Lessons from the identity trail: anonymity, privacy and identity in a networked society

575 Pages·2009·3.35 MB·English

by  Ian Kerr

1
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lessons from the identity trail : anonymity, privacy and identity in a networked society /
Editors : Ian Kerr, Valerie Steeves, Carole Lucock.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-19-537247-2 ((hardback) : alk. paper)
1. Data protection—Law and legislation. 2. Identity. 3. Privacy, Right of. 4. Computer security—Law and
legislation. 5. Freedom of information. I. Kerr, Ian (Ian R.) II. Lucock, Carole. III. Steeves, Valerie M., 1959-
K3264.C65L47 2009
342.08’58—dc22
2008043016
_____________________________________________
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
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about this book
This book derives from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council
(SSHRC) Initiative on the New Economy. Recognizing that the increased speed
of technological development and the rapid growth of knowledge are contribut-
ing to major social, cultural, and personal change worldwide, SSHRC held a
research competition to promote collaborative, multisectoral work on these
issues. One of the research teams successful in the 2003 competition received a
four-year, $4 million grant in support of a project entitled On The Identity Trail:
Understanding the Importance and Impact of Anonymity and Authentication in a
Networked Society.
With a focus on multidisciplinary dialogue and interaction, ID Trail brought
together North American and European research talent from the academic,
public, private, and not-for-profit sectors. With more than fifty co-investigators,
collaborators, researchers, and partners, ID Trail included a distinguished array
of philosophers, ethicists, feminists, cognitive scientists, sociologists, lawyers,
cryptographers, engineers, policy analysts, government policymakers, privacy
experts, business leaders, blue chip companies, and successful start-ups.
This book, one of four full-length volumes produced by ID Trail, is the
outcome of two international workshops on privacy, identity, and anonymity.
The first workshop was held in Paris, France, in 2006 and was hosted by the
Atelier Internet, Équipe Réseaux, Savoirs, and Territoires at the École Normale,
Supérieure. The second workshop was held in Bologna, Italy, in 2007 and was
hosted by Dipartimento di Scienze Giuridiche at Università di Bologna.
Participants from both workshops exchanged ideas and manuscripts with the
aim of creating a volume that would ultimately become an organic whole greater
than the sum of its individual chapter contributions. In fulfillment of an under-
taking to SSHRC to dedicate significant resources to student training initiatives,
two competitions were held, and funding was provided to include ten students
as full workshop participants. These and numerous other highly talented ID Trail
student collaborators have made substantial contributions to this book, including
a dozen as authors or co-authors.
In addition to the collaborative feedback that authors received at the work-
shops, each chapter included in this volume was subject to an anonymous peer
review process prior to its submission to Oxford University Press.
acknowledgments
This book, like the ID Trail project itself, owes its existence to significant
funding and other equally important forms of support from the Social Sciences
and Humanities Research Council and a number of private and public sector
partners, including the Alberta Civil Liberties Association Research Centre, Bell
University Labs, the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, Canadian
Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic, Centre on Values and Ethics, the
Department of Justice, Entrust Technologies, Electronic Privacy Information
Center, IBM Canada Ltd., Management Board Secretariat Ontario, Microsoft, the
Office of the Information and Privacy Commission of Ontario, the Office of the
Privacy Commissioner of Canada, the Ontario Research Network in Electronic
Commerce, Privacy International, and the Sheldon Chumir Foundation for
Leadership in Ethics. We are thankful for the support provided and could not
have produced this volume or any of our other key research outcomes without
the help of these organizations.
As a project that has sought to mobilize key research outputs in accessible
language and across a variety of venues in order to assist policymakers and the
broader public, we have worked closely with Canada’s Federal and Provincial
Information and Privacy Commissioners. We thank them for their invaluable
time, effort, and contributions to our work and for their general interest and
support. Thanks also to Stephanie Perrin, a longtime member of Canada’s
privacy advocacy community, for her role in putting us on the map during the
early years of the project.
A number of universities and groups have collaborated with us on this book.
In particular, we would like to show appreciation to Giusella Finocchiaro and the
Università di Bologna, as well as Bert-Jaap Koops, Ronald Leenes, and members
of the Tilburg Institute for Law, Technology, and Society for wonderful and
animating discussions on the topics we all treasure so dearly. As our base of
operations, the University of Ottawa has been central to everything we have
accomplished. Special thanks are due to Gilles Morier and Daniel Lefebvre for
their superb and supererogatory efforts in helping us run the show, and to
Common Law Dean Bruce Feldthusen, for always saying, “How can I help make
it happen?” With more than a hundred undergraduate, graduate, and postgradu-
ate students working with the project over a four-year period, it is not possible to
thank each by name. There are two, however, whose extraordinary involvement
at the outset of the project made it possible for all of the others to participate.
