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Many of us here in the United States believe our personal privacy is a Constitutional right. In fact, the word Privacy was not included in the US Constitution or in the Bill of Rights as originally passed.

The concept of privacy, or at least a few actions that relate to privacy were included in

A Constitutional History Lesson with David Bisno.Protection of individual rights from government abuse has been at the center of constitutional debates since the country's founding, but scholars and politicians have stopped short of claiming an explicit "right to privacy" until recently. Bisno, an M.D. turned "silver-haired scholar," discusses the history of privacy in the Constitution.

A recurring problem in modern litigation is the inadvertent disclosure of materials subject to the attorney-client privilege or the attorney work product protection. New Federal Rule of Evidence 502 changes the rules concerning waiver of privilege in all Federal and many State court cases, thereby reducing the risk that inadvertent disclosures will constitute a wavier of attorney client privilege or work product protection. But the new rule requires careful application. Important risks remain. Inadvertent disclosure of privileged or protected information too easily occurs when massive numbers of documents or files make it impractical or prohibitively expensive to review every item individually. The proverbial privileged document needle gets lost in the e-discovery haystack and is overlooked. Later, when opposing counsel recognizes that she has a potentially privileged document and brings this to the attention of disclosing counsel, there may be a fight as to whether the document will be returned, or whether the disclosure constitutes a wavier of any privilege related to the information. Under existing State and Federal law, release of privileged or protected information to an adversary, even if inadvertent, may constitute a waiver of the privilege or protection with regard to the information or document disclosed or, worse, to all documents and other information related to the same topic. Invoking the "claw" Amendments to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(b), adopted in December 2006, were aimed at reducing the risks of waiver from inadvertent disclosures. Rule 26(b) provides that if privileged information is produced, the party making the claim of privilege may notify any party that received the information of the privilege claim and the basis for it. After being notified, a party must promptly return, sequester, or destroy the specified information and any copies it has, must not use or disclose the information until the privilege claim is resolved; must t

Overview Privacy is a fundamental human right. It underpins human dignity and other values such as freedom of association and freedom of speech. It has become one of the most important human rights of the modern age.[1] Privacy is recognized around the world in diverse regions and cultures. It is protected in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and in many other international and regional human rights treaties. Nearly every country in the world includes a right of privacy in its constitution. At a minimum, these provisions include rights of inviolability of the home and secrecy of communications. Most recently written constitutions include specific rights to access and control one's personal information. In many of the countries where privacy is not explicitly recognized in the constitution, the courts have found that right in other provisions. In many countries, international agreements that recognize privacy rights such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights or the European Convention on Human Rights have been adopted into law. Defining Privacy Of all the human rights in the international catalogue, privacy is perhaps the most difficult to define.[2] Definitions of privacy vary widely according to context and environment. In many countries, the concept has been fused with data protection, which interprets privacy in terms of management of personal information. Outside this rather strict context, privacy protection is frequently seen as a way of drawing the line at how far society can intrude into a person's affairs.[3] The lack of a single definition should not imply that the issue lacks importance. As one writer observed, "in one sense, all human rights are aspects of the right to privacy."[4]

The U.S. Supreme Court Monday accepted an appeal by several groups that brought a constitutional challenge to the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board created by 2002 changes in federal accounting laws. The free-enterprise groups and a Nevada accounting firm sued to stop the Securities and Exchange Commission from naming members of the accounting board, set up by Congress to oversee public-company accountants. "In creating the board, Congress deliberately sought to test the outer boundaries of its ability to reduce presidential power," the groups said in the appeal. The groups, in their lawsuit, claimed the U.S. Constitution required board members to be appointed by the president or the SEC chairman, rather than the entire commission for the securities agency. The Supreme Court's decision to hear the appeal breathes new life into the case, which didn't get much traction in lower courts. The U.S. Solicitor General's office, in court briefs, had urged the high court to reject the appeal, calling it a "poor vehicle" to resolve the constitutional issues raised by the challengers. "The president's control over the SEC is constitutionally sufficient and the act in turn grants the SEC complete and pervasive control over every aspect of the board's authority," Solicitor General Elena Kagan wrote. A U.S. federal judge dismissed the lawsuit in 2007 and the Washington-based U.S. Federal Circuit Court of Appeals also rejected the challenge in a 2-1 decision last year. The private, nonprofit board is charged with inspecting and disciplining public company accountants. The case is the Free Enterprise Fund vs. the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, 08-861. Oral arguments will be held in the fall, and a decision is expected by July 2010.

