Issues Around the Protection or Revelation of Personal Information

Privacy watchdog groups have criticized the privacy policies and practices of internet service providers and search engine companies like AOL, Google, and Microsoft. AOL’s decision to upload users’ search query records to the internet drew intense criticism when it was shown that minor sleuthing could decipher some users’ private identities. We draw upon this and similar incidents to demonstrate various personal borders that are crossed by such revelations. We maintain that policy discussions are enhanced by multidimensional conceptualizations of privacy. We agree that many analyses of technology and privacy overlook the upsides of technological change; however, we think it is not more valid to understate privacy implications.