Privacy.. Why you have something to hide

Abstract:
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.

• My response is “So do you have curtains?” or “Can I see your credit card bills for the last year?”
• So my response to the “If you have nothing to hide…” argument is simply, “I don’t need to justify my position. You need to justify yours. Come back with a warrant.”
• I don’t have anything to hide. But I don’t have anything I feel like showing you, either.
• If you have nothing to hide, then you don’t have a life.
• Show me yours and I’ll show you mine.
• If I’m not doing anything wrong, then you have no cause to watch me.
• Because the government gets to define what’s wrong, and they keep changing the definition.
• Because you might do something wrong with my information.
• Who watches the watchers?
• Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
• It’s not about having anything to hide, it’s about things not being anyone else’s business.
• Bottom line, Joe Stalin would have loved it. Why should anyone have to say more?

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