Privacy and the "Nothing to Hide" Argument
Good essay:
In this short essay, written for a symposium in the San Diego Law Review, Professor Daniel Solove examines the “nothing to hide” argument. When asked about government surveillance and data mining, many people respond by declaring: “I’ve got nothing to hide.” According to the “nothing to hide” argument, there is no threat to privacy unless the government uncovers unlawful activity, in which case a person has no legitimate justification to claim that it remain private. The “nothing to hide” argument and its variants are quite prevalent, and thus are worth addressing. In this essay, Solove critiques the “nothing to hide” argument and exposes its faulty underpinnings.
Barnabus • July 13, 2007 8:10 AM
Oh, the delicious irony of it!
Bruce’s link above points to an abstract of the article on ssrn.com. The main document is available as a downlaodable PDF from that page.
However, AFAICT, unless one is prepared to accept two session cookies, plus four persistant cookies which don’t expire for thirty years, the site doesn’t appear to permit downloading of the PDF document – it just redirects back to the abstract until the cookies are accepted.
Of course I’ve got nothing to hide, and I can always (and have) delete the offending cookies after the download is complete, but given the theme of the essay in question…