and recording activities in
parking lots, stock rooms and even fitting rooms at clothing stores.
What are appropriate limits? Do we have a right to expect that
our public travels go unrecorded?
// -- PRIVACY NEWS -- //
Moderator note: There are two ways to access previously listed
privacy news stories. One is to visit Privacynotes archives, the
other (simpler) way is to visit
http://privacynotes.com/privacy_news.html
where I also keep a privacy news archive.
The Justice Department has accused the nation's super-secret
wiretap court of improperly trying to "micromanage" the workings
of the executive branch. In new court papers, the department also
said it was entitled to expanded powers to conduct wiretaps and
other surveillance of people suspected of terrorism or espionage.
Attorney General John Ashcroft made the arguments earlier this
week in seeking to overturn a ruling last May by the secret tribunal,
the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which is responsible
for reviewing wiretap requests in terrorism and espionage cases.
In that ruling, the court unanimously rejected a request from
the Bush administration to break down many of the procedural barriers
between criminal prosecutors at the Justice Department and counterintelligence
agents at the F.B.I.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/28/national/28WIRE.html
A new Web site displaying color photographs, market values and
other property data for every home and business in Nassau County
is proving to be extremely popular Ñ and equally unpopular. Critics
are demanding that the site be censored or even shut down. Calling
it an invasion of privacy, they cite fears that the information
it contains could be misused by gossips, burglars, stalkers, kidnappers,
rapists and murderers. Curious electronic visitors have downloaded
millions of pages since Sept. 9, when Nassau put the data online
to show the owners of 400,000 properties the results of the first
countywide reassessment since 1938.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/27/nyregion/27NASS.html
"Surveillance cameras?" asked Donnette Carter of the Porterville
Chamber of Commerce. "Offhand, I couldn't tell you." With the
recent arrest of a woman in Indiana whom a security camera videotaped
beating her daughter in a parking lot, the presence of electronic
eyes across America has drawn new attention. But what security
and privacy specialists have long known might surprise people
in towns like this: the surveillance equipment is everywhere,
not just in big cities and at obvious places like Times Square
or outside the White House, but also in Porterville and Mishawaka,
Ind., and hundreds of other places. More often than not, private
rather than public hands are controlling the lenses, as was the
case in Indiana.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/29/technology/29TAPE.html
