Telecom/1996-04-telecom-walnutcreek.iso/reports/rotenberg.privacy.speech

Text File | 1990-01-14 | 18KB | 352 lines

Date:     Sun, 3 Dec 89 12:10:56 CST
From:     TELECOM Moderator <[e-mail]>
To:       [e-mail]
Subject:  TELECOM Digest Special: Telephone Privacy
Message-ID:  <[e-mail]>


TELECOM Digest     Sun, 3 Dec 89 12:10:00 CST    Special: Telephone Privacy

Today's Topics:                             Moderator: Patrick Townson

    Telephone Privacy in the 1990's (Marc Rotenberg, via David Gast)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Wed, 29 Nov 89 14:00:40 -0800
From: David Gast <[e-mail]>
Subject: Speech on Telephone Privacy

I normally would not send a such a long posting, but I thought that
this speech was very interesting.  It is reproduced with permission.


[Speech text]

                 "Telephone Privacy in the 1990's"

             Marc Rotenberg, Director, Washington Office
           Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility
                1025 Connecticut Ave. NW, Suite 1015
                       Washington, D.C. 20036
                           [phone]

United States Telephone Association
September 13, 1989
Washington, DC

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today about "Telephone Privacy
in the 1990's."  With the current debate surrounding the introduction
of a particular CLASS feature -- Automatic Number Identification or
"Caller ID" -- it is worth a close examination of the privacy
interests at stake and the responsibilities of the telephone companies
as we look to the 1990's and the possible introduction of a wide range
of new telephone features.

I will make three points this morning about the Caller ID controversy.
The first is that the Caller ID service is unlike previous services
offered to consumers because it compels the disclosure of personal
information, without the consent of the caller.  This is at the heart
of information privacy and the reason that so many civil libertarians
and consumer advocates are concerned about the service.

The second point is that what is technically possible is not the same
as what is good public policy.  Our system of government, through the
regulatory framework, is designed to ensure that citizens have some
say over technical forces that affect their lives.  The protection of
the environment and public safety depend on the efforts of lawmakers
to draw boundaries around technologies that could make our world less
safe, our lives less secure. And this includes personal privacy.  It
is a mistake to assume that simply because something can be done it
should be done.

The third point is that the consequences of widespread concern about
privacy protection can be a powerful political force.  Although we
have not recently experienced in this country such a movement, the
experience in other countries indicates the need for adequately
addressing privacy issues as we move toward the next decade.

Based on the recent actions of the various phone companies, the public
response to the caller ID service must have came as something of a
surprise.  Pacific Bell held off on its plans to introduce the
service, and has chosen instead to undertake an eighteen month study
with various focus groups to assess the privacy issues.  New Jersey
Bell is pressing forward though has faced widespread criticism.  Two
others BOCs, Southwestern Bell and South Central Bell, have avoided
the controversy by simply not offering Caller ID. [1]

What is it about this service that has sparked such controversy?  I
think the answer was well stated by the New Jersey State Consumer
Advocate who said, "the caller ID changes the fundamental expectation
of privacy on the telephone service.  Previously, if someone wanted
your phone number, they had to ask for it."  It is this prospect that
a new technology diminishes the traditional expectation of privacy
that is so unsettling.

There are a number of organizations, individuals, and members of
Congress who are rightly concerned about this problem. In fact, the
most important group may be the large number of your own subscribers
who have chosen to have their phone numbers unlisted precisely because
they are trying to protect their phone numbers from public disclosure.
The Caller ID service will, in effect, advertise the phone number with
every call.

The Caller ID service, in its common form, violates a central test of
privacy protection -- it compels the disclosure of personal
information without the consent of the caller.  Whether or not you
subsequently decide that there are other worthwhile goals served by
the Caller ID service, it's worth stopping at this point and
understanding clearly the privacy problem.

Today, when a person makes a phone call there is an expectation that
the caller's phone number -- and more generally the caller's identity --
will not be revealed until the caller chooses to do so.  This
establishes an expectation of privacy on which people base their
action, express themselves, and control their identity.

The problem of destroying the expectation of privacy was revealed when
American Express, using the ANI service, instructed sales representatives
to greet callers by name, before the caller identified himself or
herself.  Callers were so startled that American Express discontinued
the practice.  American Transtech avoided the problem by not greeting
callers by name.  "We could do it, but we don't want to let customers
know we can capture their telephone numbers," said a company
spokesman. [2]

It's been suggested that a blocking service could be sold to those who
would prefer that their numbers not be disclosed.  This reminds me a
little of the arms merchants -- you sell one side the ability to
collect the call data and you sell the other side the ability to block
the collection of the call data.  I'm not the only person who has
noticed this -- one consumer advocate remarked at a meeting in
Washington a few months ago that Caller ID is not so much about
technology as it is about economics.

