In these days, we see a worldwide consensus about the values of personal information protection and the fundamental principles of information processing. The informational privacy is an essential value of democratic society. The fundamental principles...
In these days, we see a worldwide consensus about the values of personal information protection and the fundamental principles of information processing. The informational privacy is an essential value of democratic society. The fundamental principles of information processing are included in the OECD Guidelines (1980), the Convention No 108 of Council of Europe (1980), the UN Guidelines (1990), and the EU Directive 95/46/EC (1995).
There are, however, three models of implementing the fundamental principles of information protection: rights-dominated, market-dominated, and technology-dominated model. These models come from three distinct perspectives: political, economic, and technological. In Europe, informational privacy is an inherently political right and is guaranteed by comprehensive legal mechanisms. By contrast, in the United States, information protection is left basically to the marketplace and the desire to have market-based protections for consumers. Across these two policy models, technological rules and defaults define information practices for network interactions.
Respectively each of the three models has inherent deficiencies that circumscribe effective protection of personal information. The technical approach, standing alone, does not assure the fair information practices. The U.S. approach leaves aside important aspects of information privacy such as non-market democratic values, while the European comprehensive legislative model faces significant specific problems.
The legal, technological and market models are, in fact, interdependent as tools for effective information protection. The three models need to be channeled in the same direction so that the approaches support each other rather than frustrate each other.