Set of podcasts providing a road map through the 4th Amendment of the Constitution, particularly a 4th Amendment search. Intended to give you a step-by-step approach through the 4th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States as it applies to searches, your expectation of privacy and related issues.

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Two companies that collect, analyze and sell prescription information are mounting a Supreme Court challenge to New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation law making doctors' prescription writing habits confidential. In an appeal filed March 27, IMS Health Inc. of Norwalk, Conn., and Verispan LLC of Yardley, Pa., tell the high court that the law violates their First Amendment right to free speech in pursuit of their business. The law, aimed at thwarting hard-sell tactics by drug companies to doctors, makes it a crime for pharmacies and others to transfer information disclosing a doctor's prescribing history if the information could be used for marketing of prescription drugs in New Hampshire. Patients' names are not included in the data. The companies say that the ruling by the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston that upheld the law's constitutionality could be broadly applied to newspaper publication of stock market information and many other services that gather large amounts of information. The money made by selling the information to drug makers, the companies say, allows them to provide the same material to researchers and humanitarian organizations at little or no cost. The law first took effect in 2006. The following year, U.S. District Judge Paul Barbadoro in Concord ruled in the companies' favor and said the law violated the First Amendment. Another federal judge subsequently ruled against a similar law in Maine, relying heavily on the New Hampshire decision. But the 1st Circuit overruled Barbadoro, calling the law a valid step to promote the delivery of cost-effective health care. "Even if the Prescription Information Law amounts to a regulation of protected speech - a proposition with which we disagree - it passes constitutional muster," the court said. "In combating this novel threat to cost-effective delivery of health care, New Hampshire has acted with as much forethought and precision as the circumstances permit and the

In a 4-to-3 ruling, the New York State Court of Appeals ruled on Tuesday that the State Police violated a criminal suspect's rights under the State Constitution when it placed a GPS tracking device inside the bumper of his van without obtaining a warrant. The police had used the device to monitor the movements of the suspect, Scott C. Weaver, for more than two months. But the court ordered the evidence gathered from the device suppressed and ordered a new trial for Mr. Weaver. In three written opinions, the judges on the court debated the constitutional issues raised by the growing use of global positioning system technology as a tool of surveillance. The case could set an important precedent for state and local police agencies.

What constitutes unfair -- unethical -- aggregation? In the absence of a clear legal framework (the "fair use" doctrine in the U.S. is notoriously mushy), a lot of media people tend to use the "I know it when I see it" standard, echoing U.S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart's wry 1964 declaration about what constitutes hard-core porn.

"The attempted attack on a Detroit-bound flight last week, along with the events preceding and following it, has provided a snapshot of the ongoing struggle to balance civil liberties and national security. President Obama on Tuesday admitted a "systemic failure" on multiple levels in the run-up to the attempted bombing. Suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was in a terror database of more than a half-million people but was not on a "no-fly" list. The administration has initiated a review of airport security and the watch-list system in the wake of the failed plot. But so far, analysts say what happened is emblematic of the struggle between privacy and security interests. "It's just (an) inability to understand the right way to strike the balance that's at fault," said constitutional attorney David Rivkin. Airlines don't have access to the government's comprehensive terrorist database. They screen travelers based on the smaller, "no-fly" list."

Perhaps this is more a question of trust (not privacy) versus security. Do we really trust our government and its agents to handle private information securely?

"A New York Times article recently charted out Facebook's privacy settings and found 50 settings and over 170 options for managing privacy, she said. The chart also points out that at 5,830 words, Facebook's privacy policy is longer than the 4,543-word count of the United States Constitution ."

Seems more leadership on privacy comes from Canada than D.C.

When you put out the trash, don't expect a constitutional right to privacy of the contents. The Supreme Court of Canada unanimously ruled Thursday that police can sift through garbage if it has been set out at the edge of your property for municipal collection because "abandoned" goods do not trigger Charter of Rights and Freedoms protection.

