Why Privacy Matters

This is a book about what privacy is and why it matters. Governments and companies keep telling us that Privacy is Dead, but they are wrong. Privacy is about more than just whether our information is collected. It''s about what we do with that information. And in our modern society, that''s pretty much everything we do, from GPS mapping to texting to voting to treating disease. We need to realize that privacy is up for grabs, and we need to craft rules to protect our hard-won, but fragile human values like identity, freedom, consumer protection, and trust. Author Neil Richards shows what privacy is, why privacy matters, and how we can build a better digital future together.

A much-needed corrective on what privacy is, why it matters, and how we can protect in an age when so many believe that the concept is dead.Everywhere we look, companies and governments are spying on us--seeking information about us and everyone we know. Ad networks monitor our web-surfing to send us "more relevant" ads. The NSA screens our communications for signs of radicalism. Schools track students'' emails to stop school shootings. Cameras guard every street corner and traffic light, and drones fly in our skies. Databases of human information are assembled for purposes of "training" artificial intelligence programs designed to predict everything from traffic patterns to the location of undocumented migrants. We''re even tracking ourselves, using personal electronics like Apple watches, Fitbits, and other gadgets that have made the "quantified self" a realistic possibility. As Facebook''s Mark Zuckerberg once put it, "the Age of Privacy is over." But Zuckerberg and others who say "privacy is dead" are wrong. In Why Privacy Matters, Neil Richards explains that privacy isn''t dead, but rather up for grabs.Richards shows how the fight for privacy is a fight for power that will determine what our future will look like, and whether it will remain fair and free. If we want to build a digital society that is consistent with our hard-won social values--fairness, freedom, and sustainability--then we must make a meaningful commitment to privacy. Privacy matters because good privacy rules can promote the essential human values of identity, power, freedom, and trust. If we want to preserve our commitments to these precious yet fragile values, we will need privacy rules. After detailing why privacy remains so important, Richards considers strategies that can help us protect it privacy from the forces that are working to undermine it. Pithy and forceful, this is essential reading for anyone interested in a topic that sits at the center of so many current problems.