Privacy

Individuals’ ability to control the use and disclosure of personal information changes dramatically as new technologies emerge and social norms evolve. These changes can empower institutions over individuals, or free individuals from coercive powers of the private or public sector. The Samuelson Clinic is focused on several problems arising from these changes, with the goal of promoting a public interest vision for privacy.

Critical to understanding these dynamics is the idea that privacy creates breathing room for important values in a democracy. Privacy is a necessary condition for ability to associate freely, to speak freely, and to engage in unencumbered intellectual exploration. While well-intentioned, video surveillance cameras, identification systems, and profiling systems can affect how we participate in democracy. They can empower the government to sort individuals according to terms that are discriminatory or political. The Clinic’s advocacy connects privacy and democratic values, with the goal of accommodating legitimate needs of law enforcement while preserving individuals’ rights.

The private sector has less coercive power than the government, but in recent years, information sharing collaborations between the private and public sectors point to the need to rethink whether commercial collection poses similar risks as when the government obtains personal information. Databases of consumer information are becoming richer, more predictive, and are used in more contexts, thus affecting individuals’ autonomy. The Clinic’s advocacy is focused on identifying these developments and empowering individuals to access, correct, and limit reuse of personal data.

The Clinic also focuses on the problem of security breaches and identity theft. Professor Mulligan, in collaboration with now California Senator Joseph Simitian, developed AB 700, known popular as SB 1386, which established a duty among businesses and California government agencies to give individuals notice of security breaches. The Clinic is exploring the effects of these laws in institutions. The Clinic is also focused on the problems posed by identity theft: how can we reduce the incidence and severity of this crime? How can costs of identity theft passed on to consumers be internalized by thieves and credit grantors who enable the crime?

Project Title	Year	Project Type
Samuelson Clinic Survey Finds Strong Support for Privacy of Location Data	2008
Samuelson, Annenberg Report: Consumers Believe Privacy Policies Prohibit Common Advertising Practices	2007
Samuelson Clinic Filed Amicus Brief in Hepting v. AT&T on behalf of People for the American Way Foundation	2007
New Study Recommends Reforms for Security Breach Notification Laws	2007
Clinic Study Finds Many Companies Are Quietly Selling Personal Information to Third Parties	2007
Clinic Comments on Private Sector Use of the Social Security Number	2007
Clinic Attorney to Present on SSN Use at FTC Workshop	2007
Samuelson Clinic, Annenberg School of Communication Presented Report to FTC	2006
Samuelson Clinic Students Assisted the Constitution Project in Preparing Guidelines for Video Surveillance	2006
Samuelson Clinic Director, Fellow Participated at Computers, Freedom & Privacy Conference	2006
Samuelson Clinic Director Testified Before Department of Homeland Security on Expectations of Privacy in Public Spaces	2006
Storing Our Lives Online: Expanded Email Storage Raises Complex Policy Issues	2005
Stopping Spyware at the Gate: A User Study of Privacy, Notice and Spyware	2005
Samuelson Clinic Released Paper on Legal, Technical, and Software Interface Design Issues Related to Spyware	2005
Clinic Submits Comments to U.S. Department of State on Electronic Passports on behalf of Eight Leading Computer Scientists and Engineers	2005
Reasonable Expectations in Electronic Communications: A Critical Perspective on the Electronic Communications Privacy Act	2004
Radio Frequency Identification and Privacy with Information Goods	2004
Who Goes There? Authentication Through the Lens of Privacy	2003
Enforcing Privacy Rights Symposium 2002	2003
IDs - Not That Easy: Questions About Nationwide Identity Systems	2002
Your Place or Mine?: Privacy Concerns and Solutions for Server and Client-side Storage of Personal Information	2000
Privacy in the Digital Age: Work in Progress	1999
Ubiquitous Computing: RFID and Information Goods	2003-2004
Standards Project	2001-2002
Report Details Californians' Understanding of Privacy Offline
Location Information Privacy Project [“Geopriv”]	2001