One of the more interesting panel discussions at the IDC Cloud Computing Forum on Feb 18th in San Francisco was about managing the complexities of security, privacy and compliance in the Cloud. The simple answer according to panelists Carolyn Lawson, CIO of California Public Utilities Commission, and Michael Mucha, CISO of Stanford Hospital and Clinics is "it ain't easy!" "Both of us, in government and in health, are on the front-lines," Lawson proclaimed. "Article 1 of the California Constitution guarantees an individual's right to privacy and if I violate that I've violated a public trust. That's a level of responsibility that most computer security people don't have to face. If I violate that trust I can end up in jail or hauled before the legislature," she said. "Of course, these days with the turmoil in the legislature, she joked, "the former may be preferable to the later." Stanford's Mucha said that his security infrastructure was built on a two-tiered approach using identity management and enterprise access control. Mucha said that the movement to computerize heath records nationwide was moving along in fits and starts, as shown by proposed systems likeMicrosoft (NSDQ: MSFT)'s Health Vault and Google (NSDQ: GOOG)'s Personal Health Record. "The key problem is who is going to pay for the computerized of health records. It's not as much of a problem at Stanford as it is at a lot of smaller hospitals, but it's still a huge problem." Mucha said that from his perspective security service providers in the cloud and elsewhere are dealing with a shrinking security parameter or fence, which is progressing from filing cabinets, to devices, to files, and finally to the individual, who under the latest Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) privacy rules has certain rights, including rights to access and amend their health information and to obtain a record of when and why their Protected Health Information (PHI) record has bee

A U.S. appeals court on Friday denied a bid by the cable industry to overrule privacy rules that make it more difficult for them to share subscribers' personal information with other parties. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit denied a petition by the National Cable and Telecommunications Association, which argued that federal rules on telecom carriers' use of customer data violated free speech rights under the U.S. Constitution, federal law or both. At issue are rules set by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission that mandate telecommunications carriers must get an "opt-in" before disclosing customers' information to a carrier's joint venture business partner or an independent contractor.

January 26, 2009 - As a presidential candidate, Barack Obama made his position on abortion very clear. During his campaign, he stated that he would sign the Freedom of Choice Act and that he opposed restrictions on Partial Birth Abortions. Now as President, Obama used the 36th anniversary of the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision to reiterate his quite extreme position. Obama made several statements about "ensuring that our daughters have the same rights and opportunities as our sons...." However, his key statement appears to demonstrate an utter misunderstanding of the legal aspects of abortion, was that government "should not intrude on our most private family matters." An Associated Press subheader put it as "the ruling legalizing abortion represented a broader principle that government should not intrude on private family matters." Obama seemingly fails to understand three things about the "right to privacy." First, in that as far as it has been applied to abortion and contraception (Griswold vs. Connecticut); it is not a principle about "family matters." It is a principle purely about individual choice. Under Roe, no one else in the "family" has any say about the abortion decision. If the woman is not married to the father of the baby, he is not "family" anyway. Second, the right to privacy is not absolute. Third and most important, that under Roe, the "right to privacy" is secondary to two considerations about the unborn child: whether or not the unborn child is a "person," or at least "potential life." For these last two, we can turn to Roe itself. The "Right to Privacy" The majority opinion of Roe admits that, "The Constitution does explicitly mention any right of privacy." Majority author Harry Blackmun cites various past court decisions which recognize personal rights that are "fundamental" or "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty." Since these private rights had been found to have extension to areas such as marriage, procreation, contraception

Though Facebook has sometimes been criticized for sacrificing the privacy of its users in order to monetize the service, Chris Kelly, Facebook's chief privacy officer, has presided over the social network's efforts to build out the most sophisticated privacy options in the industry. On a granular level, Facebook users can now control what bits of information they share with each individual friend, group or network. Facebook users have taken notice. According to an annual study by the Ponemon Institute, a privacy research firm, Facebook ranks within the top 20 (15th) most trusted companies for privacy as rated by U.S. consumers. Kelly's job sometimes appears tricky, however. He must ensure that users feel they have control over their information, while weighing that need against Facebook's business model, which relies heavily on a culture of openness and sharing. Here is the full interview CIO conducted with Kelly during our reporting for a special feature on social networks and privacy. Kelly talked about what constitutes Facebook's overall view towards privacy, and how that affects its ability to serve up ads.