Our heartfelt appreciation goes to Milana Homsi and Nur Muhammed-Ally for
getting the ball rolling. Similar thanks is owed to Francine Guenette, our first
project administrator, for paving the road to success. Your special efforts were
deeply valued.
xiv acknowledgments
Finding harmony among so many different voices while preserving the
distinctness of each is no small task. To Amanda Leslie, our über-talented,
lightning-quick, and highly reliable copyeditor, we feel privileged to have had the
opportunity to work with you on this project. Thanks also to our acquisitions
editor, Chris Collins, the ever-helpful Isel Pizarro, and to Jaimee Biggins and all
members of the production team at Oxford University Press who have helped
improve the quality of this book. We are also grateful to thirty or so anonymous
reviewers for their effort and good judgment, upon which we greatly relied.
Finally, our deepest and everlasting gratitude is owed to Julia Ladouceur, our
project administrator, whose playful smile and gentle manner belie her stunning
ability to do just about anything. Always with kindness, always with generosity,
and always with a bedazzling perfection that somehow renders invisible any
remnant or recollection of the fact that the world was never that way on its own.
contributors
carlisle adams
Carlisle Adams is a Full Professor in the School of Information Technology and
Engineering (SITE) at the University of Ottawa. In both his private sector and his
academic work, he has focused on the standardization of cryptology and security
technologies for the Internet, and his technical contributions include encryption
algorithms, security authentication protocols, and a comprehensive architecture
and policy language for access control in electronic environments. He can be
reached at [email protected].
jane bailey
Jane Bailey is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa.
Her ongoing research focuses on the impact of evolving technology on signifi-
cant public commitments to equality rights, freedom of expression, and multi-
culturalism, as well as the societal and cultural impact of the Internet and
emerging forms of private technological control, particularly in relation to mem-
bers of socially disadvantaged communities. She can be reached at jane.bailey@
uottawa.ca.
jennifer barrigar
A doctoral candidate in the Law and Technology Program at the University of
Ottawa, Faculty of Law, Jennifer Barrigar previously worked as legal counsel at
the Office of the Privacy Commissioner in Canada. Her current privacy research
builds on her interest in the creation, performance, and regulation of identities
in online environments, focusing on the creation of the exclusively online “self”
and its implications for privacy law and identity management technologies. She
can be reached at [email protected].
katie black
Katie Black is an LLB Candidate at the University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law. Her
interest in privacy rights has led her to conduct research on the human rights
implications of Canada’s no-fly list, the effects of battered women’s support pro-
grams on personal identity, soft paternalism and soft surveillance in consent-
gathering processes, and the impact of opening up adoption records on women’s
reproductive autonomy. She can be reached at [email protected].
jacquelyn burkell
Jacquelyn Burkell is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Information and
Media Studies, University of Western Ontario. Trained in psychology, she conducts
xvi contributors
empirical research on the interaction between people and technology, with a
particular emphasis on the role of cognition in such interactions. Much of her
work focuses on anonymity in online communication, examining how the
pseudonymity offered by online communication is experienced by online com-
municators and how this experience changes communication behavior and
interpretation. She can be reached at [email protected].
alex cameron
Alex Cameron is a doctoral candidate in the Law and Technology Program at the
University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law. He was previously an associate at the law
firm of Fasken Martineau Dumoulin LLP. His current studies focus on privacy
and copyright with a focus on the interplay between privacy and digital rights
management. He can be reached at [email protected].
robert carey
Robert Carey is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Faculty of Information and Media
Studies, the University of Western Ontario. His research at the Faculty concen-
trates on four different strands of anonymity-related research: conceptual and
behavioral models of anonymity on the Internet; behavioral effects of anonymity
in computer-mediated communication; the conceptualization of anonymity; and
mass media’s configuration of anonymity and information technology. He can
be reached at [email protected].
jennifer chandler
Jennifer Chandler is an Associate Professor at the University of Ottawa, Faculty
of Law. She focuses on law, science, and technology, particularly the social and
environmental effects of emerging technologies and the interaction of emerging
technologies with law and regulation. She has written extensively in the areas of
cybersecurity and cybertorts. She can be reached at [email protected].
jeremy clark
Jeremy Clark is a doctoral candidate with the Centre for Applied Cryptographic
Research (CACR) and the Cryptography, Security, and Privacy (CrySP) Group at
the University of Waterloo. His research focuses on cryptographic voting, as well
as privacy enhancing technologies, applied cryptography, the economics of infor-
mation security, and usable security and privacy. He can be reached at j5clark@
cs.uwaterloo.ca.
steven davis
Steven Davis is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Simon Fraser University
and the former Director of the Centre on Values and Ethics at Carleton University.
He researches philosophy of language and philosophy of mind, and his recent
research has focused on privacy, identifying, and identification. He can be
reached at [email protected].
contributors xvii
jane doe
Jane Doe successfully sued the Toronto Police Force for negligence and discrimi-
nation in the investigation of her rape, a case that set legal precedent and is taught
in law schools across Canada. Jane Doe is an author (The Story of Jane Doe,
Random House), teacher, and community organizer. She is currently completing
research on the use and efficacy of the Sexual Assault Evidence Kit (SEAK) and
police practices of “warning” women regarding stranger and serial rapists.
giusella finocchiaro
Giusella Finocchiaro is Professor of Internet Law and Private Law at the University
of Bologna. She specializes in Internet law both at her own Finocchiaro law
firm and as a consultant for other law firms. She also acts as a consultant for the
European Union on Internet law issues. She can be reached at giusella.finocchiaro
@unibo.it.
