Protecting Personal Information
The Right to Privacy Reconsidered

The concept of privacy has long been confused and incoherent. The right to privacy has been applied promiscuously to an alarmingly wide-ranging assortment of issues including free speech, political consent, abortion, contraception, sexual preference, noise, discrimination, and pornography. The conventional definition of privacy, and attempts to evolve a 'privacy-as-a-fence' approach, are unable to deal effectively with the technological advances that have significantly altered the way information is collected, stored, and communicated.

Social media such as Facebook pose searching questions about the use and protection of personal information and reveal the limits of conceiving the right to privacy as synonymous with data protection. The recent European Union's GDPR seeks to enforce greater protection of personal information, but the overlap with privacy has further obscured its core meaning. This book traces these troubling developments, and seeks to reveal the essential nature of privacy and, critically, what privacy is not.

1. Personal Information and Privacy
I. The Genesis
II. Defining 'Privacy'
III. Privacy and Personal Information
IV. A Constitutional Right
V. A Way Forward
VI. Personal Information

2. Personal Information and Data Protection
I. Introduction
II. The Association of Data Protection and Privacy
III. EU Data Protection Law
IV. The European Court of Human Rights
V. Conclusion

3. Personal Information and Power
I. Introduction
II. Genetic Privacy
III. National DNA Databases
IV. Where is 'Privacy'?

4. Personal Information, Goods and Services
I. Introduction
II. Digital Robber Barons
III. Online Profiling
IV. Privacy and Pollsters

5. Personal Information and Freedom
I. Introduction
II. Anonymity
III. Anonymous Remailers
IV. Cryptocurrencies
V. Sexual Preference
VI. Scientific Positivism
VII. Genetic Research
VIII. Copyright

6. Personal Information and the Media
I. Introduction
II. Defining the Media
III. Collecting and Communicating
IV. 'Reasonable Expectation of Privacy'
V. 'Misuse of Personal Information'
VI. The Public Interest
VII. Data Protection

7. Personal Information and Memory
I. A Right to History
II. Photographs
III. Understanding the Past
IV. Profiling
V. Genetics
VI. Privacy

8. Privacy Reconsidered