Paperwork containing the personal medical information of at least 66 patients at Massachusetts General Hospital was lost this month when an employee apparently left it on an MBTA train. The hospital sent out letters last week to patients whose identities were included in the lost paperwork, telling them the information listed their names and dates of birth, and private medical information, including their diagnoses and the name of the provider with whom they met. The material constituted billing records for patients who attended the hospital's Infectious Disease Associates outpatient practice on Fruit Street on March 4. Deborah A. Adair, the hospital's privacy officer and director of health information services, said in a statement released yesterday that while the incident was regrettable, the hospital followed privacy laws by immediately alerting affected patients and authorities, including the state attorney general's office and the Department of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation. "[Hospital] police and security are thoroughly investigating this matter not only with an eye toward recovering the missing information but also toward making sure that this will not happen again," Adair said. "Our information privacy and security policies and procedures are among the strongest in the healthcare industry, but incidents such as this remind us that we must continue to review and revise them, as well as continue to educate our staff on best practices to avoid incidents such as this." According to hospital security reports, a manager in the infectious disease center's billing unit told supervisors that she left the paperwork on a Red Line train the morning of March 9. The manager said she had brought the paperwork home with her to work over the weekend and left the material sometime between 7:30 and 9 a.m. The Transit Police were notified, but the paperwork was not found.

If you can't measure it, you can't manage it. If you don't even know what it is...

Even IT professionals are confused about what constitutes Web 2.0, according to a survey released Wednesday by web security vendor Websense and research firm Dynamic Markets. According to the survey, of 1,300 information technology managers across 10 countries, 17 percent of respondents correctly identified all the items on the survey that can be considered Web 2.0. IT administrators commonly identified the "obvious" Web 2.0 sites -- such as the social networking sites Facebook and LinkedIn, Dave Meizlik, director of product marketing at Websense, told SCMagazineUS.com on Tuesday. They also commonly identified blogs and micro blogs, such as Twitter, as Web 2.0. But, respondents less frequently identified other sites as Web 2.0, including iGoogle and Wikipedia, Meizlik said. Only half of respondents identified video uploading sites, such as YouTube, as part of Web 2.0, the survey found. David Lavenda, vice president of marketing and product strategy at security vendor Worklight, told SCMagazineUS.com on Wednesday that IT administrators know they need to secure the enterprise from Web 2.0 threats, but are not always sure what those threats are. "When you go to organizations where security is really important -- financial and government organizations -- and ask, 'What's your fear of Web 2.0?,' they say, 'I really don't know, but we hear enough stories of people being compromised that we don't want to take a chance.' That's the most common answer." Lavenda said.

Another test of who owns what data, what can be done with it and the power of State's Rights.

IMS Health (RX) has built a lucrative niche collecting data on which drugs physicians prescribe, then selling the information to pharmaceutical companies. But legislators in more than 20 states have questioned whether the company has a constitutional right to do so. The Supreme Court could shine a spotlight on this topic in the next few weeks if it decides to hear a closely watched case IMS has been fighting in New Hampshire. The court's ruling would quickly reverberate beyond the pharmaceutical industry, affecting virtually any business that uses information about consumer buying behavior to guide its sales strategies.

To find out more about the survey, I asked Deloitte LLP chairman of the board Sharon Allen to provide some additional context. Given that my only risk-management concern early this week relates to thunderstorms off the coast of South Padre Island, I asked Sharon to step in as a guest blogger today. Here's what she sent me: When I was a high school student growing up in the small farming community of Kimberly, Idaho, little did I know that a song from that time could serve as an anthem for something happening in the workplace today. The Beatles' 1967 classic "Hello Goodbye" is a study in contrasts, as are the current attitudes about social media. Social media has arrived - and with it, employers and employees are singing very different songs about what constitutes appropriate social networking both on and off the job. Recently, I commissioned the third annual Deloitte LLP "Ethics & Workplace" survey. We polled 500 executives and 2,000 employees outside Deloitte. Our survey found that 60 percent of business executives believe they have a right to know how employees portray themselves and their organizations in online social networks. Perhaps because nearly three-fourths of the employees in our poll agreed that the use of social networks makes it easier to damage a company's reputation. However, more than half of employees polled say their social networking pages are not an employer's concern. That belief is especially true among younger workers, with nearly two-thirds of 18- to 34-year-old respondents stating that employers have no business monitoring their online activity.