The underlying policy problem is who should carry the burden for
protecting personal privacy.  Unfortunately, in my opinion, large
companies have assumed that they have the right to make use of
personal information, and have left it to the consumer to, first, find
out about the practice, and, second, to object.  My view is that large
organizations, both in the government and the private sector, have an
obligation not to disclose personal information about individuals
without the consent of the individual. This was the principle
underlying the Privacy Act of 1974 and it is the thread that ties
together virtually all of the privacy law in this country.  When you
disclose personal information without consent, or effectively compel
the disclosure as the cost of using the phone service, you have
diminished the right of privacy, our most fragile freedom.

Several responses to the privacy concerns about the Caller ID service
have been put forward.  One is that, like a peephole, the Caller ID
service provides the receiving party with greater control over phone
calls.  According to this description, a peephole provides an
opportunity to determine who is knocking at your door before you
decide whether to open it.  Certainly, you wouldn't open your door
without a quick check.  Similarly, the argument goes, a person should
not let someone into their home phone without checking the identity of
the caller.  From the privacy viewpoint, you can even bolster the
argument by underscoring the importance of the home as the last
defense against intrusions by others into one's personal sphere.

This is a compelling analogy but it doesn't quite work.  Calling may
be the next best thing to being there, but it is not the same thing.
There is simply no threat of physical assault, theft, or destruction
from a phone call.  I do not mean to understate the problem of
harassing or obscene phone calls, but there are a number of ways to
respond to these problems, including call tracing, that do not require
Caller ID. [3] It also seems unlikely that the service will discourage
the persistent, and perhaps the most dangerous, callers.  In fact, one
of the more unsettling problems with Caller ID may be the ability for
a caller to disguise the actual source of the call.

But, still, it is worth noting in the peephole analogy that the
receiving party gains some information about the calling party, and,
like with the phone answering machine, is able to exercise greater
control over incoming calls.

Another response is that you can sell a blocking service to those who
would prefer not to disclose their phone numbers.  This is unsettling
because it essentially is the selling back of the privacy interest
phone users currently possess.  It also raises a reoccurring problem
in privacy protection -- that is requiring the customer to carry the
burden for protecting privacy.

A final and popular defense of the Caller ID service is most
troubling.  A number of people within the phone industry that I have
spoken with have said that the solution to privacy concerns about
Caller ID is "public education," or, according to one trade
publication, "the launching of a widespread campaign to inform callers
of new limits in their calling anonymity." [4] This is disingenuous.
To use an admittedly extreme example, after the Valdez oil disaster,
Exxon had a big public relations problem, but they had the good sense
not try to tell the public, "Travel Tip: Don't Visit Alaska, it's not
as pretty as it once was."

Similarly, caller ID didn't fall from the sky.  Your engineers
developed the technology, your managers figured out how to market the
technology, and you are trying to decide how to promote the technology.
You carry the responsibility for its impact and its consequences.  To
quote Thomas Edison, "What man makes with his hands, he can control
with his head."

This ties into my second point - technical possibility is not the same
as permissible policy.  It is never sufficient to say that technology
has made possible these changes therefore we should employ them.
There are plenty of technologies for reading the contents of a sealed
letter.  But to do so is against the law.  Part of the challenge
facing policy makers and organizations such as CPSR is to assess the
benefits and risks of new technologies and to determine where
appropriate lines should be drawn.

Each new information technology requires a careful examination to
assess its impact on personal privacy.  This is the lesson of privacy
legislation in the 1980's.  For example, as the cable industry took
off in the early 1980's, concern about the privacy of subscriber
information also grew.  In 1984 a law passed to ensure the protection
of subscriber information.

Electronic mail, a great boon to communications, also raised concern
about the security of the contents of electronic messages.  The
Electronic Mail Association was as worried as it customers, perhaps
moreso, because of the concern that a new mail service would not be
very useful if privacy could not be assured.  The Electronic
Communications Privacy Act of 1986 responded to the need for privacy
protection for this new form of communication.

And, when a nominee to the Supreme Court found that his choice of
videos that he watched with his family in their home became the
subject of an article in a local newspaper, Congress looked at the new
technology and developed legislation to protect the rental list of
video users.

In each instance, it seems clear that Congress is ready, willing, and
able to assess the privacy implications of new technologies and to
adopt appropriate legislative safeguards.  There is little reason to
believe that it would be different with the phone companies, if they
are unable to resolve the privacy concerns to the satisfaction of
phone customers.

