Why Privacy Matters

Product Description
A much-needed corrective on what privacy is, why it matters, and how we can protect in an age when so many believe that the concept is dead.\nEverywhere we look, companies and governments are spying on us--seeking information about us and everyone we know. Ad networks monitor our web-surfing to send us "more relevant" ads. The NSA screens our communications for signs of radicalism. Schools track students' emails to stop school shootings.
Cameras guard every street corner and traffic light, and drones fly in our skies. Databases of human information are assembled for purposes of "training" artificial intelligence programs designed to predict everything from traffic patterns to the location of undocumented migrants. We're even
tracking ourselves, using personal electronics like Apple watches, Fitbits, and other gadgets that have made the "quantified self" a realistic possibility. As Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg once put it, "the Age of Privacy is over." But Zuckerberg and others who say "privacy is dead" are wrong. In
Why\nPrivacy Matters, Neil Richards explains that privacy isn't dead, but rather up for grabs.\nRichards shows how the fight for privacy is a fight for power that will determine what our future will look like, and whether it will remain fair and free. If we want to build a digital society that is consistent with our hard-won commitments to political freedom, individuality, and human
flourishing, then we must make a meaningful commitment to privacy. Privacy matters because good privacy rules can promote the essential human values of identity, power, freedom, and trust. If we want to preserve our commitments to these precious yet fragile values, we will need privacy rules.
Richards explains why privacy remains so important and offers strategies that can help us protect it from the forces that are working to undermine it. Pithy and forceful, this is essential reading for anyone interested in a topic that sits at the center of so many current problems.\nAmazon.com Review
Have you reluctantly decided that privacy is dead and sharing your digital information with unknown hordes is the toll to pay for modern life? Neil Richards’
Why Privacy Matters explains how the constant chorus of “privacy is dead” is crooned most often by those who will profit from this demise, and how we can push back against this insidious song. With dry wit and compelling examples, Richards shows that we can retake control of our privacy, strengthening our personal freedoms and putting power back into our own hands.
—Adrian Liang, Amazon Books
Review
"Neil Richards argues powerfully and eloquently about the importance of privacy in our lives and society. Insightful and nuanced, but also very accessible and clear,
Why Privacy Matters is essential reading for anyone concerned about individual identity and freedom in a world where digital
technologies are spinning out of control." -- Daniel J. Solove, Professor of Law, George Washington University Law School, and author of
Understanding Privacy\n"
Why Privacy Matters is a terrific synthesis of the literature on privacy and surveillance. It is also an insightful contribution to our understanding of those profoundly important areas of life. Every page provides provocative grist for discussion. Richards's conception of 'the situated consumer'
is especially valuable for helping scholars, policymakers, and citizens to think about the data-collection thicket that marks our twenty-first century." -- Joseph Turow, Robert Lewis Shayon Professor of Media Systems and Industries, University of Pennsylvania, and author of
The Voice Catchers: How\nMarketers Listen in to Exploit Your Feelings, Your Privacy, and Your Wallet\n"Privacy is not dead: it's the only power we have in an accelerating information society. Neil Richards offers us not just a clear-sighted defense of privacy but also a wise and humane set of guidelines for protecting it. Have the 'Privacy Conversa