a. michael froomkin
A. Michael Froomkin is Professor of Law at the University of Miami, Faculty of
Law. He is on the advisory boards of several organizations including the
Electronic Freedom Foundation and BNA Electronic Information Policy and
Law Report, is a member of the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London,
and writes the well-known discourse.net blog. His research interests include
Internet governance, privacy, and electronic democracy. He can be reached at
[email protected].
philippe gauvin
Philippe Gauvin completed his Master’s Degree in Law and Technology at the
University of Ottawa and is currently working as counsel, regulatory affairs, for
Bell Canada. His work consists of ensuring the company’s regulatory compliance
with privacy, copyright, telecommunications, and broadcasting laws. He can be
reached at [email protected].
daphne gilbert
Daphne Gilbert is an Associate Professor at the University of Ottawa, Faculty of
Law. Her privacy research focuses on the constitutionalized protection of online
expression and privacy, and she has an interest in the ethics of compelling
cooperation between private organizations and law enforcement and in the
expectations of user privacy online. She can be reached at [email protected].
marsha hanen
Marsha Hanen is a former president of the University of Winnipeg and an
Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the University of Victoria. She was the presi-
dent of the Sheldon Chumir Foundation for Ethics in Leadership from 1999 to
2006. Throughout her career, she has had a broad and deep interest in ethics,
philosophy of science, and philosophy of law. Recently she has published on
xviii contributors
patient privacy and anonymity in medical contexts. She can be reached at
[email protected].
daniel c. howe
Daniel C. Howe is a digital artist and researcher at NYU’s Media Research Lab
where he is completing his PhD thesis on generative literary systems. His pri-
vacy research has led to TrackMeNot, an artware intervention addressing data
profiling on the Internet, which he has worked on with Helen Nissenbaum.
He can be reached at [email protected].
ian kerr
Ian Kerr holds the Canada Research Chair in Ethics, Law, and Technology at the
University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law with cross-appointments to the Faculty of
Medicine, the Department of Philosophy, and the School of Information Studies.
He is also the principal investigator of the ID Trail project. Among other things,
he is interested in human-machine mergers and the manner in which new and
emerging technologies alter our perceptions, conceptions, and expectations of
privacy. He can be reached at [email protected].
bert-jaap koops
Bert-Jaap Koops is Professor of Regulation and Technology and the former
academic director of the Tilburg Institute for Law, Technology, and Society
(TILT) at Tilburg University. His privacy research primarily focuses on
cryptography, identity-related crime, and DNA forensics. He can be reached at
[email protected].
philippa lawson
Philippa Lawson is the former Director of the Canadian Internet Policy and
Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC), based at the University of Ottawa. Through her
research and advocacy work, she has represented consumer interests in privacy
issues before policy and law-making bodies. She can be reached at lawson.
[email protected].
ronald leenes
Ronald Leenes is an Associate Professor at the Tilburg Institute for Law,
Technology, and Society (TILT) at Tilburg University. His primary research
interests are privacy and identity management, and regulation of, and by, tech-
nology. He is also involved in research in ID fraud, biometrics, and online
dispute resolution. He can be reached at [email protected].
ian lloyd
Ian Lloyd is Professor of Information Technology Law at the University of
Strathclyde Law School. He has researched and written extensively on data
contributors xix
protection and has recently worked on the Data Protection Programme (DAPRO),
funded by the European Union. He can be reached at [email protected].
carole lucock
Carole Lucock is a doctoral candidate in the Law and Technology Program at the
University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law, and is project manager of the ID Trail. Her
research interests include the intersection of privacy, anonymity, and identity,
and the potential distinctions between imposed versus assumed anonymity. She
can be reached at [email protected].
shoshana magnet
Shoshana Magnet is a Postdoctoral Fellow at McGill University. She has been
appointed as an Assistant Professor at the Institute of Women’s Studies at the
University of Ottawa, commencing in 2009. Her privacy research includes
biometrics, borders, and the relationship between privacy and equality. She can
be reached at [email protected].
gary t. marx
Gary T. Marx is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at MIT and recently held the
position of Hixon-Riggs Professor of Science, Technology, and Society at Harvey
Mudd College, Claremont, California. He has written extensively about surveil-
lance, and his current research focuses on new forms of surveillance and social
control across borders. He can be reached at [email protected].
david matheson
David Matheson is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at
Carleton University. Through his privacy-related research, he has written about
privacy and knowableness, anonymity and responsible testimony, layperson
authentication of contested experts, privacy and personal security, the nature of
personal information, and the importance of privacy for friendship. He can be
reached at [email protected].
jena mcgill
Jena McGill holds an LLB from the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law and an
MA from the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs, Carleton
University, Ottawa, Canada. She is currently clerking at the Supreme Court of
Canada. She has a strong interest in equality and privacy rights, particularly as
they relate to gender issues on a national and international scale. She can be
reached at [email protected].
jason millar
Jason Millar is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Philosophy at Queens
University. He is interested in the intersection of ethics, philosophy of technology,