But there is more here than the potential regulation of just this one
service.  My guess is that the Caller ID issue is the beginning of a
long public policy debate over the use of personal information by the
phone companies.  It is clear that you are sitting on a goldmine of
transactional information.  AT&T has freely admitted that the 800
phone service created the telemarketing industry.  But, it seems, you
may well go further.

If I call a restaurant today to make a reservation for Friday night,
you could probably extract some commercial information, just from my
identity and the restaurant's identity.  And, of course, the Caller ID
service is not of much value without a reverse subscriber directory
that would make it possible to translate the phone numbers into the
name and location of the calling party.

I don't mean to give you any ideas.  I'm sure you've already thought
of these possibilities and others.  But not many people have yet
discussed these issues and the public understanding of how
transactional information is collected and exchanged has only recently
picked up.  I want to warn you as the public becomes aware that you
are selling this information, without their knowledge or consent, you
may be heading for one of the biggest privacy showdowns we've ever had
in this country.  And I can tell you right now what the slogan will be:
"From Ma Bell to Big Brother."

You should not underestimate the willingness of people, if they believe
that personal information is misused, to go to almost any length to
stop the practice.  The 1980 West German census is a case in point.

In West Germany, growing concern about the use of personal information
by the national government led to widespread opposition by many who
simply refused to fill out census forms.  As the government tried
stiff criminal sentences to enforce compliance, census protesters went
to jail rather than comply.  Failing to fill out the census was an act
of civil disobedience, comparable to mixed groups eating at segregated
lunch counters in the South during the 1950's.  Eventually, the
government backed down when the Constitutional Court cancelled the
decennial census because the government had failed to protect
individuals right to privacy. [5] And West Germany is not the only
example of this.

In Australia, the battle over a national identification card nearly
led to the collapse of the national government.  And in Sweden,
France, and Canada, information privacy is carefully monitored by
national boards with authority comparable to the FCC in the United
States.  Simply stated, the politics of privacy is a potential powder
keg.

So, here are my recommendations.

First, if you go forward with the caller ID service make sure that no
telephone number is disclosed without the knowledge and the consent of
the phone user, except in emergency circumstances.  If a person does
nothing, subscribes to no new service, selects no new feature, his or
her current expectation of privacy should remain unchanged.  That will
be the threshold test for evaluating the impact on privacy of this new
service.

Second, "reach out" and involve consumer advocates, privacy experts,
and your customers in the process of developing new services that
expand the usefulness and value of the phone network without
undermining traditional civil liberties interests.  There are no doubt
many new services that customers would welcome that do not raise the
privacy concerns of Caller ID.

Third, steer clear of the personal information business.  This will be
a privacy minefield and make the current debate over caller ID look
like a small border skirmish.  There are certainly enough other
possible ways to expand the use of phone networks without selling
personal information.  If customers learn that their routine phone
calls are the basis for unsolicited advertising, they will come to
mistrust the phone service.  You may also find yourself caught in the
net of efforts to regulate other industries directly involved in the
sale of personal information.

Having raised these privacy concerns, let me make one final point
about the importance of the integrity of the phone system.  The
telephone may be one of the greatest inventions for democratic
society, comparable perhaps to the printing press. It provides a ready
means of communication, at little cost, for virtually anyone in the
country.  Even with the growth of all the recent features, the phone
remains essentially the same to the banker and the bus driver.  It is
a tool of democracy and the mechanism of social discourse.

It would be unfortunate if the trust that we place in the integrity of
the phone system and our dependence were undermined by the rush to
commercialize personal information.  In the long-run, I believe, it
would be a loss for us all.

=====================================================================
     End of speech. Footnotes within the speech by Mr. Rotenberg
     are enumerated in the listing below:

1   "Privacy, Market Concerns Delay CLASS Roll-out in California," State
Telephone Regulation Report, April 1989, at 7.

2  "Automatic Number Identification,"  Privacy Journal, April 1989,  at 5.

3  "The End of Phone Number Confidentiality?," Privacy Journal, June 1989,
   at 1.

4  Network World, May 1, 1989.

5  David F. Linowes, Privacy in America 8 (1989).

=======================================================================

[Moderator's Note: My thanks to David Gast for the work involved in
transcribing/typing in this message from Mr. Rotenberg; and to Mr.
Rotenberg for his presentation. This issue of the Digest will be filed
in the TELECOM Archives under the title 'rotenberg.privacy.speech'

Rebuttals will of course be printed over the next few days. If you
wish to rebut or expand on Mr. Rotenberg's remarks, *please* keep
quoted text to a minimum, or eliminated entirely if possible. The
controversy on this topic tends to go on forever; my patience does
not. :)   PT]

------------------------------

End of TELECOM Digest Special: Telephone Privacy
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